What is the heroism of life – the daily heroism?

To this day, most of the focus on heroism in the Holocaust has focused on Warsaw ghetto fighters, partisans, and Hannah Szenes. When people think of acts of heroism, they think of acts of warlike human sacrifice.

But heroism is not only special for the heroic acts of war, but also and especially for the daily acts of heroism and overcoming, this is the beauty of the Hebrew language. Both heroism and overcoming come from the same root – G.B.R.

It is no coincidence that from the Mishnah period, we carry the famous sentence of R. Shimon Ben Zuma:

“What kind of hero? Conqueror of his passion.”

So why do we mostly remember the acts of war?

Terribly simple, most of us can identify with acts of everyday heroism, but in most cases this term “everyday heroism” will sound to us very amorphous and unclear. When I help someone cross the road am I a hero, or when I am a doctor working around the clock to help patients I am a hero, or when I am a girl fighting a social boycott – from experience? Opinions are divided as to whether a particular act constitutes everyday heroism or not.

Want to understand what we’re talking about? We have organized a little trivia for you – “Who are the heroes and heroines?”

After completing the survey, you will receive a link to the answers that all the people answered

When does an act of heroism take place?

If we want to simplify, we can say that heroism takes place during an act of overcoming difficulty in a way that benefits another person besides us – that is, is done for the sake of others. But here, too, there is a difficulty.

To make order in the rush, we have created for you, A schematic pattern that clarifies to us when an act of heroism takes place – heroic or everyday.

So, In each act of heroism there are three components simultaneously (optimism, activism, unity), If one of the elements does not exist – it is not an act of heroism:

  1. optimism – The ability to see the chances of a positive outcome of the act in an optimistic way.

  2. activity – The ability to act and lead, to be active and lead ourselves or others forward. Activity can also be expressed as passive activity, but in this case it will require an action that is contrary to a basic instinct – which hero conquers his passion.

  3. Unity (solidarity) – The ability to understand that we live together in this world in a substantive way, and therefore our actions also affect others, so we will take them into account when we come to act.

The three elements are necessarily present in every act of heroism, whether heroic or everyday. Sometimes the ingredients will be present in low percentages and sometimes in high percentages.

Let us examine this under two test cases:

  1. Golani SMGD, the late Roi Klein, jumps on a grenade Which was thrown at him and his soldiers during the Second Lebanon War, all with the aim of rescuing soldiers. In this case The 3 components are held at maximum:

    1. Optimism – Roy was optimistic about the chances that the act would lead to the rescue of his soldiers, just imagine that he would think that the chances of saving his soldiers are a total of 10%.

    2. Activity – Against the basic instinct, Roy Klein does not run away and seeks to save his life, but on the contrary – he is active and seeks to jump on the grenade and thus sacrifice himself.

    3. Unity (Roy) – Roy sees his soldiers before his eyes at the maximum level – he is willing to cancel himself for the sake of saving their lives.

  2. You or I rush to the meeting, and on the way we see a cute grandmother who needs help crossing the road, And we decide to help, Here too the 3 components simply exist in the lower components:

    1. Optimism – We are optimistic that we will reach a meeting and everything will work out, even though we stop to help.

    2. Activity – Against the default (keep running to the meeting), we stop and help Grandma.

    3. Unity (solidarity) – we see it before our eyes.

The two cases are extreme to each other, in one the elements of heroism are at maximum, then we get “heroic” heroism and in the other the elements are relatively close to the minimum, and therefore we get daily heroism.

Dodge is possible for 3 ingredients in the examples given above

During the Holocaust there were many cases of everyday heroism – these cases should and can inspire us all to daily heroism in the lives of all of us

A possible doge for the 3 components in the examples given above, examples from the Holocaust alongside the examples from Lebanon and everyday life

This is how we choose to walk the path of heroism of life, volunteering that empowers the heroines and the heroes and us, even if it sometimes seems difficult, the satisfaction of doing is worth every moment

For an article on the importance of creating an active tradition in this generation – click here ?