From: heb_roots_chr@mail.geocities.com
To: "Hebraic Heritage Newsgroup"<heb_roots_chr@geocities.com>
Date: Wed, 17 Dec 1997 02:51:58 +0000
Subject: Jewish Prayer - Part 12 (Mourning)
From: JUICE Administration <juice@virtual.co.il>
To: siddur@virtual.co.il
Subject: JUICE Siddur 12 and Evaluation
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World Zionist Organization
Student and Academics Department
Jewish University in CyberspacE
juice@wzo.org.il birnbaum@wzo.org.il
http://www.wzo.org.il
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Course: THE PRAYER BOOK: A WINDOW ON JEWISH THEOLOGY
Lecture: 12/12
Lecturer: Barbara Sutnick and Rabbi Reuven Sutnick
MOURNING IN PRAYER
I cannot think of a more appropriate topic as we are about to
"finish off" our course on the Internet! And if that doesn't
kill you, try this one:
There was once a man standing outside the Jewish funeral
home as a lengthy procession passed. He had the look of
a mourner. His dear friend came up to him and asked:
"Why so sad?" "Two weeks ago my uncle died," the
bereaved man answered. "Oh dear," said his friend
sincerely, "I'm so sorry." "But," the mourner added,
"he left me $20,000." "That's not bad," the second
chimed in, "But why so sad?" "Well, last week my other
uncle died." "Oh, I'm so sorry," his friend offered
soothingly. "But," the first continued, "this uncle
left me $30,000." "Wow, that's pretty good!" But why so
sad?" The mourner answered sheepishly, "This week
nobody died!"
Now, some of you will see this as still another example of
tasteless humor. However, at the risk of sounding crass, I would
like to pursue the reasoning inherent in this joke. The joke does
more than show that there is a silver-lining to every cloud. It
illustrates the emotional schizophrenia that plagues human
existence. Poor us! Our parents (after 120 years) die and we
inherit money and insurance. The first act of re-entry into
normative society after getting up from shiva (the seven-day
morning period) is to probate the will before the out-of-towners
return to their homes!
The sense of dichotomy also exists for the Jewish ritualized side
of mourning. On the one hand, we are confronted with the
overwhelming experience of loss and grief; on the other, we are
responsible to a religious, devotional system which demands that
we acknowledge any and all benefits that accrue to us at any
time:
It is forbidden for one to take benefit from this world
without first [saying a] blessing, and anyone who
BENEFITS from this world and does not say a blessing,
has STOLEN (from Heaven)!
(Talmud, Berachot 35a)
We find a remarkable discussion in the Talmud, in the Rif's
precis:
"A person must bless over the BAD just as he
must bless over the GOOD" -- A person must bless on the
bad "Blessed is the Righteous Judge" (baruch dayan ha-
emet) and receive it (the bad) upon himself with joy,
in the same manner as he accepts the good, as it is
written "Justice and Mercy will I sing." [This means
that] if it is mercy, I will sing; if it is [harsh]
judgment, I will sing ... (Rif, ch. 9, 44b)
Rabbeinu Yonah (on the Rif) is even more explicit. He tells us
that one must bless on the bad with joy and a full heart, and
should experience even the harsh judgment as expiation for one's
sins.
Before I start bringing some of these ideas into focus, I want to
mention two other related texts that really belong in our
discussion this week. After the "call to prayer" (Bor'chu) in
the morning service, we recite the first blessing before the
Shema (see Lecture 6):
Blessed is ... Who creates LIGHT and fashions DARKNESS,
Who makes PEACE and creates EVERYTHING.
This blessing is an adaptation of a biblical phrase. We read in
Isaiah 45:7:
I am the Lord, and there is none else, I form the LIGHT and
create DARKNESS; I make PEACE, and create EVIL: I, the
Lord do all these things.
True to biblical poetry, we see here the use of parallel phrases.
In each phrase, the first element is the positive; the second is
its negative. Furthermore, light and darkness are opposites;
peace and evil are opposites. The prophet tells us that the
belief in total monotheism brings with it the awful (and
sophisticated) realization that God is the source of EVERYTHING -
- even of opposite extremes.
Returning now to the blessing from the siddur, we can see that
the precise symmetry of language is not there. In the blessing
peace is still parallel to light; but here EVERYTHING is placed
in the position parallel to darkness. Instead of saying (as did
Isaiah) "Who creates peace and evil;" we say in our prayers "Who
creates peace and everything."
Question: Do you personally consider this alteration of the
language a welcome change? a necessary change? a change that you
would have left unchanged? Please e-mail your thoughts.
Now, I see a common thread in all the texts quoted. Evil,
suffering, discomfort, death, mourning are all part of the
overall fabric of God's creation. There is no monotheism, no "I
am the Lord, your God" if we don't attribute all that we
experience as negative to the God who took us out of Egypt. Even
our suffering bears the specific mark of the Divine. Therefore,
for Isaiah and indeed for those who fashioned the blessing of the
siddur based on Isaiah, "everything" deserves its proper
acknowledgment in ritual! Make no mistake about it, even though
Isaiah's language has been smoothed over a bit in the siddur,
most students of the Bible hear very clearly the echo of his
words in the prayer we recite. The upshot: amazingly, the
blessing "Who forms light and creates darkness" is a general
blessing which also blesses over evil!
I submit all of this to you because I think the Jewish religious
philosophy is highly integrated. I furthermore think the rituals
of the siddur display this integration in words and lead us to
experience it in action. What do I mean by this?
Think for a moment about the experience of bereavement. If we
consider the elements in this experience which might occasion
prayer, we would have to include: the immediate care for the
person who has died, considerations of the afterlife, the needs
of the survivors, and the expression of the community towards one
of its bereaved members. At a later point, we would want to add
to this list annual commemorative behavior. Now when I stated
that the siddur leads us to experience in words and action the
full integration of Jewish theology, I meant that:
a. Ritually, we affirm that the Source of our bereavement is
God, the same Source of our greatest joys and successes;
b. Ritually, we acknowledge the correctness of a judgment
which we don't like, which runs contrary to our human
concept of pleasure;
c. Ritually, we acknowledge that the Source of our recovery,
will be the same as the Source of our current misery, which
is also the Source of our joys, etc.;
d. Ritually and publicly, we undertake to affirm at each
daily prayer service the correctness of the judgment;
e. Ritually in tandem with our community, we reenact the
acknowledgment that the judgment was correct, over a
protracted period of time, the length of which depends on
the relationship with the deceased;
f. Ritually, we acknowledge both in the funeral service and
in the annual memorial service, the dual aspects of Judgment
and Mercy which prevail in the situation of bereavement.
Please don't miss my favorite word: RITUALLY. As has been
pointed out many times before in this course, to understand the
siddur's spin on Jewish philosophy, think RITUAL!
To affirm the source of bereavement and acknowledge the
correctness of judgment are connected ideas. As part of the
burial service we recite the words "God has given, God has taken
away -- may the great Name of God be blessed." This clearly
acknowledges, no less explicitly than the passage from Isaiah
quoted above, the connection between our suffering and the Source
of our joy: the God who takes is the same God who gives.
However, there is another moment in the mourning service which
expresses the same idea even more poignantly. At the time the
mourners tear "k'riyah," (rend their garments, which is done just
before the funeral service begins) they recite the blessing
"Baruch Dayan ha-Emet" -- "Blessed is the Judge of Truth". This
is a riveting moment, since the sound of a garment tearing in a
quiet room shocks like no other sound. However, the moment of
tearing k'riyah, which is combined with the blessing "Judge of
Truth" is also significant in its uniquely ritual context. After
a person dies, but before the funeral, the closest relatives of
the deceased immediately attain the status of "anninut". This is
the time period prior to burial when it is assumed that the
relatives will be attending to the needs of the deceased.
Consequently, in Jewish law, these relatives are free from all
positive commandments (i.e. the "thou shall's" -- as opposed to
the "thou shall not's!"). They do not pray with the community,
wear the tallit (prayer shawl) or tefillin (phylacteries); nor do
they count towards a minyan. They are, in essence, free from
ritual and from community involvement. But, the act of tearing
k'riyah and reciting the blessing affirming the judgment of the
"Judge of Truth", draws the mourner immediately back into the
world of ritual. In the same way that not eating matzah the day
before Pesach intensifies the experience of eating matzah on
seder night, so here the mourner's ritual deprivation makes
his/her "acknowledgment of the correctness of the judgment"
(Tzidduk HaDin) even more intense. After all, what ritual
experience is there anywhere in Jewish life more theologically
critical than a person's affirmation of Divine Judgment while his
"dead lies before him?"
To summarize briefly: the mourner's recitation of "Judge of
Truth", particularly in the context of a ritual deprivation which
temporarily removes him/her from the community, derives from the
siddur's integrated theology. The mourner acknowledges the Source
of bereavement, not unlike Isaiah; s/he affirms the judgment s/he
has suffered as s/he reenters the ritual community.
The concept of a ritual community, particularly as it relates to
prayers of mourning, features prominently in the final moments of
the funeral service. As the mourners turn away from the now
closed grave of their relative, they pass through two lines
formed by members of the community. They are greeted with the
words "May God grant you comfort along with all those who mourn
of Zion and Jerusalem." These are the words traditionally used
by members of the community to comfort mourners during the shiva
visit. They are also spoken to newly bereaved mourners by the
community of pray-ers when the mourners enter the synagogue on
Friday night. These words are a corollary to Tzidduk HaDin
(acknowledging that God is the Judge of Truth): the mourner
affirms Divine Justice and the community reassures him that he
will find comfort in God, like all those of the community of Zion
who have suffered bereavement before him.
This ritualized "give and take" (i.e. responsive verbalizing)
between the mourner and the community is also a central feature
of the most well-known mourning prayer, the Kaddish. Please read
the following excerpts from Kaddish:
May His great name grow exalted and sanctified in the world
that He created as He willed. May He give reign to His
kingship and cause His salvation to sprout and bring near
His Messiah, in your lifetimes and in your days, and in the
lifetimes of the entire family of Israel, swiftly and soon.
Now respond: Amen.
(congregational response) AMEN. Y'HEI SH'MEI RABBA
M'VORACH, L'OLAM U'LOLMEI ALMAYA. (May His great Name be
blessed forever and always.)
We notice that within the text itself there is a directive to the
community to respond. Scholars of Jewish prayer have noted that
the communal response is actually the most ancient part of the
Kaddish text. They also note that these Aramaic words (the
Kaddish is written in Aramaic, the lingua franca of the Jews of
the Talmudic period) -Y'HEI SH'MEI RABBA M'VORACH, L'OLAM
U'LOLMEI ALMAYA - is actually the same as those found in a
classical Bible translation (Targum Yerushalmi) of the verses
Genesis 49:2 and Deut. 6:4: "Blessed is the Name of His glorious
kingdom forever and always." The Hebrew of this verse is cited
throughout the Talmud and midrash as a community response to
prayer (the second line of the Shema, for example). Thus central
to Kaddish, both practically and textually, we have the Aramaic
version of our most significant Scriptural community response.
*SIDDUR SEARCH* The mourners' Kaddish may be found at the end of
most services in most prayer books. *EUREKA* It is recommended
that you read through it in English to fully absorb its meaning
and style.
Looking at the text the mourner recites, we can understand that
it is ritually, psychologically and theologically reminiscent of
his experience of bereavement. This is true, even though the
Kaddish does not refer to the dead or to death at all. Its words
acknowledge that God is responsible for EVERYTHING (remember
Isaiah 45:7) according to His will, and that this is a cause for
sanctifying God's name. This is an acknowledgment of Divine
Justice, the key religious element in the mourner's reentry to
the ritual community. Here too, the community answers. Please
read the following statement about this community response, and
see if you can explain why the Talmud finds it so significant:
R. Yehoshua b. Levi says: Whosoever answers "Amen. May His
great Name be blessed forever and always" with all his
might, the harsh decree is averted (i.e. he is forgiven for
sins)...
(Shabbat 119b)
It is because "Tziduk HaDin" and its associate "Sanctification of
the Name," are a great statement of faith and trust in God's
justice. In addition, they achieve significant weight, since
they are expressed PUBLICLY and in community dialogue.
(Certainly to make a theological statement publicly has more
weight and accountability than to make it privately.) The
community's response actually activates the process of public
sanctification of God's name. As the verse says: "I will be
sanctified amongst the children (plural) of Israel". (Lev. 22:32)
The relevance of a continued public acceptance of Divine Justice
throughout the period of mourning is understandable. Think of
the normal response an individual has when faced with the loss of
a close relative. He frames his rancor in the terminology of
justice: "Why me?" "Why him/her?" "S/He was so good?" "Why did
s/he have to suffer?" "Why do the good die young when there are
so many rotten people out there, who live to old age?" "THIS IS
NOT FAIR!!!" In Jewish theology, the ritual of Kaddish is the
mourner's publicly declared acknowledgement that IT IS FAIR (even
if this is difficult to face.) To this the community responds
"Amen." Ritual and practical theology go hand-in-hand.
There is one other prayer for the dead which I wish to touch on.
Both at the funeral service and at the annual memorial (Yahrtzeit
in Yiddish; Hazkarah in Hebrew), and during the holiday memorial
service, we recite the Prayer for Mercy, E-l Maleh Rachamim:
O God, Full of Mercy, Who dwells on high, grant proper rest
on the wings of the Divine Presence ... for the soul of
(mention name)...May his/her resting place be in the Garden
of Eden...
Three elements are striking here: 1) there is specific mention
of the deceased by name, 2) we pray on behalf of the dead for the
repose of the soul in the Garden of Eden, and 3) God is
represented in one attribute only, vis. as Full of Mercy. This
conforms more closely to the pattern of request that we have seen
before in petitionary prayer, than to the other prayers of
bereavement we have discussed in this Lecture. However, it is
the last point which catches my attention. The entire experience
of bereavement and the ritual affirmation of Divine Justice
(Tziduk Hadin) is based on a recognition that God is the Source
of EVERYTHING. He is the Righteous Judge, even when His judgment
does not fit our own concept of what is fair. We are directed to
publicly acknowledge God's righteousness, specifically at that
time when every fiber of our being screams that our suffering is
not right. Yet here, we turn to God in the aspect of pure mercy!
What's going on here?
For me, the answer lies in the contrast and in the sequence.
Both in the short term (the funeral service) and in the long term
(the larger calendar year), the Prayer for Mercy follows Tziduk
HaDin. As for my second point, in Gesher HaHayyim (an important
work on Jewish mourning ritual by R. Tukachinsky, see vol. 1, ch.
33, 2:7), we learn that there are those communities in which the
mourner does not recite Yizkor (including the Prayer for Mercy)
during the first year after bereavement. While the author feels
that this custom is inappropriate, he nevertheless acknowledges
that it has its basis in traditional sources. I simply wish to
note that refraining from reciting Yizkor/Mercy until after the
full run of Kaddish has been completed, expresses important
religious sensibilities: we can be prepared to see God in the
aspect of Pure Mercy only when the year-long process of Tziduk
HaDin has been completed. Likewise at the funeral.
It has been a pleasure and a learning experience for me to teach
this course, as I hope it has been for you out there in
Cyberspace. At this time, I would like to thank my husband,
Rabbi Reuven Sutnick, for the copious research, original ideas,
unique turns of phrase, and never-ending supply of jokes that he
generously contributed to every lecture of this course. We have
all been the beneficiaries! I would also like to thank the many
students who participated in "Siddur Discussions" in Cyberspace,
and to let you know that the gates of Cyberspace have not closed
simply because the last lecture of the semester has gone out!
Please keep your questions and comments coming.
Barbara Sutnick
FOR FURTHER THOUGHT
Why do you think a minyan is required for reciting Kaddish?
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