Vayishlach: A Mother’s Tears

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What can we do when our children are hurting?

We all know how much we love our children, how much we care for their well-being, how much we would do to ensure that their lives are beautiful and joyful.

Unfortunately, the world that we live in is not exactly perfect. No matter how much we try, sometimes our loved ones are faced with serious difficulties and challenges. As much as we try to educate our children to walk down healthy, righteous paths, the world can distract them and lead them astray.

Sometimes our children make bad decisions to the point of seriously hurting themselves. Witnessing a child’s suffering while feeling powerless to do anything about it is for a parent devastating, heartbreaking, and the worst thing to deal with.

So the big question arises: Is there something a parent can do to ease a child’s suffering? And another question, perhaps even more challenging: How should a parent respond to child that is hurting him or herself?

As always, we shall turn to the Torah for the answer. In this week’s reading, the Torah teaches us how we can comfort our children, provide them with the tools to comfort each other, and advocate for their wellbeing in this oft-difficult world.

And the Torah does so by holding up the example of our mother Rachel, who knew exactly how to love – and help – her children especially when they hurt.

How fitting is it then that today we honor the beginning of the 90^th anniversary the Rebbe and the Rebbetzin Chaya Mushka marriage (Kislev 14, 1928)? Though they had no children of their own, all the children were theirs. And they taught us how to love our children in these challenging times.