Kindness Towards The Dead: The Kindness of Truth
Yaakov asked his son Yosef to “do for me a kindness and a truth. Do not bury me in Egypt.” [Bereishis 47: 29]. Rash”i on this verse cites a very famous statement of our Sages: “Kindness that is done with the deceased is called ‘a kindness of truth,’ because one clearly does not look for a return of the favor from the deceased.” All other acts of kindness can always be viewed as somewhat tainted by ulterior motives, but, apparently, this kindness cannot.
Rav Yaakov Neiman asks a question on this Rash”i (in his work Darkei Mussar) from the Talmud. The Gemara states “The one who eulogizes, will be eulogized; the one who buries will be buried” [Kesuvos 72a]. This seems to indicate that one can expect something back when occupying himself with the dead. This contradicts the above quoted statement of the Sages.
Therefore, Rav Yaakov Neiman offers a new twist on this concept. When our Sages say that one does not expect payment for his participation with the dead, it does not mean that payment will not be forthcoming. It means that the person does not care if he will be paid back or not. When a person occupies himself with the dead, he gains a different perspective on life.
In other words, a person does not act the same upon returning from a funeral. Think about it. When a person attends a tragic funeral and returns home, the person is not the same — even if only for 15 minutes or a half an hour or an hour. Attending a funeral causes us to look at life differently. Often, that which had previously seemed to be very important, now takes on its true perspective. Honor and recognition become meaningless.
That is the meaning of the statement of our Sages. Performing kindness for the dead — be it doing a ‘Taharah’ (final preparation of the body before burial), being a ‘Shomer’ (watching the body continuously before burial) or attending a funeral — puts a person in a totally different frame of mind than when performing any other type of kindness. Under such circumstances, a person is not looking for a “return on his investment”. He is not thinking “Will they say such nice eulogies about me?” Who could think about such a trivial matter? A person does not look for payment – because he does not care about payment anymore.
Psychologically, such payment becomes petty and meaningless. Performing kindness for the dead is called a Kindness of Truth because it gives a person a true picture of what is important and what is trivial in life, albeit, perhaps unfortunately, only for a short time.
