We live in a time of unprecedented connection—and widespread loneliness. About one in three adults in the United States report feeling lonely, and nearly one in four say they lack social or emotional support. In such a culture, even our most profound experiences can easily become solitary. We often process them on our own—perhaps with a message or a post—without others fully present. The Torah anticipates this danger in an unexpected place: the laws of the korban todah in Parshat Tzav.
The todah, the thanksgiving sacrifice, is brought into the Temple by someone who has survived danger. The sages identify four classic cases: one who crossed the sea, traveled through the wilderness, recovered from serious illness, or was released from captivity.
What distinguishes the todah offering from other Temple offerings is the way it is structured. According to the Talmud, the Torah requires the offering to have an animal sacrifice accompanied by an unusually large amount of bread—forty loaves in total. Even more striking, all of it must be eaten within a single day.
Rabbi Ovadia Seforno, the sixteenth-century Italian rabbi and physician, explains that these details are intentional. The quantity of food and the one-day time limit make it impossible for one person to consume the offering alone. The korban todah therefore requires others to be present. Gratitude is expressed not as a private feeling, but with a community.
It may seem obvious, but nonetheless it’s true: community, the facilitator of gratitude, is what combats loneliness. Rabbi Jonathan Sacks agreed. He often spoke of loneliness as one of the central spiritual challenges of modern life—not despite the abundance of freedom and autonomy we have today, but in part because of them. When religious life is reduced to individual expression, he argued, it loses its power to bind people together.
Judaism responds to this challenge, he explained, by giving emotion a public form, with blessings recited aloud and meals eaten together. The korban todah is an occasion to invite others in.
That opportunity did not disappear with the Temple. It reappears in everyday Jewish practice. Today, after surviving danger, Jews recite Birkat HaGomel, a special public blessing of gratitude. In January 2025, shortly after her release, Daniella Gilboa recited Birkat HaGomel alongside Agam Berger and other freed hostages.
Even without sacrifices, the logic of the korban todah endures. Thanksgiving turns survival into connection—and connection helps cure loneliness.
Rabbi Dr. Tzvi Sinensky is director of the Rabbi Norman Lamm Legacy digital archive and director of Judaic Studies at Main Line Classical Academy. A member of the inaugural cohort of Sacks Scholars, he has edited over fifty books. He also publishes Reasonable Judaism on Substack and hosts a daily WhatsApp Torah audio series, From the Beginning.
This essay was written as part of our collaboration with The Rabbi Sacks Legacy Sacks Scholars.
