Letters to the Editor - September 25, 2026

The Tunes that Live On

I found the article “Discovering the Power of Song on Yom Kippur” (Sept. 18) by Prof. Dr. John Loike exceptionally moving, as I have always known that music is the language of the soul.

When I was a young girl, I loved to hear my mother sing in her beautiful voice, and when I grew older, I used to harmonize songs with her.

Very sadly, at the end of her long life, she no longer spoke or opened her eyes. Yet on what was to be her last birthday, I sat down next to her and started to sing the songs we had sung together, and all of a sudden she turned her head to face me and her lips moved for the next hour.  I was crying, but I kept singing and she kept trying to sing.

That was her final gift to me.

Thank you for that beautiful article.

Naomi Klass Mauer
Jerusalem

An Even Earlier – Middle-Eastern – Source for Dipping Apple in Honey

After the edition of the paper with my article, “The Apple in Honey: A Minhag with a Misconstrued Past” (Sept. 11), went to print, while preparing for Rosh Hashanah I came across a reference to this minhag in the Tur, writing in Toledo, Spain, prior to the Abudraham, though with no details beyond an offhand reference.  

I also want to add that my brother, Professor Zev Hirsch (himself a Torah scholar and the author of Sefer Ze’ev Yetruf, and a talmid of Rabbi Doniel Lander and Rabbi Yisrael Neuman), informed me that Sefer Ha’Agudah, written by Rabbi Alexander HaKoken of Frankfurt (one of the martyrs of the Erfurt Massacre), mentions the apple in the honey as an established minhag in Ashkenaz. While the Tur and the Abudraham both did not cite its origin, Rabbi Alexander HaKohen cites “Kasvu HaGeonim” as his source, though which Gaonic writer is not mentioned in the copy I saw. This provides an even older origin in Bavel, hundreds of years prior. 

Sefer Ha’Agudah was written in 1348, eight years after the Abudraham wrote his sefer. So while the oldest source we have is from Spain, in the Tur and Abudraham, it seems I was in error in establishing Spain, or the original Sephardic world, as the place of origin of the minhag. It seems its origin is in what is today Iraq, and while today that is considered part of the Greater Sephardic World, also known as Eidot HaMizrach, and therefore can be considered of Sephardic origin by today’s standards, it is not literally Sephardi in the sense of what would have been considered Sephardi in the 14th century, which is the Spanish-Portuguese community.

So part of my article – citing Spain as the origin – seems to have been in error, but the writings from Spain seem to be the ones that the Achronim cite for the establishment of the minhag. However, my criticism of secular historians claiming an Ashkenazic origin and the Maharil as the source still stands, and as noted above, the sources I discovered establish those historians as even more wrong. 

One of the important things when writing on Torah is to seek the truth, and if new information comes to light, I wish to make sure it is corrected and hope the new information only enhances our appreciation of the minhag of the apple in the honey.

Dovid Hirsch
Via Email

Shared Names: A Sephardic Tradition

Regarding Rabbi Reuven Chaim Klein’s article about the origins and history of Ashkenazic names (“The Journey Hidden in a Name,” Sept. 18), I would like to point out a beautiful naming tradition among Sephardic Jews from Syria, Egypt, Lebanon, Turkey, and other communities.

In many Sephardic families, children are traditionally named after their grandparents. The oldest daughter is often named after her paternal grandmother, and the oldest son after his paternal grandfather. As a result, many cousins may share the same name. When someone meets a grandchild bearing that name, it immediately brings the grandparent to mind.

Over the years, many grandchildren have proudly shared names with their grandparents – names such as Rachel, Isaac, Sara, Hymie, Abdo, Charlie, Nahan, Morris, Elliot, Abie, Fatima, and Latifa.

This beautiful tradition also helps families trace their history. The repetition of names from one generation to the next can preserve the memory of grandparents, great-grandparents, and great-great-grandparents, creating a living connection to generations that came before.

Within a single community, you might find six men of approximately the same age who all have the same name because they were named for their grandparents. Far from being confusing, this repetition is a source of pride. Each shared name carries with it the memory of a family and the generations that preceded it.

Just as names can preserve the history of a people’s journey from one country to another, they can also preserve the history of a family from one generation to the next.

Raquel Hanon
Via E-mail