The famous novelist F Scott Fitzgerald, who wrote "The Great Gatsby," once commented to Ernest Hemingway, "the rich are different from you and me."
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He meant it pejoratively. He meant it negatively. To Fitzgerald, the wealthy led a life of privilege, of indulgence, and of selfishness.
If Fitzgerald was right about the rich generally, he was most certainly wrong about Sheldon Adelson. If I can paraphrase Fitzgerald, Sheldon wasn't different from you and me, he was different from all the other rich.
In Fitzgerald's world, the wealthy are self-indulgent. In Sheldon's world, he cared about every human being.
In Fitzgerald's world, the wealthy have personal lives that are dysfunctional. In Sheldon's world, he loved his wife Miriam more than anything in the world and his eyes beamed with pride and adulation when he was with his children and grandchildren.
In Fitzgerald's world, the wealthy are devoid of values. In Sheldon's world, what mattered most was his boundless commitment to the causes he and Miriam believed in – strengthening the State of Israel, protecting the Jewish people and ending the plague of substance addiction.
Tammy and I have only known Sheldon and Miriam for a little more than four years, since just before I became the US Ambassador to Israel. But in those four years we had a lifetime of adventures together, working so hard, and succeeding, to solidify the US - Israel relationship in new and historic ways.
I had the privilege to witness first hand the values of the Adelson's and they are extraordinary. They begin and end with a commitment to family and to placing the needs of others above themselves, values that Fitzgerald would not recognize as attributes of the wealthy, but values nonetheless that make Sheldon such a truly unique and transformational human being.
History will record Sheldon Adelson as the greatest philanthropist in Jewish history. But those who had the privilege to know him will recall his massive, joyous and caring heart. So special, so memorable and so unusual.
Sheldon, I loved sharing with you the opening of the US Embassy in Jerusalem, the opening of new discoveries at Ir David, the City of David, and the opening of the Medical School at Ariel University. But Tammy and I enjoyed just as much sharing a cigar with you and Miriam and our kids on your mirpeset, on your balcony, in Tel Aviv.
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We have lost a great American hero and a great hero of the Jewish people. Tammy and I will miss him terribly.
May his memory be a blessing for us all, T'hi Nishmato Baruch.
David M. Friedman is the outgoing US ambassador to Israel.
