Posted on February 21, 2025 by Rabbi David Katz
This week was heart-wrenching for Israel and for Jews around the world. The bodies of four hostages were returned to Israel. Three have been identified: Oded Lifshitz, 84, and Ariel and Kfir Bibas, ages 4, and nine months, at the time of their capture with their mother Shiri.
Read the words of Bernard-Henri Levy published in yesterday’s “Wall Street Journal.” In stark and powerful language he wonders what the moment of capture and death might have been like for Shiri and her children:
…. One must imagine the life of Kfir and Ariel as hostages if, as is probable, they were torn from their mother’s arms. Imagine the life of a baby who spends most of his time in dark, damp tunnels. Imagine the life of a toddler, ripped from his family without understanding. Picture them playing, because children always play. Did they have stuffed animals or spent shell casings? Legos or guns to lick instead of honey-coated letters? Were they hungry? Thirsty? Did they scrape mud with their tiny nails or drink contaminated water? Did the captors change Kfir’s diapers, or did they let him sit in his own filth until his skin burned? Did they have talcum powder? Medicine for fevers? What did the masked jailers do when the boys cried, were scared of night noises, or asked the stars about their fate when they were briefly allowed outside? Did they hit them? Strike them with rifle butts? Did they amuse themselves by firing their Kalashnikovs into the air to frighten them further? Did Ariel become the guardian of his baby brother? Did they live out their brief lives together or separately? When Kfir spoke his first words, did they mock him, silence him, or pour the captors’ language into his mouth to erase his mother’s? I don’t know.
Now let’s read Leviticus 22:28: “And whether it be cow or ewe, ye shall not kill it and its young both in one day.”
Maimonides explains the verse in his Guide for the Perplexed:
It is… prohibited to kill an animal with its young on the same day (Lev. 22:28), in order that people should be restrained and prevented from killing the two together in such a manner that the young is slain in the sight of the mother; for the pain of the animals under such circumstances is very great. There is no difference in this case between the pain of man and the pain of other living beings, since the love and tenderness of the mother for her young ones is not produced by reasoning, but by imagination, and this faculty exists not only in man but in most living beings. (Guide for the Perplexed, Part 3 48:10)
This week the world witnessed a unique viciousness. We can only imagine what it must have been like for Shiri and her children.
We pray for souls of the victims. We pray for their families. We pray for the whole household of Israel.
L’shalom,
Rabbi David Katz
