Kesher Minyan: Mourner's Kaddish

28 Tammuz 5780 Kesher Minyan: Mourner’s Kaddish Anita Diamant Beloved from its earliest days, parts of the Kaddish date from the first century B.C.E. Written mostly in Aramaic–the spoken language of most Jews from the fifth century B.C.E. until the fifth century C.E.–it was recited not only by priests, but by common folk as well Kaddish originated not in the synagogue but in the house of study (beit midrash). After a … scholar delivered a learned discourse, students and teachers would rise to praise God’s name. During the mourning period for a rabbi or teacher, students would gather to study in his honor, and his son was given the honor of leading the prayer. Over time, reciting Kaddish replaced studying as the tribute given to a scholar. Eventually the custom extended to all mourners–not only the survivors of rabbis and leaders. By the sixth century, Kaddish was part of synagogue prayers, and during the 13th century, when the Crusades threatened the Jewish communities of Europe, it became inextricably linked to loss and mourning. Ellen Frankel The Talmud teaches that we are to thank God for both the good and the bad. Even bad news is to evoke a blessing. If, for instance, a man returning home from a journey hears cries of distress from his town, he is not to pray that such cries come from some other house than his. Such a prayer would be futile. What has been ordained has already come to pass (Ber. 54a) Rather he is to declare: Blessed is the true judge. So in the Mourner’s Kaddish, we press our grief into blessing, forcing praise from our mouths at the very moment when we feel most like cursing God. It’s a discipline, like all prayer. The words are not our own, the sentiments do not arise spontaneously from our hearts, the timing is artificial. We may derive no solace whatsoever from the rote recitation of this ancient Aramaic formula, which we do not understand and which, in any event, is so completely divorced from any references to death or loss. Worst of all, perhaps, nowhere does this prayer acknowledge the loneliness of the solitary mourner, who cannot even recite the words without an audience of nine others. And so the community gathers to embrace the orphan, the widow, the one estranged by death. They force her to choose life, to bless God’s will, and to imagine wholeness (shleimah) in place of the brokenness she now feels. The longer version of this prayer, known as Kaddish Shalem contains an additional verse that asks God to accept all our prayers and supplications. Why has this verse been omitted from the Mourner’s Kaddish? Perhaps the Rabbis understood that the mourner’s heart might be moved to ask for what is not possible or appropriate - for the restoration of the dead to life in this world, for revenge, for the ending of the survivor’s own life. Those distressed by the death of loved ones may not always turn to God with prayers and supplications acceptable to heaven - and therefore, they are excused from uttering this request. 1 28 Tammuz 5780 Saying Kaddish Without a Minyan https://www.rabbinicalassembly.org/sites/default/files/2020-03/mourning%20prayer%20w hen%20there%20is%20no%20minyan%20edited.pdf Rabbi Sharon Brous: The Amen Effect The one with a broken heart states, ‘Yitgadal v’yitgadash sh’mei raba’-- or in other words, ‘I’m hurting.’ And the whole community says ‘Amen.’ We don’t even let that person finish the first sentence before we interrupt to say ‘We’re here. You’re not alone.’ Nehemia Pollen and Lawrence Kushner The Kaddish makes no mention of death. But the Kaddish is all about death. It is about the meeting place of two worlds, human finitude and God’s eternity, which, of course, is the transition that the dead must make as they depart their earthly existence and enter life after death. Dov Baer Ratner (1852-1917) speaks of this intersection in his commentary on the Talmud Yerushalmi (Yeb. 15:2). There the text cites Psalm 140:8, “You protected my head on the deay of armed battle.” The Hebrew for “armed battle” (neshek) is read in the Talmud as “kiss.” The verse then becomes, “You protected my head on the day of the kiss.” “Kiss,” Ratner suggests, defines the point where, as it were, the lips of one world meet those of another. Death itself holds no terror for the righteous, but the moment of transition from one world to another, the moment of the kiss -- that is potentially a time of real danger. Indeed, even for a great tzadik, who has served God throughout his or her entire life, the earthly world is, by nature, dark and impure when compared with the blinding radiance of the next world. When, then, a tzadik goes on to the next world of true light and life, the transition is disjunctive, even jarring, like the shock suffered by a newborn infant when it leaves the womb and is born into the bright light of this world. Berakhot 3a It was taught in a baraita that Rabbi Yosei said: I was once walking along the road when I entered the ruins among the ruins of Jerusalem in order to pray. I noticed that Elijah, of blessed memory, came and guarded the entrance for me and waited at the entrance until I finished my prayer. When I finished praying and exited the ruin, Elijah said to me: Greetings to you, my Rabbi. I answered him: Greetings to you, my Rabbi, my teacher. And Elijah said to me: My son, why did you enter this ruin? I said to him: In order to pray. And Elijah said to me: You should have prayed on the road. And I said to him: I was unable to pray along the road, because I was afraid that I might be interrupted by travelers and would be unable to focus. Elijah said to me: You should have recited the abbreviated prayer instituted for just such circumstances. Rabbi Yosei concluded: At that time, from that brief exchange, I learned from him, three things: I learned that one may not enter a ruin; and I learned that one need not enter a building to 2 28 Tammuz 5780 pray, but he may pray along the road; and I learned that one who prays along the road recites an abbreviated prayer so that he may maintain his focus. And after this introduction, Elijah said to me: What voice did you hear in that ruin? I responded: I heard a Heavenly voice, like an echo of that roar of the Holy One, Blessed be He (Maharsha), cooing like a dove and saying: Woe to the children, due to whose sins I destroyed My house, burned My Temple, and exiled them among the nations. And Elijah said to me: By your life and by your head, not only did that voice cry out in that moment, but it cries out three times each and every day. Moreover, any time that God’s greatness is evoked, such as when Israel enters synagogues and study halls and answers in the kaddish prayer, May His great name be blessed, the Holy One, Blessed be He, shakes His head and says: Happy is the king who is thus praised in his house. When the Temple stood, this praise was recited there, but now: How great is the pain of the father who exiled his children, and woe to the children who were exiled from their father’s table. Reciting Kaddish for the deceased is not mentioned in the Talmud, but a Talmudic story does link the living and the dead in a way that influences medieval thinking about the Mourner’s Kaddish. Shabbat 152a-b Rav Yehuda said: In the case of a deceased person who has no comforters, [he has nobody to mourn for him] ten people should go and sit in his place and accept condolences. A certain person who died in Rav Yehuda’s neighborhood did not have any comforters. Every day of the seven-day mourning period, Rav Yehuda would take ten people and they would sit in his place [in the house of the deceased]. After seven days had passed the deceased appeared to Rav Yehuda in his dream and said to him: Put your mind to rest, for you have put my mind to rest. Alyssa Gray The French halakhic work Mazhzor Vitry (12th cent.) links this notion to the Kaddish. Rabbi Akiba is pictured as encountering the spirit of a dead man in great distress. Understanding that such distress vanishes if a son recites Kaddish for the deceased, Rabbit Akiva finds the man’s son, teaches him Torah, and has the son lead services along with the Kaddish, to save his father. Other medieval sources, especially the Rokeach (Eleazar b. Judah of Worms, 12th-13th cent.), develop the notion that reciting Kaddish saves one’s parents from punishment. Shulchan Arukh Orach Chayim 56:1,4-5 LAWS OF THE CONGREGATION'S RESPONDING TO THE KADDISH: One should have concentration when answering to kaddish. {Gloss: And one does not interrupt between "Y'hei Sh'meih Rabbah" ("May the Great Name") and "M'varakh" ("be 3 28 Tammuz 5780 blessed") [Hagahot Asheri in the name of Or Zarua wrote regarding the first explanation: "One does not interrupt between "Sh'meih" and "Rabbah" and according to the explanation of the Ri: do not interrupt between "Rabbah" and "be blessed"].} One should answer loudly and strive to run to hear Kaddish.

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