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Bereavement
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Kaddish Leon Wieseltier PB £7.99 |
| When Leon Wieseltier's father died in 1996, he began to observe the rituals of the traditional year of mourning, going daily to the synagogue to recite the Kaddish. This is the story of Wieseltier's search for an understanding of the Kaddish.
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A mourner's prayer, recited by the offspring of a deceased parent, the Kaddish is recited in Lublin and Prague, in New York and London, in Moscow and in Tripoli - in fact, wherever there is a Jewish community. Even people who ordinarily never set foot in a synagogue will recite the Kaddish when a parent passes away and on the anniversary of their parent's death. But what is it that makes this prayer so deeply moving and relevant? In this endlessly fascinating book, the authors set out on an around-the-world journey to unravel its powerful mystery. Their fascinating text explores changes in interpretation across communities and cultures, its part in Medieval times as a vehicle to make sense of persecution, Christian influences, the musical and tonal complexities of recitation, concepts of death, as well as the prayer's rich and complex history. Including stories, memories, travelogue and input from scholars and rabbis, "The Mystery of the Kaddish" is a beautiful voyage of discovery about a prayer which does not actually speak of death, yet has been moving the hearts and spirit of communities for centuries.It traces the origin, history and growth of the most famous and meaningful prayer in Jewish liturgy. |
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An innovative integration of Jewish tradition and modern professional resources gives spiritual insight and healing wisdom to those who are mourning a death, to those who would
help them, and to those who face a loss of any kind. This revised edition features a new introduction, new writing exercises, and resource lists.
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| For over thirty years
Jews have turned to Rabbi Maurice Lamm's classic work for direction
and consolation. Selected by The New York Times as one of the ten
best religious books of the year when it was first published in
1969, The Jewish Way in Death and Mourning leads the family and
friends of the deceased through the most difficult chapter of
life-from the moment of death through the funeral service, the
burial, and the various periods of mourning. Now, in this thoroughly
revised and expanded edition, Rabbi Lamm explores a wide range of
new issues and questions that Jews of the twenty-first century must
address. Special consideration is given to the subjects of organ
donation, autopsy, the question of a woman's right to say Kaddish,
mourning practices as they relate to the stillborn, the
permissibility of converts to Judaism to mourn their Gentile
parents, and
the bereavement
rights of individuals who by Jewish law are not required to mourn
but who nonetheless wish to express their grief in accordance
with Jewish tradition. In addition to exploring the sensitive issues
that the contemporary mourner must confront, The Jewish Way in
Death and Mourning is remarkable in that it
gently leads the mourner through the corridors
of Jewish law and teaches the aching heart how to express its
pain in love and respect so that it might begin on the
road to eventual healing.
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"I live with contradiction. A friend once said to me: Our children are our teachers. In death, Koby is teaching me more than I have learned from anyone alive. I live knowing that suffering teaches wisdom and a depth of infinite compassion. I live with the horror of my son's brutal death and the immense, magnificent beauty of the wadi intimately tied together. The Zohar says that you can have a heart with a chamber of pain and a chamber of joy joined together. That is my heart. When you died, I couldn't eat anything for three days. My friends begged me to eat something. Finally, I said: "I'll eat watermelon." I didn't remember that I had eaten watermelon at your birth. But as I ate it, I remembered being in the hospital room with you the day after your birth. I nursed you and held you to me, and then ate the watermelon my friend Ella had brought me. As the sun rose and the birds called out to me, a chorus of cheeps and squawks, you and I nestled together like a mother bird in her nest with her baby bird, and I felt that the whole world was nursing or suckling. Now after your death, the watermelon reminds me of fertility, a pregnant belly, the rosy flush of creation. But a circle has closed. I eat watermelon again. I am giving birth to your soul, a soul free of the constraints of body, a soul that can fly up to God and bask in delights...". |
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