January 17 • 2019 29
jn

continued from page 28

“then [looked] over their shoulders,
past them; his final words being, ‘
Oh,
wow. Oh, wow. Oh, wow!’
”
Blech surmised the dead, like Jobs,
saw God when they would live no
more.

ADVICE FROM THE AFTERLIFE
It is a Jewish tradition to go to the cem-
etery and ask the dead for assistance or
to invite dead relatives to a wedding.
Blech explained souls not only have a
consciousness, but they also can com-
municate with the living.
In the Small Miracles book series by
Yitta Halberstam and Judith Leventhal,
they document death-to-life commu-
nications during the Holocaust. One
woman, Esther, said that in Sobibor she
had a dream in which her dead moth-
er gave her detailed instructions and
a vision about escaping to a barn, 35
miles away, in a dangerous Nazi strong-
hold. “Here you’
ll go,
” said the mother,
“and here you’
ll survive.
”
The next day, 300 prisoners revolt-
ed and Esther escaped into the forest.
After almost a week of following her
mother’
s nocturnal navigation, Esther
found the barn that matched the vision.
She sensed another person hiding
in the dark. At dawn, she saw it was
her brother. And there they hid safely
until the war’
s end. How could Esther
possibly have known how to get from
Sobibor to that exact barn, 35 miles
away, without her dead mother’
s guid-
ance from the Other World?
Another story: Blech said, “I had
someone in my shul who was a bom-
bardier in World War II. He was
flying in combat and heard his father,
who was dead, call his name. The
son turned. A bullet whizzed by. The
son would have been shot if he hadn’
t
turned.
“Obviously,
” Blech said, “the question
is, why didn’
t [these warnings] happen
to the next guy? I can’
t answer that.
All I can say is, if it can happen even

sometimes, that means communication
between the living and the dead exists.
”

RETHINKING REINCARNATION
The dead can become the living. Blech
writes in Hope, No Fear, many “have
mistakenly claimed the concept of
reincarnation has no source in Judaism.
That is not correct. It has long been part
of the Oral Tradition. The Zohar, the
classic work of Jewish mysticism, makes
frequent and lengthy references to it …
Nachmanides (Ramban) attributed Job’
s
suffering to reincarnation.
”
Mystical texts consider Mordechai,
whose pivotal moment in the Purim
story was refusing to bow to Haman,
to be the reincarnation of Jacob,
who wrongly bowed to Esau. Jacob
“required another lifetime,
” writes
Blech, “in order to atone” for bowing
to his brother. Moses, who floated in a
basket (same Hebrew word as “ark”) on
the Nile, was the gilgul (reincarnation),
echoing and repairing Noah’
s story.
It happens to the most modest
among us. Reincarnation, he writes,
“offers a powerful response to the prob-
lem of theodicy, the lack of reward for
the righteous or punishment for the
wicked during our lifetimes.
”
The ancient Jewish mystics say that
when the angel taps the indentation
above our lips before birth, we forget
who we were, how we died in our pre-
vious life and what failings we are sup-
posed to repair by rebirth.
After 6 million Jews were murdered,
one-third children, God decided to
provide them with another chance,
say some. Many were “reborn,
” Blech
writes, “to live out their lives anew.
”
The rabbi is a gentle persuader. He
immediately concedes, “We need not
accept it at face value. We need only to
acknowledge that it is possible.
” People
often pray for a second chance, he says.
“God sometimes agrees.
” ■

Jonathan Mark is associate editor of the New
York Jewish Week, where this story first

“To understand death is to enter a realm
that of necessity requires faith as a guide.”
Most religions “have somehow come to
very similar conclusions:
Th
ere is life aft
er this life.”

— RABBI BENJAMIN BLECH

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