Leap of faith: Tree of life honours victims of October 7

When I trained to be a Rabbi at Leo Baeck College we would gather for Shacharit, the morning prayers, in the College’s Room of Prayer. Out of the windows, across the beautiful grounds of the Sternberg Centre for Judaism, we would have in our eyeline the word zachor, remember, carved at the top of the tall sculpture by Shoah survivor Roman Halter. We were to become the Rabbis of the future, full of optimism and hope for the Jewish future, but yet it was our duty to remember the past. 

Remembering is an essential aspect of Judaism. We build for our next generations, contributing to a better world as God’s partners. We are supported, shaped and given our sense of purpose by the memories of the past.  We remember the Exodus from Egypt, we remember our exile in Babylonia, we remember the Shoah.

Now we have another task to remember. Along with the joy of the return of the hostages from Gaza, along with the relief that our brothers and sisters in Israel will have respite from rockets and sirens and that the people of Gaza now have the chance to rebuild in peace after such an awful two years, we must remember 7 October 2023. The day marked a rupture in the soul of our communities. A moment of the deepest loss that reverberated across Israel and Jewish people worldwide.

At Edgware and Hendon Reform Synagogue, we knew we had to respond not just with grief, but with something lasting. Something that would speak to future generations about what happened, and how we held each other through it. We are remembering by having dedicated a memorial sculpture in the garden of our synagogue, created by sculptor and synagogue member Josette Aitman Perloff. It is a tree of life, struggling to bud again, draped with the yellow ribbons which called the hostages home and with a dove of peace resting on its branches. It is surrounded by the detritus of the attacks, objects, names of people and devastated kibbutzim but also with calaniot, the red anemone flowers that bloom through the horror.

Some of the objects will elicit questions in future years. We will then tell our future generations about the vulnerability of our Jewish state and indeed of our lives as Jews. But we will do so with the understanding that it is for us to grow from our memory, to try to build peace, to try to build a positive future for Israelis and Palestinians, to try to ensure that the legacy of those who died in the October 7 attacks and in Gaza will be a safer Israel and care for the recovery of the hostages who experienced the trauma of two years in captivity.

Rabbi Mark Goldsmith is at Edgware and Hendon Reform Synagogue