The Jews of October 8

“Since October 7, we’ve been making Kiddush every week. No matter where we are or who is present, I will take a bottle of wine and recite the Kiddush.”

“After Simchat Torah, I was in Israel for the first time in my life — at the age of 30. I came to volunteer around Gaza. I will return again in the summer and bring along friends.”

“After 10.7, I started learning Hebrew online, and also began attending a weekly Torah lesson at the synagogue.”

“For the first time, I have been walking around campus wearing a Star of David necklace, despite receiving hostile reactions. I cannot recall anything that has ever moved me with such intensity.”

These are just some of the statements I heard this week during my lecture tour in Toronto, Canada. The question is: If Hamas slaughtered, burned, murdered, and kidnapped Jews in the Gaza vicinity, why did someone in Toronto start laying tefillin?

The answer is the global phenomenon called “October 8 Jews”—the Jews who woke up on the day after October 7. Their hearts were opened, and they suddenly understood that they are part of a bigger story — a battle over consciousness and faith, a struggle over identity. And their spiritual awakening affected the material: Canadian Jews have donated more than $100 million to settlements in the North and South of Israel, to first-responder emergency squads and to resilience projects. Thank you.

A young student contemplating aliyah for the first time in her life drove me to the airport. Suddenly, her future seems to be in Israel.

I don’t have any definitive conclusions, although I did return to Israel filled with thoughts and ideas. But as a first step, it’s crucial that Israelis recognize this phenomenon and act on it. This is a historic opportunity for millions of our brothers and sisters in the diaspora who are liable to be lost, but who could also return home. Together we will win — together with them, too.

I’d like to extend a big thank you to the Shaarei Shomayim community led by Rabbi Sam Taylor, to Mizrachi Canada and to Rabbi Elan Mazer, Rabbi Dr. Seth Grauer and the Israeli emissaries, as well as Rabbi Yitzchak Landa and Rabbi Shimon Binstock from Chabad of Toronto. Thanks to you, I met more than 1,000 of my brothers and sisters this past weekend.

The main headline in the local newspapers when I landed in Canada was “Trump: We don’t need Canada.” Well, without delving into Canada-U.S, politics, we need Canada, and we most certainly need the Jews of Canada!

These Are My People

Hello from Toronto, Canada.

This past Shabbat morning, I was sitting in the women’s section at the Shaarei Shomayim shul, when I overheard a woman whisper to the woman next to her, “What’s happening with the hostages?”

“I don’t know,” the woman replied, “but I prayed for them all night — I almost finished reciting the entire Book of Tehilim.”

“I’m so worried about them. If only they will come back alive…” the first woman said in a trembling voice.

Here were two women living 9,000 kilometers away from Israel, who had never even met the hostages, but who can’t sleep at night because they’re worried about them and want to do everything in their power to help them.

How do we explain this?

I think the answer touches at the very core of what it means to be a member of the Jewish people: The bonds that bind us are invisible but unbreakable.

Only a few minutes after this conversation took place, the following verses were read from this week’s Torah portion: “And I will take you to be My people, and I will be your God, and you shall know that I am the Lord, your God.”

We are one people —and after all the confusion and worry, the pride and humiliation, the excitement and trepidation, our deep connection to each other is a source of strength.

How can we apply this powerful feeling of unity to our day-to-day lives?

Here is a suggestion that I’ve shared in this space before and which has helped people shift their attitude towards those around them: Let’s try and transfer this tremendous love that we feel for every one of the hostages, all the worry and caring, to those who have not, thank God, been kidnapped.

Think about the people we meet over the course of our day. If they were kidnapped, God forbid, we would be so worried about them that we would feel almost physical pain. So, take a good look at the people around you and appreciate that they too are part of the amazing phenomenon known as the Jewish people and worthy of our love.

Where Is Our Will?

A small child can walk around all day with a mud-stained shirt and not care at all. He doesn’t even notice it. But an adult? Even a small stain would bother him. He is mature.

At the beginning of the parsha, Hashem tells Moshe about the first and necessary step of the exodus to freedom: “And I will bring you out from under the burdens of Egypt.”

The Sfat Emet writes that the meaning of this verse is that the Children of Israel will no longer be able to tolerate this exile, and no longer have the patience for even one more day of slavery.

For 210 years, they labored in Egypt under extremely harsh conditions. But like a small child with a dirty shirt, they didn’t even realize how inappropriate it was for them to be slaves.

The first step on their path to becoming free was to develop a revulsion for slavery, to say from the depths of their souls, “Enough, we cannot tolerate this anymore!”

Perhaps what delays us most from making positive changes in our own lives is the fact that we don’t even feel that our situation requires correction! We’re used to it; we don’t even imagine anything better, or maybe we are afraid to change — so we accept reality as it is and make peace with it.

The initial condition for progress is the clear distinction between good and evil, the understanding that we deserve something better, that we need to grow. From there, the door can open to great change — even to the Exodus from Egypt.

May our personal and collective awareness grow, so that, together, we can emerge to true freedom!

*Translated by Yehoshua Siskin, Janine Muller Sherr

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