On Monday afternoon I was at a factory in central Switzerland. There was a demand for Kashering a production line, and the task was assigned to me. I walked around there with several of the workers among the tanks and pipes, and then we sat down to wait for the temperature to finally reach the boiling point. In the meantime, a conversation developed between us that drifted to the situation in the Holy Land, when suddenly I glanced at my phone and saw the message: “The IDF has found Ran Guiili,” and immediately after that a message from Talik, his extraordinary mother: “First to go out, last to return – our hero.”
They didn’t see the message, but they did see that I was tearing up, and they immediately asked, “What happened?”
I told them: “You won’t understand. They found Ran Guiili.” They tried to figure out whether we were relatives, maybe close friends, perhaps acquaintances, or whether they had once visited the Chabad House in Basel. Eventually they gave up and admitted that they really didn’t understand why the fact that the bones of an anonymous policeman were found in Gaza would cause me to weep with emotion—of joy and gratitude—in the Bern area.
Seven hundred soldiers searched for Rani Guiili—seven hundred soldiers, and behind them an entire people, everywhere in the world, holding its breath in sincere and unified prayer: that they would find him, that they would return his bones to his mother and to his people.
I allow myself to assume that it is somewhat jarring to read the word “bones” in the context of Rani Guiili or any other captive who was no longer alive. It is very jarring. And the truth is that for many years already—ever since the Torah tells us, in the portion we studied this week, Parashat Beshalach—“And Moses took the bones of Joseph with him, for he had made the children of Israel solemnly swear, saying: God will surely remember you, and you shall bring up my bones from here with you”—the Torah chooses the words “the bones of Joseph” instead of something more respectful, such as Joseph’s coffin, or simply Joseph.
Joseph the righteous—the king who cared for his family and his people, the one who was captive for more than twenty years in Egypt—“bones,” is that what he is?
The Rebbe asks this question in Likkutei Sichot, volume 26. True, in his oath Joseph used this expression about himself, as stated at the end of the verse, “and you shall bring up my bones from here with you.” But since this is not an expression of honor toward the righteous, the Torah should have said, “And Moses took (the coffin of) Joseph with him,” and not used the expression “the bones of Joseph.”
And as usual, in just a few words the Rebbe gives an inner, deep, and powerful meaning to the choice of the word “bones.” One can say that this is precisely what the Torah intends to emphasize: that in the Exodus from Egypt, Moses took with him the “bones of Joseph”—bones are called so because they are the essence and the strength of a person and of a living being—he took Joseph’s very essence, Joseph’s core being and purpose.
The Rebbe continues in the discourse to explain beautifully what Joseph’s essence was—what was the most essential thing about Joseph that Moses in fact brought up with him from the land of Egypt, so that it would be with them throughout the journey in the desert and serve as a source of strength and power.
The body of Rani Guiili has returned, but far more than that: his essence has returned, and it breathes into us a spirit of strength and self-sacrifice, love of Israel and devotion of soul. Not only him—every one of the heroes of the war, for whom a very significant circle was closed this week, brought with him strength in his very bones.
A bone is a simple thing, and therefore there is a similarity between one bone and another. A bone does not tell you about the different shades of human beings; a bone does not see differences. It only reveals the essential point, which is quite similar among people—and especially among the people of this nation, the people of Israel.
This is what Talik, Rani’s amazing mother, said in the eulogy this week: “Over the course of these two years I have heard many eulogies for the heroes of the War of Revival, and every eulogy reminded me of you. The same values and the same spirit—as if they copied you one by one.”
And what always amazes me most: all these people—all the fighters and the captives, the fallen and the living, all these Rani Guiilis—are all ordinary people, standard, everyday people, people who live alongside us even today. And somehow, in one moment of truth, their essence emerges and is revealed; the divine overcomes the animalistic, the spiritual rises above the material.
In that essence they showed everyone that we are one people, one big family that weeps and is moved together with anonymous members of its own—from Bondi Beach to Meitar.
Shabbat Shalom,
Rabbi Zalman Wishedski