Let There be Light – A Response to the Mumbai Massacre

The funerals are over and the bodies are buried, but I’m still shaken by the Mumbai Massacre. So many innocents lives have been so violently snuffed out, so many families were so senselessly destroyed.

While the number of people murdered hovers the 200 mark, numbers essentially belie the true catastrophe; they tend to coalesce the crime and blur the dreadfulness of the calamity. Each victim is in reality an entire world. Each is a loss that shattered the hearts of many.

On one hand I find myself in the company of billions of civilized members of the human race whose heart aches for fellow humans who were violently massacred and wounded in a far off land. On the other hand, as a Jew, this catastrophe is for me far more personal. Leibish Teitelbaum, Yocheved Orpaz, Bentzion Chroman, Norma Shvarzblat Rabinovich are my Jewish brothers and sisters. Rabbi and Mrs. Holtzberg, the Chabad team who settled in Mumbai to create a Jewish oasis for locals and tourists, are my own, colloquially speaking, flesh and blood.

Gavriel and Rivka were dedicated to inspire and impact the lives of fellow human beings. The world was moved by the story of these young people who devoted their lives to selfless acts of kindness. The loss of so many innocent lives, the hundreds of wounded, the scores of newly orphaned and widowed, the enormous amount of devastation was only compounded and accentuated by the blazing contrast between the perverted, evil ideology of the terrorists and their pure and gentle victims personified by the Holzbergs.

Like every totalitarian movement that came before, hatred of liberty and Jews (somehow these always seem to go together) is the foundation of contemporary Jihadism. Adherents to the Jihadist ideology share the presumption that the modern world is incompatible with traditional religion. To them reason, individual liberty, democracy and pluralism are lethal toxins, antithetical to G-d and religion. And so, the brittle fanatic minds that masterminded the Mumbai massacre may not have been too inept to have recognized the significance of at least one of their prime targets.

The principles that governed the besieged Chabad Center in Mumbai, as with all Chabad centers, are steeped in Chassidic values. The architect of Chassidic philosophy is Rabbi Shneur Zalman of Liadi, founder of the Chabad Lubavitch movement. One of the ideas for which Rabbi Shneur Zalman has become renowned is the importance of the mental faculties in the service of G-d. A significant portion of his magnum opus, Tanya, is in fact devoted to the development and role of human intellect, known as Chochma (knowledge), Bina (understanding) and Da’at (wisdom), the letters that compose the word Chabad.

Chassidic philosophy furthermore emphasizes the love of man. “To love G‑d,” insists Chassidic doctrine “is to love every human being,” because you cannot love the father and not his children. In this light the contrast between the Jihadist terrorist and their Jewish target is rather well pronounced.

Moreover, it was the impetus of the seventh Chabad Rebbe, Rabbi Menachem Mendel Schneerson that led Gavirel and Rivka to leave the comfort and safety of America to run a Jewish center in far off Mumbai. Their Rebbe taught that we must all work to “bring heaven down to earth,” to transform the mundane and make it holy by engaging it in worthy pursuits. The world in its entirety, mundane included, exists to be harnessed and elevated, not to be shunned or destroyed. Our world is no less the garden of G-d than the heavens above.

In Chabad the Jihadist encountered the quintessential and consummate ideological adversary. They attacked a group whose hallmark is an embrace of the world in its modernity and a love for the sanctity of life. Around the globe, Chabad Jewish Centers represent precisely the sort of ideology that the Jihadist loath, the life they insist is impossible.

Culturally, Chabad supports pluralistic democracy, while still promoting a deep commitment to G-d and tradition. The twisted killers of Gavriel and Rivka were diametrically opposed to their victims prescribed philosophy, spirit and faith. They resented the theology that is in the forefront of what they deemed impossible, the fusion of heaven and earth, the harmony of the holy and the secular.

Whether it was deliberate or pure coincidence, I’ll leave that for you to decide, it is clear that on that dark day there was a cosmic collision of opposing forces, the force of evil in its most ghastly and nefarious form and the force of purity and kindness, between the wicked daemons of death and the gentle and nurturing angels of life, as embodied in the Holzbergs.

The Torah, the Holzbergs guiding force, commands us: “B’damayich Chayee.” In your blood you shall live. It is written in the form of a command, Chayee, Live! Judaism is about life, as were the Holzbergs. They devoted themselves to nurturing the beauty that can be found in the human spirit. The terrorists on the other hand worship death and destruction. The life of others had as little value to them as did their own. Such was the nature of the tragic encounter of that fateful day.

How does one react to such an enormous personal loss, such obscene savagery? Like Aaron the High Priest, upon the death of his sons, we cannot ask too many questions. And if we insist nonetheless on asking, there will be no answers.

But silence does not amount to lack of faith and acceptance. Humility, in face of our own limited, imperfect vision of G‑d’s immeasurable goodness is not tantamount to capitulation. While there are no comforting answers, there is perspective and determination.

In times like these we need put our angst to work. Pain packs a hard punch, pain has an intensity that awaits being channeled. We can and must harness this energy to propel our lives forward. While fate may be in the hands of the Almighty, destiny awaits our partnership.

As for Chabad, Chabad does not quit. Chabad stood its ground in Czarist Russia, as it did in the aftermath of the Holocaust. Nor did Chabad abandon Crown Heights during the mass exodus, not even after the 1991 riots. The terror attacks in Morocco have not deterred Chabad where its teachers still operate in a city called “Gazablanca.”

Chabad was operative in the anti-Semitic ruins of East Berlin before the wall came down, when religion was criminalized, as it was in the Jewish ruins of Dnepropetrovsk before that Ukrainian city was open to the West. Chabad is still in the Congo amidst Africa’s “world war.” You can be sure that Chabad will not quit now. Islamic terror is not about to deter Chabad.

Even as I write these words, Chabad is planning to re-open of the Chabad House at 5 Hormusji Street, the now-famous Nariman building in Mumbai. Chabad will be there when Jewish backpackers or businessmen are inclined to return.

During the Spanish Expulsion in 1492, it is told, there was an old Chacham who, together with his fellow Jews, was fleeing with his family. In the desert his group was attacked by Arabs. His son-in-law was stabbed to death, then his daughter was murdered in front of his eyes. He grabbed his infant grandson, all that was left of his family since his wife had passed away earlier. Half-crazed from grief, he fled alone into the desert. But the relentless desert sun got the better of him and he fainted.

When he came to, he saw to his shock that his grandson was no longer alive; in the meantime he had died of thirst and the harsh elements. Numb with grief, he dug a grave for his grandson. Then he turned his eyes heavenward and cried: “It is clear that there are forces above that are determined at all costs to alienate me from my G‑d. I say to those of you dwelling on high: Despite all your best efforts I will remain a steadfast Jew!”

Chassidim know that there is only one possible response to the unspeakable acts of barbarism that transpired in Mumbai on November 26, 2008. The response is to move forward with even greater conviction, because if we hesitate we have handed the terrorists a victory.

I think that Chassidim have always perceived life as a state of war, a war between the forces of darkness and evil which seek to plunge our planet into an anarchic jungle, and the force Divine order and light.

When we are faced with darkness, as reminded by the story of Chanukah, our response must be to add light. We can spend our lives trying to fight the darkness by beating it out with broomsticks or even tanks and artillery, the affect would not be very much different than beating a dead horse. The way to eliminate darkness is by adding light, by illuminating our surroundings. When light is added darkness dissipates and disappears, it is replaced entirely with light.

So, now you know Chabad’s response to the horrific acts of evil in Mumbai, what remains is for you to have you own response. No response is for obvious reasons not an option.

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