Kavod Ha-Met - Honoring the Dead

Chayye Sara


Genesis 23:1-25:18

Précis: The parasha begins with the counting of the life of Sarah (chayye Sara) - and with her death. It continues with a detailed description of the negotiation for and purchase of the cave of Machpela by Abraham for a family burial site. Abraham orders his servant to go to Abraham’s ancestral home to obtain a wife for Isaac, and after a series of fulfilled signs, the servant finds Rebecca. Rebecca returns with the servant; she and Isaac meet, fall in love at first sight, and become man and wife. The parasha ends with the death of Abraham, and his burial by Isaac and Ishmael in the family burial cave.

Genesis 23:2-18 “Abraham arose from beside his dead, and spoke to the Hittites, saying, ‘I am a resident among you; sell me a burial site…’ And the Hittites replied, ‘Hear us, my lord…bury your dead in the choicest burial spot; none will withhold his burial place from you’…And Abraham bowed low…and said to them… ‘Let Ephron sell me the cave of Machpela…for the full price, as a burial site.’ Ephron...answered Abraham… ‘No, my lord, hear me: I give you the field and the cave…’ Then Abraham spoke…saying ‘Let me pay the price of the land; accept it from me’…And Ephron replied… ‘A piece of land worth 400 shekels - what is that between you and me? Go and bury your dead.’ Abraham accepted Ephron’s terms, and Abraham paid out the money…”

Since the dawn of time, burying the dead has been a widespread human ritual. What motivated our ancestors to bury their dead? We can assume that it had symbolic meaning to them (a hope for resurrection? a return to the womb of Mother Earth?). Without question, one motivation was to create a way for the living to remember the dead.

The negotiation for a burial plot set forth in these verses ties burial with the ownership of land. While we know very little about Jewish burial rituals before the era of Rabbinic Judaism, we do know from this story and others in the Bible (Rachel, Jacob, Joseph, et al.) that it was important for individuals to be buried in ancestral lands. As a result of the Babylonian and subsequent exiles, it became impossible for Jews to be buried with their ancestors, and so this story became a template for subsequent Jewish purchases of burial plots. Abraham was a “resident” in a land not his; his descendants seeking to purchase burial property would be faced with the same issues he faced.

What do we learn from this story First, that the grave site land needs to be purchased, and not merely accepted as a gift. Clear title and ownership is important. Second, the fact that the local citizens also used special land to bury their dead shows that Abraham was acting out a ritual which was common among those with whom he lived. Similarly, Jews throughout history adopted some of the customs of the surrounding people (the use of ossuaries in Second Temple times; wooden coffins; grave stones and markers, etc.).

Throughout our history in the Diaspora, Jews have purchased land for cemeteries whenever we were able (and permitted) to do so. Among the first items on the Jewish agenda when establishing a new community was the creation of a burial society (for both chevre kadisha and the purchase of burial land). When Jews were expelled from a state or a principality, history records that the cemeteries were among the property sold off with other Jewish possessions. Desecration of Jewish cemeteries became a symbol of one faith’s "victory" over another – whether Christians or Muslims were the ones doing the desecration, and whether it took place in the 10th century or in the 20th century.

While, like Abraham, we have tried to find secure and tranquil places to bury our dead, we have learned that buying grave sites gives neither the living nor the dead any real security. There is really no "eternal rest." If the purpose of burial rituals, as suggested at the outset, is to remember, then we now face an additional challenge: the dispersion of families across the country and around the world. It's rare, these days, that several generations of a family remain in the same location. This heightened mobility means that unlike Abraham, the responsibility for maintenance of Jewish burial sites - part of "kavod ha-met" - is not a familial responsibility alone but increasingly a communal one. Whether we are “Jewish professionals” or just members of the Jewish community, the care for the dead and for their burial places is an ancient mitzvah we must continue to observe.