X-Message-Number: 10728 From: Date: Mon, 9 Nov 1998 11:58:58 EST Subject: cryonics and halakha (Jewish law) Hi folks ! As this is a slightly long post (apologies) I'll state my question upfront, then tell the whole story. In a nutshell, does anyone know of any Orthodox Rabbis sympathetic to cryonics ??? El Problemo : My parents are what one might call "Orthodox Sympathetic Jews". Let's just say, they don't actually live that lifestyle, but are leached off of certain members of that community who are in dire need of working individuals to practise their talmudic skills on. As a few of you know, I returned from Japan last year and recently married. In order to keep the gates of hades from freezing over, despite my distaste for religion, I agreed to allow my wife to convert if we could pick the Rabbi, and it was done quickly and unobtrustively. I figured 6 months of tsures would beat years of it. I've been wanting to "consumate" a cryonics contract. Now with cryonics, the meddlers enter my life again. Reality is, if for some reason my parents were to outlive me or us, and Jewish custom being burial within 24 hours, unless I'm lucky enough to get hit by the car "erev shabbas" (before the Sabbath), in a worse case scenario, there would be a lot of un-needed "kvetching" during time prescious moments and in a highly volatile situation. Although in the end, I'd be suspended, I think it would be selfish for me not to try to circumvent potential legal and emotional problems in advance. Therefore, I'm wondering if anyone knows of any Rabbi preferably orthodox, though conservative or traditional woudl do in a squeeze, who could argue my case for me to my parents. Unfortunately the logical stuff about blind superstition and a speach on the principals of humanism and potentiality of mankind would not fair very well, I'm afraid. Naturally, the most halakhik case would simply be that cryonics is not a form of burial but a life saving procedure, and that if for some reason the bodies had to be unthawed, they would be burried. - - Kind folks, please don't kindly state such a logical arguement for me. Logic comes in beard length and affiliations in this family. Besides, who knows, if the Rabbi is successful, some lucky Cryonics org might get 4 for the price of two. (Donning beards from the old HS Fiddler on the Roof play is STRICTLY out of the question.) Would appreciate your help ! - - Ed Rate This Message: http://www.cryonet.org/cgi-bin/rate.cgi?msg=10728