Prayers For Hire At Kaddish.com

At twenty years of age

I'm still looking for a dream

A war's already waged

For my destiny

But you've already won the battle

And you've got great plans for me

Though I can't always see

'Cause I got a couple dents in my fender

Got a couple rips in my jeans

Try to fit the pieces together

But perfection is my enemy

An' on my own I'm so clumsy

But on your shoulders I can see

I'm free to be me

When I was just a girl

I thought I had it figured out

See, my life would turn out right

And I'd make it here somehow

But things don't always come that easy

And sometimes I would doubt

I'm free to be me

And you're free to be you

Free To Be Me - Francesca Battistelli

In the Orthodox Jewish tradition, there must be a male head of the household. In this current family it is Larry and Dina’s father, but with their father currently on his deathbed, that role will soon move to Larry, our protagonist. Now with Larry visiting his father on his death bed, there is a conversation there that I think really set Larry’s mindset in motion for the whole novel. Larry’s father blatantly tells Larry that he abandoned their family. Larry’s father ends up clarifying his words by saying Larry is a great son, he is there for his friends and family and helping in any way he can, but he meant Larry has abandoned his faith, which worries his father for Larry and the family’s future. Larry asks why this worries his father, which in turn his father says that since he is dying, when he is in fact dead, he wants everything “done right. Done real.” This “everything done right” is what is leading Larry’s hesitation to start out this story.

In kaddish.com, our author Nathan Englander, does a fantastic job at adding humor to a sticky situation. Englander goes in depth with how Larry feels towards his religion, as well as how Larry’s family feels towards Larry’s lack there of religion. Englander tells the readers a story that some people can probably relate to. They can relate to being raised in a religion, growing up and learning the real world, and deciding whether or not that religion will have any sway in their life moving forward. As readers, we feel the character’s emotions as we read, and this novel had many moments where I was either laughing, gasping or getting my heart strings tugged.

With the passing of Larry’s father, Larry’s sister Dina organizes a shiva in her father’s honor in her family’s Memphis house. Larry attends the shiva and is made highly uncomfortable by the shiva’s traditions as well as Larry is made aware of the duties and responsibilities that now fall to him. Unlucky for Larry’s family though, Larry has chosen a secular lifestyle, meaning he is in fact not a practicing Jew and does not fully believe in their teachings. This harsh reality affects more than just Larry now because since his father died, some responsibilities that fall to Larry are he must attend synagogue, read the Kaddish prayers so his father’s soul can be admitted to Heaven, and many other roles. Specifically for this novel, the Kaddish is what remains the forefront of the storyline. 

The Kaddish is a Jewish prayer for the dead, that must be said every day for eleven months, which Larry refuses to do. Larry doesn’t believe that saying his father’s name will send his soul into Heaven, but that praying or honoring his father in his own way will be good enough. Dina does not take well to the news of Larry refusing to recite the Kaddish which in turn will inevitably put their father’s soul in jeopardy per Judaism beliefs. Dina then gives Larry a way out saying that if he does not recite the Kaddish, he must find a proxy. A proxy being someone who will take Larry’s rights of saying the Kaddish away and recite it in his place. Someone “kosher” so it is done right, and their father can be at peace. That is then exactly what Larry does. Larry finds kaddish.com, a website that has boys in Jerusalem who add a dead family member’s name to their list that they recite daily, to take the responsibility off of people in Larry’s position. Larry then finds Chemi. Chemi is the boy at kaddish.com who will take Larry’s responsibilities to recite the kaddish, and in Larry’s mind, all is now well.

A year later, Larry received a letter from Chemi, saying it has been an honor to mourn the dead in his name. With that letter, Larry cried and realized that his father’s Kaddish was complete and how it has been a full year without his father. Larry’s tears ended up turning from mourning his father to mourning “his lost self”. Two decades later we find Larry, now taken on his Hebrew name Shaul, with a nickname of Shuli as a slight nod to Chemi, happily married with children. We learn that after the completion of his father’s Kaddish, Larry adopted himself back into the Jewish faith and his sister was a big role for that change. Larry would fly down to Memphis to visit his sister and family and some of their Jewish traditions he participated in more of a “I will not be the odd person out” mentality, which nudged him in the direction discovering “his one true self”. Shuli’s family accepted him as a son who was finally coming home. 

Shuli then lived the rest of his life dedicated to the Jewish faith. Shuli met his wife, Miri, while working as a seventh grade Gemara teacher at the yeshiva school where he had gone as a child. Shuli and Miri had two children together, a boy and a girl which leads us more into Shuli’s story. 

Reb Shuli continues his teaching job and we get introduced to a student named Gavriel. Gavriel is a student who has been acting out in school who then ends up sitting with Shuli during recess. During their recess time, Shuli  tries his best to understand why Gavriel is acting out and help him in any way he can. Shuli tells Gavriel some “rumors” that are going on about him, but what Gavriel ends up doing shocks Shuli. Gavriel admits to stealing money from his mother and buying a forbidden candy bar, eating it, and liking it. Gavriel says the reason why he ate that candy bar, that is not kosher by Judaism standards, is because “their” candy looks better than Jewish kosher candy. Shuli then takes this admission as a lesson. He explains to Gavriel that Rabbi’s are not priests, that they do not need to hear his confession, but whether or not he ate a piece of candy that he shouldn’t have or tore a page out of his mesechta, or cheated on a test, that isn’t what the problem is, it is why the sadness he has that caused him to do those things is the problem needing to be faced head on. Gavriel then tells Shuli the reason why he has been acting out is because of his mother and an interaction they had. Gavriel’s father died which shocks Shuli because he was unaware. The school never mentioned anything to him and he then recalled that Gavriel does not stand during the Kaddish everyday which struck a cord with Shuli.

Shuli goes home and is really wrecked that Gavriel’s father has passed, no one knew and that Gavriel does not stand for the Kaddish. While I was reading this, I thought it was a little hypocritical because of how Larry did not read the Kaddish for his father, but as Shuli is now in the Jewish faith and practicing, he is trying to make sure his students follow the rules and roles of their faith journey. Shuli is so bothered by this, but Miri tries to put into perspective that Shuli’s journey outside of his faith is what lead him to where he is now. He needs to forgive himself and try and help Gavriel without making it about him. 

Shuli continues to help Gavriel, but while he is helping Gavriel come to terms with his father’s death, Shuli realizes that in order to be the best version of himself, he needs his rights back that he gave Chemi, in order to recite his father’s Kaddish. Shuli becomes obsessed with receiving those rights back from Chemi, so he recruits Gavriel to help him. In the Jewish religion, Shuli could not use the computer so Gavriel helps Shuli by using the computer and finding kaddish.com, in hopes of finding Chemi. Gavriel gives Shuli permission to use his father as the person who needs the Kaddish. With no reply’s coming from kaddish.com, Shuli takes it upon himself to travel to Jerusalem and get his rights back from Chemi. Shuli finds out the location of kaddish.com seems to be at a yeshiva in Jerusalem, so Shuli leaves Brooklyn and travels to Jerusalem to find the yeshiva. 

Upon Shuli finding the yeshiva, the rabbi does not know what kaddish.com is. Shuli ends up learning at the yeshiva instead that there is a regular sponsor who comes and visits by the nickname Dudu. Shuli finds this interesting and decides to follow Dudu after one visit at the yeshiva. Shuli comes to find out that Dudu runs kaddish.com in a secret room across from the yeshiva. Shuli then learns that kaddish.com is a scam and that Dudu has never said any of the Kaddish prayers that paying customers have requested. After careful decision making, Shuli tells Dudu that he will not tell his secret, but only if Dudu gives full control of kaddish.com to Shuli. Shuli then makes a plan to take kaddish.com and turn it legitimate. He wants to take all of the paying customers that trusted Dudu for years, and add their dead family member’s names to his new list. Shuli realizes that it will be a lot of work, but if he takes 94 of the “old” names, with 6 new customers each year, he will complete one hundred a year for 30 years to set things right. It is a steep climb, but something Shuli seems to tackle with grace.

The book ends with Shuli calling Miri, requesting for her and the children to come join him and build a home in Jerusalem. Miri ends up being happy that her husband is whole now, that his obsession with his own rights is gone and feels that all of the decisions he made in his life, whether it be when he lived a secular lifestyle, or being Reb Shuli, has lead him to Jerusalem, to take over kaddish.com. 

The themes of this book very much highlight life lessons. Englander showcases the hard decision making regarding personal life as well as your religious beliefs. Shuli made it his mission to right a wrong he did to his family and his father from when he was in his 30s. This decision haunted him well into his 50s even though he thought his responsibility was “taken care of”. Shuli put his role in the hands of another, and ended up getting upset because it wasn’t done. Not just in religion, but this lesson can pertain to anyone and anything in your life. 

I picked Free To Be Me by Francesca Battistelli as my song for this review for a few specific lyrics. At the beginning of the song, Francesca sings that, and you’ve got great plans for me, though I can’t always see. These lyrics scream Shuli because he goes his whole adult life feeling like he needs to make up for giving up his rights and responsibilities for his family. He feels as if he needs to “earn” them back and to make up for his mistakes. A few other lyrics in Free To Be Me: I thought I had it figured out, see my life would turn out right, and I’d make it here somehow, but things don’t always come that easy, and sometimes I would doubt. The way Shuli feels at the end of the book, that all of his life choices had lead him to Jerusalem and to making kaddish.com legitimate, is why I chose this song by Francesca. Shuli feels as if God has great plans for him, and if may have taken him a while to get there, but that was in the cards all along. Shuli might have doubted at a time in his life, but he would continue to worship and love God and trust that he is where God wants him to be. 

The reason I have knocked this novel down a star is only due to personal preference. Some of the things Englander did to more modernize the struggles of being in God’s world, while also living in our “human” world were  a bit out of pocket. At the very beginning of Larry’s struggles with faith, the novel mentions porn as being a major temptation out of the Jewish faith. It is only mentioned once or twice while Larry was still Larry, and then the story continued on. It makes sense and I understand why it is mentioned, as stated above, Englander is bringing in real world struggles within the faith community, but it’s how he brings that situation full circle at the end of the story that makes me knock it down a star. No spoilers for how Englander brought it full circle, but I just personally felt like it wasn’t needed. Englander brought so many different emotions out in me while reading this novel, whether it was sadness, joy, pride, etc., but circling back to the porn storyline at the end of the book felt like it didn’t fit. It felt like he only added it in to atone for Larry’s porn watching temptation, but with how the book ended, Englander could have gone in less depth and mentioned it as a full circle moment, not make it a major storyline at the end. 

The journey Shuli experiences while deciding to go to Jerusalem and while in Jerusalem itself is a life lesson that he needed to learn. Shuli was so stuck on giving up his rights to the Kaddish to Chemi, that he didn’t realize what truly mattered and that was to honor his father’s death. At the beginning of the story, Larry specifically mentions that he will honor his father’s death in his own way. We learn that Larry’s father wanted his death “done right”, not just for his own wishes, but also for Larry to become apart of his family’s faith journey. Larry’s father wanted to make sure Larry didn’t end up alone and bitter by not understanding his death wishes. Bringing it back to why I think Larry’s father called out Larry on his death bed was just that. It was a lesson that Larry needed to learn on his own, and it took the death of his father to get him there.

It was so interesting to learn about Judaism while reading this novel because that is not the religion I was raised with. I valued Englander’s form of writing and how he was able to tell a story of Jewish faith while also teaching his readers about it. I was able to understand everything that was going on with a new appreciation for other religions beside my own, but this novel also made me stop and think a lot. Whether that be a Jewish word that I was unsure of or some differences between the Jewish faith and the Christian faith. 

As I have mentioned before, this story brought out a lot of emotion within me while reading. I felt the hate and depression of Gavriel losing his father, the uncertainty of Shuli losing himself, the hesitation Miri had of Shuli going to Jerusalem and finding his “lost self”, as well as the joy Shuli felt when he realized what he was called to do. It was an uplifting story that gave me another pathway and form of thinking. It put into perspective that life and loss can both bring joy, sadness, grief, trials, etc., but it’s the way you move on with your life that makes it count.