As many of you know Liz's father recently passed away (October 14, 2007). We wanted to make the obituaries that appeared in the Salisbury Post, Jeff's home paper, and the one from the NY Times available for you to read. Just click on either link below.
Salisbury PostNY TimesAlso, please find below the eulogy that Liz wrote. Some of you may have heard this either at the funeral or at one of the shiva minyanim at our house but we thought we would share this as well.
Although Dad was not a profoundly religious man he was connected to Judaism in his own way. Over the last two years I enjoyed the couple of times that Dad and I went to Temple Israel together. It meant a lot to me to have this time to sit in synagogue and reflect and to pray next to my father.
In the Jewish tradition we read a different section of the Bible each week. This week we are reading from Genesis chapter 12. Many of you will know this story as it is the first time that God speaks to Abraham.
The first two verses of the chapter go roughly as follows:
The Lord said to Avram “Go forth from your native land and from your father’s house to the land that I will show you. I will make of you a great nation and I will bless you. I will make your name great and you shall be a blessing…”
Although I am quite certain that Dad never heard the voice of God or at least he never told us if he did, I was struck by the parallels between God’s command to Abraham and some aspects of Dad’s life.
God tells Abraham to leave his native land and his father’s house and go to a foreign land. Well, 22 years ago Dad helped expand Freirich Foods, Inc. by going to a distant land. He left his native home of New York and started a new life in a far-off place called North Carolina. Just as Abraham’s family grew to become a great nation in his new home so too did Dad’s family also expand in Salisbury. The number of Dad’s offspring grew from 2 to 5.
God then promises to make Abraham’s name great. Now, Dad was most definitely the master of his own destiny. He made very clear decisions and was almost never unsure of the right thing to do. Whether Dad’s clear vision for what was right and wrong was divinely inspired or simply genetically encoded we will never know but I believe that Dad’s capacity to judge right and wrong, to honor people for who they are, his business ethics and for his deep and unending commitment to family, Dad ensured the greatness of his name.
And finally God promises that Abraham will be for a blessing - for those of us who love Dad and hold him near to us he will always be for a blessing.
For the second year in a row Team Liz celebrated Christmas in North Carolina. We ate copious amounts of food at the traditional Christmas Eve dinner and then on Christmas morning we opened all of our presents. Team Liz could always find there presents under the tree because they are all wrapped with Stars of David or menorahs!
