Tuesdays With Morrie
Yom Kippur - September, 1999

The recitation of Yizkor on Yom Kippur puts death on the agenda of this holiest of days. But the truth is that even without Yizkor, mortality is a key theme of the High Holidays. How many times this holiday season have we sung with fervent passion zochraynu l'chanyim melech hafetz b'chayim - "Remember us for life, O God"? An equal number of times we have beseeched God, b'sefer chaim bracha v'shalom neecatev, "May we and the entire House of Israel be written in the book of life." It is the continuation of life that we pray for. But lurking in the undercurrent of our thoughts are fears of our own mortality and that of those we hold dear.

I am certain that many of you have read the best-selling book, Tuesdays with Morrie. It raises a number of issues surrounding death that I would like to consider this morning. For those of you who have not read or heard about this book, let me tell you how it came to be. The author, Mitch Albom, is a leading sports columnist. One evening while flicking through the TV channels, he caught a glimpse of Ted Koppel interviewing Professor Morrie Schwartz who was Albom's mentor at Brandeis University. Albom had intented to keep in touch with his favorite professor after graduation. However, he never acted on his good intentions. From the interview on Nightline, Mitch Albom learns that Morrie Schwartz is dying from ALS, known as Lou Gehrig's disease, the same illness that caused the death of another baseball great - Catch Fish Hunter - two weeks ago. Hesitantly, Mitch Albom phones his former professor and asks if he could come and visit him. That visit leads to many more meetings, always on Tuesdays, hence the title of the book, Tuesdays with Morrie. During these weekly meetings, Morrie teaches Mitch Albom valuable lessons about life - now made ever more poignant and commanding by the reality of the professor's impending death.

This is how the author sets the scene: "The last class of my old professor's life took place . . . in his house, by a window in the study where he could watch a small hibiscus plant shed it pink leaves. The class . . . began after breakfast. The subject was 'The meaning of life.' It was taught from experience. . . . No grades were given . . . no books were required, yet many topics were covered, including love, work, community, family, aging, forgiveness and finally death."

Although Mitch Albom injects few words during Morrie discourses, he plays an important role. He enables Morrie to carry out a profound decision he made when his doctor told him he had, at most, two years to live. That decision was to make death his final course, the center point of his last days. Instead of withering away and disappearing into the grave angry and defeated, Professor Morrie Schwartz assumes for one final time the beloved mantle of professor, teaching a student once again.

As I was reading this book this summer, I couldn't help but think about another sufferer from Lou Gehrig's Disease, Thomas Youk who was in the news at the very time that Tuesdays with Morrie was at the height of its popularity. Thomas Youk also was the topic of a television investigative program, in his case 60 Minutes. But when it aired just a year ago, he was already dead. The person in the spotlight in his stead was Dr. Jack Kevorkian who had put Thomas Youk to death at Youk's own request and who made Youk the poster boy for euthanasia.

Thomas Youk and Morrie Schwartz opted for two radically opposing solutions to the same drastic diagnosis - Thomas Youk - the way of euthanasia, and Morrie Schwartz - living life to the fullest of one's ability until death takes its natural course. As Morey told Mitch Albom, "certainly, I mourn my dwindling time, but I cherish the chance it gives me to do things and make things right."

Many of us here this morning are dealing with elderly and frequently sick family members. Some of them are suffering horribly from their illness. Their pain and despair hurts us as well. How should they and we deal with their anguish? How can we diminish the appeal of putting an end to it all - either in the manner of Thomas Youk or just by giving up? Frankly, we face an uphill battle against our popular culture. As Americans, we value what is youthful, productive and successful and devalue what is feeble, disabled or old. Our worth is not absolute it is pragmatic. It is defined according to what we can do - for ourselves and for others. It is this utilitarian attitude that fuels the cherished notion that what counts is not life itself but the "quality" of life. This notion holds not only when a person is making a judgment about others, but even when the elderly or disabled are making it about themselves. It is not surprising, therefore, that many Americans see no reason for continuing the life of individuals who are no longer quantitatively useful to either themselves or to society.

This utilitarian view of life lays the groundwork for physician assisted suicide and euthanasia. But support comes also from the American notion that each of us owns our own body and that we have the liberty to do with it what we will. This supposition even has legal standing according to the Ninth Court of Appeals. This court affirmed that among the liberties accorded citizens is control over their bodies. Therefore, a person has a right to put an end to his or her life and to ask others for assistance in doing so.

This approach is not one that Judaism can condone. Suicide and assisted suicide is contrary to Jewish law for deep and profound theological reasons. First of all, Judaism teaches us that we don't truly own our own bodies. They, along with the entire universe, belong to God. We are merely their custodians and Judaism demands that we be good ones, keeping them healthy and sound. Because we are merely the custodians of our bodies, we don't have the right to do just anything we wish to them. To paraphrase Job of our Bible: Adonai natan, Adonai lakach, God gives us life and only God - through the natural process of dying - can take it back. This doctrine has been the firm belief of Judaism for thousands of years. It is an integral part of its religious creed and moral teachings.

Moreover, the idea that each person is created in the image of God - as the first chapter of the Torah tell us - means that someone suffering from ALS, for example, is still a sacred human being. The fact that the person can no longer do anything for him or herself or for society does not in any way diminish that person's worth. A person who is paralyzed from a stroke or is mentally incapacitated by Alzheimer's Disease is still a reflection of God's image and that individual's life must be valued and protected and be allowed to end in a natural way. We don't have to take extraordinary medical measures to keep terminally ill individuals alive, but we can't take specific actions aimed solely at bringing about their deaths. This is the principal tenet of Judaism's medical ethics.

Morrie Schwartz was a proud but not a practicing Jew. I don't know how much Jewish theology influenced his decision to reject suicide, choosing instead to go on with life as best he could despite his increasing enfeeblement and pain. Perhaps it was his extraordinary pluck and his jovial and spirited personality that enabled him to deal with his adversity. However, many others who are seriously ill may not be blessed with his unusual coping skills. What can we do for the perilously sick - our own parents, friends and colleagues who, in extremis, may not feel bound by Judaism's religious outlook and who may not have the same steeled strength for enduring adversity as Morrie Schwartz? How are they to be encouraged to continue on until their life reaches its natural end?

Let us look to Morrie Schwartz's last days for answers. One significant advantage that Morrie Schwartz enjoyed was dutiful and competent health care in his own home. It is something we should want for our loved ones. His doctors provided him with medication that allowed maximum pain management. He had physical therapists that came on a regular basis to massaged his feet and exercise his limbs. He had round the clock home help that paid attention to his bodily needs and prepared nutritional, liquid foods that he could swallow. Pain management and sufficient home care are not easily attained in this age of curtailed medical services. They must become a national priority. With pain under control and care that is attentive and compassionate, people will choose to let their lives naturally ebb in the fashion of Morrie Schwartz. Without it, there will be increasing requests for Dr. Jack Kevorkian.

There is something else Morrie Schwartz had that all serious ill individuals need – company. Many who are terminally ill find themselves abandoned by family and friends. People are not malicious. They just don't know what to say and do in the presence of someone who is nearing death. So they stay away. Morrie Schwartz was fortunate. Rich Albom was not the only former student who came back to pay a call. Many others did, too. And colleagues from Brandeis stopped by. His sons came to visit as did his brother and a favorite cousin. His wife, who maintained a full time job throughout this period - at his insistence - was an invaluable source of support.

In Judaism, visiting the sick is not just a matter of choice. It is a mitzvah, a commandment. People who are ill feel emotionally isolated, as if they have entered a realm different from that which their family and friends are inhabiting. A visitor breaks that isolation. The mitzvah of visiting the sick, which is called bikkur cholim in Hebrew, requires only that you be present. No one expects you to perform miracles. You're not called upon to cure the patient's depression and anxiety. You are not being called upon to be a philosopher or theologian to explain why things happen. You are present to demonstrate that the person is not alone. You are there to show respect for that person's suffering. You're there to show the person you remember and you care. You are there to hold a friend's hand, to stroke a mother's hair, to give a child a hug. You are there to listen, to show compassion and empathy and to cry together and laugh together.

Bikkur cholim is not a time consuming undertaking. You should only stay a few minutes. An eleventh century book of religious instruction says, "Don't stay too long for you may inflict upon the patient additional discomfort. And when you visit, enter the room cheerfully. Above all do not come with tales of sorrow." And let me add this advice, don't visit early in the morning when doctors are making their rounds or late in the evening when the patient is exhausted. Mealtimes offer an excellent opportunity to sit with a patient. You can help the person reach the food and eat it and provide companionship at a meal that otherwise would be taken alone.

Never underestimate the importance of even a single visit. A colleague told me about one elderly patient who saved every calling card left by members of the synagogue's Bikkur Cholim Committee. When she died, the cards were found in an envelope labeled "most treasured possessions." Rabbi Harold Schulweis of Encino, California, who suffered a heart attack several years ago, wrote these words regarding the benefit to him of bikkur cholim: "I did not see you but I knew you were there. I heard your voice. I was too tired to turn, too weak and confused to call out your name, but I sensed you presence and though my eyes were closed, I knew you were in the room and later that you were standing quietly in the corridor. Your visit restored my humanity. Railed in by steel bars, I felt so helpless, so foolish, so listless, inarticulate and non-human." He concludes with this observation: "Who visits the sick, helps him recover."

Morrie Schwartz, too, was buoyed by friends, colleagues and family who visited him. They kept him feeling human and respected and loved even as he physically weakened and become ever more an invalid. Those who performed the mitzvah of bikkur cholim gave him reason to want to live.

But in the final analysis, what eases and makes bearable the dark and difficult days of life's last season is family. I read recently that Native Americans of the Great Plains survived the harsh winters by having grandparents and grandchildren sleep beside each other. That kept both generations from freezing to death. The warmth of family is what gets us through the tough moments. Morrie Schwartz tells Mitch Albom, "It's become quite clear to me as I've been sick: if you don't have the support and love and caring and concern that you get from a family, you don't have much at all. Without them, this disease that I am going through would be so much harder. He concludes: ". . . Sure, people come and visit - friends, associates - but as wonderful as that is, it is not the same as having someone whom you know has an eye on you. That is what family is about, not just love but knowing there is someone watching out for you. Nothing else will give you that. Not money, not fame."

Yizkor is a time set aside to remember family and to affirm their importance. It is a time when we fondly recall parents, grandparents, a husband or wife, a son or daughter, aunts and uncles, who looked out for us and whom we looked out for. They were more precious to us than wealth, more important to us than fame. They kept us warm when we were cold and empty inside. They taught us lessons for life - and not just on Tuesdays - but always. We clasped their hands when their life was waning. We mopped the sweat off their brow. We dried the tears on their checks. We held them in our arms, in our thoughts and in our prayers. That love and caring allowed them to endure what they had to endure and to slip quietly into the night.

But what draws us closest to them at Yizkor time is not our last moments with them, but all the moments we shared with them that enabled that love at the end to occur. And no one is more eloquent on this point than Morrie Schwartz. He says to Mitch Albom, "In the beginning of life, when we are infants, we need others to survive. Right? And at the end of life, when you get like me, you need others to survive. Right? But here's the secret: in between, we need them as well." The people we now remember, were there for us in between. That is why we remember them so lovingly and why, now that they are gone, our pain is so great.