Shabbat Ki Tetze

Written by Rabbi Sandra Kviat Monday, 15 September 2008

We Jews are good at remembering. We remember people, places, and days.   , שמור וזכורwe sing every Friday night.  We remember when good things happened to us and when bad things happened to us.  We remember through prayers, rituals and food.  We especially remember through stories.

We are reminded by names in gold letters on walls and bookcases.  We remember through the names we have and the names that we give others.

Choosing a name for a child is a profound task.  How will the name shape the child and how will the child shape the name?  What impact can a name have on a child? What memories can a name bring to a child and to us?
 
When the wife of my friend Josh was pregnant, she began speculating about the name for the child.  Josh on the other hand was not so worried.  He preferred to focus on praying for the health of the child and mother and was sure that the right name would appear some day.

His wife and he discussed many names but none seemed to fit.  One night, Josh was awakened by a sudden inspiration.  He woke his sleepy wife and exclaimed, “I know exactly the right name for our child if it is a boy!”

You see, there was a story told in Josh’s family about his great uncle Yaakov, who lived somewhere in the pale in mother Russia.  When Yaakov became a father he did not know what to call the boy, but he did not worry.  He was sure the name would find its way.

A few days after his son was born, he set out on dark winter evening to go to the rebbe’s house.  He was walking on the soft snow humming a niggun, when he heard a voice calling. “Yaakov, Yaakov wait a minute”. Shimon the shoemaker came out of a little house and approached him.  “Yaakov, I wanted to ask you something; you know I have no children of my own and no one to carry on my name.  I was wondering whether you would call your son by my name. I would give you 100 rubles!”

100 rubles, Yaakov thought, that is a lot of money.  Imagine all the things I could buy for the family. Shimon is a nice name.  So he agreed, took the money and went on his way.

Not long after that, he heard a voice calling “Yaakov, Yaakov wait a minute”.  It was Malka, the butcher’s wife.  “Yaakov, I was wondering: you know that our only son Shmuel died, and no one will remember him once we die.  I beg you: please call your son by his name so that he will be remembered.  I will give you 100 rubles.”

100 rubles, Yaakov thought, imagine what I could do to the house with that money.  Shimon, Shmuel is not so bad a name. And so he agreed, took the money and went on his way.

The stars were bright and the air crisp and Yaakov was walking, thinking of his baby boy and all the wonderful things he could do for the family, when a third voice called out from an alley.  “Yaakov, Yaakov, wait up”. It was Rachel the candle maker.  “Yaakov” she said, “I have something very important to ask you.  I have only girls and therefore no one to carry my late husband’s name; I was wondering could you not name your son after Shlomo? I will give you 100 rubles!” Shimon Shmuel Shlomo, that is not so bad a name, Yaakov thought. So he agreed, took the money and went on his way.

So, the boy was called Shimon Shmuel Shlomo. But when he grew, up he and his family were all murdered in the Holocaust. Only the story of how he got his name was remembered.

Josh turned to his wife and said “if it is a boy we should call him Simon Sammy Solomon, so that his name will be remembered”.

And so we read this week: Remember what God did to Miriam (Deut.24:8–9), Remember that you were a slave in Egypt (Deut. 24:22), Remember what Amalek did to you (Deut 25:17,19).

We are asked to remember how we were once slaves, how we once walked in the desert, and how we once received a revelation.

We do not just remember how once there was slavery; how we once trudged through the desert for 40 long years.  Every year we try and relive the memories of our ancestors for seven nights.  We do not just remember Miriam; we create new stories about her, we write songs in her honour, we create rituals in her name.

And so we come to Amalek.  We are not asked to remember him, but to do the opposite: to blot out, to erase his name.  We are asked to do the most horrific thing you can do to somebody’s memory: not just to let them fade, or smear their name, but to actively remove their name.  The irony, of course, is that by remembering to blot out, we remember the perpetrator, but perhaps the reason why we are commanded to do that is that this is the only way to remember the nameless who suffered.  By the puzzling command to remember to blot out, we ask questions, and in that way remember those who suffered.

But זכור means more than to remember, more than a memory.  It means to mark or celebrate, it requires an action.  Remembering means doing.  The power of zakhor is to act so that others might not say “Never again”.

And so when we say ז''ל  , “may his or her memory be for a blessing, we actively remember not just that person, but also what that person stood for.  What it is in that memory that we want to pass on to other people.

And so on a day like today, when we remember the victims of September 11, we remember them and not the perpetrators, and we can say in their memory and in Shimon Shmuel Shlomo’s name:ז''ל  , zikhronam livrakha, may their lives and their stories become an inspiration and a blessing so that we remember them by how they lived.