mourning mourning

At a certain point, I suppose, one just gets sick of the whole damned enterprise. And that's the time to step back and write a paper about it. Which we did. And presented at the Annual Meetings of the American Anthropological Association in Montréal. We just got back. The presentation went really well. Maybe a little too well. It was good to step back and take stock and have something academic to say about the one year experiment.

But this is what I'd say here:

Our Kaddish in Two-Part Harmony was not just a success, it was a grand failure as well.  We set up rules to mourn by—and broke all the rules that really counted.  Maybe if we'd stuck to our guns, we'd still be in mourning-mode today. But instead of immersing in our sorrows and staying there, our sorrows lifted. And after a while, impossible as it seems to me, the sorrow's just plain gone. I mean, is that fair?

Not that that means that we don't miss our dearly departed. No, not that. But we're no longer in mourning.

And I kinda feel guilty about that.  I've put those photos away. I've stopped lighting candles. I no longer say kaddish unless I'm coerced.  The loss is there, but it's not the same black cloud looming overhead. And worst of all: I'm just plain happy. We both are.

Now what kind of mourning project is that?

So. What it tells me is that ritual works. It does the job if you stick to it on a daily basis. And just that doing, day after day, is enough to do the trick.  For us, it did the trick a month early. We were both ready to stop. Stop and move on. But my Kaddish partner is better at keeping on than I am. And because of her, we'll finish the year's experiment in formal mourning on November 27th. Will it feel any different then than it does now?

The main problem is that I've been happy.  Now what kind of mourning is that? And as a result, I haven't written a single word in a month. Except for the paper we presented at the AAA Conference.  But not a word on our blogs. Almost as if writing and unhappiness go together, which has to be absurd, right? Or a very bad habit.

For one month, it's been analysis rather than wallowing in death and dying.

But now, it's time to switch gears. And I can feel those gears heading into some new, strange, and dangerous territory...

kaddish in two-part harmony

I've been challenged to a kaddish a day — for an entire year. That year starts today, right now in fact. On this very line. I'm not sure this is a healthy thing to do, but maybe it's exactly the right way to work it through.

Bibbo tells me of the baths his babalawo prescribes. He's prescribed them to me as well, and I've written them down. Each on a scrap of paper I never find again. Magic! I've been writing on scraps of paper since I was a kid. Thinking I could hold on to an idea, thought or even person, if I've just committed them to written form. That they will be preserved. In such a way, at eight years old I invented the Genizah all by myself. Sacred words preserved, even if I can't ever find them again.

The idea of the baths is to wash 'it' all away — whatever 'it' happens to be. There are also the oils. And they do the opposite: they bring things to you. You let them soak right into your pores. I'm not sure if our kaddish in two-part harmony is more like the Ife baths washing the pain away, or more like the oils, letting them really soak in. Maybe, like a wave, it will be both, flowing in two directions.

Flowing between you and me. Through our fingertips. A responsive reading of sorts. Call and response. Though I'm not sure who's calling and who's responding. Did I call and you responded? No matter. This is all your fault.

And I'm going to accept the challenge on two conditions.

The first, is that we do not meet. Not face to face and not directly by phone. I don't mind a kaddish left on my answering machine. The voice of a horn. But not the voice of a voice.

The second condition is that this not become a tyranny, as in, oh shit, I have to write a kaddish meditation today, what a bummer. So the question is, can I write a kaddish (I'm calling it a kaddish meditation) coming from a place of love (yes, I just said that) or even anger — but not from a place of obligation.

Hers will be a daily kaddish on horn. Mine, right here, for the most part, in writing. But it won't always be right here. We're off to New Orleans shortly, for example. Some of these daily kaddish meditations likely will be transmitted by other means.

The whole enterprise is daunting. An integral transformative practice I was not expecting. But I do know how to do this. And I know how powerful it can be. Or it can be crap.

There's a third condition. And that, through kaddish, I do not fall in love with you. Not sure if there's anything you can do about that. Not sure if it's already too late. But I'm going to reaffirm right here, right now, that this is not about you or me. It's about the material at hand.

Let the kaddish begin.

war stories

We were holding kabbalah study group tonight at Beit Malkhut, and I don't know how it came up. But you know how study groups go — one topic leads to another.

We started with the Kaddish — the Mourner's Prayer — since all of us had something to mourn, and it was time to explore and see what we could ferret out. I was prepared to be thoroughly annoyed. Which is my initial mode in all these inquiries, especially when they have to do with prayer.

I have a problem with prayers.

What bugs me about them is that the melodies completely draw you in, especially when they slip into a minor key or something equally compelling for which I (who know nothing about music) have no language to describe. So there you are sucked in by the beauty of it — and so it works as ritual, and is very powerful, right?

But then you pick at it. What does this really mean?? The Kaddish is in Aramaic, not Hebrew, but it's pretty recognizable for the most part.

My rule in study group is, however, not to assume that we know what something means. Instead, we use our Gesenius Lexicon (which does include the Aramaic) and track down every form of every root until we uncover the mysteries imbedded in the text.

I had very low expectations. But that's what makes it so fun. That's what makes being a Pessimist so rewarding. With such low expectations, the discoveries become minor awe-inspiring miracles.

In English, the translations are sychophantic, repetitive and well, just plain cloying and annoying. There's gotta be more to it than that. Why all the glory, glory glory, going on and on about just how terrific our god is? And what's that got to do with mourning?

Turns out that the Kaddish began to be used for mourning in the 13th century during Crusades and pogroms, as a public affirmation of faith in the face of pogromic annihilation. That is, instead of using the Shma for that purpose. Thus, the Mourner's Kaddish was a public display of adherence to one's faith, and that's why it doesn't say one damned thing that might comfort someone's terrible loss.

The words in English are trite, not just repetitive. But looking them up, a vivid picture emerged. Not one of dying and death and loss, but of a joyous celebration. A wedding, if you will.

And god is the bridegroom. He is adorned with a special turban and set upon a special chair (or throne), and lifted into the air with great exaltation. It's a wedding celebration, joyous, and filled with laughter. Who's the bride? Well, we are. And our recitation binds our union. Our act of unification. And then there's the description of his tumescence (translated as 'might' and 'arising') — it's pretty heady stuff.

In other words, hidden in the Aramaic is an alternate tale that can be uncovered — showing that exultation, showing what form it takes.

Then I checked out Reb Schneerson.

Reb Schneerson says (in an address on the yahrtzeit of Isaac Luria, the Ari), that our remembrance should be filled with joy and laughter, and not be immersed in the sorrow of the day. Which verifies my own deconstruction of the Kaddish puzzle. For, says Reb Schneerson, for on that day, as we honor the Ari, his revelations open to us, and what should we do, but dance and laugh.

Wow, was he right.

He then goes on to say that when we take in this knowledge from those who have died before us, and as we celebrate their yahrtzeit, the revelations sink right into our very nefesh, deeper and deeper and imbed not just into our mind (sechel) but into our physical being. It burrows into our very brains, and creates more convolutions than previously existed.

It expands our cerebral cortex. It expands our brains.

In one fell swoop he goes from mourning, to kaddish to revelation, to increased brain capacity and power. Just like that.

Does the fact that I'm in shock make him wrong?

I mean, what can I say? He's the one who's been proclaimed the mashiach, after all. He's got his science down pat to back him up. Who am I to say he's wrong?

Maybe it was all the talk of Crusades and pogroms. Maybe talk of new knowledge. Dunno.

But out came one of my war stories, that I'd not told in quite a long time, and deserves its hearing right now, right here. A great story, really.

But by now it's late, and my eyes are closing of their own volition, and my head is threatening to crash down upon the keyboard without permission, and I can't possibly give the tale its due. And it just started raining, and got suddenly cold.

And so, I'll save it maybe for shabbes, and for the moment say goodnight. And savor the revelations we discovered in the kaddish. And that Reb Schneerson just maybe, maybe might be right.