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Oct 21, 2025

Sympathy, Empathy, and Solidarity

Sympathy, Empathy, and Solidarity

Rabbi Menachem Creditor


There is a sacred continuum in the human heart — a progression from sympathy to empathy to solidarity — through which we are invited to move closer to one another, and thereby closer to God. Each point on this spectrum is holy, yet incomplete without the others. The Torah commands us, “You shall not stand idly by the blood of your neighbor” (Leviticus 19:16). To obey this verse is not only to act, but to feel; not only to feel, but to become part of another’s story.


Sympathy is the beginning of compassion — the first spark of awareness that another person suffers. It is the head’s recognition that pain exists beyond our own boundaries. When we say, “I’m sorry you’re hurting,” we acknowledge another’s humanity. That, already, is sacred. But sympathy risks remaining at a safe distance. It can comfort without cost, weep without movement. It’s the cry from the shore for a person drowning far away — heartfelt, sincere, but dry.


Empathy wades into the water. It is the soul’s courageous act of feeling with another. To empathize is to remember our own wounds, to allow another’s pain to awaken something living within us. Empathy dissolves the illusion of separateness. We do not say, “That could have been me.” We say, “That is me.” When Torah commands, “You shall love your neighbor as yourself” (Leviticus 19:18), it isn’t telling us to treat others well — it’s demanding that we collapse the distance between “you” and “me.” Empathy is the awareness that the boundary is already porous.


And yet, even empathy can stop short of transformation. We can feel deeply and still remain still. Solidarity is empathy that has grown legs. It is the manifestation of compassion in motion, the covenantal choice to show up for another’s struggle as our own. Solidarity is when we stop merely understanding another’s pain and start sharing the risk of healing. It is when Pharaoh’s daughter, moved by the infant’s cry, not only weeps but reaches down into the Nile to save Moshe. It is when Jews stand with those who suffer, not as charity but as covenant. When we say Hineni — “Here I am” — not to speak, but to stand.


Solidarity, then, is the crescendo of human feeling. It is the place where we embody God’s image most vividly. The Holy One does not remain sympathetic or empathetic to our suffering; God enters it. The Exodus itself is the story of divine solidarity — a God who says, “I have heard their cry… and I will descend to deliver them” (Exodus 3:7–8). If God can descend into our pain, surely we can ascend into one another’s.


The continuum of sympathy, empathy, and solidarity is not linear but cyclical, a rhythm of awareness, feeling, and action. It invites us to live with open hearts and steady feet — to feel what others feel, and then to move. For in the end, love that remains unmoved is only sentiment. But love that stands beside another, shoulders their burden, and walks with them toward freedom — that love is redemption itself.


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Sympathy, Empathy, and Solidarity

Sympathy, Empathy, and Solidarity Rabbi Menachem Creditor There is a sacred continuum in the human heart — a progression from sympathy to...