JERUSALEM (RNS)– Like lots of spiritual Israeli Jews, Rabbi Reb Mimi Feigelson has actually been battling with her anticipations about God and suffering given that Oct. 7, 2023, when Palestinian terrorists penetrated Israel and massacred more Jews in a single day than at any time considering that the Holocaust.
“I’ve been having a hard time theologically from the very first minute,” stated Feigelson, a spiritual coach and senior speaker in Hassidic idea and death research studies at the Schechter Institutes in Jerusalem. “I believe the most instant method to take a look at it is, how can I cope with God after what taken place? Without God, I can’t live with what occurred.”
Feigelson stated Hamas’ ruthlessness throughout the yearlong war, which started on the generally jubilant vacation of Simchat Torah, has actually shaken her belief that Jews would never ever once again experience such cruelty and inhumanity.
“I constantly thought of God sitting shiva for the 6 million Jews who died in the Holocaust and getting up from shiva,” the duration of Jewish grieving “when the last survivor left this world. The early morning after Simchat Torah– I state Simchat Torah and not Oct. 7 since it keeps God in the formula– I stated, God, in my life time, you are not going to get up from sitting shiva.”
In a world “that is bleeding, where God’s kids are bleeding,” Feigelson stated, “among my larger obstacles is to keep my heart open in empathy. We are all God’s kids.”
Rabbi Meesh Hammer-Kossoy. (Courtesy picture)
Like Feigelson, Rabbi Meesh Hammer-Kossoy, head of the Beit Midrash at the Pardes Institute of Jewish Studies in Jerusalem, stated she does not wish to lose touch with her humankind, in spite of the atrocities dedicated by Hamas and other fear groups, which were felt in her own circles. Her child remained in the exact same high school class as 3 of the boys killed by Hamas over the previous year, consisting of an American Israeli hijacked by Hamas, Hersh Goldberg-Polin. Hersh’s mom, Rachel Goldberg, was operating at Pardes when Hamas abducted Hersh and 250 others.
Hammer-Kossoy’s child was phoned to IDF reserve responsibility on Oct. 7. “When my child was a soldier in Gaza, he was trying to find Hersh. At the very same time, he was attempting to keep his mankind and his extensive regard for human life, even when coming across the opponent. That has actually been the extensive difficulty, for everybody.”
Rabbi Donniel Hartman, president of the Shalom Hartman Institute in Jerusalem, thinks that, for numerous Israelis, Hamas’ attack has actually developed a higher obstacle to Zionist ideology than it did to Jewish faith.
“The Jewish individuals are well trained in handling our doctrinal truth,” Hartman stated. “Bad things occur to great individuals throughout Jewish history. We provide God a hand down that. Either we take a look at Job’s suffering, state God’s methods are concealed, or by thanking God for what we have and leaving the rest aside.”
In the view of Hartman and others,