The broken tablets of stone symbolise failure, a vast national mistake, a crisis of faith, disappointment - any number of negative aspects of the incident. And yet these too were carried in the sacred Ark by the Levites, symbols of national folly and lack of judgement. Because as a nation we don't only carry with us the glowing successes, the badges of honour, but also our mistakes, our failures.
As a nation our national book, the Bible, records the good and the bad, the times our nation did the right thing and the times we completely messed up. It's a very honest way of viewing one's own history and a very important lesson in humility and in the profoundness of our believe in teshuv, the ability to repent and change and learn from our mistakes.
On Yom Hazikaron we remember all our fallen, the ones who died saving the day with outstanding acts of selflessness and the ones who tragically lost their lives due to friendly fire, a commander's error of judgement or fa aulty piece of equipment. They all risked their lives in the defense of our homeland and people, they knew that wearing the uniform could put them in harm's way for any number of reasons and we owe them not just a debt of gratitude, but as a nation, we owe it to them to learn their stories and in doing so hopefully learn also from mistakes that cost lives. Yehi Zikhram Barukh.
At the end of the book of Genesis, Joseph makes one deeply poignant request: Though I die in exile, God will bring you back to the land, and when He does so, "veha'alitem et atzmotai mizeh", “Carry my bones” with you.
Moses smashed the first set of tablets given to him by God at Mount Sinai, but the Israelites carried them in the Ark, together with the second set, the new tablets and the fragments of the old.
And so it has been throughout #Jewish history; we carry with us all the fragments of our people’s past, the broken lives, the anguished deaths. For we refuse to let their deaths be in vain. Our past lives on in us as we continue the Jewish journey to the future, to #hope, and to #life.
Just a few days ago, on #YomHaShoah, we remembered the victims of the Holocaust. On #YomHaZikaron, beginning tonight, we will remember the victims of the Israel Defence Forces and those killed by terrorist attacks in Israel. What our enemies killed, we keep alive in the only way we can: in our minds, our memories and in our land, the State of #Israel.
There are cultures that forget the past and there are those that are held captive by the past. We do neither. We carry the past with us for as long as the #Jewish people exist, as Moses carried the bones of Joseph, and as the Levites carried the fragments of the shattered tablets of stone.
Those fragments of #memory, of those no longer with us, help make us who we are. We live for what they died for, by walking tall as #Jews, showing we are not afraid, refusing to be intimidated by the antisemitism that has returned, or, as we have seen in recent days, by the sustained assault on #Israel.
On #YomHaZikaron, as we remember those who have fallen or been killed in defence of the State of #Israel, we say to the souls of those lost: We will never forget you. We will never cease to mourn you. We will never let you down.
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