I received your letter... in which you write of the passing of you mother, OBM, and your thoughts and feelings in connection with this.
The truth is that “none amongst us knows anything at all” concerning the ways of Hashem, who created humans, directs them and observes them with a most specific divine providence – hashgacha peratis. He is the very essence of good, and, as the expression goes, “it is in the nature of the good to do good.” If, at times, what G-d does is at all not understood by the human mind – little wonder: what significance has a limited, measured, finite creature in relation to the [Almighty] infinite and endless?
When the Soul Leaves the Limitations of the Body
...The soul is eternal. An illness of the flesh or blood cannot terminate or diminish the life of the soul – it can only damage the flesh and the blood themselves, and the bond between them and the soul. That is to say, it can bring to the cessation of this bond – death, G-d forbid. With the severing of what binds the soul to the flesh, the soul ascends and frees herself of the shackles of the body, of its limitations and restrictions. Through the good deeds she has performed during the period she was on earth and within the body, she is elevated to a much higher level than her status prior to her descent into the body. As our sages expressed it: The descent of the soul is a descent for the sake of an ascent, an ascent above and beyond her prior state...
==== Excerpt of Rebbe”s letter. For the entire letter – Chabad.org Mourning a death
