The Book of Death: “Remember!”
“What’s brave, what’s noble… And make death proud to take us.”
– Antony and Cleopatra, IV, 13, William Shakespeare (1607)
The High Holidays focus on The Book of Life being inscribed, then sealed therein. And yet, the most heavily attended service at the climax, Yom Kippur, is The Book of Death: “Yizkor! Remember!”
As a community accommodation, some Shuls offer extra, separate, stand-alone Yizkor services to non-members, commonly standing-room only.
Why is the demand so great?
Because it is our only formal religious opportunity to sanctify our departed loved-ones by name. Reciting Kaddish, we memorialize them anonymously. Yizkor allows us the satisfaction of reciting that precious name we love, and miss.
There’s something else unique about it. Unlike Kaddish, we don’t require a Minyan. We can recite it alone, anywhere, even at home.
Frankly, I prefer that. Candidly, I need it.
Why? Because I need to take my sweet time.
Shuls allow us seconds to recite a few names under our breath. I have more than a few names. And I want to say them out loud.
Not for God’s sake. He can hear me even if I only think them. For my sake.
I want to savor their names one more time. I recite each slowly, enunciating individual syllables, to elongate the experience.
Sometimes, I repeat the name because I enjoy saying it’ so much. There’s no rush.
Of course, I begin with my own parents, as well as my surrogate parents, my Aunt Saba and Uncle David, and my parents-in-law (whom I called “Mom” and “Abba.”)
But I had many other surrogate parents, as well. Growing up in a post-Holocaust facsimile of a family, wherever I lived, I adopted my friends’ parents to fill my parental vacuum.
For example, I religiously called my medical-school roommate’s parents before every Rosh Hashanah and Pesach as long as they lived. After they passed, I continued to call my roommate to send them my love knowing he would speak to them. (55 years, and counting.)
Proceeding generationally, I then name my friends, sadly too many, who have predeceased me. Yes, they usually have their children doing it, but the more people who invoke their names, the more they are redeemed. More importantly, for me, every time I mention their names, I am sanctified by being, once again, associated with them.
Finally, painfully, I bless my friends’ children who have prematurely passed. I am always crying at that point. I can’t help myself. Truthfully, I don’t want to.
My tears are simultaneously joyful, cherishing their memory, as well as painful, mourning their loss. Their age, mode of death, religion, are irrelevant. God recognizes them all even if they didn’t recognize Him.
Yom Kippur is our holiest day. What makes it holy to me is not our fasting, our prayers, our tunics, our begging to be sealed in the Book of Life.
What sanctifies it to me is the honor, of once again, being briefly in touch with the most divine people I have ever known, already enshrined in heaven.
We pray to be inscribed in the Book of Life to add years to our life, before we are memorialized in marble.
We recall those in the Book of Death to marble the joy of their lives onto our remaining years.
