What Brings Them to Shul
It has frequently occurred to me that the few things that bring the largest numbers of otherwise unaffiliated Ashkenazi Jews to the synagogue - mourner's Kaddish, Yizkor, and Kol Nidrei - are all medieval inventions. Two have to do with death, and all three have to do with guilt. This latter may be the prime motivator. But why not anything of a more ancient origin?
Here's an excerpt from Samuel C. Heilman's "When a Jew Dies" that touches on this aspect in the second-to-last paragraph. Note also how he says, without quite saying so, that the Yizkor is a direct imitation of the Catholic "Memento" service.
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Here's an excerpt from Samuel C. Heilman's "When a Jew Dies" that touches on this aspect in the second-to-last paragraph. Note also how he says, without quite saying so, that the Yizkor is a direct imitation of the Catholic "Memento" service.
( Read more... )