For us to think about: A memorial serves as some sort of closure. But sometimes, while the public is ready for, and craves, that closure, the bereaved family may not be ready for it. They may feel that the memorialization is being built on the ashes of their loved ones. In addition, the bereaved may feel that the memorialization being planned doesn’t reflect the essence of their loved one…and that it is therefore missing the point.
How is such tragedy parsed into something of meaning? Or is it?
Naftali’s words: There were some kaddishes that I thought I would not complete…part sob, part prayer, the words continued, as I tried to breathe through the sobbing that wracked me with a weight of emotion I had no idea existed within me.
For us to think about: Ora Dinah, Naftali’s elder daughter, was seven years old when Avraham was killed. Old enough to know the when, how, and why. Shortly afterwards she made a comment that made Naftali shiver: “Learning Torah doesn’t protect you,” she said. “Avraham was learning and he was killed.” Naftali took her to Rav Reem HaCohen. Rosh Yeshiva of Otniel, someone he could trust to speak to her on her level. Rav HaCohen took a large book, Kuntras HaShiurim by Rav Gustman, off his bookcase. He read an excerpt written by the son-in-law of the author in which he describes the visit of a dignitary to Rav Gustman while he was in a DP camp in Europe. “Nissim uniflaot, miracles and wonders,” the dignitary exclaimed upon hearing about Rav Gustman’s miraculous survival. “Not in the least!” retorted Rabbi Gustman. “By calling my survival a miracle, you are adding your own interpretation to the events. What about all the others who didn’t survive? All we can say is that it was Hashem’s will.”
Naftali gauged Ora Dinah’s reaction. “She was comforted,” he says. “She realized that it is all inexplicable and that we cannot say a word.”
Naftali can be reached through his website, www.tragic-death.com.
