It so happens that Rosh Hashanah 5787/2026 falls on September 11th, the 25th anniversary of the terror attacks on 9/11. Given that it’s now the quarter century anniversary/commemoration there’s more emphasis on 9/11 this year. What messages can we learn from this coinciding date and current consciousness?
THE 9/11 HIGH SCHOOL HISTORY CLASS CHALLENGE
I was driving this week and heard a piece of history teachers discussing the disconnect with today’s generation of High School students. Here you have teachers for whom 9/11 was a seminal historic moment, they remember exactly where they were, the impacts were deeply felt. It’s not something they read about, it’s something they and their families lived through and experienced. It’s a part of their story, it shaped so much of their lives. And then you have today’s generation of college students for whom this is a historical moment, akin to Pearl Harbor maybe. It’s something from the past that many of them don’t relate to in a visceral personal way.
This difference of perspective is not only a 9/11 question, it is is very much a Jewish question. And it’s especially meaningful on Rosh Hashanah, when memory features prominently in the Musaf Amidah and in many passages of the prayer and Torah readings.
This reminds me of a story that Avram Infeld shared when he came to UAlbany. I shared it earlier on our “How Often Do You Think of the Roman Empire?” but sharing here below again, as it very much relates to this 9/11 history class question:
AVRAM INFELD’S HISTORY STORY
Avram Infeld (a longtime educator and educational innovator in Israel, also later served as President of Hillel International) was born in South Africa. His father was a physicist, his uncle was a physicist, and by his Bris they all kinda thought he’d grow up to be a physicist, too. After graduating High School his father came over to him and said goodbye. He asked his father where his father was going but his father that he himself was staying in South Africa, but he was saying goodbye because he was sending Avram to study at the Hebrew University in Israel.
Off Avram went to Israel and found his way in the halls of Hebrew University in Jerusalem. He spied a nice young Jewish woman walking into the history department. So he decided to major in history. But he had to explain this to his father, given the family’s fascination with physics and all the implied expectations. So he wrote his father a long airmail letter. How since his arrival in the fledgling state of Israel, he realizes how much history is hidden behind every corner, every stone has a story, the whole place is layered with generations and generations of history and therefore he decided to devote himself to the study of Jewish history.
His father wrote back a telegram. Long before email and messaging this was an near instantenous form of communication relegated to matters of most importance, because you paid per word. The telegram read something like this. (STOP was a way of indicating period or end of sentence). THEY TEACH HISTORY AT HEBREW UNIVERSITY? STOP. IMPOSSIBLE STOP. NO SUCH THING AS JEWISH HISTORY. STOP. ONLY JEWISH MEMORY!
AS ILLUSTRATED BY COMPUTER RAM
History is the study of the past. Memory is how we currently live with the past. Computers and RAM bring this message home. RAM is not storage of old files. It’s how we function, its how we operate. Ram stores info and data that are rapidly retrieved to allow the computer to execute and run programs. It’s much more than just storing stuff, its what enables us to live!
Only Jewish Memory! This explains the Jewish fascination with Memory, the oft-repeated word “Zachor” and why Memories are a whole section of the Rosh Hashanah Amidah.