6 | MAY 18 • 2023
1942 - 2023
Covering and Connecting
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guest column
Rabbi Harold Kushner z”l:
Guiding People in Their Grief
I
n times of grief, people seek
succor. In pain, people cry
out for answers, for support,
for methods to deal with their
loss and grief. Within our com-
munity, people most often turn
to their rabbi, the
spiritual guide
for answers and
support. As a pub-
lic figure in the
Jewish community,
to whom does a
rabbi turn when
facing grief? How
does the rabbi find
solace and resolution?
Within our tradition, the
Torah offers models of grieving
leaders. Just three weeks ago,
on Shabbat, we read Parshat
Achrei Mot when Aaron’s two
sons suddenly died and their
father, the High Priest, brother
of Moshe, was silent. V’yidom
Aharon (Leviticus 16:1). Silence in
the face of loss and grief.
Rabbi Harold Kushner died
on Friday, April 28, and was
buried on Monday, May 1, when
the Torah reading was Parshat
Emor delineating the obligations
of the Kohanim, the priests, to
the dead (Leviticus 21:1) Is it a
coincidence that the American
rabbi, who taught generations of
Jews how to deal with grief, died
and was buried at the time when
our Torah addresses responses to
death?
When modern rabbis have
written of their religious strug-
gles at times of personal trauma,
people have eagerly read their
words. The noted Rabbi Kushner
experienced multiple traumas
surrounding his son’s rare dis-
ease. He responded to each event
by writing, using words to offer
wisdom to others even as he
himself found solace in these
words.
In responding to the progeria
(rapid aging of a child) diagnosis
for Aaron, his 3-year-old son,
Kushner wrote When Children
Ask About God (Schocken Press).
After Aaron’s death at age 14,
Kushner penned When Bad Things
Happen to Good People (Schocken
Press). The latter volume became
an international bestseller trans-
lated into 14 languages. His mes-
sage, like that of the renowned
psychiatrist and Shoah survivor
Dr. Viktor Frankl, was that reli-
gious belief gives one meaning
and purpose in life.
Following Rabbi Kushner’s
death, in an NPR interview
on May 4, his daughter Ariel
Kushner Haber stated that her
father grappled with his theology
“as a very young rabbi … and
throughout my brother’s illness
… It meant so much to him that
he was able to comfort others
with his words.
”
Meaningful words from a
daughter grieving for her father.
Rabbi Kushner and I were
friends who bonded over
words, shared goals and shared
experiences. We were both
Brooklyn boys passionate about
the Brooklyn Dodgers and avid
sports trivia buffs. We both
started college as psychology
majors who changed plans to go
to rabbinical school at the Jewish
Theological Seminary. After
ordination, we both volunteered
to serve two years in the U.S.
Army Chaplain Corps following
which we were both assistant
rabbis to great scholars. When
Rabbi Kushner became the edi-
tor of the Journal of Conservative
Judaism, he appointed me to his
Editorial Board.
PURELY COMMENTARY
continued on page 8
Rabbi Herb
Yoskowitz
Special to the
Jewish News