“Their Kaddishes”

I was already a young adult before I had ever heard the term, “my Kaddish” – those words that have so often been spoken by a Jewish parent in reference to his or her own child… “He is my Kaddish” – the one who will say Kaddish one day for me. It was never spoken in my presence when I was growing up – perhaps because it was a concept that was a little too Eastern European for my Midwestern American Reform community… perhaps because it was the sort of thing that was said about your young son, but not to your young son.

Whatever the reason, it wasn’t until I was in my twenties and off on my own that I first heard the term, “my Kaddish.” And while I know that the phrase was invented to provide comfort – for the speaker to assure him or herself of a legacy, a place on earth long after death – I have to admit that my first reaction to it was that it seemed a little morbid and discomforting. “Is this what children are supposed to be?” I wondered. “Little grieving machines, created to lament their parents’ passing forever?

Well, it all depends upon how we define grieving… or more specifically, how we define the function of gathering as we do today, to recite Kaddish and our entire litany of Yizkor prayers, as we bring the memories of those we love and miss daringly close to our hearts. You see, there are many who would resist an exercise like this, replete with the raw tears it elicits. “Why affirm the absence?” they might ask. “Why stare at it, when looking away in distraction is so much less painful?”

Those who embrace this exercise know the answer. Yizkor is not an affirmation of absence. Yizkor is our brave acknowledgment of the embedded presence of our loved ones, set so deeply within us – in ways so palpable and so real – that we can almost feel them sitting right next to us, the shape and texture of their hands holding ours, stroking our hair, touching our hearts. They are in us – right here. And being courageous enough to reach for them – to let them in, as we always did back when the exchange was immediate and so much easier – it is both gratifying and heart-wrenching. Yes, it is less painful to look away in distraction. And we all do it… we must, or else we would cease to function. But if we only look away in distraction, neglecting the prospect of daring moments like this one, we pay an unacceptable price to escape our pain. The unthinkable price… the banishment of our beloved dead from our lives.

While we are all sharing this earth together – before death complicates the equation between us – we never even consider such a banishment. We all welcome thoughts of the eternality we will one day grant to those who predecease us – it’s a loving duty that we promise without hesitation. We raise no resistance to it. Before we or they die, it all makes perfect sense. That’s when we treasure having someone – hopefully, multiple someones – to be “our Kaddish.”

My friend and congregant from New York , novelist Steven Schnur, wrote a brief and beautiful essay about his now adult son David, entitled, “My Kaddish.” In it, David is still a very little boy, not even five years old, and his father describes their blessed discovery of each other through their encounters at sunrise, when David awakens… and awakens him. And though the anxiety of parting would likely be the furthest thing from the mind of a fascinated, young dad, still these words conclude the father’s essay, as day turns into night: “This is the boy, I tell myself in the quiet of his shade-drawn bedroom, who will perpetuate my name, say Kaddish over my grave; the one most likely to become me in form and feature, who will carry many of my own thoughts and impulses, who will hear my voice and feel my arms when embracing his own children. This is the son I did not have imagination enough to conceive, fully half the equation of a new world, a blessing beyond words.”

Those who are here today remembering their parents certainly know what it’s like to feel the weight of the honor and the responsibility that David’s father placed upon his son’s tiny shoulders. But the truth is that while those who speak of “my Kaddish” are usually thinking of their children, the honor and the responsibility surely extends to the other sacred bonds that we share and that are loosened by death. For our departed spouses… our departed siblings… even our departed children – we are the ones who are most likely to “become them,” to be compelled by the duty that their memory places upon us, now that they are gone. We are the ones who carry their thoughts and impulses. We hear their voices. We feel their arms when we embrace all those we love, all those who share with us this duty of remembering them.

The Kaddish, as many of you know, does not call upon us to affirm anyone’s absence. Quite to the contrary, being another person’s Kaddish only requires us to affirm God’s wondrous, mysterious, artful way of building this bridge that we can scarcely comprehend – this bridge between life and death. Being another person’s Kaddish demands that we take notice of the embedded presence within us – that we acknowledge the sanctity in those powerful, painful, pristine moments when the ones we miss are so close that it almost frightens us. Being another person’s Kaddish is our way of saying, “I will not look away, even though it’s easier. I will not dodge the tears, even though I fear them. For the price of armoring my heart is simply too severe. And what’s more, there is this promise between us – a promise born from the love that we shared – a promise to sustain the story of your life… the lesson that you taught… the seed you wished to plant.”

This is the contract, spanning the bridge between life and death, that compels us to share in this hour of Yizkor. This is how we Jews remember. It has been that way from the very beginning. Our father Abraham – patriarch of the family to which we all belong – was the first to count upon someone to keep that promise. He chose his beloved wife Sarah – the woman with whom he built his legacy, the woman whose death plunged him into the deep pain of mourning. But long before they were separated by death – back when their story was really just beginning – Abraham told Sarah, “V’chaytah nafshi biglaleich” – “I will live on because of you.”

It was his way of saying to her, “You… you are my Kaddish.” He couldn’t have known then that she would die first… that, in fact, he would end up being her Kaddish. But that wasn’t important then. What mattered was the promise, held firmly between them – “V’chaytah nafshi biglaleich” – “I will live on because of you.”

We know it isn’t easy. Drawing them near used to be our greatest joy. Now it carries a mixture of joy and trepidation and heartache. But our destiny is not to be grieving machines, terminally lamenting what was lost. Our destiny is forever to sustain what was found.

We are their Kaddishes. Let us speak these words in their name.