Pesah / Yizkor: And You Shall Tell it to Your Child

Stories are the legacies we leave. Certainly, we have headstones and markers that sit above our final resting place. Perhaps we have memorial plaques on the wall or names read at minyan and listed in the Yizkor book. But our true legacy is not something etched into stone or metal. That which remains behind is the memory in our loved ones’ heart. It is the laughter that we bring to our friends and family as they share stories about us, years after we’ve departed this green earth. It is the tears that we cause to run down our children and grandchildren’s cheeks as they remember what it was like to play at our feet. Stories are the legacies we leave and stories are the legacies with which we are left.

This evening, we will close a week of story-telling. If there is one Jewish holiday that the majority of us celebrate, in one way or another, it is Passover. We spend the duration of the Seder – and more or less the better part of the week – telling our story. We speak of our wandering ancestor Jacob. We tell of the Egyptians suffering under the barrage of plagues. We talk about parting waters and challenged faith. We share stories. We share our stories. And those stories blend into story-after-story, chapter-after-chapter. All because of the simple commandment in the Torah: “And you shall tell your child on that day, saying, ‘This is done because of that which Adonai did for me when I came forth out of Egypt’” (Exodus 13:8) – V’higadita l’vinkha bayom hahu lemor ba’avur zeh asah Adonai li b’tzeti mimitzrayim. Because God took us out of Egypt, we eat unleavened bread and tell our Story.

There we are sitting at our Seder table, thousands of years after Moses and Aaron banded together as family to redeem their captive brothers and sisters.

And yet, we try to tell the story to our children and they are not there. We wait patiently for our father’s hallel and our mother’s matzah ball soup, but they too are not there. We listen for our uncle’s Kiddush over the first cup, and our sister’s shouts of glee after she found the afikomen, but alas, they too have not come to Seder this year. We look around the table and see the stain from where our grandmother spilled wine years ago and we can almost spell the smoke of our grandfather’s pipe. But alas, they’re not there.

Although we celebrate this festival of freedom with glasses raised and songs of joy, it is not without the tears in the corners of our eyes as we realize that this year, perhaps like others past, there are empty seats at our Seder. Our Seder is missing our family and our friends.

But we muster up the strength and struggle through our pain attempting to fill these empty seats—and perhaps by the future generations. We strive to fill these seats with those named for our departed loved ones. We strive to fill these seats with the loved ones who also remember the departed. And if we cannot find the inner strength to fill these chairs with actual persons, we ensure that these seats are overflowing with our countless stories. And we tell these stories, from Passover, from the rest of the year, from anytime—stories that we are obligated to tell and never forget.

Never Forget and Always Remember. Yizkor Elokim. May God Remember. We gather together this morning to remember. To remember those loved ones. But how and why do we take a moment to implore God on this festival of freedom to remember our dearly departed? We do so and are able to do so because we must—because it is on this festival that we celebrate our transition from slavery to freedom, me’avdut l’herut. We embrace our ability to break free from the paralyzing anguish of loss and emerge renewed and anew in the light of freedom. Free from captivity but filled to the brim with stories.

We may traditionally read the biblical verse as: And you shall tell your child on that day, saying, ‘This is done because of that which Adonai did for me when I came forth out of Egypt’ – but today, this Yizkor of Pesah, we should reread this verse and understand that it is our endless and tireless responsibility to tell our departed loved one’s story to the future generations – l’vinkha – because only by doing such – ba’avur zeh – can we truly be freed from the narrow straits in which we sometimes find ourselves restrained this time of year – b’tzeti mimitzrayim. Our loved ones’ Exodus comes though us, and it is our personal Exodus that only comes about as a result of our telling their story.

Through stories are we redeemed…is our family redeemed. And we long for that Exodus. At the end of our Seder we recite together, Next Year in Jerusalem – L’shanah Haba’ah biyrushalayim. But Jerusalem is much more than a physical place. It is a state of being and a state of mind. We pray with open minds and heavy hearts that next year we will sit down at our Seder in Jerusalem, the spiritual base and foundation of peace, yerushalayim—personal, mental, spiritual and emotional. We look forward to the next year when we can continue to tell the stories that are burning to come out—a year free from personal plagues of pain of loss and a year when we can truly be liberated with the words of our loved ones on our lips.

For if we do not continue to tell the stories, if we come perilously close to the edge when the stories are not retold, then it is we who have truly “passed over” the opportunity to remember, the most important part of this holiday.