ANALYSIS
Just a few hours ago, terrorists attacked a bus in Jerusalem, killing six people and injuring many more.
I am, of course, grieving along with all citizens of Israel, and with all people throughout the world who sanctify life.
But I’m also thinking about something else. In about ten days, the Jewish People will be celebrating the very important holiday of Rosh Hashanah. If there is one theme for the holiday of Rosh Hashanah—even one word—that theme and that word is “life.” On Rosh Hashanah, we beg God to grant us life in the coming year.
But we are not just asking for physical life—to live and not to die. Let me quote you a short prayer that we recite three times a day, beginning of Rosh Hashanah, going for ten days, all the way to the fast of Yom Kippur:
“Remember us unto life, O King who desires life. Inscribe us in the Book of Life, for You, God, life.”
Not only is “life” mentioned four times in this short prayer, but pay attention to what KIND of life we are asking for: “for you, God, life.” We are not asking merely to live another year—of course, we want that. We are asking that we be inspired to live a life for God—a life of moral courage, a life of good deeds, a life of caring, a life with deep meaning.
And then I think of this morning’s attack. It was perpetrated by people who want the exact opposite of what we are about to ask God for during this special time of the Jewish year. They want death—not just the physical death of Israelis and Jewish people. But the death of morality, the death of good deeds, the death of caring, the death of life with meaning.
Life, and a life for God, is the very DNA of the Jewish people—an ideal about which we can never compromise and never reject.
At the Fellowship that I lead, we give life every day—to the poor, to the ill, to the lonely. We give life to the State of Israel as we provide security equipment to our communities. We give spiritual life to the immigrants we bring from countries around the world to help them fulfill their dreams of living in the Holy Land.
We do this because it’s right, and we do this—with the very generous help of our hundreds of thousands of Christian supporters around the world—because it is what God wants.
“For you, God, life.”
Yael Eckstein is President and Global CEO of The International Fellowship of Christians and Jews, one of the world’s largest religious charitable organizations. The Jaffa Institute’s 2024 Woman of the Year and The Jerusalem Post’s 2023 Humanitarian of the Year, Yael is a Chicago-area native based in Israel with her husband and their four children.
