A Time to Remember

On October 7, 2023, on the festival of Simchat Torah – normally a joyous holiday to mark the completion of the annual reading of the Torah– the brutal massacre carried out by Hamas in the south of Israel sent devastating shockwaves throughout the Jewish world. The special exhibit addresses this collective trauma through themes already present in the cycle of the Jewish year, such as destruction, memorial days, and private and collective mourning.

The display spans three focal points in the permanent display of the Mandel Wing for Jewish Art and Life: Simchat Torah, Memorial Days, and the entrance to the Tzedek Ve-Shalom Synagogue from Suriname. It opens with a complex discourse with Tisha B’Av, first through the poem Lamentation for Be’eri by Israeli musician Yagel Haroush, which is reminiscent of the Biblical Lamentations mourning the destruction of Jerusalem. This discourse is strengthened by a set of Sabbath candlesticks, “In Memory of the Destruction of the Temple”, designed by the late Israeli artist Zelig Segal in 1988. Segal created three Sabbath candlesticks in the set, two of which have apertures for candles and may be kindled, while the third is sealed as a reminder that the joy of celebrating the Sabbath can never be complete in light of that which was lost.

In the Memorial Day galleries, Anat Golan’s Keep It Light (2017), a memorial candle-turned necklace offers an innovative Jewish and Israeli version of the mourning amulets or prayer beads often used in other religions. The necklace was created from the metal holders of mass-produced memorial candles – a commonly used object in Israel – cut and shaped into beads filled with wax and strung on a cotton thread, and each group of beads signifies a different stage of mourning (shiva, shloshim, one year).  The necklace symbolizes both a point in time and an ongoing cycle of mourning.

Alongside the necklace, several pins reflect both the personal and collective memory of fallen soldiers and victims of terror: a memorial candle broach (Einat Leader, 2017); “Blood of the Maccabees” pin to honor fallen soldiers; and in solidarity with Hamas’ civilian hostages, a “BRING THEM HOME” dog tag (Tamir Reicher, Neta Zwebner, Meir Arnon, and Gal Piechowicz, 2023), and the yellow ribbon pin (Shaul Cohen, 2023).

Redemption of captives is a supremely important commandment in Judaism, one which has been keenly felt in communities across Israel October 2023. Also on display is a 19th-century charity box inscribed with the words “Redemption of Captives” from the Neve Shalom Synagogue in Paramaribo, Suriname, which had been used to collect money for Jewish prisoners held on Devil’s Island, including French Jewish officer Alfred Dreyfus.

With the closing words of Yagel Haroush’s Lamentation for Be’eri, we hope that evil will eventually pass from the land: “From the wellspring of Thy mercy/my brokenness heal/may the spring of my own eye/water Be’eri (my well).”