Yizkor Memories

Rabbi Melanie Aron

Saturday, October 14, 2006

In recent years we have come to learn how malleable memory it. Sometimes this is a big problem. Courts have discovered how unreliable witnesses can be in identifying defendants. They can be lead by questioning, influenced by the order of a line-up, and respond to suggestions made by those interviewing them. What they seem to remember clearly, may not be so. Psychologists have identified the process by which false memories can be implanted or memories transformed over time. New information, dreams, and fantasies can get mixed together and when rehearsed, get firmly implanted as memory.

In Judaism, remembrance, yizkor, is too important to be left to chance. Remembering is formalized through yarzheit, the marking of the anniversary of the conclusion of a life, as the ship of life returns from its voyage and sails into harbor, and through yizkor. Yizkor was originally recited only on Yom Kippur, when the books on all souls are open, and we, the descendants of the deceased, can add to their merit, through the good deeds done, the charity donated and the prayers recited in their memory. We are given an opportunity to add a final chapter, a postlogue as it were, to their lives on earth.

Yizkor on the three pilgrimage holidays was a later custom based on the traditional Torah readings for the last day of these holidays which mentions the importance of donations, and the custom of giving charity in memory of our loved ones. Yizkor as we currently observe it with the reading of names was a creation of the Jews of Rhineland German. In response to the devastation of the Crusades, great yizkor books were created for each community with the listing of the names of the dead. Following the Holocaust in our own time, this tradition was renewed by many lost communities.

The extent to which memory is malleable and we have a chance to create another chapter in our memories of the deceased is viewed positively in Judaism. Sometimes we lose loved ones when we are still immature or not yet ready to focus on our relationship with them. Sometimes through speaking with their friends, family members or work associates, or through our own growth, we have profound insights into their lives that come only after they are gone. Keeping their memory alive by continuing some value or good deed that was important to them in our own lives, allows them to be a blessing in our lives.

Remembering, Reciting, Rewriting. Remembering our loved ones; reciting the prayers that help us find comfort; and continually rewriting the story of their lives, year after year, as we continue to grow in our own experience and understanding.