shiva

A letter from Isaac brought
the distressing new of my
fathers death. A reply
from home later on my telegram verified
the news.

The news broke my heart and
body for my father was the source
of all my inspiration the guiding
spirit for the whole family.

The news was broken to sister Clara
[and] with her I am observing the Shiva
at her house.

Mothers wish to name Nettie’s child
after father will be complied with.
I cannot now state my feelings,
I am too much overtaken with
grief.

With a trembling heart voice I recited my first Kadish

———————–

Matt’s Notes

It’s best, I think, to leave Papa alone with his grief for the moment and allow him to remember the face of his father, Joseph Scheurman.

————

Only real life can devise such cruel timing. No sooner had Papa wired home the news of his new nephew’s birth than he received word of his father’s death.

The notification arrived by mail, too, meaning Papa’s father must have been dead for days while Papa naively went about his business. I’m sure this made the moment even worse for him because it would have affirmed just how distant and removed he was from the world of his youth. Any hope he might have had of recapturing what he’d lost, of reuniting with his parents and family, of seeing them all in one place, was now gone. He would never dream of home the same way again. A terrible turn for Papa, for whom dreams were so important.

The telegram and the letter from his brother must have remained, side-by-side, on the kitchen table while he wept. Later, he would have put them in his pocket, collected himself and walked to his sister Clara’s house. On the way he would have thought of his other sister Nettie, who lay, resting, in the hospital, unaware that her newborn son had just been named.

2nd day of Shiva

Oh my beloved father is gone.
Never again will I see that patriar-
chal figure which was my father, as
I had hoped.

God called him but I shall meet
him in Heaven when my time comes.
I shall observe the teachings
that my father taught me. But how
he suffered for his children, what
a fight for his very existence he
put up although a cripple in
order to bring up his children in
the most proper way.

May the Allmighty give me the
strength to devote my all to keep
my mother as comfortable as can
possibly be. Among those [that] called today
to offer consolation were Aunt Golde
Cousins Herman Dunst & wife H. Breindel
Shapiro & Jack Zichlinsky of the camp, Pregev
of the shop and others.

————

Matt’s Notes

Papa’s father was a teacher at the Torah Talmud (religious school) in Sniatyn. This would not have made him a wealthy man, but he was undoubtedly an intelligent, authoritative and admired figure. Papa refers to him as a “cripple” because he had a withered arm, and though we’re note sure why I wonder if was a symptom of a more systemic disease that turned his life into a “fight for his very existence.” Even if it wasn’t, I’m sure Papa, who undoubtedly grew up in close quarters with his father and watched him negotiate daily tasks like dressing, eating, writing, and putting on tefillin (ornaments that religious Jewish men lace around their arms and heads during morning prayers) must have seen his struggles as relentless and heroic.

Note that Papa uses an abbreviation of the Hebrew expression Olam Haba in the first line of this entry:

Olam Haba literally means “the world to come,” and Papa uses it here as another way to say “I’ll meet him in heaven.” Later in the entry, he writes the expression Hashem natan Hashem lakach, which means “God gives, God takes away”:

——————-

—————–

References:

• More on the expression Olam Haba from Judaism 101

3rd day of Shiba.

Memories of my beloved father travel
through my mind, oh my heart is
aching so,

This evening after prayer service [they] told
me the old Hebrew consolation

which touched me so.

In my sorrow and grief the visit
of friends offering consolation relives
my suffering a little, Among todays
visitors were Cousins Mrs. H. Breindel
Sheindel Breindel, Badiner, Lemus
and Gravitzky, Sara Alter and
Mamie from the Shop.

I shall devote myself to the worship
of God and say Kadish for the memory
of my dear father.

—————

Matt’s Notes

The “old Hebrew consolation” Papa mentions above can be written in English as hamkom yenachem etchem betoch she’ar aveilei tzion ve’yrushalaim and means “May you be consoled among the mourners of Zion and Jerusalem.” Here it is in Papa’s handwriting:

And for those not familiar, I should explain that shiva or “sitting shiva” (Papa spells it shiba in this entry; b’s and v’s are often interchangeable in Hebrew transliteration) refers to a week-long mourning period following the death of a loved one. The close family of the deceased follow a number of rituals during this week: they recite prayers, go to synagogue, and will sometimes cover their mirrors, eschew chairs for boxes, and refrain from personal grooming to deny themselves comfort and vanity.

It is also considered a good deed for friends to visit the homes of the bereaved. This explains the lists of people Papa records in his shiva entries, including a number of people we’ve met before (his cousins the Breindels and Herman Dunst, B’nai Zion brothers Lemus, Zichlinsky, and Shapiro) and some new characters (Badiner, Sara, Mamie and Pregev from work, and Aunt Golde). In keeping with tradition, Papa’s visitors would have brought food, helped out around the house and refrained from initiating unnecessary conversation in order to let him and his sisters focus fully on mourning their father, Joseph Scheurman.

4th Shiva day.

Sad days for me,

Among those called to console
were Cousins I.M. Eisenkraft,
Friedman of the Camp, and
some Zionists and chalutzim.

My bereavement is such
that I can hardly find any
consolation.

Sara Aarons and Gertie of the
shop also called today.

————–

Matt’s Notes

As someone who has sat shiva for a parent, I can say firsthand that the ritual made a lot of sense to me at the time, if only because it provided a set of instructions to follow when I wasn’t much able to make good decisions or think about practical things. Under such circumstances, you find yourself bobbing and surging among unfamiliar, unpredictable waves of feeling, and it’s a sort of luxury to sink and drown in them rather than struggle to remain reasonable, afloat. And this I gathered just because people dropped by my apartment with bagels, poured my Scotch and handled the pollo a la brasa deliveries from Flor de Mayo, not because I had any feeling for the shiva‘s spiritual underpinnings.

Papa’s relationship to Judaism was far more profound, and we see it here in all its layers. His mere belief was, of course, a source of comfort, but it also inspired his everyday pursuit of Zionist causes and union activism. In turn, the supporters and friends who now filled his house were all related in some way to these pursuits: Zionists, chalutzim (Zionist “pioneers”) fraternal brothers from the Order Sons of Zion. The community Papa constructed for himself, and to which he now entrusted himself, existed almost entirely because of his deep, abiding commitment to Judaism.

Even more importantly, the father Papa mourned was a religious teacher, so to mourn according to Jewish law was to follow his teachings, to remain all the more connected to his memory and his influence. So when Papa writes “My bereavement is such that I can hardly find any consolation,” it is not an exaggeration or complaint — he feels this way because he has been so instructed, and so constructed, by his faith and by his father.

Went to Sniatyner Shul
for services

————-

Matt’s Notes

Yesterday I mentioned how I sat shiva for my father and how I found the tradition helpful even without my grandfather’s deep spiritual attachment to Jewish ritual. But it’s tough to write about Papa’s father’s death, and Papa’s own period of mourning (the Shabbat service Papa writes about above was his first since learning of his father’s death) without my own feelings and memories interfering.

I would like to discuss the role of landsmanshaftn and other immigrant support societies in connection with Papa’s mention of the Sniatyner schul; I would like to explain how the Sniatyner schul was probably not a physical synagogue, but a congregation of people from Papa’s home town of Sniatyn that shared a chapel with several others; I would like to explain how even today’s modern-day Sniatyner society, probably descended from the very group that ran the Sniatyner schul, doesn’t quite know where the schul was; I would like to discuss how, even though landsmanshaftn were less practically important to immigrants’ lives by the 1920’s, an organization like the Sniatyner schul must have been a great comfort to Papa who, unable to travel to the old country to mourn his father, could at least pray for him among people of his home town.

I would like to discuss all that but I can barely think about anything but my father’s death and how I’d like to find some keys to mourning him properly in my grandfather’s diary. In some ways, the circumstances of our experiences were similar. Neither of us had seen our fathers for years when they died. We both entered our periods of mourning with our images of our fathers frozen in time. For each of us, our fathers had become, in the weeks and months leading up to their deaths, transformed by illness and age into creatures we would never know or see.

Yet the distance that separated Papa from his father was real, insurmountable; the distance that separated me from mine was something else, far more confusing, opaque, difficult to map. I may have learned the value of sitting shiva, but perhaps more so because I’d seen, at his tiny funeral where there were not even enough men present for a minyan, how the absence of ritual made the day so much more difficult to negotiate than it could have been. He had been sick for so long, and it had taken its toll on each member of my family differently, and we all wandered away from his grave and into our own heads instead of a room full of people and food and structure. It is impossible for me to remember that day and impossible for me to forget it. It is impossible to change.

How can I hope to discuss what Papa went through when my own memories are so raw and different?

Again Sniatyner Shul,
evening sat down shivah
again

———–

Matt’s Notes

As mentioned yesterday, the Sniatyner shul was likely a congregation of Jews from Papa’s home town of Sniatyn that shared a house of worship with many other such immigrant congregations. Papa’s father was a teacher at the Talmud Torah (religious school) in Sniatyn, and would have been as well-known a figure as any small-town school teacher.

How many people in New York’s Sniatyner shul had known him, questioned him, admired or feared him? How many had heard stories about him from their parents, or had their own stories to tell of his advice, methods, and habits? How well did they know the tones of his voice, the look of his hand as he pointed at a page, the way he positioned his paralyzed arm? How many had sat beside him while he explained a difficult concept, nodded their heads, met his gaze? As Papa sat and said kaddish there on the Lower East Side, how many people consoled him, or kept their distance, or stole glances at him and thought to themselves, yes, I remember his father’s face?

—————–

Since Papa’s diary deals with sitting shiva at the moment, I should again mention that The Lower East Side Tenement Museum Web site has a good depiction of what the home of a mourning Jewish family would have looked like in the early 1900’s. Papa lived alone so his place wouldn’t have looked quite like this, but maybe it’s a closer approximation of what his sister Clara’s apartment looked like a few days earlier.

———

Update — May 19, 2007

A couple of editions of the American Jewish Yearbook from the early 1900’s say the Congregation Sniatyner Agudath Achim was located at 209 East Broadway between Clinton and Jefferson Streets. Papa would have walked about four blocks south from his apartment on Attorney Street to reach it.

Further update: 209 East Broadway is currently the location of the Primitive Christian Church. Reverend Rivera, the lead pastor there, tells me the spot used to be occupied by an establishment called Broadway Manor, a reception and meeting facility that catered to the Jewish community. I imagine that’s where Snityner Agudath Achim, among other congregations, held their services.

Image source: “Khaim Lib, the Talmud Torah [talmetoyre] ‘melamed’ [teacher] with his pupils.” Courtesy of the Yivo Institue for Jewish Research’s People of a Thousand Towns site.

Had Miriam in the house
due to the efforts of Badiner
got up from Shiva.

I had to go to the Barber in
order to appear at the Bris
that Nettie should not notice
and guess of our great loss.

Attended Bris with Badiner
and Philip, and dear fathers
name was given to the baby boy.

I am all upset and
can hardly find any
comfort.

———

Matt’s Notes

For seven days, Jewish law has sanctioned Papa’s immersion in his grief. For seven days he has nursed an icy emptiness in his stomach, felt his limbs tremble, his eyelids drop of their own accord. For seven days he would go for hours without moving, then suddenly be struck with the urge to jump up, outrun the fact of his father’s death, pace around his apartment, only to realize he could not escape his loss and, weeping, set himself back down on a wooden box. For seven days he has scratched his unshaven cheeks, opened his door for friends and relatives, accepted their hugs and looks of concern and trays of cakes and plates of chicken and pots of soup. For seven days he has prayed, reflected, allowed himself to be borne away on waves of feeling and memory. For seven days he has buried himself with his father.

Today, though, the shiva ends, and it is time for Papa to rejoin the living. Incredibly, in a moment that would seem metaphorical if it were not real, he emerges from his week of dark mourning, gets a shave and a haircut, and welcomes his newly-departed father’s newly-arrived grandson into the world. Has Papa’s sister really been in the hospital with a newborn baby all this time? Has the baby really been waiting to take the name of the man who has been the object of Papa’s prayers? Could a week of shiva have a more unlikely, appropriate, or poignant ending?

On a more personal note, while I know Papa’s sadness is not over and his mourning will go on, I hope that I, too, can return to the real world after this week of shiva. I’ve noted before how, in spending so much time with Papa every day, my own moods often mirror his, and it’s never been more true than this past week. There is no way to read and think and write about the death of Papa’s father without thinking about the death of my own, no way to avoid comparison.

Like Papa, I was separated from my father in the years before his death, but not by an ocean, not by emigration forced on me by political and social circumstances. My father was separated from me by Alzheimer’s disease, a form that struck him early in life and removed him, by degrees, from himself and me before his condition had been diagnosed. I was young when his transformation happened, and in confusion and shame and frustration I forced myself to forget him, pretend he didn’t exist, until one day I learned he was dead and suddenly found myself wanting to mourn him properly, gather his friends, say kaddish by his grave, find some way to remember who he had been and not who he had become. By then it was too late, though. I’d become too good at forgetting to learn how to remember all at once.

And so, to dwell with Papa during this week of shiva, to witness his fitting and proper behavior, to watch him pay tribute to a father he struggled to remember and longed to see, reintroduced me to my own improper mourning, awakened the memories of a father I struggled to forget and loathed to see. Is there a way to properly mourn him now? Is that what this last week has been? Have I watched Papa mourn, mourned alongside him, immersed myself in grief in an attempt to learn how to do it right?