The value of life to Jews is evident, even in death

Jewish Values On Full Display Even During Wave Of Deadly Terror

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Jay Engelmayer
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The Jewish religion places a high value on human life. In religious belief, the act of saving a life is considered a “mitzvah”, otherwise known as a good deed, and yet, in line with the fact that Jews are a race, a nation of people with a common ancestry, heritage, and tradition, the importance of preserving life is not limited to the devoutly religious, but to Jews across the observational spectrum. Sadly, the recent wave of devastating and senseless terror attacks in Israel highlights this fact and shows a distinction between the two peoples who claim the land as their own.

On February 26th, the brothers Hallel (21) and Yagel (19) Yaniv were driving in Samaria where they lived and were murdered by a terrorist who took advantage of a traffic jam in Huwara and fired at least twelve shots into their car, killing the young brothers. Less than two weeks later, on March 9th, Or Eshkar (32) was headed to a wedding in Tel Aviv with some friends when a terrorist opened fire on Dizengoff Street. Despite the hope that Or could be saved, he passed away eleven days later on March 20th.

Last Friday, Lucy Dee was driving with her two daughters, Maia (20) and Rina (15) on the second day of Passover to meet up with family for a nature hike, a popular Israeli holiday activity, when another Palestinian terrorist shot at their car forcing it to crash, then got out and fired more than 20 bullets from a Kalashnikov rifle into their car at point blank range. The sisters were pronounced dead at the scene while the mother, Lucy (48) had sustained a gunshot to her brainstem and was airlifted to a Jerusalem hospital where she died several days later.

So how do these three tragic events highlight the initial assertion that the preservation of life is a value the Jewish people hold dear? So far, from these horrific murders, ten lives have been saved and four individuals can now see. The Yaniv brothers, Or Eshkar and Lucy Dee’s organs were donated to help give life and sight to others. Mrs. Dee’s corneas will also be used to give the gift of sight to others.

Organ donation upon death is merely one way in which Jews from across the religious and secular spectrum help to save the lives of others. 2021 statistics show that Israel ranked third in live organ donations, that is to say, healthy people volunteering to give a kidney, a piece of their liver or even a lung lobe to save others. To put this into perspective, 63 percent of all organs donated in Israel come from living donors, compared with 28 percent in the United States and this does not even begin to cover the culture of preserving and gifting life in the nation.

Jews do not discriminate against those who get donated organs either. On May 11, 2021, as a barrage of Hamas rockets from Gaza battered Israel and violence erupted in mixed Jewish-Arab towns, Yigal Yehoshua, 56, of Lod was hit in the head with a brick thrown by a Muslim Arab during a riot in the city. He died six days later. His donated lungs, liver, and kidneys saved four lives. One of them was a 58-year-old Arab mother of six from Jerusalem.

So where does this all stem from? It is a value that has been passed down since the time of Abraham. According to Jewish tradition, life is considered a sacred gift from God, and preserving life is one of the most important values in the Jewish faith. The Talmud, the central text of Jewish law and tradition, states that "whoever saves a single life is considered as if he or she has saved an entire world" (Sanhedrin 37a). This teaching emphasizes the importance of every individual life and encourages Jews to do everything possible to preserve and protect life.

Organ donation is seen as a way to fulfill this value of preserving life. The act of donating organs to someone in need is considered a mitzvah, a good deed that is rewarded by God. The Talmud teaches that "if a person can be healed, and he refuses to be healed, he bears the responsibility for his own death" (Baba Kama 85a). This passage suggests that it is the responsibility of individuals to do everything they can to preserve their own lives and the lives of others.

The Jewish community also recognizes the importance of organ donation as a way to save lives. Many Jewish organizations support and promote organ donation, including the National Kidney Foundation and the religious Halachic Organ Donor Society. These organizations work to raise awareness about the importance of organ donation and to provide resources and support to Jewish individuals who wish to donate their organs.

However, there are some issues related to organ donation that are of concern to some religious sects within the Jewish community. One concern is the issue of brain death, which is the irreversible cessation of all brain functions. Some scholars argue that brain death does not necessarily mean that a person is truly dead, and therefore, organ donation may not be permissible. Others argue that brain death is a valid form of death and that organ donation is permissible in these cases. The debates themselves across the levels of religious observance show the importance of life within the Jewish world.

While in many religions, there are concerns that organ donation is a desecration of the body, Jewish scholars have argued over the years that organ donation is a way to preserve life and it is not a desecration of the deceased’s body. They point to the fact that the Talmud teaches that "a single life is worth more than a thousand corpses" (Yoma 85b), a passage that is used often to emphasize the importance of preserving life over preserving the body after death.

To conclude, the Jewish value of life is deeply ingrained in not just the religion, but the culture. Organ donation is seen as a way to fulfill this value by saving the lives of others even after a tragedy such as the indiscriminate killing of civilians young and old by terrorists who celebrate death rather than life. By considering the value of life and the importance of preserving it, Jewish individuals fulfill their responsibility to do everything they can to preserve and protect life, no matter whose life it is.

 

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