When a Tombstone Reads ‘Light of the World’

The memory of the Lubavitcher Rebbe, whose birthday is today, is becoming increasingly shrouded in the mists of time. Who he was seems to be of interest to two groups: Chabad and those who monitor Chabad messianism. For the rest of the Jewish world, the Rebbe’s legacy, while important, is not a priority. And the non-Jewish world has not sufficiently heard of him. But that is a mistake, especially in our growing secular world.

It is generally agreed that religion plays a vital role in society by imparting values and calling on people to live for a cause higher than themselves. Without religion we would all be a little more selfish and much more materialistic. So, why do we live in such a secular age that in large parts of the globe, like Europe, religion has become irrelevant? And why is the once-indomitable religious right in America rapidly losing its political muscle?

Because religion has too often shown sharp teeth, has too frequently displayed an ugly face and has failed to produce people whose behavior is predictably better than the general population. This is not to say that there aren’t many religious people who are righteous, moral and good, but rather that there are many who are not.

The truth of any belief system is tested in its effectiveness. Communism looks better than democracy on paper, but in practice it produces poverty and tyranny. Whether it’s the Rabbinical saying that “action is what counts” or Jesus’s saying that “by their fruit you shall know them,” a religion is tested by its ability to inspire righteous action.

Few believers in the West would ever fly a plane into a building. But we would tell a gay man that he has no place in church or synagogue. We would spread malicious gossip about a friend, even though it is expressly condemned in the Bible. And we are often less than honest in our business dealings, even though the ancient Rabbis declared that the very first thing we are asked as our souls ascend to heaven after death is whether we were commercially honest.

Here is where the Lubavitcher Rebbe revolutionized all religious faith. For the first time in memory, a world religious figure gazed upon mankind and saw not a sea of sinners but an ocean of possibility. While the confessional of many our Christian brothers begins with “Forgive me father for I have sinned,” the Rebbe’s formula was “Join me my child in the performance of one good deed.”

For the first time in memory, a world religious figure gazed upon mankind and saw an ocean of possibility.

From his perch atop a broken neighborhood in Brooklyn, the Rebbe proclaimed the essence of faith as the call to perform a single mitzvah with its untold power of spreading love and light. Ronald Reagan called upon Mikhail Gorbachev to tear down the tyrannical wall that had been built over a generation. But the Rebbe called on religion to tear down the walls of condemnation and the towers of damnation that had been built over millennia.

The Rebbe replaced religious judgment with an impassioned humanity. His message became a mantra: give charity, pray daily, offer hospitality and love every stranger as oneself. He practiced what he preached.

A Catholic gay man I know once wrote the Rebbe a letter where he disagreed with the Bible’s views on homosexuality. Never expecting his letter to even reach the Rebbe, he was blown away when he received a five-page response in which he was treated as being infinitely beloved of G-d.

Whereas some religious leaders condemn abortions, the Rebbe sought to cultivate a love of children. Those of us who can still close our eyes and remember the enormous public gatherings where the Rebbe, a world-renowned scholar, would spend hours teaching children, or the warm smiles he would give our own children when, on Sundays, he would furnish thousands of kids with a dollar for charity, can only imagine the infinite anguish this great man felt when G-d withheld giving him offspring. But that seemed to only increase his empathy as he adopted the world’s children as his own.

When a man wrote to the Rebbe about an argument he had with his wife over home improvements, the Rebbe wrote back, “The true greatness of a man is to fulfill his mission in life by acting in a way that is favorable to the members of his family and the people that are around him.” Incredible. A world religious figure telling a man that he would find “true greatness” not by how piously he behaved in the synagogue but in how lovingly he treated his wife in the kitchen.

What is the Rebbe’s legacy? Simply this: He gave faith back its heart. In inventing global religious outreach, which has now been copied by nearly every other world religion, he forever shattered the religious inclination to judge, marginalize and send away.

Once, when I was sixteen, I was standing on Ben Yehudah Street in Jerusalem giving out Sabbath candles to non-religious women when an American mother in a tank-top ran from me as I approached her. I calmly told her that I could not recall giving her offense. She then related that she had just come from a religious neighborhood in Jerusalem where a man spat on her for showing cleavage. I responded that my Rebbe had taught me that in a place where there is darkness, it is best to light a candle. She took the Shabbos lights and went happily on her way.

Islam is a great world religion. What it most needs today is a Rebbe courageous enough to buck the trend of religious judgment, enjoining believers to inspire rather than destroy. The same is true of even Evangelical Christianity which, while producing adherents of unparalleled generosity and kindness, often sees its teachings spilling over into diatribes against the immorality of a godless culture. They too need a Rebbe to teach them to bless the daylight rather than curse the night.

Most of all, it is Jews who ought to rediscover the legacy of the Lubavitcher Rebbe. With the deep divide between religious and secular in Israel and the chasm that separates Orthodoxy from Reform in this country, we need to remember a leader who taught us that religion places as much faith in man as it does in G-d and that the principle means by which we come closer to G-d is by loving His children.

About once a month, I travel to the tomb of the Rebbe. I never tire of reading the awesome words of his headstone. “Here lies Ohr Olam — a light of the world.” My G-d. To be a mere mortal and to burn so brightly that one becomes a light of the world. If only, if only.

Rabbi Shmuley Boteach is the international best-selling author of 20 books, most recently “The Broken American Male and How to Fix Him.”