Being Kaddish

What is Kaddish? Kaddish is not merely a liturgical formula. We say in our tradition that a person is a Kaddish, not merely that he says a Kaddish. What is Kaddish? Kaddish is the declaration that God is supreme, that His kingdom is real, that we hold the visions of it in the center of our being. Kaddish is the proclamation that God, who is above all of our blessings and all our praises, is never the less at the heart of our hearts and the soul of our souls, and is the Source and the Guarantor of all that is good and just and right and beautiful and holy. Kaddish is a turning outward to the world in ultimate concern, even when our own hearts are broken inside and are praying for the peace and the welfare of Israel and mankind. Kaddish is man’s determined struggle to make God King in this world, to bring the peace that reigns in His high places into the places of human habitation. And a Jew is asked not simply to say Kaddish, but to be a Kaddish.- Rabbi Dudley Weinberg