[Avodah] Le'ilui Nishmas an Infant

[Micha Berger]

On Tue, Dec 22, 2020 at 05:59:12PM -0500, Zvi Lampel via Avodah wrote:
>> Yes. But we're talking about how the RBSO could be Just. I would prefer
>> getting to a point of "I really don't know" than embracing theories
>> that don't seem fair. It's theology. "I don't know" is a perfectly fine
>> answer; we shouldn't insist we /can/ understand it all and settle for
>> compromises....

> True. But it is only a dilemma deserving an ''I don't know' response if you
> accept the premises that the practice of saying kaddish in such a situation
> is valid, somehow ...

Which situations?

Qaddish for a parent was something I already posted about. RMT and RHS
have a perfectly rational way of explaining Hashem's Justice. The parent
gets reward for whatever they did to inspire the child to say Qaddish,
Borkhu, learn Torah, give tzedaqah or whatever.

Qaddish for someone who you don't owe in that sort of way doesn't actually
have a long tradition. I wouldn't assume it qualifies as minhag Yisrael.

But I think that regardless of whether a person can get zekhus for a
mitzvah done, rather than for their role in causing that mitzvah to be
done, if the emotions of the moment can cause someone to say Qaddish
with kavvanah, why not say it?


On Tue, Dec 22, 2020 at 07:57:28PM -0500, Akiva Miller via Avodah wrote:
> I understand these situations to be similar to when one asks a tzadik to
> daven for him. The tzadik is pained to some non-zero degree about the
> petitioner's problem, and he asks Hashem to fix the situation. If Hashem
> does so, it's not because of any zechus of the petitioner, but rather it is
> to do a favor for the tzadik.

But because the state of the petitioner is undeserved harm to him.

Unless the person praying for the niftar has some idea of what's happening
to the niftar and how his tefillah alleviated is, there is no balancing
of the tzadiq's account.

And for that matter, the person who didn't get some nisayon still needs to
get the work done in some other way. A niftar who isn't getting the
correcting effect of onesh or lack of sekhar... how else would he get the
work done?

Tir'u baTov!
-Micha

-- 
Micha Berger                 I slept and dreamt that life was joy.
http://www.aishdas.org/asp   I awoke and found that life was duty.
Author: Widen Your Tent      I worked and, behold -- duty is joy.
- https://amzn.to/2JRxnDF                      - Rabindranath Tagore