Shaarei Shamayim

EMOR 5770

Today’s parsha contains the laws of mourning—at least for a Kohen—and so I would like to speak this morning about Jewish mourning—specifically about sitting shiva—at a time when, thank Gd, no one in our congregation is sitting shiva so you won’t think that I’m pointing fingers at anyone.

A Kohen is permitted—or to put it more accurately—is required to participate in the burial of his closest relatives, even though by doing so he will become tamey, ritually defiled, and will not be able to officiate as a Kohen until he purifies himself. The parsha makes 2 points: a Kohen must avoid contact with the dead; but a Kohen should, no, must do so if the dead person is one of his 7 close relatives—father, mother, brother, sister, son, daughter or wife.

In this passage, the Talmud (Zevachim 100a) recounts a fascinating story. Once there was a Kohen whose wife died on erev Pesach. Now Pesach—more than any other Yom Tov—required a great many animal sacrifices so everyone could partake of the Pascal Sacrifice for the Seder, and so every Kohen was needed to help. Therefore, this Kohen decided not to tend to his wife’s burial in order to be able to maintain his important public responsibilities.

Laudable, was it not? He placed the needs of his people above his own. But not according to the Talmud. The Talmud says that his fellow Kohanim forced him—against his will—to visit his dead wife and become tamey, impure.

I confess that I never really understood that story until I read a piece by Rabbi James Ponet, who is the Hillel Director at Yale. Rabbi Ponet writes that there are times when all of us want to deny the reality of death:

One of the ways of avoiding its reality is to be too busy to deal with it. You can almost hear the “yuppie” thoughts of this Kohen. “Surely my work on behalf of the community is of far greater importance than my responding to this woman’s death. And after all, she has been sick for years. In a sense, I have already sat shivah for her at her hospital bed. So now I mustn’t jeopardize my communal responsibilities, especially at this busy season of the year, when thousands of people are coming to Jerusalem to bring their sacrifices and when every single available Kohen is needed.”

Have you heard rationalizations like that? I have, and so has every other rabbi. I know lots of people who didn’t have time to sit for 7 days when a loved one has died and who have ended up sitting 7 times 7 days on a therapist’s couch, working out the feelings and resolving the conflicts that they didn’t have time to work out then.  So I know this Kohen that the Talmud speaks of. I have met him many times and so have you.

There are 2 changes that I have noticed in the way we grieve these days. One is that not too long ago, the funeral used to take place the next day after a loss. Now it’s almost always a day or 2 after that, because if the person has died in Atlanta and a child lives either in New York or California, and a grandchild is in Europe or Israel or on a safari in Africa, it takes at least a day or more to gather the family.

The 2^nd difference that I see is that while shiva in ancient Hebrew means 7; in Modern Hebrew, it often means 3! And in many cases, shiva means one, strange as that sounds to anyone who knows Hebrew. People simply think that they don’t have the time to sit still for a week, and therefore, they ought to be excused. 

There is an obscure passage in Jewish law that says that if a person is very poor, if he has no savings, and if his family will be destitute and will not have any food to eat unless he works, then, in such a case, the person is permitted to stop sitting shiva after 3 days and go to work. I am always amazed to see how many people who don’t know very much about any other rule in the Jewish law, evidently know this one. And I am always amazed at how many seemingly affluent people go back to work after 3 days.

I wonder, do they do so because they are really so indispensable to their businesses? Or because they are afraid of finding out if they stay away for a week that they really are not so indispensable? Or do they do so because they are afraid to confront themselves and deal with the reality of their loss, and so they need to keep themselves busy?

Whichever the reason it, the law is clear: mourning is not an option; it’s an obligation! When your relative dies, your daily routine, your regular work schedule, your life is supposed to be put on hold. You are, for at least a week, no longer defined by your work. The rest of the year, if someone asks you, “Who are you? You answer, “I am a salesman, a teacher, a rabbi, a businessman, a doctor,” but not this week. This week, when someone asks you who you are, the answer is, “I am a son who has lost my father, a husband who has lost my wife, a brother who has lost my sister. This is who I am, this and nothing else,” at least for these 7 days. We cannot skip paying our dues to grief by pretending that we are busy.

And one thing more I learn that I am during these 7 days: a mortal human being that will not live forever; one who sits on a low stool and does not shave, but instead feels and comes to terms, not only with the death of the one whom I have lost, but with my own mortality as well. You are never quite the same after you go through this experience and those who avoid it deny themselves a precious spiritual experience.

I remember a man in his late 50’s, who had children and grandchildren, who-never-the-less said to me during the shiva for his father, and whose mother had died some years before, “Now I am an orphan.” And he was!

Death is not a mistake. Death is what we owe and must pay for the life we have been loaned. The bill can be postponed, if we try hard enough, if our genes are good enough, and if our luck is ample enough…but in the end it must be paid. There are no exceptions and sitting shiva for someone who was a part of our life, who has known us as long as we have known ourselves, helps us get this—not only in our minds but in our guts! You cannot get out of it by claiming that your job is too important. That may get you out of jury duty, but it won’t get you out of shiva—if you’re honest with yourself.

The other side of this is that we must not overdo our mourning. The 1^st 3 days are for weeping, the 1^st 7 days (shiva) for lamenting, the 1^st 30 days (sheloshim) for public display of mourning—that is the rabbinic timetable. The Sages set this schedule, not because everyone grieves at the same rate. Of course they don’t! They set this schedule so that people would know that, ready or not, whether they want to or not…at some point they need to move on. Only for parents does mourning extend for a full year. But we are not allowed to stay frozen in our grief for more than that. 

2,000 years before Freud, the Sages said: “Whoever insists on mourning more than the Law requires is probably mourning for something else.” Jewish tradition worries about those “brave souls” who slough off their grief and go back to their offices so quickly and so casually. Jewish tradition is concerned about such people because if death is nothing, then life is nothing. 

Why do we observe shiva for 7 days? Because the world was made in 7 days and each person is a world—a world that will never be again. A world has been lost; so how can anyone slough it off and go about his affairs as if nothing has changed?

Jewish tradition also worries about those who wallow in their grief and cannot move on with their lives. And so Jewish tradition insists that while you must sit shiva, observe shloshim and the year of mourning for a parent…it also insists that you stop sitting shiva and observing shloshim and the year of mourning when the time comes.

King David teaches us in Psalm 23: “Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I shall not fear harm, for You (Gd) are with me.” There are times when all of us must walk through the valley of the shadow of death. But we do not walk the valley alone, Gd is with us and Gd helps us get to the other side. Gd helps us mourn, and then, and only then, Gd helps us heal.

This is the Shabbos when we 1^st encounter the laws of mourning in the Torah. May Hashem, in the words of the prophet Isaiah (25:8): Bila hamavet lanetzach, “Eliminate death forever”…umacha Hashem Elokim dima meyal kol panim, “and wipe the tears from every face.” Amen!

Rabbi Mark Hillel Kunis     5/1/10