Don’t just mourn – love

Suffering is part of life. It is also a central theme of the Jewish faith. In fact, every summer, Jews commemorate two fateful days in our history by abstaining from food and drink. On the 17th of Tammuz we remember several tragic events, such as the siege of Jerusalem by the Babylonians. And on the 9th of Av we mourn the destruction of the Temple in Jerusalem.

But suffering and fear are not just aspects of Jewish history. They also shape Jewish life today. This summer, as we fast and remember the disasters of the past, our hearts and minds will be focused on the hardships of the here and now – especially the atrocities of October 7.

But how should Jews answer to pain and suffering? Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel had an answer.

Heschel urged us to first recognize that “trials” and “pain” are part of the “totality of life.” But acceptance of such a reality should not lead to “complacency” or “fatalistic resignation.” Instead, Heschel advised us to be “very sensitive” to “adversities and evils in (our own lives) and those of others.” In other words, simply recognizing that suffering is an inevitable aspect of the human experience should not lead to apathy.

Ultimately, Heschel advocated a particular response to “misfortune and evil.” He thought we should “go beyond grief.” In fact, it seemed to Heschel like a “kind of arrogance” to respond to misfortune with “grief.”

Heschel advocated a specific response to “misfortune and evil.” He believed we should “grow beyond grief.”

Why? Well, Heschel reminded us that “we never know the final meaning of things, and therefore a sharp distinction between what we judge to be good or bad in experience is unfair.” In other words, we should practice a certain epistemological humility. We are not omniscient. We do not know – and cannot know – why suffering occurs. Only God has this knowledge. When we respond to tragedy with grief, it means we understand what is beyond our reach.

At first glance, Heschel’s position sounds harsh. Should we really not mourn when faced with murder and destruction?

But Heschel was not an advocate of apathy. In fact, he believed that humanity could respond more strongly to tragedy. He urged us to use a more powerful weapon against suffering: love. He put it bluntly: “Love is greater than grief.”

If we understand Suffering can make us apathetic. Don’t we often try so bravely to fight death, disease and poverty because we find them so incomprehensible, so undeserved and so meaningless? It is the impossibility of understanding that motivates our resistance.

Remember what happened when Moses spoke to God at the burning bush. Desperate to understand why the Jewish people were in bondage, he asked God, “Why have you brought disaster on this people?”

And how did God respond? He did not explain to Moses why the Jewish people were enslaved. In fact, he never gave Moses a reason. But that does not mean that God did not care about the plight of the Jewish people. Of course he did. As Rabbi Jonathan Sacks wrote of this exchange, “God does not want people to be poor, hungry, sick, oppressed, uneducated, disenfranchised, or mistreated.” But instead of giving Moses an explanation, he took him into his cause: He sent Moses to free the Jewish people from slavery.

That is how we should all respond to suffering.

We don’t have to understand suffering. We have to fight it. As Rabbi Sacks wrote: “When it comes to the poverty and pain of the world, our Religion of protestnot acceptance.” Judaism calls us to respond to suffering with sacrifice. It demands that we respond to misfortune with charity. It teaches us to fight pain with prayer. In short, we are to love – not just mourn.

Heschel stood for just that. And he practiced what he preached. When Heschel witnessed racial injustice in the United States, he didn’t just mourn. He linked arms with Martin Luther King Jr. as they marched in Selma. Heschel didn’t just complain – he loved.

We should do the same. As Jews fast this summer, we should reflect on the tragedies of the past and the ongoing trials of the present. But reflection must not turn into resignation. We must “rise above grief.” And like Moses and Heschel, we must choose love.

Elias Neibart is a student at Harvard Law School and was previously a Krauthammer Fellow at the Tikvah Fund.