Shliach Halts Cremation at Last Minute

Rabbi Avremel Brod, Shliach in Stockton, California, met an elderly Jew in the past few months, who put on Tefillin for the very first time.

Rabbi Brod kept in touch with the 85-year old man, helping him to light a Menorah last Chanukah, he relates.

This week, Rabbi Brod visited him, and the man was nearing the end of his life.

“The man was suffering from a terrible illness, and could not talk,” Rabbi Brod recounted. “But he smiled, and I said Shema with him, and we said vidui prayers.”  

A few days later, Rabbi Brod received a call that the man had passed away. 

Upon asking about the funeral, he was told that he was planned for cremation, and had been picked up by the funeral home.

Rabbi Brod begged to speak to his wife, but to no avail.

Finally, she agreed to speak with him, and he begged her to reconsider. He promised that if she will agree for him to have a Jewish burial, Rabbi Brod would make all the arrangements and cover all the expenses.

His wife finally relented, but said that it was probably too late, as the body had already been sent to the funeral home.

Undeterred, Rabbi Brod did not give up. Calling the funeral home, he asked them to stop the cremation. 

“They called the crematorium and told them to hold it off,” Rabbi Brod said. “Literally at the last second, we stopped it.”

So, that day, without a minyan, this Jewish soul was buried in a Jewish cemetery.

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