What Would Rabbi Sacks Think About Manchester?

The senseless attack against Jewish Mancunians on Yom Kippur, the holiest day of the Jewish calendar, left Jews around the world heartbroken. 

Again, a community familiar with such horror, finds its resilience being tested.

The horror in Manchester felt personal. Though I now live far from Northern England, I was born just an hour away in Liverpool, a city that has long shared rivalry with Manchester. Beneath the friendly competition about football and music, I’ve been told of a deep camaraderie among the Jewish communities that has endured for generations.

While my father spent a few years as a Jewish professional in Northern England, he had the honor of meeting Rabbi Lord Jonathan Sacks z”l. He still recalls it vividly: the moment he met someone who seemed to understand the moral architecture of the world. I came to read Rabbi Sacks later in life but to this day, I look towards his teachings to understand life, society, and and purpose that gives life direction.

After the Manchester Arena bombing at an Ariana Grande concert in 2017, the largest terror attack in Britain in recent memory, Rabbi Sacks offered thoughts which encapsulated moral clarity and compassion: “Last night in Manchester we saw the worst and best of humanity… Terrorists seek to strike fear into our world and divide us. But they underestimate our strength.”

Rabbi Sacks had an uncanny ability to clearly name that which is evil, and its underlying forces, while never surrendering to hopelessness. His chochmah emanated from Torah but was for the whole world to absorb. 

The need for his wisdom is even more palpable in these moments. Hours after the attack on the Heaton Park Shul, calls from protests were rife with exclamations like ‘I don’t give a f*** about the Jewish community right now’. These types of statements reflect the state of moral disarray  in the social fabric of Britain and throughout western democracies, political structures which Rabbi Sacks spent his whole life defending.

Over the past few years, his influence has grown, and a heed for his clarity is glaring posthumously. As the Jewish Telegraphic Agency recently reported, his writings are more frequently being translated to Hebrew, and being widely read across both secular and religious audiences.

During Sukkot there is more of an urgency for his teachings now than ever. Rabbi Sacks would describe the sukkah as a metaphor for society: fragile, interdependent, and sustained only by mutual care. He wrote, “If we knew the future, we could act with certainty. But to be human is to live with uncertainty and yet still have the courage and the wisdom to decide.” The courage, along with trust, he references is the fiber and backbone of the social contract, which is ever more frayed in this age of polarization. Sukkot calls us to a posture which seems to have been lost – to welcome visitors, open our tent like Abraham, and embrace vulnerability.

What Britain needs is not more statements of tolerance, but a renewal of moral leadership – political, civic, and religious leaders who uphold and defend Jewish safety as a prerequisite of the nation’s moral health. 

As we approach the five-year anniversary of Rabbi Sacks’s passing, we cling to the moral voice and perspective he offered, one that helped Jews see beyond fear. Always rooted in faith but open to the world, he continues to shed light on the difficult and fluctuating questions about belonging and belief. In moments like these, I believe he would remind us that Judaism is not a religion of withdrawal but of engagement, a covenantal faith that insists society can be redeemed.

The wounds from this Yom Kippur are still fresh among those in Manchester and the Jewish world. Yet, the covenant of Rabbi Sacks reminds us that mourning and moral renewal are not separate. When faith is tested, we are immediately called to turn grief into grace, and fear into responsibility.

If we do, even in the darkest times, we can still be the light that guides the way forward.