Muslim Heroes of the Holocaust
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An artist sold an invisible sculpture at auction. It sounds absurd, but it points to a real question: how much of what matters most in life can we actually see?
In May 2021, Italian artist Salvatore Garau sold a sculpture at auction for about $18,000. The catch? It was invisible. Titled Io Sono (“I Am”), it existed only as an idea. The buyer received a certificate of authenticity and instructions to display it in an empty space.
Garau defended his creation by explaining that even a vacuum isn't truly empty, that seemingly empty space contains energy and potential. He argued that the sculpture was a legitimate work of art, even if it couldn't be seen or touched. Apparently, at least one person agreed enough to spend 18,000 visible dollars to own it.
I’m no art expert, and perhaps I am missing something profound about conceptual art, but to me it sounds ridiculous.
But be careful not to draw the wrong conclusion. Just because something is invisible doesn't mean it isn't real, powerful, or extraordinarily valuable. History offers a remarkable example of what can happen when people fail to appreciate the significance of something they cannot see.
In the 1840s, a young Hungarian physician named Ignaz Semmelweis was working at Vienna General Hospital when he noticed something troubling. Women giving birth in the maternity ward staffed by doctors were dying at dramatically higher rates than women delivering in the ward staffed by midwives. He was determined to understand why.
Eventually, he made a remarkable connection. Doctors were performing autopsies and then examining women in labor, often without properly washing their hands. Semmelweis suspected they were carrying something from the deceased patients to the mothers, something invisible that was causing deadly infections. Germ theory had not yet been established and he couldn't see or identify precisely what was responsible.
Something invisible was taking lives. The fact that doctors couldn't see it didn't make it any less real, and their inability to recognize it didn't diminish its power.
He introduced a requirement that doctors wash their hands with a chlorinated solution before examining patients, and maternal mortality rates plummeted. Yet rather than embrace his findings, many in the medical establishment resisted them. Semmelweis died in 1865 without seeing his discovery widely accepted. Only later, through the work of Louis Pasteur and others, would the scientific world come to understand the invisible microorganisms responsible for so much illness and death.
Something invisible was taking lives. The fact that doctors couldn't see it didn't make it any less real, and their inability to recognize it didn't diminish its power. Semmelweis didn't need to see the source of the infections to recognize its effects and understand that it mattered. The tragedy was that so many others dismissed what they couldn't see, even when the evidence of its impact was right in front of them.
In fact, some of things that make life worth living are invisible.
Can you put a price tag on the love of a spouse, the affection of a child, or the devotion of a parent? What is the market value of genuine friendship, of knowing there is someone who will be there for you no matter what? Can loyalty be weighed on a scale? Can trust be photographed? Can you deposit hope in the bank, measure peace of mind in square footage, or calculate the value of meaning and purpose?
We cannot see hold these things in our hands, or assign them a precise numerical value, but we know how profoundly they affect our lives. A person can live in an enormous mansion, drive an expensive car, enjoy every tangible luxury imaginable, and yet feel terribly empty because they lack love, connection, purpose, or peace of mind. Conversely, someone can have very little materially and nevertheless live a life filled with joy, fulfillment, gratitude, and meaning.
When we confuse what can be counted with what truly counts, we risk spending our lives accumulating things of limited value while overlooking what is genuinely priceless.
And yet, how much of our time, energy, and attention do we dedicate to the things we can measure while neglecting the things that matter most? We measure our financial success by our net worth, our professional success by our titles, our social success by our followers, and sometimes even our personal success by the size of our homes or the vacations we take. There is nothing inherently wrong with material success, and there is nothing wrong with enjoying the blessings God gives us. But when we confuse what can be counted with what truly counts, we risk spending our lives accumulating things of limited value while overlooking what is genuinely priceless.
The Mishna teaches "Who is wealthy? One who is happy with his portion" (Ethics of the Fathers, 4:1). Wealth isn’t defined by how much a person owns, but by how a person relates to what he has. Two people can have identical bank accounts and entirely different levels of wealth. One feels deprived, jealous, and perpetually dissatisfied, while the other feels grateful, content, and blessed. The numbers are the same, but their lives are profoundly different. True wealth isn't merely a financial condition; it is also a spiritual and emotional one, something no accountant can calculate and no bank statement can capture.
Among the most precious things in life that cannot be seen or measured is our faith and trust in God. Just because we cannot see God doesn't mean He isn't present, and just because we cannot fully understand what He is doing doesn't mean He isn't doing anything.
When Jacob flees his home and faces an uncertain future, he has his famous dream of the ladder reaching from earth to heaven. God appears to him and promises, “Behold, I am with you, and I will protect you wherever you go" (Genesis, 28:15). When Jacob awakens, he makes an extraordinary declaration: "Indeed, God is present in this place, and I did not know."
What changed wasn't God’s presence, but Jacob’s awareness of it.
Think about what he is saying. God hadn't suddenly arrived when Jacob had his dream. He had been there all along. What changed wasn't God’s presence, but Jacob’s awareness of it. The place that had seemed ordinary, perhaps even frightening and lonely, was revealed to be filled with holiness and Divine presence. Jacob came to realize that God’s presence that was already there.
How often is that true in our own lives? We go through our days worried about our families, our health, our finances, our relationships, and our futures. We confront disappointments and frustrations, sometimes large and sometimes small, and we become so consumed by what is happening around us that we lose sight of Who is with us through it all. We may not have a prophetic dream like Jacob, but we can work on developing the awareness that allowed him to declare, "God is in this place, and I didn't realize it."
Of course, faith in God doesn't mean pretending that everything is easy, denying that suffering is real, or claiming to understand why painful things happen. It doesn't mean that if we believe strongly enough, every illness will disappear, every relationship will be repaired, or every financial challenge will resolve exactly as we want. We don't always understand God’s ways, and we should be careful not to presume that we do. Emunah, faith in God, means that even when we don't understand, we can work to trust. Even when we don't see the path forward, we can remember that we are not walking alone.
We cannot see love itself, but we can see the kindness, patience, generosity, and sacrifice it inspires. We cannot see loyalty, but we appreciate it when someone shows up for us when it isn't convenient. We cannot see gratitude, but we recognize it in someone who appreciates what they have rather than constantly focusing on what they lack. And while we cannot see emunah itself, we can recognize its influence in the way a person responds to uncertainty, disappointment, success, and the ordinary frustrations of everyday life.
The most valuable things in life aren't always the things we can see. They are the things we cannot afford to live without.
