{"id":276407,"date":"2018-11-28T14:56:18","date_gmt":"2018-11-28T14:56:18","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.merindab.com\/private\/2018\/11\/28\/werpiper-carnivaloftherandom-hagar-972-2\/"},"modified":"2018-11-28T14:56:18","modified_gmt":"2018-11-28T14:56:18","slug":"werpiper-carnivaloftherandom-hagar-972-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.merindab.com\/private\/2018\/11\/28\/werpiper-carnivaloftherandom-hagar-972-2\/","title":{"rendered":""},"content":{"rendered":"

werpiper<\/a>:<\/p>\n

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carnivaloftherandom<\/a>:<\/p>\n

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hagar-972<\/a>:<\/p>\n

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animatedamerican<\/a>:<\/p>\n

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alternativetodiscourse<\/a>:<\/p>\n

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I\u2019ve been thinking a lot about compassion in Judaism, and being kind. In that light, I would like everyone to know that my current favorite Jewish supernatural headcanon is that, instead of driving vampires away with crosses or stakes through the heart, we say the Mourner\u2019s Kaddish for them. I mean, that\u2019s just so adorable. You see this threatening undead creature, and instead of yelling murder, you feel bad for them, and you mourn for them. Imagine being a vampire at the receiving end of that, having been chased away for years and years and told you\u2019re a monster when you come across someone who sees you and your existence and accepts that you\u2019re in a pretty bad place and offers help in the best way they can. I\u2019m actually tearing up about this a little. If someone adds to this post I\u2019ll love them forever.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

It doesn\u2019t work for zombies.<\/p>\n

This is one of the hardest things she learns, in the business. \u00a0Saying the Mourner\u2019s Kaddish will slow a vampire, to stare at you with wide shocked eyes (and once, memorably, to weep blood-tinged tears), unable or unwilling to lift a hand against you. \u00a0It will calm a dybbuk, enough to make it stop whatever destruction it\u2019s begun, and almost always enough to start a conversation about why it clings so desperately to the world of the living, what it\u2019s left undone, how it can be freed to move on. \u00a0You have died<\/i>, the Kaddish says, and we mourn you as we would mourn our own dead, because someone must.<\/i><\/p>\n

But there is no soul and no mind left in a zombie, no vestige of the self it once was, nothing left for the Kaddish to speak to.<\/p>\n

She says it anyway, with every head-shot, with every flung grenade.<\/p>\n

Not because she still hopes one might hear her, but because they are dead, and the dead should be mourned.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

\u2026this is gorgeous. <\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

I would buy the hell out of this book.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

It almost works on ghosts. \u00a0The freezing, electric wind of their presence slows to a soft chill like the last breath of winter. \u00a0The ectoplasmic glow flickers, dims, and steadies. \u00a0They seem to be listening.<\/p>\n

But they do not leave. \u00a0Jewish or not, and whether or not they knew Aramaic, they seem to sense the Kaddish\u2019s meaning: Blessed is He beyond blessing and song, beyond praise and consolation that is uttered in the world.<\/i><\/p>\n

In their half-world, half forever lost and half still ours, the ghostly voices lift. \u00a0No longer do they moan and scream. \u00a0They sing: May there be peace<\/i>. \u00a0Their words linger when the living song has ended, when the mortal must stop for breath. \u00a0The dead hold their notes. \u00a0The song rings on.<\/p>\n

Perhaps they will sing until there is peace upon us in truth.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

werpiper: carnivaloftherandom: hagar-972: animatedamerican: alternativetodiscourse: I\u2019ve been thinking a lot about compassion in Judaism, and being kind. In that light, I would like everyone to know that my current favorite Jewish supernatural headcanon is that, instead of driving vampires away with crosses or stakes through the heart, we say the Mourner\u2019s Kaddish for them. I … <\/p>\n

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