Death and mourning as a significant practice in Judaism: HSC Studies of Religion

What this dot point is asking

The Judaism depth study asks you to choose ONE significant practice from death and mourning, marriage, synagogue services, and to:

1. Describe the practice.
2. Demonstrate how it expresses the beliefs of Judaism.
3. Analyse its significance for both the individual and the Jewish community.

This page covers death and mourning. It is a rich choice: it is a sequence of practices from the moment of death to the anniversary years later, each grounded in the Tanakh, the Mishnah, the Talmud or the codes of Jewish law, so every stage can be linked to a belief and a source. Death and mourning has been an option in the practice question every year from 2023 to 2025.

Write with sensitivity. Describe practices as Jews understand them, and distinguish Orthodox practice (which follows halakhah, Jewish law, in full) from Conservative (Masorti) and Progressive (Reform and Liberal) practice where they differ.

The answer

Death in Jewish belief

Judaism affirms life above almost everything else, and it treats death with realism: "For dust you are, and to dust you shall return" (Genesis 3:19). God is sovereign over life and death and remains just even in loss: "Naked came I out of my mother's womb, and naked shall I return there; GOD has given, and GOD has taken away; blessed be GOD's name" (Job 1:21).

Jewish teaching also holds that death is not the end. The Mishnah states that "all of the Jewish people ... have a share in the World-to-Come" (olam ha-ba) (Sanhedrin 10:1), and the book of Daniel speaks of those "that sleep in the dust of the earth" who "will awake" (Daniel 12:2). Belief in the resurrection of the dead (techiyat ha-metim) is the last of Maimonides' Thirteen Principles and is praised in the daily Amidah. Progressive Judaism generally speaks of the immortality of the soul rather than bodily resurrection, and some Progressive prayer books offer alternative wording.

Jewish practice focuses less on speculation about the afterlife than on two duties: honouring the dead (kavod ha-met) and comforting the living (nichum avelim).

The practices in order

1. At the time of death and before burial (aninut)

• The seven relatives. A person is obligated to mourn for a father, mother, son, daughter, brother, sister or spouse.
• Hearing of the death. On hearing of a death, Jews say "Baruch Dayan ha-Emet", "Blessed ... the true Judge", the blessing the Mishnah prescribes "for bad tidings" (Berakhot 9:2).
• The onen. Between death and burial the mourner is an onen. The Mishnah exempts one "whose deceased relative is laid out unburied before him" from "the recitation of Shema, from the Amida prayer, and from the mitzva to don phylacteries, until the deceased has been buried" (Berakhot 3:1): nothing is to distract from caring for the dead.
• Shemirah. The body is not left alone; watchers (shomrim) stay with it, often reciting Psalms.

2. Preparing the body: the chevra kadisha

• The chevra kadisha ("holy society") is a volunteer burial society found in Jewish communities around the world, including in Australia. Its members perform taharah: the body is washed carefully and modestly, then purified with water, while prayers are said.
• Tachrichim. The body is dressed in plain white linen or cotton shrouds. The Talmud explains why: funerals had become so costly that "relatives would sometimes abandon the corpse and run away", "until Rabban Gamliel came ... by leaving instructions that he be taken out for burial in linen garments", and "the people adopted this practice after him" (Moed Katan 27b; also Ketubot 8b). A man is often buried with his tallit (prayer shawl), with one fringe cut.
• The coffin. Where a coffin is used it is a simple wooden box. In Israel burial is often in shrouds alone.
• No display. Traditional practice does not embalm the body or hold an open-casket viewing.

3. Keriah

Before the funeral the mourners tear a garment (or, in some communities, a black ribbon pinned to it), standing, and say "Baruch Dayan ha-Emet". The practice goes back to the Tanakh: "Jacob rent his clothes" when told of Joseph's death (Genesis 37:34), and Job "arose, tore his robe" (Job 1:20). By custom the tear is on the left, over the heart, for a parent, and on the right for other relatives.

4. The funeral (levayah) and burial

• Promptly. Burial takes place as soon as possible, ideally within a day, from the Torah's instruction to "bury it the same day" (Deuteronomy 21:23). It may be delayed for the honour of the dead (for example to allow close relatives to arrive) and does not take place on Shabbat or major festivals.
• The service. It is simple: Psalms (often Psalm 23), a eulogy (hesped) and the memorial prayer El Malei Rachamim ("God full of compassion").
• Accompanying the dead. Walking behind the coffin (the word levayah means "accompanying") is itself a mitzvah.
• Burial in the earth. The coffin is lowered and mourners and friends shovel earth into the grave, often using the back of the shovel at first to show reluctance, so that the family does not leave the dead unburied. Traditional Jewish law forbids cremation; Reform Judaism permits it, though many Progressive rabbis discourage it.
• Kaddish. The mourners recite the Kaddish at the graveside for the first time.
• Two lines of comforters. As the mourners leave, those present form two lines and say: "May the Omnipresent comfort you among the other mourners of Zion and Jerusalem."
• Kohanim. Men descended from the priests (kohanim) traditionally avoid contact with the dead, following Leviticus 21:1, and stand apart at a cemetery except for close relatives.

5. The meal of consolation (seudat havra'ah)

On returning home, the mourners are served a meal prepared by others. The Talmud teaches that "a mourner on the first day of his mourning is prohibited from eating of his own bread" (Moed Katan 27b). The meal traditionally includes round foods such as eggs and lentils, symbols of the cycle of life.

6. Shiva: the seven days

• Source. Joseph "observed a mourning period of seven days for his father" (Genesis 50:10); shiva means "seven".
• At home. The mourners stay at home (the "shiva house"), sit on low stools, do not work, wear the torn garment, and traditionally do not wear leather shoes, bathe for pleasure, cut their hair or study Torah (except texts about mourning). Many cover mirrors and a memorial candle burns throughout.
• The community comes. Prayer services are held in the house so the mourners can say Kaddish with a minyan (ten adults; ten men in Orthodox practice). Visitors come to comfort. "The consolers are not permitted to speak words of consolation until the mourner opens and speaks first", as Job's friends sat with him in silence (Moed Katan 28b).
• Shabbat. Public mourning is suspended on Shabbat, when mourners go to synagogue.
• Variation. Some Progressive Jews observe a shorter shiva, for example three days.

7. Shloshim and the year of mourning

• Shloshim (thirty days from burial): mourners return to work but avoid celebrations, music, and, traditionally, haircuts and new clothes.
• Avelut for a parent (twelve months): mourners continue to avoid celebrations and say Kaddish at daily services, by custom for eleven months.
• The Talmud's measure. The whole structure is summed up in Moed Katan 27b: "Three days for weeping, and seven for eulogizing, and thirty for the prohibition against ironing clothing and for the prohibition against cutting hair. From this point forward the Holy One, Blessed be He, says: Do not be more merciful with the deceased than I am." Mourning is required, but excessive mourning is discouraged.

8. Remembering: matzevah, yahrzeit and Yizkor

• Matzevah. A headstone is set up, often at an unveiling ceremony towards the end of the first year. Visitors to a grave may leave a small stone as a sign that they have come.
• Yahrzeit. Each anniversary of the death (by the Hebrew calendar) the mourner lights a 24-hour candle and says Kaddish.
• Yizkor. In Ashkenazi communities a memorial prayer is said in the synagogue on Yom Kippur and on the last days of Pesach, Shavuot and Sukkot (Shemini Atzeret).

The mourner's Kaddish

The Kaddish is in Aramaic and begins "Yitgadal v'yitkadash sh'mei rabba", "Magnified and sanctified be God's great name". It never mentions death. By praising God in public at the moment of loss, the mourner affirms faith and sanctifies God's name, and because it requires a minyan, it draws the mourner back into the community every day. In Orthodox communities it has traditionally been said by sons; in Conservative and Progressive communities, and increasingly in some Orthodox ones, daughters say it too.

How death and mourning express the beliefs of Judaism

Significance for the individual

• Permission to grieve. Keriah and the first days of shiva give grief a visible, accepted form. The mourner does not have to pretend to be well.
• Gradual healing. The stages move the mourner from total withdrawal (aninut and the first three days) to home-based mourning (shiva), to limited public life (shloshim), to ordinary life with remembrance (the year and the yahrzeit). The Talmud's image of a sword that moves from between the mourner's thighs, to the corner of the room, to the marketplace (Rabbi Levi, Moed Katan 27b) captures the easing of grief over time.
• Faith in crisis. Blessing "the true Judge" and reciting the Kaddish let the mourner express trust in God when it is hardest, and the belief in olam ha-ba gives hope.
• A continuing bond. Saying Kaddish for a parent is seen as an act of love and honour (fulfilling "honour your father and your mother"), and yahrzeit and Yizkor keep the relationship alive in memory.
• For those who help. Members of the chevra kadisha regard their work as chesed shel emet, "true kindness", because the dead can never repay it.

Significance for the Jewish community

• The community comes to the mourner. Comforting mourners is a commandment for every Jew. Visitors fill the shiva house, cook, and form the minyan, so no mourner grieves alone.
• Institutions of care. The chevra kadisha, the burial society, is one of the oldest institutions of Jewish communal life and is maintained by volunteers in communities including those in Sydney and Melbourne.
• Daily synagogue life. Because the mourner's Kaddish requires a minyan, mourners attend services daily for eleven months, strengthening synagogue attendance and community ties.
• Memory across generations. Yahrzeit and Yizkor link generations; the comforters' blessing links private grief to the collective memory of Zion and Jerusalem.
• Equality and solidarity. Plain shrouds and simple coffins, since Rabban Gamliel, mean that rich and poor are buried alike, and that no family is shamed by the cost of a funeral.
• Diversity within one framework. Orthodox, Conservative and Progressive Jews share the core structure (prompt burial, shiva, Kaddish, yahrzeit) while differing on details such as cremation, the length of shiva and who says Kaddish.

Evaluating the practices

• Strength. The graded structure is widely regarded, by Jews and many others, as psychologically wise: it gives grief time and form, surrounds the mourner with community and sets a path back into life.
• Challenges. Prompt burial can conflict with coronial or regulatory requirements; dispersed families and busy lives make full shiva and daily Kaddish harder to keep; debates continue within Orthodoxy over women saying Kaddish.
• Balance. The practices are demanding, but their demands express the central conviction that both the dead and the living must be treated with the dignity owed to people created in God's image.

In one sentence

Jewish death and mourning practices, from aninut, taharah and keriah through prompt burial, shiva and shloshim to the year of Kaddish and the yahrzeit, express belief in one just God, the dignity of every person made in God's image, the authority of Torah and the mitzvot of kindness, equality and hope in olam ha-ba, while honouring the dead, healing the mourner step by step and gathering the community around them.

Try this

Q1. Distinguish between shiva and shloshim. (2 marks)

• What the marker wants. Shiva: the seven days after burial, at home, the most intense mourning. Shloshim: the thirty days from burial, with lighter restrictions.

Q2. Explain how the mourner's Kaddish expresses Jewish beliefs. (4 marks)

• What the marker wants. Praise and sanctification of God's name at a time of loss, trust in God's justice, the need for a minyan (community), honour for a parent.

Q3. Analyse the significance of shiva for the Jewish community. (5 marks)

• What the marker wants. The commandment to comfort mourners (Sotah 14a; Maimonides), the minyan at the shiva house, the etiquette of Moed Katan 28b, the meal of consolation, and a judgement.