Arik Einstein's message

Those with a strong sense of public mission do not see their deaths as the end of their life's work. They are a link in the chain. As the late Eli Mohar, Arik Einstein's collaborator on his autobiography, wrote in his famoussongabout Jewish revival in the land of Israel, "A caravan continues from the last century."

First Prime Minister David Ben-Gurion was like that. Wanting to set an example to the nation about the importance of settling the Negev, he did not allow himself to be buried in the section for leaders of the country on Mount Herzl. Instead, he chose a burial site for himself and his wife Paula overlooking the beautiful view to the south of Kibbutz Sde Boker. This was a kind of message.

Former Prime Minister Menachem Begin, too, was not buried in the section for leaders of the country. Instead, he and his wife, Aliza, were interred in the ancient cemetery on the Mount of Olives, near the graves of Irgun operative Meir Feinstein and Lehi member Moshe Barazani, both of whom committed suicide in jail before being executed by the British. This was another message. Was Einstein's burial on Wednesday at the old Trumpeldor Cemetery in Tel Aviv also meant to say something? Was it a message or happenstance? One would imagine that because he died so suddenly, his burial plot had been prepared long in advance.

Trumpledor is one of three pantheons where Zionist leaders are buried. The other two are the Mount of Olives and the Kinneret cemeteries. Labor Zionist founder Berl Katznelson, poetess Rachel Bluwstein and singer/songwriter Naomi Shemer are all buried at Kinneret, and the remains of Zionist thinkers Moshe Hess and Nachman Syrkin were interred there belatedly. The Trumpeldor Cemetery was established in Tel Aviv 111 years ago. Since 1932 it has not accepted new burials, except in exceptional cases.

Einstein was buried alongside the first generation of pioneers who built Tel Aviv, as well as intellectuals like poet Hayim Nahman Bialik and philosopher Asher Ginzburg (Ahad Ha'am), Meir Dizengoff, Yehuda Leib Matmon Cohen, Haim Arlozorov, Israel Rokach and Eliyahu Golomb, and artists such as Nachum Gutman, Asher Barash, Devorah Baron, Alexander Ziskind Rabinovich, Joel Engel, Baruch Agadati and Shoshana Damari -- all of them educators, who rejoiced at Purim street festivals of the first Hebrew city and composed rhymes and melodies.

Whether there was a message or not is not important. Einstein was Israeli, and first and foremost a Tel Avivian in every sense. Those who heard the eulogies on Wednesday -- and the most interesting of all was delivered by a man who was close to him and later parted ways, Rabbi Uri Zohar -- understood that he was indeed a rare man and not just a great singer. After Zohar became haredi the two stopped collaborating. Nevertheless, two of Einstein's daughters also became religious and married two of Zohar's sons. In his religious way, Zohar promised the deceased life in the world to come and then made a perfectly apt remark: Arik was a man more than an artist, he said, and for this reason Zohar was hoping to see the radiance of his face again before the Messiah came. In the world that Zohar has inhabited for many years, there is a special meaning to this blessing.

Even though it did not rain, it was as if the clouds were crying too.