To Burn or Not to Burn – That is a question!

Until today, I had been ignorant about the very common practice of Cremation. Even though I had attended a number of funerals where the deceased had been cremated, including my own sister-in-law’s where I performed the funeral service.

I had had no reason to question this option for the funeral of a deceased person, and as a Gentile no-one in my community, including my ‘faith’ community had ever raised this issue with me – at least not that I remember.

So today, thanks to a new Facebook friend and a ‘ticker’ sidebar feed of his that somehow caught my eye, I read this fascinating short narrative and question that was posed to a Rabbi (This prompted me to search further as I will expand below):

“Dear Rebbe,

I saw your post last week about cremation and I will tell you that it broke my heart anew. For all my life I wondered what I would do if I were given the opportunity to pull a Jew from the crematorium at Aushwitz. How would I react?

And then my neighbor went and cremated his father. I felt powerless and helpless to do anything. What should I have done? What could I have said?

Rebbe, I have another problem. My neighbor is now consumed with guilt because he recognizes the permanence of what he did. Day after day, he cries to me and, despite years of learning, I am not sure how to respond.

Anxiously awaiting your reply.

Respectfully, Chaim

______________________________________

Dear Chaim,

As the number of unaffiliated Jews who opt for cremation rises, it behooves us all to recognize the value of a proper Jewish education. We should strive to live a passionate Jewish life filled with inspiration and gratitude to H-shem , King of the Universe.

But what of your neighbor?  What of the six million?

Regarding the six million , I can set your mind at ease for that was not our challenge. They died sanctifying G-d’s name and for that they will yet merit to live sanctifying His name.

As to your neighbor. I will share with you a story of a young man whose life was not one you would call a life of model behavior. The type of tattoos that covered his body bore silent witness to a life of decadence , depravity and corrupted behavior.

Even for such a person , the gates of repentance can be opened and this young man found his way to a bais medrash/ Jewish study hall and discovered the prescription for proper living in our Torah.

Covered with long sleeves, our hero lived out a little under a year incognito with only the night times under the covers to remind him of his sins and the requisite teshuva/repentance he still needed to fulfill. And then....

....and then Rosh Hashana was approaching and as the Days of Awe loomed before him, he realized that he would be , literally naked in the mikva and his shame would be visible for all to see. He approached the mikva with fear, with trepidation, but with determination that he would immerse himself and emerge like a baby from the womb, reborn.

As he removed his shirt, the chatter all around him died down and all eyes were focused on his arms and back. If the door were not blocked, he may well have bolted but he was rooted to the spot.

Silence.

The silence stretched to what seemed an eternity until an elderly man walked over to him and pointed to a number tattooed on his arm. A number that branded him a survivor of the holocaust. A number that bore testimony to beatings, deprivation and eyes, that witnessed mans inhumanity to man.

The old man walked over to the young man in the mikva , took his arm as they both were preparing to pray to be inscribed in the book of life. "Come ", he said gently, "Come. I see from your tattoos that you too, have survived a hell on earth"

Together they went down in the mikva and, together, they came out to live a heavenly existence.

If we want to do something to nullify the affects of the crematoria of our days, we must connect ourselves, our children , our neighbors and our neighbors children to our glorious history. We must connect ourselves to those before us who sang Ani Maamin/’I believe with perfect faith’ as they were marched to the gas chambers.

To those who were willing to go through hell and die for their Torahthentic Judaism , we must connect to them and be willing to live for that Judaism.

We must not just educate ourselves. We owe it to our children and grandchildren.

And if your neighbor uses this as a springboard to bring life from the ashes, there may yet be hope after all.

Warmly, Rabbi Dovid W.”

So I read and was moved by this post on Facebook this morning and thought, why is cremation identified by the Rabbi as so wrong? Despite all my years of studying the Tanakh, Jewish culture and perspectives, etc., and having visited Israel twice; having toured throughout the whole Land of Israel for 3 weeks, having a number of Jewish acquaintances and friends, and having spent some time leaning Hebrew, how had I missed this? Why was the option of cremating the deceased considered so wrong? Was it just the memory and respect of the cremation of so many in the Nazi gas chambers or was it more?

It only took the reading of two articles at Aish.com to convince me it was much more. This reading also both embarrassed and humbled me with the realization that I should have known this. I don’t blame my Gentile upbringing; my many churches or many Christian friends who didn’t inform me, as the ignorance of such things is very deep and has a long, long history.

Instead, this revelation just convinces me more of how much our Gentile world needs our Jewish ‘elder brothers’, who have been trusted with the ‘oracles of God’ for thousands of years, to come alongside us and teach us the ways of the God of Israel, YHVH Himself!

So while I do recommend that you read the two articles linked below, I will now add a very short summary of why cremation is wrong for all people, but especially for those who seek a relationship with the Almighty and a place in the Age to Come.

In Genesis 3:19 we read: “You will return to the ground, for it was from the ground that you were taken.”

The understanding of this passage is that we are to be buried (put into the ground) when we die.

This is further clarified in Deuteronomy 21:22-23:

“If a man have committed a sin worthy of death, and he be put to death, and you hang him on a tree; his body shall not remain all night on the tree, but you shall surely bury him the same day; for he who is hanged is accursed of God; that you don’t defile your land which Yahweh your God gives you for an inheritance.”

The implication here also is that if you don’t bury the deceased you are directly defying this commandment of the Almighty.

As the first  article below states: “Cremation is destructive and denigrating. In the same way we don’t burn Holy Books, so too the body was a vehicle for the soul and should be treated with gentle respect.”

Also to further clarify this by contrast, consider these biblical examples of death by burning, which are considered examples of disgrace or tragedy:

Genesis 38:24 “It happened about three months later, that it was told Judah, saying, “Tamar, your daughter-in-law, has played the prostitute; and moreover, behold, she is with child by prostitution.” Judah said, “Bring her out, and let her be burnt.”

Here we see that in seeking to display the apparent disgrace that Tamar had brought upon his family, Judah was ready to burn her. If this had occurred her cremation would clearly have been seen as a punishment.

Leviticus 20:14, ‘If a man takes a wife and her mother, it is wickedness: they shall be burned with fire, both he and they; that there may be no wickedness among you.

Leviticus 21:9 ‘The daughter of any priest, if she profanes herself by playing the prostitute, she profanes her father: she shall be burned with fire.

Joshua 7:15 ‘It shall be, that he who is taken with the devoted thing shall be burnt with fire, he and all that he has, because he has transgressed the covenant of Yahweh, and because he has done a disgraceful thing in Israel.”’

Joshua 7:25  ‘Joshua said, “Why have you troubled us? Yahweh will trouble you this day.” All Israel stoned him with stones, and they burned them with fire and stoned them with stones”’

Clearly these shocking passages show emphatically that to be burned, to be cremated, was the method used for those who were disgraced before God and therefore, by inference clearly not the desired method of an honourable funeral.

The clear implication of these passages from the Tanakh is that, if we respect the deceased person, we should NOT cremate them. Because it is neither a good look when we consider the cremation of so many in the Nazi death camps, but even more so, because to do so is clearly to disobey the instructions (Torah) of HaShem.

For more details, I recommend the two articles linked below, which also give some background on why allowing the body to decay normally is the more Godly approach.

'The Jewish View of Cremation'   - http://www.aish.com/ci/sam/48936292.html

and  http://www.aish.com/sp/ph/Cremation_A_Burning_Issue.html

Shalom!