John Edward has a television program called "Crossing Over" on which he claims to contact the dead in the afterlife. Well, I've done the same thing. Not on TV but in the hospital and in the nursing home, I contacted my mother in the afterlife. Within a few days of being diagnosed with terminal brain cancer early this summer, she stopped talking almost entirely. When she did speak, what she said made little sense and had no relationship to whatever was going on around her. For a while she opened her eyes when she was being fed, but the rest of the time they were closed as she lay in her bed. She could no longer walk. She was utterly unable to do anything for herself. There was a body there, but the person who was my mother was gone, never to return. And although we did nothing to prolong her life, she lingered for almost a month. God was merciful in not making it longer.

This is not life. This is some strange, sad afterlife that our scientific achievements have enabled us to create. I certainly don't think I have the right to tell you what you ought to do about yourself or your loved ones. But for my part I am leaving instructions - and you are all my witnesses - that if my mind is gone and there is no realistic hope of it coming back, I want to be kept as pain-free as possible, and nothing else. No heroic measures, no resuscitation, feeding tubes, i.v.'s, medication, nothing. When my mind and personality are dead, leave my body alone and let it die in peace. I wish no part of an afterlife that is somewhere between life and death, but is neither.

But the other kind, the Divine Reward, Heaven, life after death, what we call in Hebrew Olam HaBah, the World to Come - that I'd like to be part of.

Wouldn't we all?

A newspaper poll in 1991 showed that 80% of all Americans believe that there is a heaven. Sixty-seven per cent believe there is a hell. Most interesting of all, although 72% of the people believe that they are going to go to heaven, only 40% believe their friends and neighbors will qualify. [King Duncan, Pastor's Professional Research Service, Seven Worlds Corp. (Knoxville, Tenn., Jan/ Feb/ Mar 1991)."]

Of course, although it would be nice just to know I'd live on after death in some vague, undefined limbo, it wouldn't be worth much unless I can remain aware of what's going on.

What does mainstream Judaism teach about the afterlife? In the Bible, precious little. In the earlier books there is almost no mention of life after death at all. Only in the very late books, like the Book of Daniel, do we begin to get ideas somewhat similar to ours. What we know now about Jewish ideas of an afterlife comes mainly from the Rabbinic period, the creation of the Talmudic sages whose teachings became normative Judaism up until the advent of the modern Reform and Conservative movements.

In their teachings, at the end of this life there were three possibilities. If you were truly saintly, when you died, your soul, fully conscious, went immediately to heaven. If you were truly evil, when you died you were totally, irrevocably obliterated, no chance of appeal, end of story. If you were somewhere in the middle, presumably like most of us, you had to be cleansed, or purged of your sins before you could go to heaven. The cut-off point between obliteration or purgatory and heaven was twelve months. If you required more than twelve months of cleansing, you were gone.

According to our folk-lore, when the living recited Kaddish for the dead it eased the passage of their souls through the rigors of purgatory. That's why the custom developed of only saying Kaddish for eleven months rather than twelve. People apparently didn't want others to think that their dearly departed had committed so many sins that they required the full year to atone for them. In our day and age, I suggest to mourners that saying Kaddish for a calendar year from the date of a death does make more sense then adhering to this particular bit of folk-lore.

Mainstream Judaism didn't believe in Hell. The idea of eternal obliteration was bad enough. To the rabbis, eternal punishment was unthinkable. But enough people apparently were able to think about it that Hell and eternal damnation came to make up at least one alcove in the sub-basement of Jewish superstition.

Although the rabbis taught that heaven was, well, heavenly, it wasn't the end of the story. Heaven was just a holding area. The souls were to wait there until the coming of the Messiah. When the Messiah arrived, all the bodies of the righteous dead would be resurrected and each soul would be placed back into its own body. Whatever you died from, of course, would be fixed. Missing limbs would be replaced, which was much more easily done if all body parts were buried in the same place. The ravages of age would be reversed, although you wouldn't be made young again. These new bodies would never again age, and, my personal favorite, no matter what you ate, you would never gain weight. Lest you worry about where all those people would fit, don't. A God who could create a whole universe should have little trouble coming up with a little extra real estate.

Three times a day, in the central petitionary prayer of each service, the Amidah, we prayed: "Baruch Attah Adonai, Mechayai ha-maitim, Blessed are You, Eternal One, who resurrects the dead." Yes, I know this is also a central belief of Christianity. The Christians got it from us. We got it from the Zoroastrians. As the Book of Ecclesiastes reminds us, "Ein chadash tachat ha-shemesh, there is nothing new under the sun."

It may be a little surprising to learn that a central belief of normative Judaism is the resurrection of the dead, but that's the absolute truth. I was so amazed when I first heard it that it ultimately helped lead me toward Reform Judaism. In the Conservadox Talmud Torah of my childhood we were studying the Amidah and I read in the English translation: "Blessed Art Thou, O Lord, Who quickenest the dead." "What does 'quickening' mean?" I asked my teacher. He responded, "Shah, shah, don't ask." It was that kind of intellectual timidity, and many other incidents like it, that helped lead me to the Reform movement. Only later did I learn that quickening is an archaic term from obstetrics. It refers to the first time the pregnant woman actually feels the baby move in her womb, indisputable evidence that there is life growing inside her. The traditional prayerbook used this obstetrical term as a euphemism for resurrection.

What does Reform Judaism teach about the afterlife? Our "official" teaching is deceptively simple. We believe in the immortality of the soul. But what does that mean? Since no one can possibly know for sure, the term is left purposely undefined in order to include the entire spectrum of Jewish belief. Immortality of the soul can mean anything from the most traditional ideas of resurrection to the most modern concepts that everyone who lives has an eternal effect on the cosmos.

That is the direction, I believe, that our teachings about the afterlife have been moving in all along. Paradoxically, like so much else in religion, our teachings about life after death are really about the meaning and purpose of life before death. Each life is precious, we teach. Each of us has a unique and lasting effect on the universe, we teach. Our purpose here on earth is to do whatever good we can, we teach:

A story by Y.L. Peretz entitled, "Beside the Dying," tells about a man who is lying on his deathbed. He is visited by an angel who is to carry him to heaven as soon as his last breath expires. Sensing the angel's presence, the fever-stricken man asks, "And what is life like up there in heaven, in paradise? What shall I be doing there?" The angel answers, "You won't have to do anything. There is eternal rest there, everlasting joy, and enduring happiness." Concerned, the man turns toward the angel. "Is anyone there whom I can help? Can I raise up the dejected, heal the sick, feed the hungry, or give water to parched lips?" "No," the angel replies, "no one will need your help there." Distraught, the man says, "Where there is no one who needs my soul, my heart, my tear of pity, my word of comfort, or my hand to lift them up, there is nothing for me to do." And he refuses to go with the angel. Instead he asks if he could be reassigned. [Neil Kurshan, Raising Your Child To Be A Mensch, (New York: Atheneum, 1987) p. 34.]

Do we wish, for ourselves or our loved ones, the limbo afterlife of a body that lingers when the mind and personality are gone? Each of us may someday be called upon to choose. God willing, we will never have to. Do we wish to die early to get to heaven? Not on your life. Do we want to leave this world now to be with the loved ones who have preceded us? Some may say it. Almost no one tries it. Would our beloved dead wish to be reassigned, to continue trying to fulfill the purposes of life, to feed the hungry, clothe the naked, console the sorrowing? Is there a moment's doubt that they would?

That is what we remember and that is all we can remember. For all of our theories we really know nothing about an afterlife, not even if there is one. So let us, as our unveiling service says,

…treasure the time we have, and resolve to use it well, counting each moment precious - a chance to comprehend some truth, to experience some beauty, to conquer some evil, to relieve some suffering, to love and be loved, to achieve something of lasting worth.

And let us remember those we have loved and lost, for what they did in life is their true legacy after death.