D’var Torah: Jacob Pressman Shivah
Rabbi Daniel Pressman
10-11-15
My father’s shivah has overlapped the weeks of Parshat B’reishit and Parshat Noach—the creation and subsequent rebooting of the world. As such, the Torah begins preoccupied with olam hazeh: this material world. But when you are a new mourner, sitting shivah, you are not in olam hazeh. The rituals and practices take you out of daily life and place you in a holy space of mourning, as you begin the process of adjusting to a world without the person who died.
Sitting on the sidelines of olam hazeh, remembering my father’s deeds and character, contemplating his peaceful crossing of the threshold into olam haba—the world to come—I’ve been thinking a lot about the afterlife.
I don’t know about you, but in my upbringing immersed in the educational institutions of Conservative Jewish life—Beth Am Hebrew School, LA Hebrew High School, Camp Ramah, USY, the University of Judaism, even the Seminary—I don’t recall anyone ever talking about olam haba. We were still in the thrall of that 19th century, rationalist, wissenschaft paradigm. Perhaps someone said those conventional words, “We live on in the memory of those who loved us.” But an actual afterlife? Not a word.
Over 35 years ago, I had the wonderful opportunity to take a five-day seminar with Dr. Elizabeth Kubler-Ross. After her pioneering work in thanatology, and her world changing book, On Death and Dying, people opened up to her about their near-death experiences, and she came to believe in the afterlife.
So after I came home from the seminar, I was talking with my father about what I had learned, including her affirming of an afterlife. I asked him, “Do you believe in an afterlife?” And he said, “Yes.” It didn’t make sense to him that the soul would not survive the physical body.
So I said, “You never said anything about it to me.”
And he said, “I never told you anything about sex, either, and you managed to find out about that!”
So my father believed in olam haba, and that, I’m sure, was why he never feared death.
As you may know, Judaism has no single belief about the World to Come. In his masterly book, Jewish Views of the Afterlife, Simcha Paull Raphael presents a vast panaroma of our tradition’s many ideas about the next world. There is one that I particularly like. It comes from Chaim of Volozhin.
He writes, “The actions themselves of the person constitute the reward in Olam Haba. After the soul departs from the body it rises to take pleasure and satisfaction with the light, energy, and worlds of Kedusha (Holiness) that have been added and multiplied by his good actions.”
He bases this on the well-known teaching from Mishnah Sanhedrin that we also study with Pirkei Avot: “כל ישראל יש להם חלק לעלם הבא”
We usually translate that as “All of Israel have a portion in the World to Come.” But that’s not what the Hebrew says. Instead of b’olam haba, in the world to come, it says l’olam haba, “To the world to come.”
He explains, “‘In’ implies that Olam Haba is ready and waiting from the time of Creation, as if it were something with a separate existence, and if man warrants he will receive a portion of it for his reward [like a piece of candy waiting in G-d’s pocket to be given to whoever deserves it].”
“To the world to come” implies that “In truth, Olam Haba is [made up of] the actions of the person, which he expanded and added and perfected into a place for himself [to dwell].” In other words, every day of our lives we are creating our portion in Olam Haba.
So imagine with me the heavenly world Jack Pressman created. His mind is sharp, and he is fully restored to the height of his abundant powers and talents In his dwelling on high there will be pictures he drew of his beloved Margie, and the rest of his family. He has every kind of art material, so he can draw and paint and do calligraphy to his heart’s content. There’s a wood shop so he can build things. There’s a piano, and he plays and sings every day. Sometimes Joel adds his baritone and my late wife Beverly her pure soprano. Rogers and Hart drop by to sing “Blue Moon” with him. He continues his eloquent writing and witty rhyming on his computer, and since this is heaven, it’s a Mac. He studies Torah with all the great Rabbis and teachers—and no doubt dazzles them with his insights. The thousands of people he touched in his life who preceded him into the next world gather to learn more of his wisdom and sing his praises. In Dad’s world to come, everyone dresses elegantly, only kind words are spoken, the marginal and awkward are treated with honor, and God is praised with fervor and joy. There is love and laughter and sweetness.
The world that my father created with his devotion and skill is heaven indeed. How fortunate are we that he gave so lavishly and lovingly of his olam haba in this world, making it a better, kinder and holier place.
2