The torches that lit the way

From the other side of the bench

By David Seidemann

Issue of October 8, 2010/ 30 Tishrei 5771

My cellphone rang the other day and it was none other than Mayer Fertig, the editor of this fine newspaper. He wasn't calling to inform me that my writing days were over. Rather he called to inform me that his days of publishing and editing The Jewish Star were coming to an end. I was stunned. I always thought I would “hang it up’’ before he would. His new position with Yeshiva University is a wonderful opportunity for him and their gain is truly this newspaper's loss.

Since I began writing for this paper in 2007 I have enjoyed a special relationship with Mayer. I see this new opportunity being afforded to him as an appropriate time for me to reevaluate my relationship with The Jewish Star and Richner Communications, the owners of this paper. On a personal note, I want to thank Mayer for affording me the opportunity to share my thoughts with you, the readers, over the last 3 and a half years. Without Mayer affording me the opportunity, my thoughts would have remained just that, thoughts. I wish him the very best in his new venture.

Speaking of ventures, a few days ago my family ventured to Manhattan to see the classic Broadway production of Mary Poppins. I still become choked up at the end when Mary leaves, never to return to the Banks family. You have to feel sorry for those kids who developed such a close relationship with Mary and who flourished under her tutelage.

You sort of wish Mary could've stayed forever and as is the case in most fairytales — that the whole mishpocha could have lived happily ever after. But such was not the case in the land of make-believe on Cherry Street. Such is not the case in real life either, hope as we wish it would be.

Teachers bring us only to a certain point and then we must fly by ourselves. Therapists bring people to a certain point and then the patient must begin the journey on his own. Editors and publishers build and develop a product only to a certain point. Parents bring children to a certain point and then the child must set sail on his own.

In life, the best we can hope for is to follow in the footsteps of those that walked before us. More often than not, those that did walk before us did so on much more dangerous roads, on much narrower highways without streetlights and the guideposts that we enjoy and without the comfort we afford ourselves. Nevertheless, the distance our ancestors covered and the lessons they uncovered often make our efforts seem insignificant.

Four times a year on Passover, Shavous, Yom Kippur and Shemini Atzeres that lesson is brought to the forefront in a glaring fashion. Four times a year we intoned " Yizkor" the prayer of remembrance that asks G-d to remember the souls of parents, grandparents, uncles, aunts, brothers and sisters all of whom were the "editors" of at least a portion of our personal newspapers, our lives.

How we wish they never left us if only to see how well we learned from them. How we wish they never left us so that they could see how we are clearing the forest for the next generation. How we wish they never left us, for even though they taught us how to fly, we always wanted to fly together, never alone.

Four times a year on our major Jewish holidays when we convene with the souls we are building, we are reminded never to forget those souls that were instrumental in building us. And while the text of the prayer asks G-d to remember them, I can't help but view the text with some poetic license and, though grammatically incorrect, interpret the phrase “Yizkor Elokim” to mean remember the godliness and holiness of our ancestors; remember the godliness — this spirituality they instilled in us; remember that whatever we know about G-d, however we experience G-d, is due in large measure to them. And so we light one candle that burns for 24 hours in honor of a parent, a grandparent or a sibling that had previously lit a torch that has been burning for years.

One by one we bade farewell to the many mitzvot, commandments, that served as our companions these last few weeks. Gone is the shofar, the lulav, the esrog, the hoshannos, and the Sukkah itself. The individual adornments of Rosh Hashanah, Yom Kippur and Sukkos are placed under lock and key. Instead we trade them all in for a general embracing of the Torah of our heritage. On Simchas Torah we dance with that which we acknowledge is our future; a commitment to a way of life that creates stability within the home and on the road. We put all the individual mitzvot aside and dance with the Torah, the singular embodiment of all of the individual mitzvot. For not everyone can be proficient in the details of our religion. Some can muster only a general commitment yet we dance with them, because we are all one family.

One can easily argue that this generation is unprecedented in its learning of Torah and practice of individual commandments. Both the amount of practice and practitioners, scholars and scholarship, rival any time in Jewish history. At the same time, only the fool can fail to acknowledge that without the miles of track work laid by our ancestors, the trains we are sitting on would still be in their stations.

And so we light a single candle that burns for 24 hours in honor of those that preceded us, those souls who carried torches that will burn forever.