In Loving Memory of Asher Shmuel Chaim ben Tziona V'Ephraim

My wife and I lost our precious and beloved son, Asher, a few months ago. He was only ten years old. Obviously, this tragic event, prompted many questions. One of the questions is, that one mourns a father or a mother for an entire year, while for other close relatives, including a child, the mourning period (Avelut) is only thirty days.

It would seem that these allotted times of Avelut (mourning) are perplexing. After all, while the loss of a parent is certainly a tragedy, it is, however, the way of the world. As King Solomon says in Kohelet, "Generations come, and generations go." Young people grow into adulthood, have families, grow old and eventually pass on to a better world. While one should mourn and feel the tragic loss of a beloved parent, it is truly different than the loss of a beloved child. Should not the prescribed mourning period be even greater for a beloved child than for a beloved parent, for losing a child is not a natural occurrence? Thus, the time frame for expressing one's grief for a child should logically be commensurately extended more than for a parent. Why then is the mourning for a parent an entire year while for a child only thirty days?

Rabbi Yitzchak Hutner makes a profound observation in response to this perplexing question. He explains that when a parent passes away, another link in the chain that stretches back to the Mount Sinai Revelation is severed. The son or daughter who loses a parent suddenly becomes one more generation removed from that unparalleled experience that we call Matan Torah. For that loss one mourns and grieves for an entire year.

We can derive from this remarkable statement that the underlying motif behind mourning is totally different from what logic might dictate. One does not grieve only because of his personal loss. He also mourns his spiritual distancing from the Mount Sinai Revelation. This is a concept that is inscrutable to most people. We understand a parent's relationship to a child in a different light. Parents provide the bridge to a previous generation, one that brings us closer to G-d's speaking to us directly at Kabbalat HaTorah. Our relationship with our parents is no longer just a matter of mundane DNA, a flesh and blood affiliation. It is also an eternal, spiritual experience.

Honoring one's parents now takes on a new meaning. We give respect to their spiritual heritage not just to an individual. Therefore, we honor our parents because of what and who they are and not merely as a consequence of our physical relationship to them.