burying shomer Shabbos/non-shomer Shabbos separately

↑ ShiraMiri ↓

Thu, Sep 21 2006, 5:37 pm

Motek wrote:

JRKmommy wrote:

My question regarding what people regularly and publicly do was this - being Shomer Shabbos means ALWAYS keeping Shabbos, so would someone be assumed to not be Shomer Shabbos if they ever slipped, or just if they "regularly and publicly" slipped.

It's really not that mysterious or difficult to ascertain. We are talking about people who are not shomer Shabbos, period! Not oops, I forgot the laws of borer, but vrrooom, off in the car to the mall!

Motek, she is not talking about a knowledgable person.

Imagine I see you getting into the car to go to the mall Saturday morning. I run up to your car window and shout,

"Hey, Motek!! Are you ok? It's shabbos - are you on your way to the hospital, can I do anything to help?"

And you say,

"No, nothing is wrong! Macy's is having their big annual sale. Parnassah is tight and I can't miss this event!"

Vrrrooom, you are off in the car to the mall.

Well, yeah, public desecration of shabbos right there. You know it is shabbos, you know you shouldn't be driving, you know you shouldn't be carrying a purse and shopping, yet you do it anyway because you feel you have a good reason to violate shabbos.

However, there are so many people, and I was one of them, who really had no idea what it meant to keep shabbos. I thought shabbos meant lighting shabbos candles on Friday night with a bracha. Good shabbos! Let's watch TV! But I always believed in G-d and so did my family. I never doubted that Hashem created the world. But I had no understanding that my responsibility was to LIVE that belief. For me belief led to the search for knowledge. The search for knowledge led me to action. Some people never get to the point where they know that there is something to look for beyond the belief! As I continue to learn I realize all the things I don't know. There are questions I can ask today that I didn't have the knowledge to ask 15 years ago. Hopefully there are questions I will be able to ask 15 years from now that I can't conceive of asking today.

Many Jews today really ARE like kidnapped children. If you want to place the blame on the generation that broke with frumkeit, fine. But that does not apply to the majority of secular Jews today. So why should they be ostracized?

↑ Motek ↓

Sun, Sep 24 2006, 7:02 pm

momoftwins wrote:

The father was burried in one section and the mother was burried
in another section .I feel they should be burried near each other - regardless .

How do you know what the couple wanted? And don't you think they knew the system when they paid for their plots?

Marney wrote:

For me belief led to the search for knowledge. The search for knowledge led me to action.

admirable!

Quote:

Many Jews today really ARE like kidnapped children. If you want to place the blame on the generation that broke with frumkeit, fine. But that does not apply to the majority of secular Jews today. So why should they be ostracized?

I don't know how many cemeteries do this anymore anyway to know whether our discussion only applies to a few or many. As far as "ostracised," in today's day and age when, as you say, people just don't know, it's not a penalty but like posters wrote earlier, it's beneficial for the soul.

↑ JRKmommy

Mon, Sep 25 2006, 8:00 am

There is a very large Jewish cemetary here which serves the entire Jewish community. To the best of my knowledge, there are certainly people buried there who would not meet the halachic definition of being a Jew. That said, there are sections for individual congregations, so if you were buried in the "X Orthodox shul" section, you could probably count on the people around you being halachically Jewish.

That said, there was a high profile case several years ago where a leader of Jews for J was refused burial - they literally had an urgent meeting and blocked the hearse from entering.

I should also add that some of my concern about rules comes from nasty situation that I knew about in Israel. Someone I knew was depressed and committed suicide. The family was initially told that she would need to be buried outside the regular area. They were very upset. A very large sum of money was paid, and suddenly she was buried in the regular section. The idea of people abusing positions of power and misusing halacha as a tool to extort money from mourners is beyond disgusting, IMO.

↑ Ruchel ↓

Mon, Sep 25 2006, 9:04 am

Quote:

1) Why not asked to be buried near someone who sincerely kept the Mitzvot?

Because no one on Earth can be sure about that, and because I don’t feel a need to be put in the “superior” category. Any nice person is ok to me, and what is between G-d and this person is between G-d and this person.

I don't spend my life trying to be only among frum Jews, so when I am dead..........

Quote:

2) Why do you automatically associate being observant with all those negative things you wrote?

Because in this context it is obvious that it is what will happen. People who are good but not frum will be in the “bad” category, and those who look frum but aren’t good in the “good” one. If this existed in my country (G-d forbid) I would be tempted to ask to be in the "bad" section, because I would encounter no hypocrisy.

Quote:

One who is sincere with Yiddishkeit keeps the Mitzvot, and doesn't excuse himself by saying that he's a Jew at heart.

If only it was so easy in Europe too…… I'm not starting to count how many Ashkenazic Jews I know keep shabbes really fully because it is too sad, but yeah.

Quote:

(I'm not talking about those who didn't know better, but usually those don't know Jewish burial customs either).

Almost everyone, frum or not, wants a Jewish burial.

Quote:

And don't worry about different customs. After all, most people are buried together with the rest of the people from their communities.

Yes, so we will probably end up with full frum communities buried in the “bad” section.

Quote:

If you want to place the blame on the generation that broke with frumkeit, fine. But that does not apply to the majority of secular Jews today. So why should they be ostracized?

Well said !

Oh, and ditto Marion and Marney.

Quote:

I feel that at least in a Shomer Shabbos section I can be assured that everyone buried there is halachically Jewish!

Don’t be so sure…….. LOL

my non Jewish cousin in law is shomeret shabbat.

I understand wanting to be buried among your people and not among non jews, but a yid is a yid and feeling superior enough to decided you don’t want to be near people who didn’t have your luck is imho beyond sick. Go and talk to Hitler and Stalin, not to the victims.

What if one day you discover your “minhag” has something wrong, and you’ve been violating shabbes all your life? In all honesty, would you ask to be buried in the “bad” section just to avoid dirtying the neshamos of the people around?
Next we will have a section for the geirim, one for the Bts, one for the without yichus…

↑ Ruchel ↓

Tue, Sep 26 2006, 8:36 am

mali wrote:

Ruchel wrote:

Next we will have a section for the geirim, one for the Bts, one for the without yichus…

According to you, all we need is one section for Frum-not-sincere Jews, and another for non-Frum-sincere ones. Easy.

Easy to misread what I write.

I WROTE: I am against any section. Now, if we want a frum/non frum one, we would need to be able to know who is really frum. It is not possible. Then, no section. And yes, I doubt there would be hypocrisy (about religion) in the non frum section. I don't know anyone who fakes being non frum.

↑ Ruchel

Mon, Dec 25 2006, 2:38 pm

Motek wrote:

As to why Shabbos is the criterion over all other mitzvos, Rambam writes in his last halacha of hilchos Shabbos:

"Shabbos and idol worship are each comparable to all the other mitzvos of the Torah. Shabbos is the everlasting sign between Hashem and us. Therefore, whoever transgresses the other mitzvos is in the category of a wicked Jew but one who publicly desecrates the Shabbos is like an idol worshipper ..."

I have heard about it, but was told (from dh who learned it from school) it only "works" when only the "worst" Jews don't keep shabbes, not in our society where unfortunately the majority doesn't (or not fully). Today there are people who are atheist but not idol worshippers, people who believe but aren't (that) observant, and so on. So according to this, although shabbes is a huge criterion, it wouldn't be enough to be sure the person is an idol worshipper or even an atheist.