Remembrance and Renewal: Honoring Our Memories on Yom Kippur
As we mark the one-year commemoration of October 7th, we also will honor the 1,200 people killed last October when we say Yizkor, a prayer of remembrance, this Yom Kippur. Sadly, last year’s massacre is another tragic moment to be inscribed on the Jewish calendar.
Memorializing tragic communal events is ingrained in our practice and our liturgy. Some historians believe that the Ashkenazi tradition of saying Yizkor originated to commemorate the victims of the Crusades. Each Jew is a monument to a great family tradition that has survived incredible odds. As Jews, we do not build monuments of stone; rather, we fill our sanctuaries with stories. The Jewish library of history is not a building, but a repository of memory that is organic and human, a living breathing history book.
This year, Yizkor will not be a recollection of ancient tragedies long past, but a remembrance of a wound that is still open and raw. This tragedy is ongoing, and yet we pause on Yom Kippur to remember the past, reflect on those we have lost, and process collective and individual traumatic events.
We say Yizkor every year, no matter the situation. Yizkor was recited in the concentration camps during the Holocaust, and when the Cossacks attacked. These moments of pause can become therapeutic at an individual level, and are essential at a communal level to keep people connected.
Yizkor is related to the word “zachor” — both share a root meaning “to remember.” Rabbi Jonathan Sacks points out that the Hebrew language has no word for “history.” It had to borrow one. In fact, the Torah never says to study history — instead, it tells us to remember.
History is written in books, but we are each the repositories of Jewish memory.
Rabbi Sacks explains further:
“There is a profound difference between history and memory. History is “his” story — an event that happened somewhere else to someone else. Memory is “my” story — something that happened to me and is part of who I am. History is information. Memory, by contrast, is part of identity. I can study the history of other peoples, cultures, and civilizations. They deepen my knowledge and broaden my horizons. But they do not make a claim on me.”
Our memory and our personal experiences over the past year are sanctified in the Yizkor service. This balance of personal and communal mourning in the Yizkor service mirrors the experience that is especially relevant this year, as we are remembering and mourning so many people who were close to us while recognizing that each of our individual stories make up the collective whole.
The Torah constantly tells us to remember many things. This Yizkor, we will remember those we lost, and in some way, keep them alive by keeping their memories alive.
As we enter Yom Kippur this year, in light of those we lost so tragically, Yizkor gives us the opportunity to tell the story of what happened to us personally and process it, and to honor and remember those who we lost. Amid ongoing tragedy, we must also reflect on what we have experienced.
I encourage everyone, before the Yizkor service, on Erev Yom Kippur, to write down your own personal recollections of October 7th and its aftermath. Write down what you remember, and your emotions, your questions, and your hopes. Keep these reflections for yourself as a physical symbol of your memory from this past year. Keep these writings for future generations.
Yizkor teaches us that it is our memories which are holy and sacred, and it is in these memories that our loved ones live on.
Daniel Epstein is the Rabbi at George Washington University Hillel where he has worked for the past eight years. When he is not on campus he spends time with his wife Odelia and his three kids Emmett, Emunah, and Ahavaha. He also runs the website cloudyeshivah.com in his free time.
Remembrance and Renewal is a series of reflections around the High Holidays and the first commemoration of October 7 from Hillel educators across North America. Read Rabbi Jessica Lott’s thoughts on entering a new year with old grief and Judith Dworkin’s words on remembering people we have lost through the words of the kaddish prayer.