25 Sep WE DON’T FORGET

Yizkor. To remember. On Yom Kippur we
remember the loved ones who are no
longer with us.
Those who are fortunate to still have their
parents, leave the shul prior to the
recitation of Yizkor. What should they do
while they wait outside for the davening
to resume? Talk about the weather? Catch
up on what’s new in everyone’s family?

Discuss what’s on the menu for the break-
fast?

My brother, Rabbi Yisroel, shared that
Rebbetzin Batsheva Kanievsky a”h
would say that those fortunate enough not
to be saying Yizkor, should also daven.
Make a personal tefilla that their parents
be healthy, strong and well. That next
year IY”H, they will once again be
amongst those who merit to leave the
shul during Yizkor.
As Jews, we believe that a person is
comprised of both physical and spiritual
elements. When one passes away, the

physical departs from this world, but the
spiritual, the eternal neshama, lives on.
The neshama is forever watching over us.
While the neshama can no longer perform
mitzvos, we, the living, can do for the
neshama, elevating the soul to attain
higher levels of kedusha, purity. A person
should never feel saddened that once a
parent has departed, they can no longer
do for them. Yes, the loss and pain are
real, but we can do mitzvos in their name,
and connect to them through our good
deeds.
Yom Kippur is translated as Day of
Atonement. In the Torah, it is referred to
as Yom HaKippurim. The Rama suggests
that the plural – HaKippurim – signifies a
double atonement, for both the living and
the neshamos above. By pledging to give
tzedaka as part of the Yizkor tefilla, we
ask of HaShem, “ May the departed be
bound b’tzror hachaim, in the bond of
life, together with the souls of Avraham,
Yitzchok and Yaakov; Sara, Rivka,
Rochel and Leah”.
Additionally, by saying Yizkor and
mentioning the names of relatives no

longer with us, we recall their good deeds
as a merit for us.
There is a separate Yizkor prayer for
those who died al kiddush HaShem, the
martyrs who died sanctifying the name of
HaShem. “The holy and pure ones who
were killed, murdered, slaughtered,
burned, drowned and strangled…” I think
of the zeides and bubbas I never met. The
lives cut short in the Holocaust. All the
lives lost in the wars in Israel, and
particularly over these past two years in
Gaza. The suffering and torture so many
endured.
May all their souls be elevated to a place
on high. Yizkor – we must remember
always.
It was the winter of 1946. Simon
Wiesenthal, then a 38-year-old Holocaust
survivor was in a Displaced Persons
camp in Germany. The camp had an
American rabbi serving as a chaplain,
there to give guidance and comfort to the
broken-hearted.
The American government learned that
the Nazis created an exhibition of Jewish
artifacts and Judaica.
It was to be a museum to show that Jews
once lived. Hitler and the Nazis believed
that the Final Solution would, G-d
forbid, succeed in obliterating the
Jewish race, and our nation would
become a relic of the past.
The Jewish chaplain was asked to go to
view the collection and report back on
his findings. He asked Wiesenthal to
accompany him, and the two were off.
They found candlesticks and kiddush
cups that graced many a Shabbos table.
Candlesticks that heard the brachos of
so many women, as they ushered in the

Shabbos. The whisper of many-a-
mother’s private prayers as she lingered

before the flames. Kiddush cups that
once held wines of blessing, bringing
kedusha into the home every Shabbos
and Yom Tov. They saw sifrei Torah,
siddurim and tefillin. Both the chaplain
and Wiesenthal were alone in their
thoughts, surveying the rooms, thinking
of the lives lost.
And then, Wiesenthal heard a piercing
cry. The chaplain was holding a siddur,
his hands trembling, as he pointed to an
inscription. There, in a woman’s
handwriting, was the following:
“I am begging for whomever finds this
siddur, to help avenge the death of the

Jews of Europe.”
There was a signature beneath the
message. In a shaky voice, the chaplain
said, “It’s my sister”. While he managed
to escape Europe in time, his sister was
ensnared in the vast Nazi killing machine.
Under the signature were haunting,
chilling words. “The murderers are
among us. I hear them in the next house.
Avenge our death.”
A young woman’s cry to be remembered.
Yizkor!
“The Murderers Among Us” became the
title of Wiesenthal’s book on Nazi
criminals. The poignant message
inscribed in the siddur never left
Wiesenthal’s heart and soul. It shaped his
life and became his mission.
(The full story can be found in Small
Miracles for the Jewish Heart, by Yitta
Halberstam and Judith Lowenthal)
The New York Times Magazine relates a
story of Simon Wiesenthal spending a
Shabbos at the home of a Holocaust
survivor, who became a successful
jeweler. Prior to the war, Wiesenthal was
an architect. His jeweler friend asked him
why he never went back to designing
homes. Simon Wiesenthal replied, “You
are a religious man. You believe in G-d
and life after death. I also believe that
when we come to their world, and meet
the millions of Jews who died in the
camps, and they ask us ‘What have you
done?’, there will be many answers. You
will say I became a jeweler… but I will
say I didn’t forget you.”
Yizkor. We Remember.