Today I attended a press conference in support of the the Medical Aid in Dying Act for 2017 (S.3151/A.2383), a bill to give New Yorkers the option to make end-of-life healthcare decisions that are right for them in the final stages of a terminal illness.
This was a gathering of faith leaders (as we're now styled). I didn't speak, but Rabbi David Gordis did. So did various other clergy. They all addressed two issues: The need for compassionate options to alleviate suffering at the end of life, and the reality that not all people are going to make the same choices or use the same criteria. The two black clergy also spoke about the need for increased conversations about death and dying in the black community, because (and I didn't know this) it has tended to be a taboo topic in the Black Church. (I am quoting one of the speakers when I say "Black Church" and it seems like capitalizing it is appropriate.) The full list of speakers and quotes from what they said can be found here:

For me, this is an issue of the separation of "church" and state. Rabbi Gordis hit the nail on the head when he said that different people will accept different authorities in making decisions about the end of their own life. If halachah (Jewish law) guides your life, then its guidance will have authority for you. If a different religion, or a particular preacher or philosophy guides your life, then it is guidance from that source that will have authority. The authoritative framework you consult may have nothing to do with religion at all. The crucial point is this: Religions and philosophies and religious leaders besides your own have no authority for you. Nor should they. It is entirely wrong for the State to give any religion's teachings the authority of law. This is a matter which is surely between each human being and their Creator -- or if you prefer, their conscience. A matter which, although it affects those who love them, is enacted only upon the body of the person actually making the decision for themselves.
I have been thinking about what I would have answered if anyone from the press had asked me what Jewish tradition says about the Medical Aid in Dying Act, and I finally realized that Jewish tradition provides the following guidance: עשו סייג לתורה / Asu s'yag laTorah. "Make a fence around the Torah." (Pirkey Avot 1:1)
In Jewish tradition, this means "Put in place safeguards so you don't accidentally transgress." For instance, one may technically recite the evening prayer (Sh'ma) until dawn breaks. But for safety's sake, the rabbis of the Talmud said you really should get it done before midnight.
Similarly, one traditionally does not cook on Shabbat (the Sabbath). One may plug in a percolator before Shabbat starts in order to keep water hot, and make tea on Shabbat. But are you then cooking the tea leaves? Lest you should be cooking unaware, one runs water from the pot into an empty cup, and pours from that cup into another which holds the tea leaves. Presumably by making the tea leaves a step removed from the heat, you are not cooking. Except that there is another opinion which says that you have to pour from the first cup into a second cup into a third cup -- just in case.

Now to transfer that guidance to the Medical Aid in Dying Act. What would Judaism instruct? To provide safeguards in this law, so that there will be no faintest suspicion of coercion in the decision-making or prescription-writing. So that only mentally competent, terminally ill adults may make the request for the prescription, and only they may administer the medication to themselves at a time of their own choosing. So that only physicians whose conscience permits them to write such prescriptions will do so. Specifically included in the legislation are these safeguards:

  • The terminally ill adult must be mentally capable of making his/her own healthcare decisions
  • The physician must make sure his/her patient is fully informed of all other available options
  • The terminally ill adult must request the prescription from a physician and be free from undue influence or coercion
  • Two witnesses need to sign the request form attesting to the voluntary nature of the terminally ill adult’s request
  • The terminally ill adult must be able to self-administer and ingest the medication
  • The physician must offer his/her patient multiple opportunities to rescind the request for aid-in-dying medication

For a discussion of these safeguards, and clarity about how medical aid in dying is different from suicide, homicide, "assisted suicide" or "mercy killing," see here:
In addition, nearly 20 years of experience and research in Oregon have upheld the conclusion that these safeguards work.

I can hear the hypothetical reporter now: "But Rabbi, what does Judaism say about ending one's own life?" To which I reply: "What Judaism says is entirely irrelevant to the passage of this bill." It becomes relevant only when someone asks me for guidance from Jewish tradition as they face the end of their own life. What Judaism does or does not say matters not a whit to folks whose religious and moral authority comes from a different tradition. And that's all I'll say about it. Because the issue in passing this legislation, for me, is the separation of church and state, a principle of our democracy enshrined in the First Amendment and one I treasure.
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More information about the campaign to pass New York's Medical Aid in Dying Act can be found here: