Kaddish: Praise from the Darkest Place

The Gemara at the very beginning of Berachos (3a) tells a story that I believe is the heart of this lesson. Rabbi Yosi said: “Once I was walking on the road, and I went into one of the ruins of Yerushalayim to pray.” Eliyahu HaNavi waited for him at the entrance until he finished, and asked him what he had heard in that ruin.

Rabbi Yosi answered: “I heard a heavenly voice cooing like a dove and saying: Woe, that I destroyed My house, burned My Sanctuary, and exiled My children among the nations.” Eliyahu told him: not only at that moment; three times every day it says so.

And then Eliyahu adds the words that touch us here: when the Jewish people enter the synagogues and the houses of study and answer “May His great Name be blessed”, the Holy One, blessed be He, nods His head and says: “Fortunate is the king who is praised like this in his house. What is there for the father who exiled his children, and woe to the children who were exiled from their father’s table.”

Look where the answer of Kaddish is first heard: in a ruin, in exile, in the hour of pain. The children are far from their Father’s table, the house is burned, and still they come together and say: may His great Name be blessed. That is what this lesson is about. (In the Gemara’s words, the answer is half Hebrew, הַגָּדוֹל; our siddur says it all in Aramaic, רַבָּא.)

Kaddish is never said alone. The Gemara (Berachos 21b) teaches that “any matter of holiness is not said with fewer than ten”, and learns it from the verse “I will be sanctified among the children of Israel” (Vayikra 22:32). The word “among”, תּוֹךְ, appears also in the story of the spies, “separate yourselves from among this congregation”; there the congregation, the עֵדָה, was ten men: twelve spies, without Yehoshua and Kalev.

The Alter Rebbe brings this as halachah (55:2): Kaddish, Borchu and Kedushah are not said with fewer than ten. And (56:4) the ten are not ten speakers but a congregation: nine who listen and answer, and one who says it.

This is one more reason why Kaddish is a comfort. A mourner cannot say it in his room. He must come out, stand among ten Jews, and they must answer him. Rabbi Yerachmiel Tilles writes on Chabad.org that having to say Kaddish in public “also helps to move the mourner beyond personal woes and to start thinking more communally.” Who counts in the ten, and what to do when they are not there, is a question for your rav.

The Gemara (Sotah 49a) asks a frightening question: after the destruction, Rava says, every day’s curse is greater than the day before; so on what does the world stand? And it answers: on the Kedushah of the Sidra, and on the “Y’hei sh’mei rabbo” said after Aggadah, after the words of Torah taught to the people. It quotes a verse that speaks of a land of darkness “without order”, and reads it: where there is order, where Jews keep these holy “orders”, light shines out of the darkness.

That is the key to the language. Tosafos (Berachos 3a) explains that it was customary to say Kaddish after the derashah, the public lesson, and simple people were there who did not all understand the Holy Tongue; “therefore they established it in the language of Targum, which all understood, for that was their language.” Tosafos also rejects the idea that it is in Aramaic so that the angels would not understand.

Rabbi Tilles adds that Aramaic was the main spoken language of our people from the destruction of the first Beis HaMikdash until after the Talmud, and draws the lesson: “we can see how important it is for the mourner to understand the prayer he is saying.” He also brings, in the name of the Zohar, a deeper reason, as cited: using an everyday language for holiness is itself part of making His Name great in the world.

This is why the grammar of this lesson is Aramaic grammar (§G39 to §G43). It is close to Hebrew, and a little effort opens every word.

The Gemara (Shabbos 119b) brings a teaching of Rabbi Yehoshua ben Levi: “whoever answers Amen, y’hei sh’mei rabbo m’vorach with all his strength, his sentence is torn up.” And Rabbi Chanina explains the word Amen itself: it stands for אֵל מֶלֶךְ נֶאֱמָן, Keil Melech Ne’eman, “Hashem, faithful King”.

The Alter Rebbe writes this into his Shulchan Aruch with great force. The holiness of Kaddish is greater than all the other holinesses, and there is more mitzvah in answering Kaddish than in answering Kedushah (56:1). One should concentrate well on “Amen, y’hei sh’mei rabbo”, for whoever answers it with all the strength of his concentration, a sentence of seventy years is torn up; and one should answer aloud, “for this voice breaks all the accusers”; but not with great shouts that would make people laugh (56:2).

“With all his strength” is explained in HaYom Yom, as we will see in the next section: not loudness, but being totally immersed in the words.

The Alter Rebbe (55:1) writes that Kaddish is said wherever there is a break in the order of prayer, and no fewer than seven Kaddeishim each day, after the verse “Seven times a day I praise You” (Tehillim 119:164). He lists them: after Pesukei d’Zimrah, after the Shemoneh Esreh, after U’va L’Tziyon, after Ashrei at Minchah, after the Shemoneh Esreh of Minchah, after the blessings of the evening Shema, and after Maariv. He adds that every person should take care to answer at least ten Kaddeishim every day.

Rabbi Dovid Zaklikowski, on Chabad.org, describes four kinds in our daily prayers:

• Chatzi Kaddish, the half Kaddish, said by the chazzan between sections of the prayers;
• Kaddish Shalem, the complete Kaddish, also called Kaddish Tiskabel, said after the Amidah, with an extra line asking that our prayers be accepted;
• Kaddish Yasom, the mourner’s Kaddish, the complete Kaddish without the line on accepting the prayers, said after separate parts such as the Song of the Day;
• Kaddish d’Rabbonon, the Kaddish of the Rabbis, said after learning words of the Sages, with the added paragraph Al Yisroel.

He notes a fifth Kaddish, said after a burial. The Alter Rebbe explains why the complete Kaddish waits until after U’va L’Tziyon: it returns to the Shemoneh Esreh, “for it says ‘May the prayers be accepted’” (55:4). And the commentary of our siddur notes that the first Kaddish of the day is the Kaddish d’Rabbonon before Hodu, a prayer for the whole Jewish people, in the spirit of loving every Jew before we pray.

Many people think of Kaddish as a prayer for the dead. Rabbi Tilles writes: “even though it is chanted by mourners, it is not a prayer for the dead. Exactly the opposite.” There is not one word about death in it. It is only praise of Hashem and a longing for the perfection of His world.

Why, then, do mourners say it? He gives two reasons: it is an honor for the soul that its “representative” stands up and sanctifies Hashem’s Name; and above all it is a great merit and help for the soul. Rabbi Zaklikowski writes that the sanctification of Hashem’s Name through the child of the departed “brings great satisfaction and elevation to the soul”. And Rabbi Sholom Ber Hecht (Sichos in English) notes something beautiful: “We say the same Kaddish for a Tzaddik … and we recite the self-same Kaddish for our dear departed loved ones.” The same words raise every soul.

A story is told, which Rabbi Tilles brings, of Rabbi Akiva, who met the soul of a man who had died and was suffering; only if his son would say Borchu and Kaddish could he be released. Rabbi Akiva found the boy, taught him, and when the boy said Kaddish in the synagogue, his father was released. (I bring it as Rabbi Tilles tells it.)

And there is something even greater than Kaddish. Rabbi Tilles writes: “When the children lead good Jewish lives, full of mitzvah observance and Torah study, this is even more meritorious for the soul of the parents than saying Kaddish.” And he ends with the verse: “the living should place it upon their hearts.”

Who says Kaddish, for whom, for how long, and when there is more than one mourner, are questions of practical halachah and custom; ask your rav.

The Alter Rebbe gives the answer of Kaddish great care (chapter 56). Here is what he writes, for learning; the practice itself, as always, with your rav.

• One sentence. “Y’hei sh’mei rabbo m’vorach l’olam ul’olmei olmayo” is the Targum of “May His great Name be blessed forever and to all eternity”; therefore one does not pause between “y’hei sh’mei rabbo” and “m’vorach”, so as not to break a sentence in the middle (56:3).
• Every vowel counts. One says מְבָרַךְ with a patach under the ר, which means “blessed”; with a tzeirei it would mean that He blesses others. And לְעָלַם with a kamatz under the ע, and וּלְעָלְמֵי with a ו (56:3). This is explained in the grammar section (§G43).
• B’rich hu. “D’kudsho b’rich hu” is the Targum of “the Holy One, blessed be He”; in our countries one does not pause between “b’rich hu” and “l’eilo min kol birchoso” (56:6).
• No talking. Eliyahu was once found with four thousand camels loaded with wrath against those who speak between “Amen y’hei sh’mei rabbo” and “yisboreich” (56:7).
• Bowing and three steps. The chazzan bows five times in Kaddish: at Yisgadal, at Y’hei sh’mei rabbo, at Yisboreich, at B’rich hu, and at Amen; and after Kaddish he takes three steps back before Oseh shalom, as at the end of the Shemoneh Esreh (56:8).