Something was bound to go wrong on the Tzaddik’s first Yahrtzeit. It was a day I had hoped to bring my mother to the cemetery for the first time — for she herself had been too gravely ill to understand at the time that he had actually died. In the next room. In her house….
daily kaddish: for eichmann
[powerpress]
a kaddish for eichmann
Has anyone ever said kaddish for Eichmann? I had this argument tonight. Rh insisted that someone somewhere has mourned him. But that’s not what I meant. I did not mean just a Mourner’s Prayer. I meant a real live authentic kaddish. Maybe even with a minyan. And my thought was no. That it was very…
daily kaddish
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kaddish in two-part harmony
I’ve been challenged to a kaddish a day — for an entire year. That year starts today, right now in fact. On this very line. I’m not sure this is a healthy thing to do, but maybe it’s exactly the right way to work it through. Bibbo tells me of the baths his babalawo prescribes….
what is it about musicians?
I was at the bookstore at the airport, and you know how much selection they have there, don’t you. Close to nothing at all. Couldn’t believe I was traveling without a book in my bag. But then again, the whole point of the trip was to go collect books, so it also made sense not…
on playing kaddish
Mira Amiras’ blog “and this part is true” had a recent post entitled “war stories” about translating the Kaddish, the traditional Jewish mourner’s prayer. She asks, “What does this really mean?” It’s a good question, because the Aramaic text doesn’t say a thing about mourning. It’s a pretty generic prayer, in fact. Here’s the basic…
war stories
We were holding kabbalah study group tonight at Beit Malkhut, and I don’t know how it came up. But you know how study groups go — one topic leads to another. We started with the Kaddish — the Mourner’s Prayer — since all of us had something to mourn, and it was time to explore…
mandelbrot and music: on listening in fractal dimensions
Benoit Mandelbrot died this month. He was the guy who came up with fractal theory, which led to all those gorgeous computer graphics like this one: Last week, my friend and contradance bandmate Tina Fields wrote an essay about Mandelbrot’s ideas on her blog, Indigenize! I found it quite thought-provoking, and it surprised me how much I…