Rabbi Mark Gelman appeared stating indeed the Schiavo Case is a viable case in the eyes of the Jewish Faith.
Rabbi, the Schiavo Case is a viable case in any religion. You should not 'fashionably' rewrite Commentary.
HOWEVER... the Jewish Faith allows for dying when dying is eminent without interference from physicians.
Rabbi Moshe Feinstein and Rabbi Shlomo Zalman Auerbach have ruled that a dying patient should not be kept alive by artificial means where the treatment does not cure the illness but merely prolongs the patient's life temporarily and the patient is suffering great pain.
IN THE CASE of Terri Schiavo who is Catholic and not Jewish the only aspect of her care that 'keeps her alive' is her feeding tube. The feeding tube will not CURE the malady of hypoxia. It is completely OBVIOUS that a woman with a wonderful life with a good husband would suffer significant pain at the 'idea' of being in a vegetative state.
The Discoure on NewsNight;
(AARON) We began talking about the issues raised in the Schiavo case. And we'll end there, too. It may help here to tell you that, while others see this with all the wonderful clarity of black and white, I see lots of gray, and I suspect I'm not alone. So, to help us through the gray, we call on rabbi Marc Gellman, familiar to many of you, an old friend to me, and, among many other things, a columnist these days for Newsweek.com. Nice to see you, sir.
RABBI MARC GELLMAN, THE GOD SQUAD: Hello, Aaron.
BROWN: I guess I'm looking for a road map (A fashionable reference. A political reference intended to demean the conversation making reference to Israel in the context perscribed by Bush. The verbage is completely out of context. Christian Bigotry.) here. What does it mean in this day and age to be alive?
GELLMAN: What it means is that you have an elemental right to stay alive. If you are innocent, if you are alive, even if you're mute, there's just a common moral consensus that you should not be starved to death, or you should not have to die of thirst. It's true for infants, who can't feed themselves. It's true for people in comas. And it's true for brain-damaged people. In a certain way, what's amazing about this case, Aaron, is that it doesn't come down to, what do the religious people believe and what do the nonreligious people believe? I think there's a general consensus that you have a conflict here between the rights of a husband to be the next of kin and the rights of an innocent, mute and living person to continue to live.
BROWN: All right. All right.
(CROSSTALK)
GELLMAN: And I think that that's just basic.
BROWN: OK.
GELLMAN: OK.
BROWN: I'm not sure...
GELLMAN: OK.
BROWN: I'm not precisely sure -- and we've argued before, and perhaps we will again -- that you answered my question what it means to be alive, except to say that it means to be alive, that any life is alive. So we'll leave it at that.
GELLMAN: No, it means that you have a right not to be -- to have someone end your life. That's the most elemental thing it means.
BROWN: OK. OK. Do -- let's assume for a second, Marc, that she, in fact -- because I have no factual reason to believe she did not -- she, in fact, said to her husband, I don't want to live that way or this way, if this should ever come to that in my life. Does that matter in a theological sense about whether society should condone the ending of a life?
GELLMAN: That's a great question. And I think it's one of the things that's complicated people's thinking about it, Aaron. In a theological sense, it doesn't matter, because the theological construct is that what matters is, what is the right thing to do? What matters in a legal context, and for people who think about personal autonomy, is, who has the right to make the decision, whatever the decision is? From a theological point of view, you have no right to end your own life and you have no right to end the life of someone else.
BROWN: OK. All right. And, just in this sequence, then, Marc, the final question, then, under no circumstance in the theological view, or in your theological view, do I have the right, in the way that people in the state of Oregon, for example, have the right, a terminally-ill person, to end their life prematurely simply because I decide the quality of my life or the pain I'm enduring is more than I choose to bear?
GELLMAN: Right. But there is a gray here. You do have a right to eliminate an obstacle to death. If you are on medical machinery that is not therapeutic and has no purpose other than to prevent you from dying, other than machinery to feed you and provide hydration, other than that, you have a right to end that medical intervention and reach a peaceful and natural death.
BROWN: But I don't have the right, even though I may be -- I do not have the right, even though I may be in great pain, that I may be terminal within three, four, five, six months, I do not have the right, in a theological sense, to hasten the end of my life, take some pills, and die?
GELLMAN: Right, because the concept is that your life is not a privilege. It's a gift that you didn't give and you cannot take. It's a fundamentally different point of view than people who believe we own our own bodies and we have absolute personal autonomy.
BROWN: Yes.
GELLMAN: It's a very different point of view.
BROWN: Good to see you, my friend. Thank you. Thank you.
GELLMAN: Thank you.
BROWN: Marc Gellman tonight, Rabbi Marc Gellman
The Hebrew faith allows for pain relief to be adminitered. I consider the Jewish Faith to be among the most progressive faiths in that they provide 'Commentary' to the ancient scriptures and they always have. The Oregon Law of assisted suicide recognizes the fundamental fact that people are dying within six months. It also recognizes the pain, both physical and emotional, that needs attending when death is approaching. The law also allows for the individual to seek pain relief from dying within those final six months to preserve their dignity. Seeking pain relief from life is a Jewish Right, not a priviledge. The good Rabbi overlooked the fact The Oregon Law is supervised by at least two physicians who could easily be Jewish. There is a perscription to uphold the dignity of those dying who want relief from the emotional path ahead of them. There is nothing wrong with The Oregon Assisted Suicide Law, except it is poorly named.
