Chapter 23-25:18 - Rosh Hodesh Kislev November 25th
Burials
by Rabbi Jeremy Rosen
This week’s reading of the Torah starts with a burial and ends with a burial, after the deaths of Sara and then Abraham. Sounds morbid! But death is inevitable, and where it is not accompanied by pain, can be positive. The rabbis talk about the “kiss of death.” And something that takes us away from a world of sorrow and physical suffering and degradation into one of peace.
One would expect there to be a whole list of commands in the Torah about burial rituals. There are not. But there are references to deaths and mourning of the patriarchs and Moses and Aaron (and two of his sons).
Usually, when someone dies, the Torah says, Vayamot. When Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob died, the Torah uses three words. Vayigvah, Vayamot VaYyeasef El Amav. He expired and died and was gathered to his people.
We know that in the ancient world there were many names for gods of death. There was Mot from which the Hebrew word Mavet derived. And the Torah talks about Sheol, the grave. But we also know that the word Geviyah refers to the body when it stops functioning, and then begins to decompose. The bones of important people were then gathered and placed in urns or ossuaries, often in caves with other members of the family.
These three words describe the process. The body ceases to function, and then is left to decompose, and only afterward the bones are gathered up and placed in a cave or an ossuary. Which explains why it took time for Abraham to arrange for the burial and why he had to establish with the Efron the Hittite that he was of sufficient stature to warrant a formal burial place.
Later Rabbis suggested that this gathering up of bones and placing them with their ancestors was a reference to the next World. Like being put in a Pyramid on the way to the Afterlife.
But the rabbis also say that these three words together are only used for the very righteous. In which case, we have a problem. Because these same words are used about Ishmael too. Was he righteous on the same level as Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob? Higher even than Joseph and Moses of whom these words were not used together?
Rather I think the message is that anyone, everyone, can reach spiritual heights, each in his or her own way. And Ishmael despite the bad press of his youth ended up a better person. He reconciled with Isaac. And came with him to bury his father. We should not give up on people even if there is a doubtful past.
Shabbat Shalom
Rabbi Jeremy
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Jeremy Rosen was born in Manchester, England, the eldest son of Rabbi Kopul Rosen and Bella Rosen. Rosen's thinking was strongly influenced by his father, who rejected fundamentalist and obscurantist approaches in favour of being open to the best the secular world has to offer while remaining committed to religious life. He was first educated at Carmel College, the school his father had founded based on this philosophical orientation. At his father's direction, Rosen also studied at Be'er Yaakov Yeshiva in Israel (1957–1958 and 1960). He then went on to Merkaz Harav Kook (1961), and Mir Yeshiva (1965–1968) in Jerusalem, where he received semicha from Rabbi Chaim Leib Shmuelevitz in addition to Rabbi Dovid Povarsky of Ponevezh and Rabbi Moshe Shmuel Shapiro of Yeshivat Be'er Ya'akov. In between Rosen attended Cambridge University (1962–1965), graduating with a degree in Moral Sciences.