By Forest Rain
Why do horrible things happen to
good people?
Some things are so horrific that
they can only be called evil. The Holocaust. The Hamas Massacre of October 7th,
the new Holocaust. There aren’t enough words to convey the full extent of the
horror. Words like “atrocity” are just too small and the question arises: where
was God when these unspeakable events occurred?
Many people mistakenly assume that
the trail of God by Jews in Auschwitz is an allegory rather than an actual
event.
Elie Wiesel once declared: "I was there when God was
put on trial. It happened at night; there were just three people. At the end of
the trial, they used the word chayav, rather than ‘guilty'. It means ‘He owes
us something'. Then we went to pray."
Then we went to pray.
Fast forward to the Holocaust of
October 7th. Head of the Southern district of ZAKA, Yossi Landau, described
their own “trial”, in the devastated Kibbutz Be’eri.
ZAKA, Israel’s "Disaster Victim Identification" experts
are volunteers who collect bodies in cases from car accidents to terror
attacks. They are motivated by the belief that the dead deserve sacred respect.
Burying them whole and with dignity honors the soul of the departed and
recognizes the sacred spark of God that gives life to every human being.
The massacre occurred under the cover of a missile bombardment
from Gaza. The search for survivors and the collection of bodies began before
the massacre was over, while soldiers were still fighting the terrorists, while
missiles were raining down on Israeli communities.
In one of the homes Yossi Landau, described an unfathomable scene.
The family’s dining table was in the middle of the room. On one
side of the room, they found the bodies of a father and the mother. They were
kneeling on the floor, their hands tied behind their backs. On the other side,
as if in a mirror image, a little girl and boy approximately six and seven
years old.
The father had an eye gouged out.
The mother had one of her breasts cut off. The boy had several of his fingers
chopped off. The little girl, they chopped off her foot.
And after all that the terrorists
sat at the table and ate the food the family had prepared for their holiday
meal.
Yossi Landau explains that he feels
as if the bodies speak to him, telling the story of their death. Although
highly experienced in dealing with death but the joyous cruelty evident in this
scene was overwhelming to him and his team.
The horror of what this family
experienced was so evil, it was like a wall that could not be passed and yet,
it needed to be passed in order to grant these souls the dignity of a proper
burial.
Yossi Landau described this scene
in many interviews. Only in a few did he describe how
they dealt with this horror.
He collected himself and told his
team to hold hands. They walked into the room. There was blood everywhere. They
sat down in the middle, with the bodies and the table with the remains of the
meal and they sang a Jewish song:
“I believe
With complete faith
In the coming of the Messiah.
And even though he may tarry,
With all this, I will still wait for him.
I will wait for him every day
May he come.”
And then they got up and began attending to the bodies.
This was just one of the first houses, there were many more to
check and no way to know what they would find there.
Where was God amidst this evil?
In Judaism there is a concept of God “hiding His face”, as if
stepping out of the story. That doesn’t mean that God is gone or stops caring,
it means that we can’t feel the connection to Him. It is perhaps like a parent
who steps out of the room to see how the children work out their problems by
themselves.
The Jews in Auschwitz judged God and found him “owing” – and then
they went to pray.
The Jews in Be’eri sat down in the blood of our tortured family – and sang
their faith in the coming of the Messiah.
This is the unfathomable faith of the Jewish People in the face of
horror. It is the strength of a People broken, yet still standing – the
mysterious factor that leads to deep confusion about Jews.
Who are these people, victimized yet refusing to be victims?
Many conclude that the evil we face must not be so bad – because
who could get up again after that?!
Broken yet still standing. God, not guilty but “owing”. We are
still here and even in the midst of the blood of our tortured family members,
can sing of faith in the coming of the Messiah – not here but with hope for a
better future.
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