What brought about 3,500 Chabbad emissaries from 100 countries together for this picture, which was taken on Sunday at their annual conference in New York? What motivates them to make contact with millions of Jews around the world and help them in any way they can?
The answer is provided by the words of the man who sent them on their mission – the Lubavitcher Rebbe. In his commentary on this week’s parshah, he dwells on the following verse: “Isaac again dug the wells of water that they had dug in the days of Abraham his father.” And he explains:
Yitzchak’s work is also our work – to dig wells. To believe that under the dirt and dust and all the layers, there is clear, sweet water. Even if someone seems indifferent, distant, and cynical – even wicked – that is just an outer shell. Inside there is a soul, there is life.
This was not just Yitzchak’s mission, and it is not just the mission of the emissaries in this picture. It’s a mission we are all tasked with.
“Yitzchak’s work gives strength to every single person,” the Rebbe said, “so that he can’t claim he cannot reach the light of the soul…. Yitzchak has already paved the way for us and gave us the strength not to despair, to remove the interfering elements and to reach the essence.”