Transcription:
It’s almost like asking, how does water help a fish? Because if a person experiences death without any kind of religious belief system, then there’s the emotional sadness of having lost someone important to you, but there’s no acknowledgement of the fact that the person who was very vital and living is continuing on in their existence in any significant way. Society subscribes today, by and large, to a belief that once you die, that’s it, game over. We’re here for a short time on this moving rock, and you’re here for 80, 90 years if you’re lucky, and then when it’s time, it’s time. So get it all in today while you can. That’s not the view within Judaism and in many other faiths. Judaism believes in the eternity of the soul, and as such, it views our role here to be doing acts of service and productivity, not for ourselves, but primarily for G-d and to fulfill His wishes for achieving perfection for our souls. And it really creates a completely different set of priorities in how a person lives their life when they’re living their life, not just for gratification, since we’re only here for a short time, but rather to develop and cultivate a spiritual essence that will continue long after the body has gone. So when a person comes with that kind of orientation to a life cycle event like death, they are both comforted and they indulge in the sadness on a much more profound level, because the loss is no less of a loss than it would be if the person did not live eternally, but it is with an understanding that that person’s soul has migrated to another plane of existence, and that there’s still more that I can do to help my loved one find their way to where they need to go. Quite often, a person finds religion at a time of death, let’s say especially of a parent, because if a child feels, I didn’t do enough for my parents while they were alive, I didn’t appreciate them fully, what can I do for them now that they’ve gone? Well, if you don’t believe that the soul lives on, then sorry, there’s nothing you can do. And that in itself provides a certain state of, let’s say, trauma or grief for a person that he can’t overcome. But if I believe that the soul lives on eternally, and so that there’s something that I can contribute to that soul, even after it’s migrated from this world, it provides a tremendous sense of catharsis for one to say Kaddish, for one to attend synagogue services, for one to do another kind of mitzvah, another good deed, such as giving charity in the memory of my loved one, or to do something else of that nature that provides benefit for the soul. So it’s a whole different way of approaching the death process.