Dear Chaverim, this week we offer a print version of Rabbi Rosenblatt’s 2026 Pesach Yizkor address.
Israelis explain the difference between Yom HaShoah – officially ‘Holocaust & Heroism Remembrance Day’ – and Yom Hazikaron – officially ‘Remembrance Day for the fallen soldiers of the wars of Israel and victims of actions of terrorism’ – in the following terms. Yom HaShoah teaches us the price of not having the State of Israel, and Yom Hazikaron teaches us the price we must pay to have our own state. Each of these perspectives translates into important commemorations for us. The early members of the Knesset knew they had to enshrine these remembrances through appropriate memorials and monuments. One such memorial is the famous Yad Vashem.
In establishing Yad Vashem in 1953 the Israeli Knesset debated the biblical meaning and appropriateness of its name. The phrase yad va‑shem was drawn from Isaiah 56:5. Some MKs opposed the term because they did not want to juxtapose Nazi atrocities with biblical language. Others questioned whether a sacred biblical idiom could adequately bear the weight of modern catastrophe or state commemoration. A third group thought only a biblical phrase could capture the enormity of the loss.
Perhaps the argument that solidified the use of the term was found in the context of the source text. Isaiah is addressing a generation – maybe generations – of Jewish men who had been captured, mutilated, and sterilized as eunuchs in the Babylonian and Persian empires. He writes, וְאַל־יֹאמַר֙ הַסָּרִ֔יס הֵ֥ן אֲנִ֖י עֵ֥ץ יָבֵֽשׁ׃ …and let not the eunuch say, “I am a withered tree.” The promise of Isaiah in his time was to remember in future generations those who would have no biological descendants to remember them. Similarly, the promise of Yad VaShem was for the 1.5 million children and countless families taken in the Shoah who would be denied children and future generations of their own.
Yad VaShem are two simple Hebrew words; in fact, two of the simplest. Yad is a hand, and Shem is a name. Yet together they appear in combination only once in the entire Bible. This compound word – yad connected with va [and] to shem has its own special meaning. The full passage is
I will give them, in My House
And within My walls,
A monument and a name –Yad VaShem יד ושם
Better than sons or daughters.
I will give them an everlasting name
That shall not perish.
There are at least three layers of meaning in this term. The Targum Yonatan and the Biblical commentator Ibn Ezra both interpret the term as a place. It is a guarantee of a sacred place to remember these brave, but abused champions of the Jewish people who preserved faith in the face of oppression.
The biblical scholar Sara Yefet offers two other translations. Yad can also mean monument. The first example of this is the monument that King David’s rebellious son Avshalom consecrates for himself in Samuel II 18. This reflects the use of a physical device to create a permanent memory, a durable consciousness. However, Yefet notes that the term used for the creation of monuments is not the verb to give, but rather the verb to establish. Here Isaiah uses the verb to give. This prompts Yefet to search for other meanings of the terms Yad and Shem. Both refer to the portions allotted to individual tribes as an everlasting inheritance in the land of Israel – which are to be maintained by their descendants as a national legacy. Famously, the biblical figure Navot says to the rapacious King Ahab, “it is an abomination to Gd for me to give the portion of my ancestors to you!” –חָלִילָה לִּי מֵיהוָה מִתִּתִּי אֶת נַחֲלַת אֲבֹתַי לָךְ”
Yad Vashem is not just a monument; it is a portion within the walls of the Temple grounds, the holiest space that is given by Gd, one which is to be preserved like the apportioned land given to our forefathers. It is a sacred legacy to be tended and defended.
These words have resonated for us these past weeks and years. We are all fully conscious of the young men and women taken in their prime and who will never become fathers and mothers. Two examples in particular resonate, but only as representatives of the larger phenomenon of branches cut from our national tree of life.
One was the fallen soldier Moshe Katz Z”L. This young paratrooper was a ‘lone soldier’ who declined to take leave to celebrate Pesach with his family. He did not want to abandon his unit, especially given the personnel shortage in the IDF. His relative, Rabbi Hecht, said that “he wanted to do something more and that something more was going through basic training and joining the Israel Defense Forces to protect life and limb of the people that he loved.”
The other is Vancouver’s own Ben Menashe Mizrachi Z”L – who died while giving medical care to others at the Nova Festival. Two weeks ago, Ben’s younger brother Dan was awarded his IDF paratroopers beret in the same unit in which Ben served. The paratroopers have a signature red beret. As soon as Dan received his beret and Tanach in front of the Kotel (Western Wall) we ran over to his parents and swapped his new beret for the one his brother had worn. It was a living embodiment of the unique monument of which Isaiah speaks.
The legacy of these kinds of stories, and the inspiration of those who have paid the ultimate price so that we can have the State of Israel is beyond measure. It is more valuable than real estate in Jerusalem or North Tel Aviv. It is more durable than even the largest family. The curious matter here is that Isaiah framed this in biblical times as a gift to those young men – the eunuchs – who were denied future generations. Yet, it feels rather more like a gift to us, too. The inspiration of Moshe Katz, Ben Mizrachi, and the stories of the 25,642 other soldiers that have similarly given their lives for the nation is a gift to us all.
Radak has yet another interpretation; Yad VaShem is actually the stories of these heroic stalwarts that will be recounted in the halls of the scholars “within My walls,” at the beating heart of the Jewish people. The very first Yizkor — memorial liturgy — was composed to inspire the congregation. In the wake of the First Crusade there were two responses to the violent coercion of conversion and martyrdom in the Crusades. The community embraced the precious valor of the martyrs to inspire renewed commitment to faith and to Torah. Ever since, these memorials and monuments to our fallen have served as a source of peerless inspiration. Isaiah 56 gives us a name for this permanent legacy that should be spoken of again and again: שם עולם אתן לו אשר לא יכרת – an everlasting name that will not be cut off.
Shabbat Shalom,
Rabbi Rosenblatt
