About Memorials

Today I packed in to a crowded room and stood silently for a full minute as a siren rang to remember the 6 million Jewish men, women and children who were murdered only 68 years ago in the Holocaust. Tears streaked my cheeks and my son looked concerned. My daughter, who's two, asked "what, Mommy? Why crying?"

I looked at my daughter, and my son and I looked out the window at the azure Jerusalem sky, and I realized in that moment that I wasn't crying for the lives that were lost, because a soul can never be lost. I was crying because those souls are right here. They are all around us, living, breathing, thriving. I cried because I am a Jewish woman, and I am here. And my husband and my beautiful children are standing in Jerusalem, in the place where our ancestors were told that their children would be like the stars in the sky. You know what's funny about the stars? You can't count them, that's the meaning we're taught in grade school. But here's another meaning, they are enduring and vast.

I looked in my daughter's eyes this morning and I saw in those eyes the eternity of the stars and the promise of a future so vast and so abundant. And I knew in that moment that we are their living souls carrying on the lives and the dreams that are never lost. And by thriving, by living a full and abundant life, we are their memorial.

The Danger of "I Know"

A mentor of mine said at a recent seminar that the most dangerous two words in the English language are "I Know." The minute you say those two words you are guaranteed to stunt your growth. Because behind those two words are a belief that you own the knowledge and don't need to continue learning. To really know a thing is to experience it, he said. Until you experience and apply a concept or an idea or a thing, you don't know it and that's good, because it means you keep asking and learning.

I thought about that, and realized that the Hebrew word and concept of "to know" supports that same definition. ידע (pronounce ya-DAH) means know, and when it's used in Torah it is very much referring to experiential knowledge. In fact, it is the word in the Torah that is used when referring to the intimate relations of a couple. And isn't that the truth of sex, at it's core? To truly "know" someone is to "experience" that person in the fullest sense. And interestingly, the word which means "witness" is עד (pronounced ehd), same letters. Not a coincidence that to witness something, especially in a legal setting, you better darn well have been there and seen it!

So that got me thinking about the four children who are mentioned in the Haggadah in the Pesach story. The story is of 4 sons, the wise one, the wicked one, the simple one and the one who doesn't know how to ask. Each of the first three asks a question and receives an answer appropriate to the question. The last son, we are told, "you will open for him and answer..." the really interesting thing is that this last son is given the same answer as the wicked son. But the way we're taught about these children in school is that the four sons are a family and the "one who doesn't know how to ask" is the baby! So how can you give an innocent baby the same answer as the wicked son, who's question is so antagonistic?

When you really think about this, it makes no sense at all to equate the non-asking child as a baby, because babies probably know better than anyone how to ask questions! In fact, the simple son, who's question is just, "what's this?" is much more congruous with what a child would ask. And even the wicked son who seems to have no desire to include himself in the community of the Jewish Nation and wants no part in the miracles that occured or the obligations they imply, asks a question.

So really who is a person that doesn't know how to ask? It doesn't say, "is afraid to ask, is too insecure to ask, doesn't want to ask" it says "doesn't know how to ask." And then it occured to me. The only way you wouldn't know how to ask is if you've stopped learning. If you think you already know. And that is why he gets the same answer - and with less interaction. With the wicked son, the haggadah says, "you knock out his teeth and tell him 'Because of this God took me out of Egypt' me and not him, because he eliminated himself from the question." To have such an emotional and interaction with someone indicates a deeper connection with that person. But the last son, it just says, "you open for him and say, 'Because of this God took me....'" Nothing else, no additional interaction. Because, you know what, he's not listening anyway. He thinks he already knows.

Be wary of those two dangerous words and always keep asking!

Shabbat Shalom!
~Ayelet