Leviticus 18:5

וּשְׁמַרְתֶּ֤ם אֶת־חֻקֹּתַי֙ וְאֶת־מִשְׁפָּטַ֔י אֲשֶׁ֨ר יַעֲשֶׂ֥ה אֹתָ֛ם הָאָדָ֖ם וָחַ֣י בָּהֶ֑ם אֲנִ֖י יי׃

You shall keep My laws and My rules which a person will do and live in them, I am the Lord.

My grandfather’s voice always wavered when he said kiddush. I can hear him chanting the words of that Friday night prayer from what must be a memory of over fifteen years ago. The night I remember him saying kiddush he had tears in his eyes. I think being at a shabbat table with his children and grandchildren, saying the words that his own parents and grandparents said over the wine created a swell of emotions that he tried in vain to hold back.

My grandfather has since passed, but I think about this when I say kiddush on Friday night. His voice, the way he held the cup, his presence is so alive in that moment. For my grandfather, I wonder who was alive and present to him when he said kiddush. I never asked him whose voice he heard when he prayed those words, who he remembered holding the kiddush cup, though I know in that mitzvah was the memory of generations of family members. 

This is the essence of what it means to live in the mitzvot. The power of tradition is that these commandments are vessels of memory, in which the souls of countless generations are kept. They are our greatest treasure. To keep these traditions and to pass them to the next generation does more than simply sustain our way of life. It keeps the memories of our past alive, the memories of our loved ones, our teachers, our friends, our community members, and the memories of the generations of Jews with whom we share these timeless practices. This is the promise of the mitzvot. If we cherish them and keep them, we give expression to the memory of those who proceed us, and someday our memory will live on through them as well.