Shemini

Aaron the High Priest was silent in the face of his son’s death, “vayidom Aharon”. We therefore don’t really know what he felt, whether anger, intense pain, or sadness, or perhaps a combination of emotions. It is a poignant moment when his innermost feelings are kept private from us.

In contrast to Aaron, we know the feelings of Judah Leon Abravanel, the son of Don Isaac Abravanel, on the loss of his son, who was forcibly converted by the King of Portugal in 1496, never to be seen again. Judah lamented the horrific loss of his son in the poem, Telunah Al Ha-Zeman. He wrote, “Twelve years have passed since I have seen my child. I can find no rest, no comfort…The memory of him has robbed me of sleep. I have hung my harp on the weeping willow, transformed my song into lamentation.”

Aaron and Abravanel responded to personal tragedy in very different ways. Aaron was silent, while Abravanel wrote. In doing so, they demonstrated to us that there is no one way to mourn. Some choose to express their feelings, while others prefer to grieve in silence. Every person reacts to loss in his or her own way.

For this reason Rabbi Yosef Karo ruled that at a mourner’s home, a comforter must wait for the mourner to initiate conversation before speaking (Shulchan Aruch Yoreh Deah 376:1).