The Torah praises Aharon HaKohen’s silence in the face of tragedy. What distinguishes silence from speech? Should Aharon not have eulogized his two sons for all the exemplary qualities they possessed? Should he not have wept copious tears over the terrible personal and communal loss of two such shining stars? Horav Aviezer Piltz, shlita (Rosh Yeshivas Tifrach), explains that, when Moshe Rabbeinu said, B’keruvai Ekadesh v’al pnei kol ha’am Eichabed; “I will be sanctified through those who are nearest to Me, thus, I will be honored before the entire people” (ibid 10:3), Moshe responded, “I knew that the Mishkan would be sanctified through someone within whom G-d’s glory reposes, but I thought it would be one of us. Now I know that they were greater than we are.” When Hashem imposes His Strict Justice on those closest to Him – regardless of how righteous they are – He is feared and honored. After all, if this is the way He deals with the ones He cherishes most, can one begin to imagine the fate of a sinner?
When Aharon became aware of his sons’ extraordinary spiritual stature, he realized that any verbal expression on his part describing his sons would barely scratch the surface. Speech has limits. Words are framed by syntax, confined by vocabulary and ultimately restrained by the human being’s verbal and analytical prowess. In the space allowed for words, could even Aharon HaKohen find the right words that would deliver the greatest impact and present a full appreciation of his sons?
Tears? As raw and unfiltered as weeping may seem, they are limited by the body’s ability to express itself through tears. Tears erupt – they flow – and then they cease. It is all about the restraint of boundaries.
Not so with silence, because silence has no boundaries. While articulation is confining, silence is elevating, because it can penetrate free of the limitation associated with words. In a eulogy, the speaker or writer attempts the impossible: to compress a life well-lived into the space of sentences and paragraphs. Even the most gifted writer, the most prolific speaker, will find this to be an almost insurmountable challenge. Silence allows the mind to expand, to bear fruit, to focus on aspects of a person’s life not attainable through words. Silence cannot be compressed or restrained. It allows for the loss to be felt from all perspectives.
Aharon understood that this tragedy and his sons’ unique spiritual stature were beyond comprehension and, thus, defied explanation. Any sound would have repressed the pain, because it would relegate the sound to a confining structure. Silence, by its very nature, has neither structure nor boundaries.
I have always wondered on Rosh Chodesh or other festival-oriented days when we do not render a hesped, eulogy, whether this is, in fact, “fair” to the neshamah of the deceased. After all, hesped is an expressed appreciation of a person’s life and achievements, an opportunity to gain a deeper respect for someone who no longer walks among us. Why should the “timing” of one’s petirah, death, affect his hesped? Having developed deeper insights into Aharon’s silence and understanding that, in fact, this, in and of itself, was his hesped, we realize that the most powerful hesped may be the one which is not delivered. When a community gathers to pay silent tribute to a fallen member, heads bowed, eyes filled with tears, hearts heavy over the loss, it is in such stillness that the niftar’s life achieves its greatest eulogy. Sounds fade; words fail. Silence is enduring.
Chanah, mother of Shmuel HaNavi, prayed to Hashem from deep within the recesses of her heart. “Only her lips were moving, but her voice was not heard.” Horav Nachman Breslover, zl, explains that her tefillah came from such depth that sound would have diminished it. He explains that a silent scream breaks inner barriers that confound sound. A silent scream can shatter one’s spiritual apathy, emotional paralysis, despair that for a number of reasons has frozen. For some people, that is exactly what they need.
