Yesterday was my Dad’s 12th Yahrzeit.
It’s so hard to believe that he has been gone for such a long time.
My Father zl was a larger than life person. He was an accomplished Torah scholar and a successful businessman. He garnered the respect of so many people.
There are many exceptional qualities that my Father embodied and so many lessons that I learned from him. As I get older, I’m still uncovering nuances that I didn’t fully grasp until now.
For example, I recently came to the realization that my Father never looked back.
He was a child of World War 2. While he was spared from the concentration camps as his family emigrated to Palestine in 1933, his whole world was turned upside down. The dreams he had for his future were destroyed as he had to help support the family. They suffered from hunger and other challenges. He lost many extended family members in the Holocaust, and was even arrested by the British for being a spy.
(It was a case of mistaken identity of course, but he was imprisoned and threatened with hanging until he could prove his innocence.)
Despite the complexity of his youth, and many losses he experienced, my Dad kept going. He did not allow those experiences to hold him back from building a family and creating a successful life.
It is easy to allow oneself to get mired in the past and not move forward.
In this week’s Torah portion which is called Vayera, we learn about Lot, nephew of Abraham. Lot grew up in Abraham’s home and journeyed with him.
At a certain point in time, Abraham told Lot that the time had come for them to part ways. This was due to the fact that Lot was not sufficiently meticulous in respecting the property of others. This was evidenced in the fact that Abraham muzzled his camels to make sure his animals would not graze in fields that were not his own. Lot was not careful in this manner and therefore, in this nuanced detail, Abraham recognized a lack of respect for others and decided it was time to part ways.
Lot surveyed the land before him and chose the most verdant of options which was Sodom. He chose the most lush area despite the decadent values of the inhabitants of Sodom.
Sodom was a city of iniquity and by choosing to make it his home, we are afforded another glimpse into Lot’s skewed values.
Gd decides to destroy the city of Sodom and tells Abraham of the plan. Abraham immediately prays for the salvation of Sodom in the hope that there are some worthy of saving, but Abraham is unsuccessful, and the Divine plan to destroy the city unfolds.
Immediately before the city is destroyed, Lot is warned and told he must leave immediately or else, he too, would be caught up in the maelstrom and be destroyed. Just moments before Sodom is destroyed, the angel says to Lot, “Run for your life. Do not look behind you, nor stop anywhere in the Plain; flee to the hills, lest you be swept away.”
The only caveat given to Lot and his family as they escape - don’t look back.
Why were they told not to look back?

Our Sages have a number of explanations.
Lot and his family were actually on the same level as the inhabitants of Sodom, and they should have been destroyed as well. They were therefore not worthy of seeing the punishment enacted so they were told not to look back.
Rabbi Shmuel Weinberg shares another perspective.
By instructing Lot and the family not to look back
“the angel was teaching a fundamental lesson in life. When you have made mistakes, when you underachieved or came up short, don’t look back, always look forward. Don’t focus on your past and beat yourself up, don’t listen to voices of negativity and defeatism, look to the future and the opportunities it presents. We need to understand what drove the mistakes we made and feel remorseful for them, but we cannot and must not ruminate on them.”
Looking back can be destructive. It keeps us stuck in the past and doesn’t allow us to overcome and move forward.
Despite the instruction not to look back, one family member could not refrain from a glance backward.
Lot’s wife looked back and was transformed into a pillar of salt.
Rabbi Efrem Goldberg teaches that the medium of salt is by design and not a coincidence.
Salt is a preservative.
“Salt, by its very nature, preserves and keeps what it is spread on intact. It inhibits the ability to grow, to change, or to move forward. Lot’s wife literally got stuck in her past. She couldn’t move past it, couldn’t look forward, and didn’t let herself start again.”
This is a tale of loathsome opportunity and the inability to leave the past behind.
Last night I had the honor of attending an evening at the MJCCA book festival which was sponsored by the Israel Parasport Center. The evening featured a conversation with Noa Tishby and Mike Leven and was designed to raise funds and awareness for the Center and its forward facing, life altering work.
The Center provides rehab and sports opportunities to those what have been disabled and allows them to look forward and achieve despite their life changing injuries.
One of the speakers last night was Livnat Elgazi. She is a survivor of the Nova Festival and she spoke as someone who has benefited from the extraordinary service provided by the Israel Parasport Center.
She shared with the audience her experience on October 7.
Livnat was at the festival with two friends, Ofek and Eden. When the three realized what was happening, the three tried to escape in a car. They were attacked by terrorists who killed Eden and injured the other two. Ofek and Livnat hid in the underbrush for 4 1/2 hours in a wounded condition. At the end of that time Ofek heard Israeli soldiers and left the hiding place despite Livnat’s pleas. He was shot a few steps away from their hideout. Livnat managed to take a few steps away from her hiding place without being detected. She saw three Israeli soldiers crawling towards her and she begged them for help. They were shocked to see her. She was the first living person they had encountered. Under heavy enemy fire, the soldiers were able to evacuate Livnat and get her to safety.
The tears cascaded down my cheeks as I listened to Livnat’s tragic story. But my tears of grief mingled with tears born of inspiration. Livnat mentioned over and over in her talk the words “Borei Olam” or Master of the Universe.
At every juncture of her experience she invoked the Borei Olam saying that Gd watched over her, protected her, made her invisible to the enemy. She ended her talk in a paean of praise to Gd which she wanted to express in front of the 1200 people in the audience, to express her gratitude for her life and the opportunity to move forward.
In the most timely of fashions, Livnat mentioned the wife of Lot and said that as they were saving her she could not look back because otherwise she would never be able to go forward again.
I am deeply grateful to Livnat for sharing her journey and her deep faith.
When we look back we tend to focus on our mistakes and we label ourselves unworthy.
We give up on ourselves.
We allow our circumstances to define us.
When I was a little girl, my Dad taught me the Parsha, the Torah portion, every week. He would share the story and then always add his thoughts on how the portion was relevant to us.
The message was often one of hope, resilience and forward thinking. It’s the past that pushes us forward.
Thank you Livnat for being the embodiment of courage and faith in the face of a devastating past.
Livnat ended her talk by showing us that she has been able to rehabilitate her injured arm, the one that no longer has a thumb, and she raised that arm high and said Am Yisrael Chai.
Today is Day 405!
Bring the hostages home now!
Shabbat Shalom and so much love!