One method of studying Torah is to search for truth by looking beyond the facts.The method assumes that by asking questions both about the text and oldestwhat’s missing from the text, deeper meaning will be revealed. By applying the same method to our own family history we can deepen our under- standing of our past.

    What is my story? How do I want to be remembered? What do I want to pass on to my children and how?
To help answer these questions, I created a spiritual ethical will to give my children. By explor-ing our family, who and where we came from, I hoped they would enhance their own sense of identity. Here is a part of our family’s Genesis story. My maternal grandmother, Minnie, was born in 1880 in Sanok, a small Carpathian Mountain village, 110 miles southeast of Krakow. Now part of Poland, it was then part of Emperor Franz-Joseph’s Austro-Hungarian Empire. 
    Minnie’s father, Jacob, was a Torah scribe. Her mother, Chaya, Jacob’s second wife, She was so pious that until she was 28 she did not speak on Shabbat. Minnie immigrated to the US alone in 1898. She settled in Kenosha, Wisconsin to live with her half-brother Max. She was 18. She later met and married my grandfather, Eugene, and moved to a suburb of Chicago. Soon after the birth of their first child, Minnie took her baby on a visit to her family back in Sanok. Her second child, Lillian, died in the flu epidemic of 1918. Together Eugene and Minnie had six children, including my mother, Beatrice, the youngest.
    Minnie was widowed after 28 years of marriage, lived another 30 years alone, and was buried in a Lubavitch cemetery in Chicago in 1961.
     Minnie read and spoke five languages, and read several newspapers daily. She maintained her own herb and vegetable garden although Eugene worked in fruit and produce. She baked Challah every Friday and had her grandchild deliver loaves by bicycle to her grown children’s homes for Shabbat dinner.
    Available midrash (interpretive stories) about Minnie is limited to the following: She was known as a vain woman, and family members called her “Queen Marie of Romania”. She kept a barrel of rainwater to shampoo her hair, and spent much time brushing it. My mother described Minnie as depressed. She never fully recovered from the death of her second child, and spent long hours grieving on a cemetery bench. 
    My personal memories of her are unsubstantial: An image of a stout grandmother enfolding me in her grandmotherly hug; and when she visited, my memory of removing hairpins to loosen the long, yellow-white braids wound around her head.
     But to study Torah as described above requires looking for meaning in the gaps of the text. Questions arise because things are left out or don’t seem to fit together. My questions about Minnie were provoked by my desire to under-stand her life and who she was beyond the facts I had been told. 
    Can someone’s whole life be dismissed as vain, depressed, and non-functioning? And what a paradox it seemed to be when I thought about the resources she must have possessed.
   Why had she emigrated alone as a young woman? Was she excited or terried to leave home? Was it her choice to go or had she been urged by her family? Was her family trying to protect her or give her opportunities impossible in Sanok?
   What had her mother taught her about being a woman,a wife,a mother, and a human being that would prepare her for thisnew life? Did her hopes for life in America include using her intelligence and language skills? Had she like Sarah and Abraham been “called to go forth?”
      What had led her to return with a small infant in 1904? Were the adjustments of emigration too much for her? Were her life dreams dashed by circumstances in small town mid-America in the early twentieth century? How did a young couple make a trip to Sanok a priority, and how could they afford such a journey? What risks did Minnie take as a young woman traveling without a man?
   How did she manage such a journey with a baby before the bullet train; without Dramamine for motion sickness; no Pampers or Huggies; no baby Motrin, sterile changing stations, or prepared baby food?
    Did she miss her family? Had she yearned for her father to bless and her mother to hold their first American grandchild? Was it vanity- wanting her beautiful new daughter admired? And once in Sanok again, was it hard to leave her family, or did she ache to return to her life in America?
     Beyond the human frailties and limitations that were my total image, I now have a different sense of her that includes her strengths. I respect her story and appreciate the complexity of the life of the immigrant. I am awed by her courage and saddened by her disappointments. By exploring the questions and imagining myself in her shoes, I understand more about who she was. I am proud to be her grand-daughter and to transmit her story as part of my legacy to my children.

Rachael Freed is a teacher and family therapist. She develops workshops and seminars for charitable organizations, faith institutions, and women’s groups on creating spiritual-ethical wills. Find her on the web at www.womenslegacies.com or email her at rachael@womenslegacies.com.

Note: The three photos on the previous page show Minnie about the age she came to this country, about the age she lost her second child, and in her later years.

High Holidays, Elul and the Spiritual Ethical Will
Elul, the month of approach and preparation for the Days of Awe, is a time set aside in the Jewish calendar for us to reflect on our lives - past, present, and future. 
     One way to reflect is to prepare a spiritual-ethical will - a contemporary document evolved from the traditional ethical will found in Genesis 49. 
     In ethical wills we have the opportunity to document our family histories and link our heritage to future generations. In doing so we can make amends, tell regrets, and express gratitude for the blessings of our existence. We can also leave a legacy of our wisdom, values, and ideals. 
    Confronting the meaning of our lives and our mortality is the focus of the High Holy Days - a perfect time to compose a “heart print” to connect us to the generations. By writing an ethical will we secure not only our immortality, but create a most precious contribution to the future as well. 
     To help you write an ethical will, here are three hands-on resources: 

Women’s Lives… Women’s Legacies: A Guide for Creating Your Spiritual-Ethical Will, by Rachael Freed, will soon be available. Email her at rachael@womenslegacies.com to reserve your copy in advance. 

Ethical Wills: A guide to Putting Your Values on Paper for Your Family, by Barry K. Baines, MD, is scheduled for publication this fall by Perseus/HarperCollins. You can also nd lots of information about ethical wills on his website: www.ethicalwill.com. 

So That Your Values Live on - Ethical Wills and How to Prepare Them, edited and annotated by Jack Riemer and Nathaniel Stampfer. 1994.

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