Community Magazine April 2013

by the Hand of Hashem Touched HAROLD SHAMAH A s my children grow, I want more than anything for them to have emunah , faith – faith that Hashem oversees every moment of our lives; faith that as Jews we have a Gd-given “playbook” for life. Many of us, I am afraid, do not have the strong foundation of faith that is needed to inject emunah within the hearts of the next generation. How can this goal of firm, resolute faith be achieved? I believe we achieve this objective through a combination of reasoned thought and validating experiences. By “reasoned thought,” I refer to the compelling arguments for the truth of our faith. For example, the greatest validation of our belief is the divine revelation to the entire Jewish nation at Mount Sinai. Have you ever pondered how that story might have started and been believed for thousands of years by the entire monotheistic world if it was not true? I have not been able to imagine another logical explanation. Not even the greatest salesman could convince an entire population, Jewish no less, that they experienced something they didn’t. I am currently working with several community rabbis to put together a curriculum that will, with Hashem’s help, draw upon this and other arguments, for the purpose of bolstering our community’s emunah . But there is also another way of reinforcing emunah , and in this regard I am turning to the community for help. Many people have built or reinforced their faith as a result of undergoing an experience whereby they were touched directly by the “Hand of Hashem.” On a recent ski trip with around a dozen men, I asked over Shabbat dinner if any of them had experienced Hashem’s presence in their life, some kind of “personal revelation” or other event through which Gd’s Providence was tangibly felt. After sharing my own story, I was amazed to discover that in just our small group, there were 3-4 other similar experiences. I then began thinking, if there are about five remarkable stories of Gd’s “revelation” in this small gathering, there must be dozens, if not hundreds, of stories in our community waiting to be told. Many of us, for one reason or another, are hesitant to talk about these experiences, but in my view, these accounts can be a vital and invaluable resource for us in our efforts to disseminate emunah and inspire our children with the belief in Hashem. I present here two such stories – one involving a relative, and another about a personal experience. To Eden and Back My cousin, Irwin Shamah, had a store in Brooklyn, and in 1972, the store was held up at gun point. Instead of acquiescing, he confronted the assailants and ended up with five bullets in his upper body. Over the course of the next few hours, he faded in and out of consciousness. He remembers being wheeled into the operating room, at which time he had an extraordinary experience. “There was a long tunnel with a bright light at its end. As I emerged, the light washed over me, filling me with a tranquility that I can only describe as Gan Eden . My father, who had passed away six months earlier, was there to greet me. There are no words to describe the joy. He told me that I couldn’t stay. I had to go back. It was not my time. There was more to accomplish. I was then hovering over my body in the operating room. The surgeon had his hands in my chest pumping my heart. I awoke in the recovery room, never to be the same.” The surgeon was not surprised to hear Irwin describe details of the operation to him. Irwin’s story was not unique. There are countless documented near-death experiences that confirm the existence of the afterlife. 42 COMMUNITY MAGAZINE