Originally published July 16, 2010

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BOB ABERNETHY, anchor: We had a chance early this past spring to visit members of a Chinese family as they honored their ancestors at their graves. It is the belief of many Chinese that there is an ongoing spiritual connection between them and their forebears. They venerate them, pray to them, and take gifts to their graves. Our guide was Jan Lee, a third-generation resident of Chinatown in New York.

JAN LEE: Chinatown has been described oftentimes as a village within the city. There’s a certain pride in passing on the culture and every tradition possible so that the younger generation understands where they came from.

The Chinese have a belief that you don’t exist on your own, that there is this continuum.

We observe certain traditions within our household, and that includes making sure that my grandfather’s altar, and now my father’s altar in my mother’s house, has food during the holidays, for instance during the Chinese New Year.

Home altar

We’ve been observing for many, many, many decades this tradition of going to the graveside and sweeping the graves and planting flowers and bringing offerings of food.

When my grandfather was planning for the future of the Lee family, he had the foresight to purchase a large family plot in Evergreen Cemetery. It had all the benefits of being not only a beautiful site, but a great place for cosmic energy — feng shui.

Once the candles are lit, it really signifies the connection between us as mortals and our ancestors’ spirits and that we’re opening sort of a gateway to communicate with them. And when we light incense, we pray. It’s the time when they get to join in the feast that we bring to the cemetery, and that includes offering them wine, and that includes burning money so that they have money to spend. It’s all the idea that, by burning it, you’re bringing it to them.

Jan Lee

We bow three times because there’s a belief that the spirit actually splits. In the Chinese belief, one of your souls will go to heaven or hell depending on your past deeds, and one is interred. But there’s also a part of the spirit that stays among us, and that’s the spirit that we call on when we need help.

Once the candles are finished, it signifies that the spirits have finished their meal and we can partake of the food that we brought.

I think everyone in my family still believes that my father’s with us. That belief comes from starting when we were very young going to cemetery and having a family altar in my family home.

The connection to the ancestors is something that I think we all feel important to us, so it’s never been an idea of obligation. It’s our choice.

Religious Leader at the Memorial Service: Gracious and loving God, we gather in this solemn place to remember the lives and mourn the deaths of these that have given so much. Even in death they reached out to those in need of help.

ERIN DEEGAN (University of Maryland Medical Student): We ended up having many discussions while we were going through anatomy lab on moral issues and spiritual issues, and I think it really opens up a forum for a spiritual discussion, because we end up believing different things, but we all appreciate the fact that these bodies are there for our use.

HANLEY: The students come to view the donors’ bodies as teaching tools, with a distinct separation between the physical and the spiritual.

Erin Deegan

Ms. DEEGAN: Seeing this person there in front of you it’s hard to separate the body from the person, and it takes some time. But I think in the end my faith helped me, because I knew that it was just a body and not a person that I was working on.

HANLEY: Still, when they meet the families they gain a deeper respect for their donors.

Ms. DEEGAN: To be able to see the families and to really feel what they are feeling and to know that these were their relatives and friends and people they really cared for helps me to place it in perspective.

HANLEY: For some of the families, this is the only memorial service their loved ones will have. Donors’ bodies go directly to the state anatomy board after death, and there often is no funeral. Eventually, their ashes are interred near this monument.

LYNN BOOKSTARR (Family Member): I appreciate having this opportunity to honor my parents, both of whom gave their bodies to science, and I also carry a card, and so I will be interred here eventually.

HANLEY: Some family members come to the service every year to remember their relatives and friends. In a few cases, they are inspired to become donors themselves.

Lynn Bookstarr

Ms. BOOKSTARR: Because I know eventually I will be interred here it gives me a sense not only of the eternal life of those I loved, but also of my — continuing after my death in some way, have my body contribute, and I believe that the soul leaves the body at the time of death and that my soul will be here, as my parents’ souls are here.

Chaplain at the Memorial Service: May their memory inspire us to live justly and kindly. May their souls be at peace, and may they be bound up in the bond of eternal life. And let us say: Amen.

BOB ABERNETHY, anchor: The beliefs and practices relating to Jewish prayer shawls called tallit. The elaborately braided fringes, the tzitzit, on the four corners of the shawls, represent God’s 613 commandments to the Jews. We discovered a synagogue with a class in which boys and girls preparing for their coming of age ceremonies, bar mitzvahs and bat mitzvahs, make their own tallit. Our guide is Rabbi Greg Harris of Congregation Beth-el in Bethesda, Maryland.

Rabbi GREG HARRIS (Congregation Beth El, Bethesda, Maryland): The tallit is a ritual garment. It is a prayer shawl that is composed of a large piece of cloth that has fringes on the edges. The tradition of wearing fringes dates all the way back to the time of the Torah, the time of the Hebrew Bible. In the Book of Numbers, in Chapter 15, we are given the commandment, one of the 613 commandments in the Torah, that tells us to wear tzitzit, to wear fringes on our garments. When we recite the verses from the Book of Numbers, we recite it during a prayer called the Sh’ma. The Sh’ma is a central prayer within Judaism, and we literally gather our tzitzit together, and each time we say those words, we give it a kiss.

SUSAN KANTER (Congregation Beth El, Bethesda, Maryland, speaking to class): And once again, watch the lipstick.

Rabbi HARRIS: A kiss is something that you give to someone that you love. It’s not the cloth that we are showing affection for, but it is what they represent — the 613 commandments. To be able to select the colors, select the material can be personally meaningful and, I think, a very powerful way to access a tradition that is as ancient as Judaism. It’s the best example of hands-on Judaism. It is not uncommon for a couple that’s going to get married to build their wedding canopy, the chuppah, to include a grandfather’s tallit because he can’t be there himself.

An atarah is the neckpiece, the top piece of the tallit, and anything can go on there. Sometimes, if you go to a synagogue you will see that it has the blessings itself written on. We say “L’hittatef ba’tzitzit” — to wrap yourself in the tzitzit. But anyone can choose a verse that’s meaningful. The 613 commandments are all represented by the tzitzit.

AMANDA FORD (Congregation Beth El, Bethesda, Maryland, speaking to class): These are kosher tzitzit. They’re made out of pure wool, out of a twisted string, and there’s enough in here to do all four corners.

Rabbi HARRIS: We know that in Hebrew, every letter has a number. Aleph is one and bet is two. If we add up the numerology of the word tzitzit, it adds up to 600, and that combined, the word tzitzit for 600, five knots, four strings that are folded over to make eight is 613, which are the commandments.

The prayer we say when putting on the tallit ends, “L’hittatef ba’tzitzit” — to wrap yourself in the tzitzit. I always tell the bar mitzvah boys and the bat miztvah girls that when we say L’hittatef ba’tzitzit that we are wrapping ourselves in everything that it means to be Jewish: Jewish law — halachah — and Jewish customs, Jewish music, Jewish food, Jewish books. And we are being embraced by thousands of years of tradition. It is a highly spiritual, powerful moment.

BOB ABERNETHY, anchor: Monday night (April 2) Jews begin observing Passover, the commemoration of their ancestors’ deliverance from slavery in Egypt when they got out so fast there was no time for bread to rise. Observant Jews prepare for Passover — Pesach — by getting rid of everything in the house that is chametz — leavened. They even sell such food, symbolically, until Passover ends. We visited the Orthodox Jewish family of Ari and Shoshana Lerner in Pikesville, Maryland.

Rabbi ARI LERNER: Cleaning for Passover is a big adventure in most Orthodox homes. It typically starts weeks before the actual holiday and everybody gets involved and pitches in.

Passover is really the touchstone event in Judaism, and this gives an opportunity for families, parents and children alike, to really engage in a sort of preparation for the holiday as a whole. So everything ranging from, you know, cleaning out cabinets, countertops, bedrooms, going through dresser drawers, looking through books that may commonly be used in the areas where there’s food present or at tables while the kids are, you know, eating dinner, etc., and closets, pantries — all that kind of stuff is really gone through extensively to make sure that, within the spirit of the law and the letter of the law, that there’s no leavened material in the house.

It’s imperative that all the surfaces and everything that you use are completely kosher for Passover, because there can be no presence of chametz left. So, for example, stainless steel sinks need to be completely cleaned out thoroughly, let sit for 24 hours, and then boiling water is poured over all the surfaces of the sink.

Artificial surfaces such as Formica or Corian have to be covered.

We have a whole set of pots and pans specifically for Passover. We have dishes and knives, forks, spoons, cups, everything. Whatever we have during the rest of the year, we have one special set of that we only use for those eight days of Passover. Once we get things clean enough and we have areas that are clear of chametz, then we bring up those boxes and stock the shelves that we’ve already cleaned for Passover.

With regard to chametz that we’re going to keep in the house over Pesach, we typically collect it in certain locations, certain cabinets. We try to isolate it into closed off areas, and we actually have to sell that to a non-Jewish person for the duration of Passover.

Congregational rabbis will do it en masse for their congregations. People will come with a list of the locations that they have chametz in their house that they plan on selling.

Rabbi SHMUEL SILBER (Suburban Orthodox Congregation): So, you agree to employ me as your agent.

Rabbi LERNER: I’d be honored.

Rabbi SILBER: Good. So that verbal agreement, as well as your signature on this power of attorney, are enough to go ahead and formalize our relationship — me as your agent to sell the chametz on your behalf.

Rabbi LERNER: All of our preparation before Passover gives us the sense that we are preparing ourselves for some type of exodus.

SHOSHANA LERNER: The Exodus story is one that we tell to our children every single year. We have an obligation to tell that story over to our children, and that gets us, you know, involved in the Passover cleaning, and it actually gives the children a lift.

Rabbi LERNER: Passover season is really an indication of our freedom. It’s a time where we reflect on God’s role in our world. It gives us a tremendous opportunity to connect with family and with friends and with our religion and with ourselves.

BOB ABERNETHY: On our calendar this week, the Jewish high holy days, which began Friday, September 6 with Rosh Hashana — the Jewish new year — and end September 16 with Yom Kippur, the Day of Atonement. We went to Rosh Hashana services at the Stephen Wise Free Synagogue in New York; and first, to a purification rite called “tashlikh,” performed in Central Park.

Rabbi GARY BRETTON-GRANATOOR (Stephen Wise Free Synagogue): Today we come to this body of water to perform the tashlikh ceremony… so that we may purify our hearts and our souls as the new year begins… “Avaynu malkaynu hanaynu” … and now if you take a piece of bread, as you throw it into the water, symbolically cast away your sins and let us be pure as we start this new year.

God has hopes for us. And in a way we have to try to live up to those hopes… It’s part of the human condition. We are flawed. And sometimes our flaws weigh us down especially when we want to try to become better people. If we allow our sins to weigh us down, we’ll never be able to free ourselves from our mistakes. … So we have to, after a real analysis of who we are and what we are and what our faults are, try to be able to cast them away. But we don’t cast them away without acknowledging what they’re all about. We cast them away by saying I know what I’ve done and I want to do “chuva,” I want to change.

I think that the heavens are open. We believe that God is giving us a chance… the gates of heaven are open to allow us to better ourselves.

The shofar is meant to really wake us up. It’s kind of like a spiritual alarm clock. Wake up! Recognize that you have a chance to make this world better. And it’s a plaintive cry, so we also hear that God is saying, “Come back, come back to me,” as any parent would to a child.

Repentance, prayer, and charity are the hallmark[s] of this season. We search our souls and then we pour out our souls to God, saying, “God help us, give us the strength to be the kind of people that we want to be.” But that’s all meaningless unless it compels us to do the right thing. And that’s what charity is all about. Those are the required actions even in the wake of September 11. Have we done the work of caring for others?

There is apples and honey here…

Apples are a symbol of life. And honey is a symbol of sweetness. And as we enter into this new year, we want to recognize that life is renewed and it should be a sweet year.

It’s a time when we feel that we’re being judged, when we judge ourselves very severely, and yet we’re living in an incredible world. We are surrounded by beauty; we’re surrounded by wonderful acts of generosity, of selflessness, and we have to stop for a moment and recognize how truly lucky we are.

BOB ABERNETHY: Next Wednesday evening begins Yom Kippur, the Day of Atonement, the most solemn day of the Jewish calendar. Observant Jews spend all day Thursday in synagogue fasting and repenting. As the day ends, Jews believe God seals their fate for the coming year. The cantor, also known as the hazzan, leads the congregation in ancient, sung prayer, pleading for God’s forgiveness. We spoke with Cantor Abraham Lubin of Congregation Beth El in Bethesda, Maryland, as he prepared for the high holidays.

CANTOR ABRAHAM LUBIN: One of the centerpieces of my work and every Hazzan, is to lead the Congregation in prayer. To hopefully inspire them in wanting to pray. To create a mood through the music, through the liturgy, through the intensity of your own input into the service — to create that kind of environment.

Rather than to try to change God, so to speak, prayer should change us, should make us better human beings, that is the ultimate purpose of prayer.

We are instructed to have what is known as “Heshbon Hanefesh,” to have an inventory of our soul. Kind of count those things that matter for our hearts, for our souls, for our conscience, and for our very life.

So we ask the question, these are fundamental questions of life. Who shall live, and who shall die as we usher in the New Year. Who shall be hungry, who shall be poor, and who shall be rich.

These are serious questions, we don’t know [the answers to them]. But the prayer ends on such a wonderful, hopeful note, it says that with repentance, with prayer and with good deeds, with righteousness, we can avert, God forbid, any decree that is not of a positive nature — and we are very positive and hopeful that the year will be a peaceful one, a year of harmony, of good health, a year of life, and that is what we wish everyone for the high holidays.