JANUARY 27 • 2022 | 43

there to offer help when others
are suffering.
And so it has proved to
be. There were Jews helping
Gandhi in his struggle for
Indian independence; Martin
Luther King in his efforts
for civil rights for African
Americans; Nelson Mandela in
his campaign to end apartheid
in South Africa. An Israeli
medical team is usually one
of the first to arrive whenever
and wherever there is a natural
disaster today.
The religious response to
suffering is to use it to enter
into the mindset of others who
suffer. That is why I found so
often that it was the Holocaust
survivors in our community
who identified most strongly
with the victims of ethnic war
in Bosnia, Rwanda, Kosovo and
Darfur.

THE POWER OF STORIES
I have argued, in Not in God’s
Name, that empathy is struc-
tured into the way the Torah
tells certain stories — about
Hagar and Ishmael when they
are sent away into the desert,
about Esau when he enters his
father’s presence to receive his
blessing only to find that Jacob
has taken it, and about Leah’s
feelings when she realizes that
Jacob loves Rachel more. These
stories force us into recognizing
the humanity of the other, the
seemingly unloved, unchosen,
rejected.
Indeed, it may be that this is
why the Torah tells us these sto-
ries in the first place. The Torah
is essentially a book of law. Why
then contain narrative at all?
Because law without empathy
equals justice without compas-
sion. Rashi tells us, “Originally,
God planned to create the
world through the attribute
of justice but saw that it could
not survive on that basis alone.
Therefore, He prefaced it with
the attribute of compassion,

joined with that of justice.
” That
is how God acts and how He
wants us to act. Narrative is the
most powerful way in which
we enter imaginatively into the
inner world of other people.
Empathy is not a lightweight,
touchy-feely, add-on extra to
the moral life. It is an essential
element in conflict resolution.
People who have suffered pain
often respond by inflicting pain
on others. The result is violence,
sometimes emotional, some-
times physical, at times directed
against individuals, at others,
against whole groups. The only
genuine, non-violent alterna-
tive is to enter into the pain of
the other in such a way as to
ensure that the other knows
that he, she or they have been
understood, their humanity
recognized and their dignity
affirmed.
Not everyone can do what
the elderly Japanese man did,
and certainly not everyone
should try disarming a
potentially dangerous individual
that way. But active empathy is
life-changing, not only for you
but for the people with whom
you interact.
Instead of responding with
anger to someone else’s anger,
try to understand where the
anger might be coming from.
In general, if you seek to change
anyone’s behavior, you have to
enter into their mindset, see
the world through their eyes
and try to feel what they are
feeling, and then say the word
or do the deed that speaks to
their emotions, not yours. It’s
not easy. Very few people do
this. Those who do, change the
world.

The late Rabbi Lord Jonathan Sacks

served as the chief rabbi of the

United Hebrew Congregations of the

Commonwealth, 1991-2013. His teachings

have been made available to all at

rabbisacks.org. This essay was written

on Feb. 6, 2018.
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Southfield, MI 48034

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24725 West 12 Mile – Ste. 110
Southfield, MI 48034
1-248-945-1111

24725 West 12 Mile – Ste. 110
Southfield, MI 48034
1-248-945-1111

24725 West 12 Mile – Ste. 110

Southfield, MI 48034

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