Words of comfort to the mother of
Ahmed Mousa - 10 years old

"What are you weeping for?", asked the Elder.

"I pity my little son, dear father, he was three years old, just three months short of three years old. I grieve for my little son, father, for my little son. He was the last little son left to us, we had four, Nikitushka and I, but our children didn't stay with us, they didn't. When I buried the first three, I wasn't too sorry about them, but this last one I buried and I can't forget about him. As if he's just standing right in front of me and won't go away. My soul is wasted over him. I look at his clothes, at his little shirt or his little boots, and start howling. I lay out all that he left behind, all his things, and look at them and howl. Then I say to Nikitushka, that's my husband: 'let me go on a pilgrimage, master.' He's a coachman, we're not poor, father, not poor, we run our own business, everything belongs to us, the horses and the carriages. But who needs all that now? Without me, he's taken to drinking, my Nikitushka, I'm sure he has, even before I left he'd give in to it, the minute I turned my back, and now I don't even think about him. Its three months since I left home. I've forgotten, I've forgotten everything, and I don't want to remember, what can I do with him now? I'm through with him, through, I'm through with everybody. And I don't even want to see my house now, and my things, I don't want to see anything at all!"

…

The same way my Nikitushka was comforting me, word for word, like you, he'd say, "Foolish woman, 'he'd say, 'why do you cry so? Our little son is surely with the Lord God now, singing with the angels' he would say to me . "I know, Nikitushka, 'I'd say, 'where else can he be if not with the Lord God, only he isn't here with us, Nikitushka, he isn't sitting here with us like before!' if only I could just have one more look at him, if I could see him one more time, I wouldn't even go up to him, I wouldn't speak, I'd hide in a corner, only to see him for one little minute, to hear him the way he used to play in the backyard and come in and shout in his little voice: 'Mama, where are you?' Only to hear how he walks across the room, just once, just one time, pat-pat-pat with his little feet, so quick, so quick, the way I remember he used to run up to me, shouting and laughing, if only I could hear his little feet pattering and know it was him! But he's gone, dear father, he's gone and I'll never hear him again! His little belt is here, but he's gone, and I'll never see him, I'll never hear him again …!"

She took her boy's little gold-braided belt from her bosom and, at the sight of it, began shaking with sobs, covering her eyes with her hands, through which streamed the tears that suddenly gushed from her eyes. .

"This, "said the elder, "is Rachel of old 'weeping for her children, and she would not be comforted, because they are not." This is the lot that befalls you, mothers, on earth. And do not be comforted, you should not be comforted, do not be comforted; do not be comforted, but weep. Only each time you weep, do not fail to remember that your little son is one of God's angels, that he looks down at your from there and see you, and rejoices in your tears and points them out to the Lord God. And you will be filled with great mother's weeping for a long time, but in the end it will turn into quiet joy for you, and your bitter tears will be become tears of quiet tenderness and the heart's purification, which saves you from sin. And I will remember your little child in my prayers for the repose of the dead. What was his name?"

"Alexei, dear father."

"A lovely name! After Alexei, the man of God?"

"Of God, dear father, of God, Alexei, the name of God."

"A great saint! I'll remember, mother, I will remember, and I'll remember your sorrow in my prayers, and I'll remember your husband, too. Only it is a sin for you to desert him. Go to your husband and take care of him. You little boy will look down and see that you've abandoned his father, and will weep for both of you: why, then, do you trouble his blessedness? He's alive, surely he's alive, for the soul lives forever, and though he's not at home, he is invisibly near you. How, then, can he come to his home if you now hate your home? To whom will he go if he does not find you, his father and mother, together? You see him now in your dreams and are tormented, but at home he will send you quiet dreams. Go to your husband, mother, go this very day."

"I will go, my dear, according to your word, I will go. You've touched my heart. Nikitushka, you are waiting for me, my dear, waiting for me!" The woman began to murmur.

The above passages are from the book, 'The Brothers Karamazov by Fyodor Dostoevsky. I was touched by it when I first read it, and I was touch much more as I just typed them. This post is meant to be words of comfort to all the mothers who have lost their children tragically. I don't think anyone would ever know what it must feel like to be the mother of a child that just left home and is suddenly gunned down and he will never return. Only such a mother knows what it must feel like to remember the child's happy voices. What is must be like to look at his little child's handwritings, to look at his pictures, to look at his young friends and he is missing. I think I would not want to live. But are those words of comfort? No! Don't listen to me, listen to what the Elder was telling the aggrieved mother.