The Last Three Days of Your Life

The Last Three Days of Your Life

Yom Kippur Sermon, 5787/2026

I’m going to tell you about the last three days of your life.  And what those three days might tell us about how to live all the days until then.  

My sermons for Yizkor are usually attached to the themes of the Memorial Service and that is true this year.  We reflect on the lives of those we’ve lost.  On how the eternal nature of the soul is at least in part how we remember those we’ve loved.  But unavoidably at Yizkor, we are talking about death.

People always think the worst thing for rabbis to talk about in a sermon is politics.  I even hear of rabbis worried to talk too much about Israel for fear of alienating congregants.  But I can tell you beyond any doubt, that I would be far more comfortable telling you what I really thought about President Trump, that I would without reservation talk about how I believe modern day Israel is an honest to God miraculous fulfillment of biblical prophecy, before I talked to you openly and candidly about death.  And so with great love for you all and with a great desire to be considerate of you all, if this is going to be a topic that might be too much for you, I encourage you now or at any time to step out if you need to.  

That said, I do venture into this topic because I feel one of the great services I can offer to you is to normalize talking about death and dying.  It is a value I believe in deeply.  Birth, childhood, adolescence, adulthood, sickness, health, we talk about all of those, we are comfortable with them and perform their associated mitzvot with real zeal.  But in what I believe is an un-Jewish way, we don’t like to talk about or be around death.  And that is sad because this common human experience needs to be prepared for at least as much as a wedding or bris.  If it is, if we can face it, we can find the holiness and the beauty and the love and maybe even the lessons that come out of the loss of a loved one.  And even the loss of our own lives.  

Let me add something more before I venture on to telling you about the last three days of your life.  Not every death is going to be like what I will describe. What I’m about to share has been studied and is shown to be consistent across cultures and places, across the religious and the non-believing, but only when it comes to those whose passing is of a certain kind, the one that comes after serious illness or disease.  That often occurs after stays in the hospital, or rehab, or hospice. 

For many people, and probably many of us, these things will not be true.  And knowing about many of the losses felt by many in this sanctuary, I want to acknowledge that.  I want to say that as best as I can as one outside your experiences, I see you and I care about you and I don’t want to hurt you in any way.  I am speaking generally in what follows, not about everyone.  I wish I had a message that could provide universal comfort to all of you who have suffered a loss in your life.  I can only hope you’ll find some in what I have to say.  

Three days before you die, you won’t want to, or even need to, eat or drink as much or anything at all.  Your breathing is going to sound different.  How your body looks will be different.  

And, you are probably going to be visited by someone you know, who’s already dead.  And who will comfort you and help you in your final transition, your last trip.  And it will make you feel good, at peace, they are there.  

This has been studied in the work of Dr. Christopher Kerr among others (and I can tell you anecdotally that I’ve seen it, too).  It happens to all sorts of people, everywhere, whether they believe in God or not.  The person who visits you will be someone who made you feel safe, not someone who was scary or hurtful to you. Many people report it to be a beloved pet; lots of dogs are the ones who come to visit.  

And it won’t be delirium, which would be something that would be jarring and interruptive.  Delirium you wouldn’t be able to remember happening either - you wouldn’t be able to describe what was happening let alone talk about in a calm and positive and comforted manner.  But with these visits, you might very well be able to share how comforting it is that your mother or grandfather or Rex or Spot came to see you. 

Another thing that happens around this point is that you may rally.  You may sit up, get up, be more coherent, talk, eat.  I knew someone who just the day before was as frail and sickly as could be who got up and grilled dinner for his family.  This is what doctors such as Alexander Batthyany and Bruce Greyson refer to as the “surge.” It doesn’t mean you are getting better, in fact it means the opposite, but it does mean the mysterious yet miraculous events of the last days of your life are playing out.  During this precious time it is as if you’re being given a chance to say final goodbyes and have the final interactions that both you and your loved ones need.

What’s even more remarkable is how this “surge” can look if you have dementia.  Very often there is what is sometimes called a “terminal lucidity.”  As studied by Dr. Sam Parnia and others, the person who may have not “been there” for years, whose brain shows physical damage, may during this period be that “the old person” again – even though it seems altogether impossible.  

What Parnia supposes is that with the brain no longer having to spend its energy on the business of keeping you functioning - on the decisions related to what you need to eat and what you’re going to wear and what you’re going to tell your boss about the project you didn’t finish - all the stuff that the brain needs to do to “live” (all those things dementia takes away) - he posits that with about three days left to live, your brain stops worrying about all that anymore.  The brain can turn all that “off” and let the “real you” come through.  All your memories and connections and important experiences reveal themselves again because nothing else matters now.    

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That kind of makes sense, doesn’t it?  How often do we talk about all the distractions and worries that fill up our days?  All those everyday decisions, the things we can’t control, opinions of others, that cause us fear and anxiety.  What would it be like to just not have all those anymore?  Think of the space that would leave.  It may seem like a paradox that the dying process reveals just how unhealthy those worries and anxieties and fears are to our “true selves.”  And kind of marvelously, it also shows us how resilient our “true self” really is - that it is still there to the very end.  Which means, of course, it is with you now, too.

—-

Jewish law recognizes this three-day demarcation we’ve been talking about.  The change in eating habits, the sound and quality of breathing, the transitional state where olam ha-zeh, this world, and olam ha’ba, the world to come, touch and mix.  This period is referred to as gesisah, the final phase of dying, or perek ha-mavet, “the chapter of dying” in a person’s life.  The person in this “chapter of life” is referred to as a goses.  

It is a period to be treated with great kavod, honor, because of the unique holiness of what can transpire at this time.  And the fact that medical science notes that the dying person at this point may start to interact with loved ones who’ve gone on before, may become more lucid than they have long been, all points to the truth of the significance our ancestors were describing before the medical terminology could.  

As Jews we are commanded to treat the goses as a living person in all respects.  They are not an object nor are they to be avoided. The goses should ideally never be left alone. One should focus one’s attention and concern on the goses, avoid idle chatter, eating, or casual behavior - out of respect for both the dying individual and the Shechinah, the Divine Presence, which we believe rests at the head of their bed.  This too, speaks to Judaism’s insights into what science now recognizes can happen.  That we may truly feel like God is at hand when we are given such precious final moments to be with our loved one.  

And yet, our secular world with its fear of death and dying, is petrified to know all this, let alone actually observe it.  It is to its great detriment and the detriment of our loved ones as they die and all of us as we try to live.  

Thank you for staying with me this far.  And as I said, these experiences won’t be the experiences that all of us have or what we’ve already encountered with our own loved ones in their last days.  

But what if we could try to live with this awareness of what our last three days might be like?  

What if we could, every day, feel that the people who cared for us and loved us the most, who didn’t hurt us but protected us, could be with us, watching over us and guiding us?  In some ways, the science sort of says they are and they do.  

What if, inspired by what our last three days will be like, we sought to make ourselves into the caring and nurturing people who will come back for others when it is their time?  In some ways, to me anyway, the greatest failure as a parent I could imagine would not being the one to come and help my aged and ailing children on their final journey.  

What if, despite all the frenzy around us, all the imposing but not important decisions that fill our days, we could still remain in touch with the core of who we are, and make sure that is what came through for the people we loved and for everyone we encountered.  Not a distracted person but a person who was really “there?”

Maybe beyond politics and even beyond death, the topic rabbis really worry the most about discussing is God.  So at the risk of sounding like a fanatic or a fool, what if, in considering all these things we might learn from the last three days of our life, we learned that God is really here with us?  Because that’s what all this feels like to me. It feels like God fulfilling the promise to watch over us even at the hardest of times.  Giving us what we need to meet if not our greatest, then certainly our final challenge.  And what if, instead of just feeling God’s presence in those last three days of our life when we really needed God, we were able to discover that all the days of our life were days we needed God to be there, and it turned out, in fact, that God really was?

G’mar Chatimah Tovah

Wearing (and Living) Tradition

The scene in question - forgive the colonialism and white savior undertones... fully on display.

Rosh Hashanah Sermon, 2026/5787

Club Paradise is a movie that has shaped my life.  Sure, the 1986 Robin Williams movie has its problems to be sure.  First off, a 10 year old probably shouldn’t have been watching it.  Also, 40 years on, a lot of the humor is not just corny but borderline offensive - sexist, racist, it has a white guy show up to a Caribbean island and he saves it, as if Jimmy Cliff (who costars) isn’t cool enough to do that for himself.   it’s an 80s movie, you get it.  But the arc of one supporting character, and his final scene, (again, leaving aside the colonialism), still gives me goosebumps and inspires me whenever I think of it.  It’s 

Now I usually prefer to share personality over personal stories, but this one may be worth hearing -  if you’ve ever wrestled with how Judaism, with all its rules and customs, some seemingly arcane or obsolete or lacking in utility, are actually invaluable to what a human life needs, what I learned from this film is something you may want to learn, too.  

So - Club Paradise.  Robin Williams’ character comes into a bunch of money.  He decides to reinvent himself as owner of the titular resort on the fictional island of St. Nicolas, a British territory in the Caribbean.  It’s a simple place, a little rundown, a little impoverished, a little corrupt.  The bad guy, the island’s native prime minister, is trying to make a deal with some foreign investors to exploit the island’s resources.  In the supporting cast is  Peter O’Toole, not in his greatest role, playing Anthony C. Hayes the island’s governor representing Queen and Commonwealth but who, when we meet him, is washed up, drunk in a bar, of no value, no meaning, no purpose to himself or anyone.  

Yet, when the evil prime minister stages a coup to realize his plan and seems to have prevailed over our heroes Williams, Jimmy Cliff and Twiggy, what happens?  The Governor finally sees that the people of the island are suffering, are in need, and only he can save them.  But not just he himself, all he stands for, all he represents (and again, it’s problematic from today’s understandings of imperialism and European dominance - but stick with me, I’m trying to make a point).  He stands for a system, the British Empire, that is - supposed to anyway - help and protect its subjects.  And so it is only as its representative, it is only when bedecked with all the symbols and trappings of his office - red uniform, sash, white pith helmet with plume, saber and horse - that he rediscovers his purpose, and rallies all the islanders to save the day!

His uniform, which could easily seem silly - who wears a plume - becomes the expression of something bigger and greater, something that inspires.  

And that, my friends, is the power of tradition!  I think - again, without it being the point of the movie - that character inspired me to choose a career, a calling, where even I, a person with all sorts of faults and shortcomings can nevertheless, lift up others.  But it is only with the trappings, the symbols, the special words and the proper actions, that the lifting can happen.  

As a clergy person, it is my humbling responsibility and honor to “wear” as it were Judaism’s “uniform.”  And to  become, when I do my job right, Judaism’s representative, and every so often, when I do my job really well, to represent its Creator, too.

In those moments our traditions transform me and by extension the people I’m interacting with:  

The person in the hospital feels better in a way nothing else may heal them, because of that black rabbi’s manual with those ancient words in it.  

The robes grant a majesty to a setting, elevating it, showing us that there can be transcendence in a world that sorely lacks for such awe and wonder.  

The three-piece suit and tie and fedora at the funeral, the prayers and words, let people know their loved one, whoever they were, is worthy of the utmost signs of respect and honor.  

The kippah at the gas station lets people know that pride in who you are cannot be cowed.  

And the message I want you to hear is that Judaism, our traditions, can transform all of us into vessels that comfort and inspire, that demonstrate God's wisdom and goodness are present here.  

Visit a shivah house and see if it’s not true about you.  But for it to work there has to be such a thing as a shivah observance, and a shivah house to observe in, and a shared expectation that even people I don’t know will come and make manifest human kindness and empathy that in the face of great loss one might also experience a great outpouring of love - but we need the tradition to make all that happen!

The greatest betrayal would be to think we can do it all on our own - without the shared past and without the community that shares the lessons of that past and what they mean today.  To look at all Judaism is and say:

Those old prayers?  That old book?
That strange language? Those ancient rituals?
Those dietary laws?  That tallit?  Those candles?
That thing on the doorpost?

What possible use could those things have in the world we live in now?

We sometimes ask whether Judaism is "relevant."  But maybe that's the wrong question.

Because "relevant" usually means: Does this fit comfortably into the world as it presently exists?

Tradition has a much more important job.

Tradition remembers things the present has forgotten.

It preserves habits we may someday need again.

It keeps words available for moments when our own vocabulary fails us.

It keeps alive standards that may seem quaint until the culture around us loses them.

It preserves identities that we may not fully appreciate until history suddenly calls upon us to inhabit them.

And that is why an old uniform can matter.  Not a costume.  A uniform.

A costume allows us to pretend to be somebody else.  A uniform reminds us who we already are.

And perhaps that is the distinction to end with.

Being a rabbi is not Jewish dress-up.  Tradition is not nostalgia.  It is not an attempt to pretend that we still live in the world of our grandparents, or the shtetl, or the rabbis of the Talmud.

Tradition is the uniform that each of us can wear and proudly proclaim:  You belong to something.  People wore this before you.  People stood here before you.  People carried these words through circumstances you cannot imagine.  And now it is your turn.

Governor Hayes puts on the uniform as a sign of his transformation.  As the symbol that conveys he is now ready to be the leader the people of the island need in a desperate moment.

Maybe that is what our traditions are waiting to do for us.  Not to drag us backward.  But to call us forward.  

To provide us with something we may not even know we possess until the moment comes when the world desperately needs us to remember where we came from and who we are.

Shanah Tovah!

Beyond Just Hate and Pride - Answers to Combating Antisemitism

Joy, Independence, and Curiosity

Rosh Hashanah sermon from 2026/5787:

Shanah Tovah and Shabbat Shalom.  For the people who think Ed Sheeran is a good musician, and for the rest of us who don’t, he’s been in the news of late for more reasons than just songs people play at weddings.  He had a concert recently with 2012’s top artist, Macklemore, most noteworthy previously for his concern for Palestinian suffering in the immediate aftermath of October 7th, and now, for calling out “Free Palestine” as Sheeran’s opening act, which, bad enough on its own, got an enthusiastic and rather anti-Zionist if not downright antisemitic response from the crowd, causing many Jewish attendees to feel unsafe and leave.  Sheeran hasn’t called out Macklemore in any significant way.  

So what should I have to say about that?  Or about Mayor Mamdani’s continuing insensitivity and hostility to the Jewish community and to Israel?  Or about the troubling shift in the Democratic Party, or the troubling statements of Vice President Vance?  “Be Angry”?  I can give you plenty of things to be angry about if that’s what you want.  “Be Proud”? I can tell you over and over about the importance of Jewish pride as an answer.  And I do believe we should be angry. And probably scared, too.  And we most certainly should be proud.  

But I have said all that before.  And others have said that before, some of them even more eloquently than me!  If you’re going to give me your time today, I feel beholden to you to offer something more than anger and pride.  I want to suggest, “joy,” “independence,” and “curiosity” as three more important ways to respond to antisemitism.  

–

The most subversive response to antisemitism may be Jewish joy. Not oblivious to the world, Stepford wives, happy.  Not happiness as denial, but simchah, real “joy” as resistance. What has antisemitism done to Jews - Jewish college students, demonstratively Jewish people walking the streets, to members of our own congregation who worry about coming to shul?  It has done what it always seeks to do - to frighten, humiliate, isolate and shame. 

Continuing to celebrate Shabbat, weddings, babies, Torah, food, music, humor and community is therefore not escapism.  It is a profound response of a people not willing to be cowed.  And not just proud of who we are, but in a true and real way - joyful about who we are. 

Psalm 100 says, “Ivdu et Adonai b'simchah”—serve God with joy. Anyone who’s been to Simchat Torah has seen an example of the way we take joy remarkably seriously!

We see that even today.  Rosh Hashanah is extraordinarily serious, yet we celebrate it with meals, wine, sweetness and hope. Judaism's response to danger has never simply been grim determination. Even in the face of God’s judgement, we put honey on the table.  We put apples on the table.  We wish each other not just a good new year but a sweet new year.  Even as we seek to do teshuvah, we do so with simchah as well.  How much the moreseo every other day of the year?

Sure, we hire security. And we call out hatred. We will defend Israel and defend one another. But after the security meeting, after the rally, we're also going to make Kiddush, and sing and stuff our faces with simchah, with joy! 

–

“If the only reason your grandchildren know they are Jews is because someone hates Jews, then antisemitism has already taken too much from us.”

Antisemitism seeks to make us live reactively.  Seeks to grab the initiative, the proactivity, the independence of thought and action, from out of our hands as yet another way to cripple us.  We mustn’t let it.  We must, to paraphrase Pirkei Avot, “in a place where there is nobody willing to be a mensch, it means you need to be one.” 

We usually understand it as stepping forward when others fail to act. But there is another possibility: Don't let somebody else's behavior determine yours.

Antisemitism is inherently reactive—they hate, so we become angry; they protest, so we counter-protest; they post, so we post. Eventually our enemies are setting our emotional schedule.

Another way it is reactive - Antisemitism can tempt us into becoming the people it accuses us of being. When people demonize us, there is a tendency to become suspicious of everyone—to assume everyone secretly hates us, nobody can be trusted, the whole world is against us.

Think again of today.  Rosh Hashanah asks: Who is actually sovereign over your life?  Are you?  Is someone else?  Or is God?

We recite in the Malchuyot section of Mussaf, verses proclaiming God's kingship. To say Adonai Melech—God is King—is also to say: the antisemite is not. He doesn't get sovereignty over my attention, my mood, my Judaism, or the kind of human being I become.

—

Perhaps the best piece of advice I want to offer, my favorite, is that antisemitism should make us more curious about Judaism.

When someone spray-paints a swastika on a synagogue, we automatically ask questions like, “Who did this?” “Why do they hate us?” “How do we stop them?”

Turn it around.  Ask a different, a defiant question:

“What is inside this building that generations of people have been so determined to destroy?”

Instead of allowing antisemitism to lead primarily to the study of antisemitism, let it provoke the study of Judaism.

They burned the Talmud. But have we opened it?

They prohibited Torah study. Do we study it?

They forbade Jews from observing Shabbat. What does Shabbat mean to us?

They tried to prevent Jews from teaching Judaism to their children. What are we teaching ours?

That is not guilt. It's curiosity.

Perhaps the great tragedy would be to spend so much time studying why people hate Judaism that we never find out why generations of Jews loved it.

Those who hate us don’t get to decide what we can be and what we can feel.  Our enemies don't get to take away our joy.   They cannot make us more focused on their insanity than on Judaism’s wisdom and wonder.  

So this year, let them hate.  And let us learn, let us act, and let us celebrate.  And in so doing, let us live our lives as God intended and as the world needs us to do.  Am Yisrael Chai!