Five Stages of Grief
This morning in our Torah, we read as God told Moses that the time has come for him to die. Moses knew that this was coming. God had already told him that he would not enter the Land of Israel. He is keenly aware of his advanced years.
There is an extensive midrash that charts Moses’ journey towards acceptance of his fate. I’d like to share parts of it with you, but first I’d like to draw your attention to that fact that it follows the progression of Elisabeth Kubler-Ross’ five stages of grief. In her 1969 book, On Death and Dying, Kubler-Ross describes, in five discrete stages, a process by which people might deal with grief and tragedy, especially when diagnosed with a terminal illness or catastrophic loss. While individuals experience and react to grief and tragedy in varied ways, Kubler-Ross’ five stages are widely accepted as an accurate overview of trends in human emotion under extreme circumstances. The five stages of grief are: denial, anger, bargaining, depression and acceptance. I think you will see evidence of each of these as we explore the midrash.
And so we begin with denial. Despite his long life, despite the fact that God had decreed many years earlier that Moses could not enter the Land of Israel, Moses lives much of his life in denial. Yet when God says, “The time is drawing near for you to die,” Moses is not ready. Our midrash teaches that Moses’ anger at the news of his impending death was so loud that the world and all of God creation trembled. Moses’ pleas are so loud that God calls upon the angels to bolt the gates of heaven!
Still Moses is undeterred, and finally gets God’s attention. Then the bargaining begins. “Master of the universe, if You will not let me enter the Land of Israel, allow me to at least remain alive, like the beasts of the field, who eat grass, drink water and thus savor the world – let me be like one of these.” At that, God replied, “Enough. Speak no more to Me of this matter.”
But Moses spoke up again. “Master of the universe, if not like the beast of the field, then let me become like a bird that flies daily in every direction to gather its food, and in the evening returns to its nest – let me be like one of these.” The Holy One replied again, “Enough.”
This goes on. Moses moves from imploring God to imploring heaven and earth, the stars and the planets, the mountains and the hills. But it is to no avail. Moses returns to God defeated, depressed. Moses says,”How can the feet that went up to the firmament, the face that confronted Your Presence and the hands that received the Torah, cease to exist?”
God responds with an important message for leaders in any generation. “Each generation,” says God, “is to have its own interpreters of Torah, each generation is to have its own providers, each generation is to have its own leaders. Until now it had been your portion to serve Me, but now your disciple Joshua’s time has come.”
Hearing this, Moses says, “Master of the Universe, if I must die in order to make space for Joshua, let me be his disciple in my final hours.” God agrees to this request.
And so Moses goes to sit at the right hand of Joshua. The mantle of leadership has been moved, and the Israelites have come to accept Joshua as their new leader. When Joshua and Moses entered the Tent of Meeting, a pillar cloud came down and formed a partition between them. After the cloud departed, Moses went over to Joshua and asked, “What did the Holy One say to you?” Joshua replied, “When God used to reveal the Divine to you, did I know what it said to you?”
In that instant, Moses cried out in anguish and said, “Rather a hundred deaths than a single pang of envy. Master of the Universe, until now I sought life. But now my soul is surrendered to you.” Moses had accepted that he would die.
There is one more element of the midrash surrounding Moses’ death that is particularly valuable for us to explore this week. Having accepted that his time has come, Moses asks for and receives God’s permission to bless Israel. In concluding his blessing, as he feels his time waning, Moses says, “Over the years, I have troubled you greatly. Now, please forgive me.”
The Israelites replied, “Our master, our lord, you are forgiven.” In their turn they said to him, “Moses our teacher, we troubled you even more, we made your burden so heavy. Please forgive us.” Moses replied, “You are forgiven.”
We are about to enter into a New Year. In our tradition, we know that we are to approach the new year with serious reflection. We identify our missteps and ask to be forgiven. We strive to open our hearts to forgive those who have hurt us. The High Holiday liturgy that we will invoke in the coming weeks will ask us to face some difficult topics, including our own mortality. So often in our tradition we turn to Moses as a role model. He is our ideal leader, the consummate teacher and ultimate teacher of Torah. This morning, we had the opportunity to look at Moses the person. A man who experienced real emotions and struggles, as we too, no doubt, will face these in the year to come.