A Mirror, a Mourning, and a Mission
This week's Torah portion, Behar–Bechukotai, reminds us what it means to build a society centered on human dignity, justice, and sacred relationship. The shocking murder of two Israeli embassy workers, Yaron Lischinsky and Sarah Milgrim, underscores what happens when hatred replaces our commitment to one another’s humanity.
In Behar, we are told:
"Do not wrong one another, but fear your God, for I am the Eternal your God."
— Leviticus 25:17
This commandment appears amidst laws about land, debt, and liberation—reminding us that economics, politics, and power must be guided by compassion. The lives of the two young diplomats were cut short by violence fueled by the toxic mix of ideology and rhetoric that strips people of their humanity. This violence is the product of a world in which people are flattened into symbols, where political grievance is channeled into bloodshed, and where the sacredness of human life is too often ignored or denied. Every life is sacred. When people become targets rather than neighbors, when anger is weaponized instead of healed, this is the result.
The Torah’s vision, especially through shmita (the sabbatical year) and yovel (the jubilee), is a radical call to recenter society around justice, care, and the sacred worth of every soul. The land rests. Debts are forgiven. People go free. Why? Because the system must never be more important than the people within it.
Bechukotai then warns of the consequences when we stray from these values. Not as punishment, but as a reflection of what happens when we no longer see each other as reflections of the Divine.
This tragedy, this deep wound, lays bare some unbearable truths:
Systems that devalue human life are not just unjust; they are fragile, unsustainable, and ultimately self-destructive.
Political rage that ignites violence is a profound desecration, a betrayal of all that we hold holy.
Our collective healing and future must be built on the foundations of liberation and restoration, not the bitter, cyclical poison of vengeance.
Let this week’s Torah portion be a mirror, a mourning, and a mission.
May Yaron and Sarah’s memories be a blessing. May we honor them—and also acknowledge the countless civilians in Gaza, by building a society rooted in humanity, compassion, and justice.
We cannot separate this violence from the rhetoric and policies here in the United States that have normalized dehumanization. When public discourse reduces people to categories—enemy, threat, other—it lays the groundwork for violence both at home and abroad. The same forces that inspire hate crimes in our cities also fuel the machinery of war and indifference across the world.
We cannot mourn Yaron and Sarah without also holding space for the lives lost in Gaza—the children, the elders, the families whose lives have been shattered. We cannot look away from the devastating human cost of war. Children pulled from rubble, families torn apart, dreams shattered before they even had a chance to bloom. And now, hunger and starvation are taking root. Parents are unable to feed their children. Aid is blocked, and desperation is growing. The Torah commands us to hear the cries of the oppressed, to see each life as sacred, and to pursue peace with everything we have. Our hearts break for every parent who has buried a child, for every person who has lost their home, and for every unanswered prayer for safety.
If we truly believe in the holiness of all people, we must hold that truth even when it’s uncomfortable. Even when it asks more of us. Our grief must not be limited by borders. Compassion is not a zero-sum game.
May our mourning move us toward action—for an end to this war, for aid, for dignity. May we never lose our capacity to be heartbroken by the suffering of others. And may we hold both grief and hope as we imagine a different future.
Right on point. Thank you, Sandra, & Shabbat Shalom.
Yes!