A farewell at Chabad for Lori Kaye, murdered by terrorist

By Donald H. Harrison

POWAY, California – Fifteen people mounted the bima at Chabad of Poway to remember and praise Lori Gilbert Kaye and to sing their appreciation for God and America.  Hundreds more were inside the sanctuary.  And a crowd stretching well down a walkway was outside listening to the story of a woman who gave her life to save the life of her rabbi, Yisroel Goldstein, on a holy day, Shabbat, the last day of Passover, in the same religious sanctuary just two days before.

Numerous dignitaries were seated in the sanctuary.  They included three members of Congress, several state legislators, Mayor Kevin Faulconer of San Diego, three county supervisors; leaders of law enforcement, and representatives of other faith groups. They were there not only because of Lori Kaye, whom all agreed was an unusually good and giving woman, but also because her death at the hands of a white supremacist was an attack on the entire Jewish community, as well as upon the American ideal of pluralism and religious liberty.  So, it was fitting that Poway Mayor Steve Vaus, accompanied by Oscar Stewart who helped to chase the shooter from the building, led the congregation in singing first softly, as a prayer, then louder as a declaration, “God Bless America.”

Sam Hoffman, president of Chabad of Poway and emcee of the funeral which lasted a few minutes shy of two hours, paid tribute not only to Stewart, but also to Jonathan Morales, an off-duty Border Patrol agent who prays with the congregation, for following alleged gunman John T. Earnest out of the building, and shooting at his car moments before Earnest came to a stop and surrendered to police who had converged on the scene.  And Hoffman offered soothing words to Noya Dahan, the 8-year-old girl who was wounded with shrapnel, and her uncle from Israel, Almog Peretz, who also suffered shrapnel wounds shielding children from the gunfire.

It was a funeral in which the family’s sorrow was America’s sorrow, perhaps even the world’s sorrow as it was streamed on the Internet across the globe.  It was also a funeral showcasing resolve in the face of tragedy and love countering hatred.

The first speaker was Elan Carr, America’s new envoy to fight anti-Semitism, who said he was speaking in behalf of President Donald Trump and the entire American government.  He said that hate-filled movements such as the white supremacists who attracted Earnest to their cause “have no place on earth and no place in the United States.” Carr added that America is “at war with these people,” not only against those who openly preach a naked form of anti-Semitism but also against those who “dress up their anti-Semitism as anti-Zionism.”

Carr was followed by Eitan Weiss, the acting Israeli consul-general in Los Angeles, who assured the Kaye family that Israel and its people stand with them.  He prayed that Kaye’s “memory be a blessing and may she be the last victim of anti-Semitism.”

“God Bless America” led by Vaus and Stewart was followed by a reading from the 20^th Psalm, first in Hebrew and then in English, by  brother rabbis Mendel Goldstein and Yehoshua Goldstein, sons of Chabad’s spiritual leader, Rabbi Yisroel Goldstein.  “Some rely on chariots and horses, but we rely on the Lord,” the Psalm declares.  That was followed by Rabbi Mendy Rubenfeld, who leads Chabad of Poway’s youth groups, reading in both languages Psalm 23, which begins “The Lord is My Shepherd…”

The director of all the Chabad houses in San Diego County, Rabbi Yonah Fradkin, was next to speak.  He said had the gunman’s automatic rifle not jammed, an entire congregation might have been wiped out.  Instead, he said, “one sacrifice was chosen,” that being Lori Kaye, whom he described as “a beautiful person, always willing to help” and one deserving  the title “mensch” [a very good person], a title which he said will be linked to her name forever.

Three members of Lori Kaye’s family spoke in succession – her husband, Howard, a medical doctor, who tried unsuccessfully to revive her after the shooting; her daughter Hanna, 22, who told of a once estranged, later reconciled, and at the end very loving relationship with her mother; and Lori’s younger sister, Randi Grossman, who heads Chai Lifeline of Los Angeles, which helps children struggling with life-threatening diseases.

Howard Kaye said at the home that he shared with his wife, she had a Peace Poll, with a legend in five different languages, proclaiming “May peace prevail on earth.”  He said he drew comfort from a midrash on Leviticus 10:1-3 in which Aaron’s two sons, Nadab and Abihu, brought fire and incense to the Altar in the Tent of Meeting, and were immediately consumed by a fire sent by God.  “Moses said to Aaron: Of this did Hashem speak, saying ‘I will be sanctified through those who are nearest Me, thus I will be honored before the entire people’; and Aaron was silent.” According to the midrash, Moses turned to Aaron and said that the two young men had been chosen by God, because “they were greater than we.”  And that, declared her husband, “is who Lori was!”

He disclosed to the congregation that he “did CPR on her, there was no blood, she did not suffer, and she went straight up.”  In contrast to his wife’s goodness, said Kaye, “there is also evil.”  He said no one will remember his wife’s killer; “he will be gone forever” and there will be “no redemption for him.”   Passionately he urged any people who similarly are involved with hate-mongering groups, “Get out while you can; come back to the real world – the world of Lori, which is peace and love on earth.”   He received a standing ovation.

Next was Lori’s daughter, Hanna, who while speaking to the large congregation, also was speaking directly to her mother, whose picture graced the left side of the bima. She said they went through ‘the thickest of fire” into each other’s arms, and that Lori was the “mother who could love me as I wished to be loved” and the “mother who I could trust… speak freely to.”   She described her mother as an incredibly giving person, one who as a young woman had toured the country with the “Up With People” singing group, and personified the concept of “radical empathy.”  She noted that Passover and Sukkot were her mother’s favorite holidays; “she kept the sukkah up all year.”  Before Shabbat, she was forever baking challahs to give to neighbors, friends, and people in need,  and that her dream had been “to be a bridge of love.”  She said she believed her mother would have forgiven her killer, so that his hatred “would not overshadow the love of my mother.”

That theme of Lori’s overflowing kindness was amplified by her sister Randi, and her close friend Roneet Lev.  Lori was the middle of three sisters, with Ellen being older and Randi younger, and had a way of connecting with people.  Meeting others, she “knew their life history in 10 minutes.”  In school she became friends with her teachers, and she was a gift giver, forever cooking a meal for a shiva house, or delivering flowers.  She said sometimes it was necessary to hide the check book from Lori because she would write out so many checks for giving tzedakah.  She paid for other people’s medication, for their hotel bills in times of distress, and for gifts.

Lev, her friend and hiking buddy, said Lori always purchased two coffees, one for herself and one for her companion.  If the companion didn’t want it, or already had a coffee, Lori knew a homeless person nearby to whom she could give it.  “She brought you soup, came to your retirement parties… She was the queen of knickknacks, tschotckes.”  And when Lori knew someone was traveling to another country, she would give them a check made out for $100 to be donated to a charity of the traveler’s choice in that country.

Lori was a fan of President Donald Trump, and kept a Trump coin on her Shabbat table and her Passover table, Lev said.  Some of her friends didn’t agree with her about the President, “but she wouldn’t sacrifice a friend or family over politics.”

Dying to protect the rabbi, she said, Lori did her part.  She was a kedusha, a person who sanctified God’s name.  Now, she said, people should follow her example by engaging in “random acts of kindness and make the world a better place.”

Rabbi Shlomo Cunin, who is in charge of all the Chabad Houses on the West Coast, said that Lori’s soul has ascended to heaven to be with that of the Lubatvitcher Rebbe (Rabbi Menachem Mendel Schneerson) and that of his rebbetzin, Chaya Mushka.  He urged women who were listening to say ‘Lori, I am doing this for you” when they light Shabbat candles, and men to say the same when they put on tefillin.  To non-Jewish clergy members, Cunin urged that they tell their congregants of “a special lady brutally murdered in a holy place.”

To would-be terrorists, he vowed:  “We will not bend for your hatred … We will not stop doing all the good work.”

And then, Rabbi Yisroel Goldstein came to the bima, his both hands swathed in bandages.  One hand had a missing finger.  He looked out at the congregation, and he declared, “This is our response – a full shul, packed!”

He recalled that Lori Kaye had helped to arrange a loan from Wells Fargo, where she had once worked, for the construction of Chabad of Poway’s building, which was dedicated in 1997.  He asked rhetorically where the congregation should go from here, after having seen the darkness of humanity, but also the heroism of those who braved death.  He responded forcefully, “We don’t allow anyone – no terrorist, no murderer, no evil – to shut us down.”

The funeral service was concluded with the chanting of the El Moleh Rachamim, the traditional song of mourning, by Rabbi Baruch Shalom Ezagui of Chabad of La Jolla.   Thereupon the family departed the sanctuary to escort the body of Lori Kaye to the El Camino Cemetery.

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Harrison is editor of San Diego Jewish World.  He may be contacted via donald.harrison@sdjewishworld.com San Diego Jewish World’s eulogy series is sponsored by Inland Industries Group LP in memory of long-time San Diego Jewish community leader Marie (Mrs. Gabriel) Berg.  A running collection of statements from groups and individuals in response to the shooting at the Poway Chabad may be accessed by clicking here, then scrolling through the end of the story to the comment section.