Mourning my Son

On the yahrtzeit of Akiva Ehrenpreis;

R’ Akiva Shamai ben Eliezer z”l

Ahava Ehrenpreis

On my desk I have a photo of a handsome young man at Café Rimon in Yerushalyim. A piece of cake with a single bright candle sits on the table in front of him. My son Akiva’s eyes are alight with the joy of fulfilling the dream of learning in Ir Hakodesh, of so much more to do, to “mechazek the world with Torah.”

When I visited him in Israel when he was learning in the Mir Yeshiva, it seemed every vendor in Meah Shearim knew him. “The rugelach are really fresh about midnight on Thursday night, Mom, come meet the baker.” Another mother of the Chaim Berlin Yeshiva group who were together with him in Israel later told me, “It’s so nice your son makes sure there’s food and nosh for Shabbos for the bochurim in the dirah even if he goes away for Shabbos!” Many other young men confided to me that Akiva helped them settle in, find the best chavrusas, insisted in their going to a higher shiur. “Just like the donuts,” one friend said.

“Donuts?”

“Yes, he always brought them to yeshivah in Brooklyn for anyone who stayed late for mishmar.”

I did remember him appearing bein hasedarim to borrow the car to pick up donuts. That smile, that raised eyebrow. “How you doing, Mom? I picked up this new CD, I knew you’d like it.” Everyone was his concern, from younger siblings who, even when he was in Eretz Yisrael, would get a Thursday night phone call to check how each was doing. Kiruv rechokim was in his every cell. “I met these people, Mom, lawyers from the Upper East Side, why not have them all for Shabbos? It’ll be great, they’ve never been at a Shabbos table.” If I looked a little dubious or overwhelmed, he’d reassure me, “Mom, you’re going to be so happy we did this!” And I always was. As I received the glowing thanks of all those he brought to us and to Torah life, I’d assure them, “I’m just part of Kivi’s staff. He’s the driving force.”

Perhaps we were the elders, but he made us grow with his pursuit of mitzvos. Life with him was always striving for a higher madreigah. Life without him means I must strive to reach spiritual goals on my own without his shining, joyful light to lead me to a higher plane.

These may be the emotions of a mother but I heard them echoed in a letter we received from Akiva’s Rebbe in the Mir: “Of all of my talmidim, throughout all the years, there has never been a bochur who had and continues to have such hashpa’ah on me. I cannot forget his ahavas haTorah, his hasmadah and his special koach to make everyone around him a better person and a better learner. His dedication to understanding the sugya, his simchah when things became clear, and his drive to always demand from himself more and more were unique. The willingness to be nosei ba’ol and help every friend was something that left an impression on all who came in contact with him ... When I spoke to him I always felt that even though he was so young, I was in the presence of an adam gadol. I am sure that in shamayim Akiva has a place with the gedolei hador.”

I was on the corner of the street where Akiva had lived soon after his marriage. I could see his beloved yeshivah, which he’d attended throughout his school years and into kollel. I could see him in my mind’s eye waiting for the light to change so he could get to seder. He was the one who turned on the lights of the beis medrash and turned them off at night. He doesn’t live there anymore, his Creator having called him to join the Beis Medrash Elyon. A child’s absence impacts every aspect of our simchas ha’chayim. One can never forget even in the midst of the immense joy of Shabbos, of a Yom Tov, or a personal simchah, that there was once another who the One Above chose to take from us. Simchah isn’t a given; we must work to achieve it. True simchah cannot be realized until Mashiach.

Adapted from Mishpacha magazine