By the Grace of G-d
Dear Friend,
Our hearts are shattered by the cold-blooded attack on our brothers and sisters—Jews of all walks of life gathered yesterday at Chabad-Lubavitch of Poway in celebration and prayer to the Almighty on Shabbat and the final day of Passover.
While commemorating the Jewish people's miraculous liberation from bondage and persecution more than 3,300 years ago, and preparing to remember their departed loved ones at the Yizkor service, these beautiful people were heinously attacked for no reason other than the fact that they were Jewish.
We offer our immense gratitude to G-d that the full scope of the perpetrator's evil intent to commit mass murder was miraculously unrealized when his rifle inexplicably jammed, though tragically not before snuffing out the life of a most beautiful human being and injuring others.
Indeed, we mourn the holy soul of community trailblazer and activist Lori Gilbert-Kaye—Leah bat Reuven—who was so cruelly torn from our midst, and pray that G-d provide strength to her family and that they find solace in the many people she touched and the myriad activities she set in motion. The fruits of the immense good she planted on this earth will forever serve as extensions of her very life.
We pray for the healing of all the injured, including Rabbi Yisroel Goldstein—Yisroel ben Chana Priva—who lost his index finger while being shot at from almost point-blank range and yet instantly ran to protect the children; 8-year-old Noya bat Eden (Dahan) and her uncle, Almog ben Ruti (Peretz) visiting from Sderot, Israel, and no stranger to terrorist attacks.
We pray for the healing and comfort of their families, the entire Poway community, the Jewish people worldwide, and the entire world community—men, women and children of every type, each created in the image of the benevolent G-d whose hearts ache from senseless tragedies like these.
The fact that these G-dless acts have multiplied of late underscores with even greater urgency the critical need for proper moral education for our youth, rooted in the belief in a Supreme Being—Whose Eye that Sees and Ear that Hears should preclude anyone from devaluing the life of another human being.
Indeed, we are grateful to live in a country that is predicated on these values and thus protects our right to live openly and proudly as Jews, and we value immensely the friendship and outpouring of support from so many of our fellow Americans.
We are particularly grateful to those whose brave stand against the shooter saved additional lives, including the city's police department and all levels of government from the municipality on upward who have been working selflessly to ensure the safety and wellbeing of the Jewish community in Poway and around the country.
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At the onset of the Passover holiday only one week ago, at familial and communal seders held worldwide (including those conducted by thousands of Chabad-Lubavitch institutions across the globe), millions of Jews proclaimed that "[though] in every generation they rise to destroy us… the Holy One, blessed be He, saves us from their hand," due to the unbreakable bond of His everlasting covenant with the Jewish people.
In light of this covenant, the Rebbe, Rabbi Menachem M. Schneerson, of righteous memory, taught that we may not hide or cower even in the face of pure evil. To the contrary, we must drive it away.
How?
Cold-blooded, fanatical, baseless, relentless hatred can be uprooted from its core only by saturating our world with pure, undiscriminating, uninhibited, unyielding love and acts of kindness, and by teaching that to all our children, in our schools and our homes.
Today more than ever, the Rebbe taught, we must spread love and unity; positivity and light. We must fulfill our covenant to spread the light of G-d, to act upon the urgent responsibility we all share to recognize and nurture within each other the loving handiwork of the Creator of all things.
Even as we grieve and mourn, we must increase exponentially our acts of goodness and kindness.
As Jews it surely behooves us also to increase our adherence to our special mitzvot, like donning tefillin (for men) and lighting Shabbat candles (for women), and to help others do the same. While performing our increased mitzvot let us keep in mind that in so doing we are extending the life of Leah bat Reuven.
*
Apropos to the stirring prophecy read by the Jews gathered at Chabad-Lubavitch of Poway yesterday, along with their brethren around the world, may we finally merit to the time when the evils of war, hate and jealousy will be eradicated forever, when the world will instead be filled with the knowledge of G-d, with the coming of our righteous Moshiach speedily in our days.
With deep pain, endless love and fierce determination,
Sincerely,
The Chabad.org Team
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