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Day of the Living Dead
Rabbi Avi Shafran

Day of the Living Dead

Rabbi Avi Shafran
Director of Public Affairs
Agudath Israel of America

Had it been cheap fiction instead of tragic real life, the case of Georgette Smith would have strained credulity.

Shirley Egan, a frail, elderly woman, outraged by her daughter Ms. Smith's plans to place her in a nursing home, shoots the 42-year-old woman she raised from birth. As if that weren't lurid enough, the daughter, paralyzed from the neck down, insists on being removed from life support equipment, and obtains a Florida court order to force the reluctant hospital to comply with her wishes. The machines are disconnected and the patient dies.

The coup de grace: it was subsequently reported that prosecutors were weighing a murder charge against the mother.

In the end, however, the Florida state attorney decided that Ms. Egan's "deteriorating health, and her relationship to the victim, do not provide an appropriate circumstance" for a murder charge.

His decision was correct, but for chillingly wrong reasons. Ms. Egan is innocent of murder not because of her health or her relationship to her daughter, but because she didn't kill her.

There is a frightening, if subtle, statement in the willingness to even consider murder charges against Ms. Egan. Consider: Were an assailant to cause, say, loss of limb, and the victim subsequently declared life not worth living without the arm or a leg, forever maimed and unable to function as most people do, and then proceeded to commit suicide, can we imagine murder charges being brought against the attacker?

One would hope not. While punishing the attacker for the injury to the fullest extent of the law, we would, however, rightfully put responsibility for the death on the one who effected it, in this case the deceased.

Why then, is it not just as obvious that Ms. Smith, who likewise made the choice to die - indeed obtained a judge's imprimatur to secure it - is alone responsible for her own death?

Granted, her mother assaulted her, grievously. But murder? She horribly injured her daughter, but she did not kill her.

Or did she? Is relegating a physically active human being to a life of paralysis, of boredom and dependency on others, the equivalent of the termination of meaningful life itself?

It is in the moment's hesitation before that question is answered that the danger to us all lurks.

Because the answer is no, and it should come swift and strong.

Life is not jumping or running or climbing, at least not for human beings. It is not even walking or being able to lift one's hand, important though mobility and dexterity may be to most of us. Our most meaningful living is done in our minds and our souls.

There is a gentleman, now of Jerusalem, who, like Ms. Smith was, is paralyzed from the neck down. The injury that resulted in his condition was suffered in a freak swimming accident; he had been a promising athlete before the day, many years ago, when a diver landed on his back.

His first thoughts, like those of Ms. Smith, had been plans for suicide. But he had been less able to accomplish the deed. Though his begged those close to him to help him end his life, they refused. Court assistance likely never crossed his mind. Decades ago, in any event, it would not likely have been forthcoming.

Today, though, the swimmer has not only come to terms with his condition but actually considers his accident to have been the most fortunate occurrence in his life.

He explains that, after his initial anger and hopelessness subsided, his paralysis forced him to confront, deeply and seriously, the question of whether athletic prowess, or even basic mobility, had defined the very meaning of his pre-accident life. After many days of contemplating that question, in anything but a theoretical sense, he found himself forced to concede that a life defined by physical activity was a rather silly notion.What then was life really about? His further thought -- and consultation, and study -- led him to the traditions of the Jewish faith into which he had been born.

His paralysis, he feels, was a well-disguised gift. He is chilled by the thought that a well-meaning relative or friend might have successfully helped him effect his demise years ago, in the first days of his new life.

It is too late for Ms. Smith to acclimate to a new life, of course; she received the "help" she sought all too promptly and efficiently.But her dismissal of the value of a physically limited life was only a tragic personal mistake.

If her mother, though, is perceived by the law and the society it serves as guilty of something more than attempted murder, as having effectively ended a human life, then we are well on the way toward missing the most essential meaning of our humanity.


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