Yom HaShoah

April 21, 2009

The setting of the sun last night meant the beginning of Holocaust Martyrs’ and Heroes’ Remembrance Day, the first of three compelling observances over the course of the coming week, with Yom ha Zikkaron next Tuesday blending into Yom ha Azma’ut on Wednesday. On my computer, I managed to find the television broadcast of the opening ceremony at Warsaw Ghetto Square at Yad Vashem. Dignified, somber but not morbid, powerfully respectful of the past and the memory of those who suffered so horribly....somehow similar to our memorials in Durham-Chapel Hill and yet different in some fundamental way. It wasn’t until this morning that I was able to understand the difference.

This morning, Rekefet was standing at my desk, having just finished standardizing the computer signature for my email. In the next room, two colleagues animatedly discussed some issue in Hebrew. A lot of Israeli conversations sound like arguments. At 10 am the commemorative siren sounded. Literally in the middle of a breath, Rekefet stopped what she was about to say. The immediate silence from the next room sounded as if somebody had flipped the mute switch. I stood in silence, my eyes closed, just feeling the immensity of this ritual. The country comes to a halt for one minute of remembrance. When the siren blast ended, Rekefet said that standing alone was upsetting to her, that she was glad that in the schools, children are together for a ceremony as the siren sounds. This is the only place in the world that pauses—-together---as a community---as a people---to respect the memory of this unspeakable experience in the history of the Jews and to ponder our future. According to the Mishna, we were all together at Sinai at the giving of the Law. I think that we are all together on Yom HaShoah.