Jewish community must embrace late Chief Rabbi’s message of unity and moral clarity as Israel battles for existence and with global antisemitism rife
November 11, 2025 10:48
Five years have gone by since the sudden passing of Rabbi Jonathan Sacks. I lost a friend, but more than that, we all lost a man with a rare gift – the ability to explain us to ourselves.
Rabbi Sacks could uncover the hidden depths of who we are and what we might become. He taught that Judaism is not only about remembering our past but about shaping our future. When we embrace our identity, we draw the strength to change the world. His words still speak to the challenges of our time with undiminished clarity and power.
I first met Rabbi Sacks soon after my release from Soviet prison, when I travelled to thank Jewish communities for standing with us in the struggle for Soviet Jewry. In London, I encountered a young rabbi whose brilliance was matched by his humility. He was deeply rooted in Torah, yet fluent in the language of philosophy, history and ethics. Later, when he became Chief Rabbi of the United Kingdom and I joined the Israeli government, our paths crossed often. I came to see how this Orthodox rabbi was, in the best sense, profoundly unorthodox – unafraid to think broadly, to reach across boundaries and to speak to the world as a whole.
One moment remains especially vivid. During the Second Intifada, when antisemitism was spreading through universities and the media, Rabbi Sacks invited me to London to speak about my working definition of when criticism of Israel becomes antisemitic. I expected to address a public forum. Instead, Rabbi Sacks met me at the airport and said, “We’re going straight to the Archbishop of Canterbury.” He wanted me to speak not about politics but about faith – about the small, worn book of Psalms that had sustained me through my nine years in Soviet prisons, the one my wife Avital had given me just before my arrest.
For Rabbi Sacks, fighting hatred was never only about argument, but about human connection, about reaching the moral conscience that binds people together. He believed that the struggle against antisemitism must also be a call to shared humanity.
That was Rabbi Sacks – deeply grounded in the Jewish world, yet speaking to all of humanity. He showed how science explains the world, while faith gives it meaning. He reminded us that the moral foundations of modern civilization have their roots in Judaism. His books opened a space where reason and faith could meet.
When I wrote the foreword to the twentieth anniversary edition of A Letter in the Scroll, I reflected on how Rabbi Sacks’ writings helped me frame my own journey – from an assimilated young man in the Soviet Union to someone who discovered, through Judaism, the meaning of freedom. In the darkest days of repression, rediscovering my Jewish identity gave me courage and purpose. Rabbi Sacks understood that same truth: that identity is a source of strength that sets us free.
Today, Israel faces another battle for its very existence, and Jews around the world are again confronting hatred. We have learned, painfully, that freedom and security can never be taken for granted. In these moments, Rabbi Sacks’ voice feels more urgent than ever. He reminds us that our unity, our moral clarity and our shared mission as a people remain our greatest sources of strength.
I now see people in synagogues of every background studying his books – something rare while he was alive. In death, his presence has only grown. His ideas continue to cross borders, bringing together worlds that too often stand apart: faith and reason, universalism and particularism, Israel and the Diaspora.
Those who are part of Jewish tradition are never forgotten. Rabbi Sacks’ words have entered that tradition. His voice will continue to guide us, and generations after us, toward a life of meaning and freedom.
Natan Sharansky is the Chair of the Rabbi Sacks Legacy Global Advisory Board.
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