Feeling the Pain of Another

There is no way to fully understand someone else's pain. Try we might but we are not that person and therefore cannot understand. We can try to relate but we can never fully understand.

As I get older, and go through new experiences in life, I begin to understand this concept more and more. This past shabbos my friends husband was niftar. He was not a regular human being but someone who was extraordinarily kind, caring and compassionate. He had exemplary middos, something that anyone who would meet him would see. It was clear at his levayah how many people loved him. Just by looking at the large amount of people that came to pay their respects, you were able to see just how he touched all those around him.

One of the hespedim noted his sincere emunah, how even at the hardest of times he was able to sing "Tov L'hodos L'Hashem". I heard that story and was amazed at what strength that required. It's easy for us to say "Hashem wanted it this way", or "He completed his tafkid in this world" and a multitude of other catch phrases but do we understand the implications of these statements? Yes, they might be true but when you're the parents and have lost your first born son to a fatal disease, at that moment, at the ‘hear and now’, are they saying...It's better this way? If you are, you're a malach. But for the rest of humankind, you're crying tears of pain and sorrow.

Since the levyayah, I can't get the painful cries out of my head. The pain of his parents, wife, family and friends. The pain of losing someone so close to you, someone who was so giving to you...is just unbearable.

This would be the third funeral I've attended this year. Each of those people, strong leaders of their community. Each of those people a stellar example of true emunah and bitachon. Each of them righteous individuals on their own right.

I say good-bye and hope to be half of what these people are over the course of my lifetime. My bracha to all of you…may we live lives filled with bracha, simcha and health and may we bring these delights to those around us for years to come.