I don’t know this child. And I don’t know his parents. But I am going to assume that he was raised in a way that taught him the true meaning of empathy. His sensitivity, awareness and desire to help his mother is so powerful and shows us that at a young age he realizes that ice cream tastes good for the minute, but a good deed lasts a lifetime. In Hebrew, the word for empathy is “rachmanut” and its root is “rechem” which means “womb.” The idea of the womb is that like a pregnant woman, when we are empathetic we are being other-centered–we are putting another’s needs and feelings at our core. And that is what Ahrmard is doing. And beautifully enough, he is being “womb like” to his mother, who physically carried him at her center and now he is making her, his center.
