United in Grief

Just a few weeks ago, we joined together to make challah with elders on both of our campuses.  Many had never made challah before and we walked through both the ritual and the process.  But, before we did that, we talked about why we were united in making challah, why we were joining people all over the world to do the same on this day.  We talked about the “Week of Goodness” that was organized by the parents of Hersh Goldberg-Polin, in an effort to send our prayers and our energy to those still being held hostage since October 7.  We talked about Hersh at each of these events and we dedicated our efforts to specific hostages, whose stories we shared with those assembled.

Today we gathered again. Today we, once again, hoped that our collective energy would go beyond our walls and help support others.  But today, our energy was focused on comfort in the face of immeasurable loss.

Hersh’s parents, Rachel and Jon, have become familiar faces to all of us.  We’ve seen the tape strips on their shirts, relentlessly tracking the 330 days of their son’s captivity.  We watched as their faces showed the signs of this ongoing strain, as they each became more drawn, more exhausted, weighed down by fear and pain and not knowing.

As a parent, whenever my child faced an illness or an injury or a tough situation, I wished it could be me.  I feel it still, although they are now all adults.  “Better it should be me,” I thought.  “I would rather my child not have to struggle or suffer.  Why them and why not me?” I think most parents feel this way, that their first priority is that their child be safe and healthy and happy, that we would willingly “take it,” whatever “it” is, in order to spare our child.

I would imagine that Rachel and Jon have often thought “why Hersh and not me?”  But I cannot begin to imagine what else they have thought, what torment they have lived through for those 330 days.  To have no answers, to have only the scenarios that your mind creates, to wonder every day if your child is alive, if he is in pain, if he is afraid, is impossible to comprehend.

At Hersh’s funeral, Rachel said that she hadn’t been able to breathe for all of these days.  And that now, knowing that her son was gone, she could breathe again. Her worry is now, tragically, just grief. And many of us, around the world, feel deep sadness as well.  We grieve for the innocent lives lost, for the terrible impact that senseless acts of terror and brutality have wrought.  We grieve for the families who have lost loved ones, for those whose lives have been forever shattered and we pray for strength and peace.