A note about matters of the heart

Above all else, guard your heart, for everything you do flows from it.” Proverbs 4:23 – words rooted in the deepest layers of Jewish sacred writing, spoken by sages and cherished within families for thousands of years. It’s a teaching we share in passing with our Christian neighbours too, since their faith grows from these same ancient texts, with the Old Testament forming the foundation before those lessons thread into the New.

There’s something elemental in this – that Jews, Christians and others reach for this wisdom to shape how we live, how we endure, how we lean into goodness in a world often far from gentle.

For Jews living in Australia, this proverb calls out across generations, shining like a beacon at a time when storms gather. It’s a shield against the tide of antisemitism that’s been rising in our country with a relentless and disturbing force. Recent months have brought attacks on synagogues, ugly threats, painted slurs, and acts of violence that make ordinary life feel tense, uncertain.

We hear stories of children afraid to wear their Magen David necklaces, of elders who double-lock doors, of families who worry about walking to shule. Statistics and headlines spell out the trend – tripling incidents, fearful polling, politicians rushing for solutions – yet the ache is felt most keenly in heartbeats, in everyday acts of bravely showing up anyway.

What does it mean, then, to “guard your heart” in this climate? The Bible doesn’t offer platitudes or gentle comforts, it demands action, proactivity, a reckoning with our own moral fibres. It asks us to take stock of what we’re made of, to check our prejudices and our courage, to refuse the role of passive recipient. Jewish tradition, ever layered and relentless, insists that when hate is loud, we respond: not with silence or withdrawal, but by educating, comforting and uniting.