Rabbi Yehoram Ulman, who led the service, had to pause and collect himself as he paid tribute to Matilda’s short life.
“The tragic, so totally cruel, unfathomable murder of young Matilda is something to all of us as if our own daughter was taken from us,” he said.
The service heard how she had lived with beauty, goodness and righteousness.
“The Jewish … believe that death is not eternal … it is not because we are naïve,” Rabbi Ulman said.
“I’m telling you with absolute conviction that the separation with Matilda is not forever.”
Still, he conceded that his words would likely offer little comfort – something he knows too well. A day earlier, Rabbi Ulman spoke at the funeral of his own son-in-law, Rabbi Eli Schlanger, who was also killed in the attack on Bondi.
“You give me strength at a time when you need strength yourselves. And I try to do the same,” he said to Matilda’s parents, who sobbed in the front row.
Ms Chernykh earlier said the family was devastated.
“I look at their faces [and] I don’t know if they will be ever happy again,” she said of Matilda’s parents.
Matilda’s younger sister, from whom she was “inseparable”, is shattered and confused, she said. “She doesn’t have enough tears to cry.”
On the same day the massacre’s youngest victim was laid to rest, its eldest was too. A service for Alex Kleytman – an 87-year-old Holocaust survivor – was held at the same funeral home on Thursday morning.
In a statement, his family said he died doing what he loved most: protecting his wife Larisa and celebrating his Jewish faith.
“The two gunmen killed him, but his memories, his legacy, and his books will bring light for generations to come,” it read.