This week’s Parashah “Vayechi” (He lived) talks about Yaakov’s farewell address to his children before he passes away. Why would a Parashah that talks about death is called “he lived?”
In Parashah “Chayei Sarah” (The life of Sarah) that recounts Sarah’s death also we see the same trend. What these two Parashah’s have in common is that life is eternal. This world is the antechamber for the world to come. In 180 years when we depart this world the only thing that we take with us is our Torah knowledge and the kindness we did. This is the only things that are eternal, both in this world and the world to come.
I always tell people, “life is made of memories, make them beautiful.”
Till his last breath this is what Yaakov was concerned with. He brought all his children together to tell each one of them what was their purpose in life and gave each one a blessing.
Through my years as a volunteer in hospice, I rarely saw the person dying surrounded by his children, most of them left this world alone.
It’s never too late to teach our children what really matters in this world and build our relationship with them, showing them how important they are to us and how much we love them. In this way we are building an eternal bond which will live in through them.
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