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Council Of Rabbis
Blasts Dr. Kevorkian

Er

DAVID ZEMAN STAFF WRITER

0

n the eve of Dr. Jack
Kevorkian's latest trial on
assisted-suicide charges,
the Council of Orthodox
Rabbis of Greater Detroit has
publicly restated its opposition
to assisted suicide. The council is
urging Jews to consult their rab-
bis on how Torah views the prac-
tice.
"Mercy killing is a non-issue
— it's murder," said Rabbi
Elimeilech Silberberg of Bais
Chabad of West Bloomfield, a
member of the council.
"Both sides (in the assisted-
suicide debate) marshal logical
arguments that they are correct,"
Rabbi Silberberg said. "But ulti-
mately it comes down to: what
does Torah say? Torah tells us
how to direct our lives.
"And Torah only gives one ex-
ception on killing, and that is
killing someone who has com-
mitted a capital offense. That's
the only exception the Torah
gives."
His comments drew a rebuke
from attorney Geoffrey Fieger,
who will defend Dr. Kevorkian
when his trial begins Monday in
Oakland County Circuit Court.
Mr. Fieger told reporters this
week the position of Orthodox
rabbis was "closer to Nazis than
they think they are." He did not
back away from that statement
in an interview Tuesday.
"Yes, they are victims of the
Holocaust so they hate to hear
that word (Nazi), but they are far
more similar to extremists than
to rational, progressive human
beings," Mr. Fieger said. "The
more extreme you are, the more
inflexible and intolerant you be-
come."
Mr. Fieger, whose father
Bernard was born Jewish, said
he does not identify himself as
a member of the Jewish or any
other faith.
Dr. Kevorkian, who has at-
tended the suicides of 27 people
since 1990, will be tried next
week in the deaths of two pa-
tients. Another Oakland County
trial is slated for April in the
deaths of two other patients.
The Council of Orthodox Rab-
bis has been unequivocal in its
opposition to assisted suicide, a
practice that Dr. Kevorkian calls
"medicide."
In December 1992, the coun-
cil issued a written statement
calling on people with even
"seemingly hopeless cases" to al-
low God to guide their fate.
"The statement that where
there is life there is hope is an ac-
cepted principle in Judaism," the
council wrote in condemning Dr.

Kevorkian's practice, calling it "a
very terrible act."
Rabbi Silberberg said that peo-
ple in pain from a terminal ill-
ness can take comfort in knowing
that "this is part of his service as
a created being.
"As long as a person is living,
one's soul radiates divinity to the
world."
But other rabbis in the Detroit
area have varying opinions on
the subject, with many sharing
in the overriding support that the
general public seems to have for
Dr. Kevorkian's cause.
In a recent poll, a vast major-
ity of Michiganians and a slim
majority of doctors in the state
said they would support making
assisted suicide legal for some
terminally ill people under well-
regulated conditions.
"I am not in favor of doing it in
the way that Dr. Kevorkian is do-
ing it, but I am in favor of ar-
ranging a systematic, ethically
appropriate method that allows

Debate
re-opens on
"medicide."

the terminally ill to choose as-
sisted suicide," said Rabbi Sher-
win Wine of the Birmingham
Temple, the area's only Human-
istic congregation.
"One of the primary ethical
values of Judaism is the defense
of human dignity," Rabbi Wine
said. "When dignity is lost, when
the quality of life no longer has a
semblance of happiness, the eth-
ically appropriate thing to do is
to give that person a right to
choose ... We of all people should
be sensitive to unnecessary suf-
fering."
Rabbi Wine added that, in his
view, the Torah never contem-
plated the specific issue of as-
sisted suicide, particularly in
terms of whether it constituted
murder. In any event, he said,
the Torah should be considered
in conjunction with the history
and moral practices of the Jew-
ish people.
The Michigan Board of Rab-
bis, which represents Reform,
Conservative and Humanist rab-
bis in the state, has taken no for-
mal position on assisted suicide,
according to Rabbi Wine.
Rabbi Harold Loss of Temple
Israel, president of the board,
could not be reached for com-
ment: D ' - '

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