<body><div><figure><img src="https://img.particlenews.com/image.php?type=thumbnail_580x000&amp;url=0sUKi5_0wIJxYDP00" alt="https://img.particlenews.com/image.php?url=0sUKi5_0wIJxYDP00" width="2048" height="1152" ></figure>“Atzeret tiheye lachem; kasha alay preidatchem” – “An Atzeret it shall be for you; your departure is difficult upon Me.”I found myself reading this refrain to the kinah (elegy) that my madrich from my time at Yeshivat Har Etzion, Nachum Goldstein, had posted on his WhatsApp status. It was April, and he had added a stanza to the kinah he had written in the wake of the October 7 massacres. I was blown away by it. “The nations have entered into Your inheritance; they burned her; they took captives… And her sons and her daughters cast out in her streets. There is no survivor on this Simchat Torah… See our disgrace and hear the voice of our brothers’ blood screaming from the ground!”Packed with layers of meaning and several dozen references from Tanach, statements of Chazal, and earlier kinot, this kinah beautifully captured the essence of that dark day. It was a masterpiece interwoven with classical texts and phrases, often reframed in a way that gave them new meaning within the context of Oct. 7. The refrain, for example, where the song gets its title, consists of a well-known phrase about the holiday of Shemini Atzeret, the day the Oct. 7 attacks took place. “An Atzeret it shall be for you; your departure is difficult upon Me.” This line traditionally refers to the notion that Hashem gave us the holiday of Shemini Atzeret purely as an opportunity for Him to spend one more day with His people, as an act of love, for our departure from Him at the conclusion of the holidays is “too difficult” for Him, so to speak. However, after Oct. 7, this line has new meaning. The departure was not merely that of the holiday’s end; it was the actual loss of so many of our brothers and sisters on that day. “Atzeret” in Hebrew is a word with multiple connotations. It means “assembly,” noting the festive element of the holiday, a time when we get together. It also denotes “stopping,” marking the cessation from work, which also reflects the holiness of the day. But for me, just as Simchat Torah will is now marred by the tragedy of Oct. 7, the word “Atzeret” also has a new association. It will always remind me of all the lives that were cut short on the day when “lo tziva tzur lamashchit dai” – “the Rock did not command the destroyer, ‘Enough!’”I read through the kinah over and over, trying my best to absorb the meaning within each word and phrase. I began to read it along to the tune of Eli Tziyon, a somber tune sung for Tisha B’av. After some time, the tune shifted into a new, independent one. I immediately reached out to Nachum to share my creation. I had previously thought about the idea of publishing a song, but had never tried to see it through. I love singing and I’ve always connected to music, but the thought of putting myself out there creatively was incredibly daunting and I had no clue where to start in trying to publish a song.However, I believed it was important to move forward with this endeavor. I had a powerful tune that reflected the raw emotions of that day – the anger, fear, sadness, and indignation – as well as masterful, penetrating lyrics. The song could serve as a meaningful tribute for all those we lost, and a cathartic expression of our emotions. It was something worth sharing with the world.Having never done something like this before, I had to figure out how exactly one produces a song. I reached out to individuals who had gone through that process before, and they pointed me in the right direction. I ended up working with Yoel Weiss, a musician and producer, and described my vision for the song to him: that told a story of pain, loss, and an increasing sense of devastation. Over the course of several months, he helped craft a cinematic musical accompaniment that achieved just that. The last piece was to design the cover art, which was modeled after the site of the Nova Music Festival, where over 360 people were killed and 40 were taken hostage.Yet, the song and kinah end on a hopeful note: “Turn our mourning into dancing, and on the Sabbath we shall gladden our heart.” Whereas our dancing turned into mourning on that sad Shabbat and the gladness had ceased, we hope that Hashem will answer our prayers and allow us to rejoice once again. It is my hope that Atzeret will serve as a meaningful connection for us to Oct. 7 and provide a sense of catharsis and comfort through these trying times.Photo Caption: The cover art for the song “Atzeret”Photo Credit: Ruben Prawer</div></body>

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My Atzeret: The Story of an October 7 Memorial Song

“Atzeret tiheye lachem; kasha alay preidatchem” – “An Atzeret it shall be for you; your departure is difficult upon Me.”. I found myself reading this refrain to the kinah (elegy) that my madrich from my time at Yeshivat Har Etzion, Nachum Goldstein, had posted on his WhatsApp status. It was April, and he had added a stanza to the kinah he had written in the wake of the October 7 massacres. I was blown away by it.