Few are as universal and human as the experience of hope: the aspiration for security and safe haven, for times of peace and prosperity, for family and the unborn, for success and betterment. In application, hope contrasts the present conditions and circumstances with idealized ones, envisaging a world ought to be in place of the currently realized.

As such, never is hope more sorely needed than when it is most feeble and assailable. Amidst the bleakness and evil of the day, hope provides counsel to us with a reminder of the goodness available in the world. Amidst uncontrollable uncertainty, hope deters us from abandonment by instilling us with the promise of better days. Amidst untold loss and grief, hope encourages us to look beyond.

Hope may also be shared across a people, reinforced by a collective to transcend circumstance and time. The durability and resilience of hope are highly eminent in Judaism, which paints a history of a twothousand-year-old hope. From where we once wept on the banks of
the Euphrates and Tigris, through persecution, expulsion, massacre, and annihilation, the Jewish people have carried the dream of security, religious freedom, and recognition. Following two millennia in the diaspora, the Jewish people have finally carved themselves a piece of the world amongst other nations as hope manifest.

Wading through the inclement world of today, we must clench onto our mantles of hope, steadfast, despite uncertainty, fear, and loss. Veiled with hope, we may find relief in the shaken promise of a redeemable future. As we are reminded in Pesach, in every generation they rise up to destroy us, but the Holy One, Blessed be He, delivers us from their hands. And should we trust in our faith and history, we must stubbornly insist on the possibility of a brighter tomorrow.

Source: Human Rights - written by young jews from 40 countries with support of B'nai B'rith International Portugal and International Observatory of Human Rights