{"id":55702,"date":"2019-05-16T19:13:32","date_gmt":"2019-05-16T16:13:32","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/?p=55702"},"modified":"2020-04-24T13:51:45","modified_gmt":"2020-04-24T10:51:45","slug":"ruth-as-a-paradigm-of-elder-care","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/en\/ruth-as-a-paradigm-of-elder-care\/","title":{"rendered":"Ruth As A Paradigm Of Elder Care"},"content":{"rendered":"
<\/div>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"","protected":false},"author":7,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[281],"tags":[337],"acf":{"old_id":"55702","type":"no","iframe":"","writer":55703,"related_cahpter":"221","type_929":"2","show_author_image":false,"old_create_date":"","old_url":"","post_main_content":{"description":"As we count up to Shavuot we are excited to share new, exclusive content from a collection of essays: \u201cGleanings: Reflections on Ruth\u201d edited by Rabbi Dr. Stu Halpern of YU, published by Maggid\/Koren. We\u2019re grateful to be able to share selected excerpts from a wide array of writers, leading up to Shavuot and the reading of the Megillah.","content":"

Imagine, for a moment, that your mother-in-law confronts you on a desolate road. She is depressed and overwrought, needy and with\u00addrawn, desperate for help and emotionally unreachable. Now imagine you are alone with the responsibility. Your husband, her son, has died, and there is no one else left to care for her. What do you do? What are the limits of your responsibility?<\/p>\n

Most of us, living in the twenty-first century, in a world of medi\u00adcal technology, material comforts, and institutional options, jump to the logistics. We ask ourselves, what do I need to do to make sure she stays healthy? We run through the length of a day and map out countless scenarios: who will purchase the food, do the baths, fill out the paperwork, count the pills, and be there at night? Our minds fill up with the anxiety-ridden questions of maintaining the status quo. How will she get to the bathroom? What happens if she falls? How will I get her to all the appointments? Responsibility becomes a men\u00adtal occupation, full of depleting details devoid of spiritual grandeur and meaning\u2026<\/p>\n

When Ruth faces her mother-in-law in the desert she hears the agony of old age and responds with an affirmation of life.<\/p>\n

Ruth listens to Naomi, not just to the content but to the call. There is nothing for her to live for, no love, no intimacy, no life. Naomi has no spouse, no children, and no grandchildren; she has no hope for continuity or a future for her fam\u00adily. It has all perished. It feels as if even God has left her. This is also how we age. Understanding this truth is how we learn to care for the aged.<\/p>\n

It is a joy to see divine beauty in an infant; it is a discipline to see it in the elderly and frail. Ruth\u2019s magisterial act is twofold: she sees the existential pain at the center of Naomi\u2019s words and she expresses a form of divine sight when she sees the sacred beauty of her mother-in-law. By clinging to her, Ruth pulls her back into a world of holiness and establishes holiness at the center of their relationship.<\/p>\n

You will not be alone Ruth proclaims. You will not be alone where you walk and where you sleep. Your tradition and peoplehood will still gain another life, even if you can have no more children. God will not forsake you because your God is now my God and \u2013 I am here.<\/p>\n

Now, imagine again that your mother-in-law confronts you on a desolate road. She is depressed and overwrought, needy and withdrawn, desperate for help and emotionally unreachable. Now imagine you are alone with the responsibility. Your husband, her son, has died, and there is no one else left to care for her. What do you do? From Ruth we learn to pause before the logistics, to face our elders, to see them as God sees them, and to proclaim that they are not alone.<\/p>\n

From: Dr. Tamara Mann Tweel, \u201cThe Exquisite Challenge of Care\u201d in Gleanings: Reflections on Ruth<\/em>, Stuart Halpern, ed., Yeshiva University \/ Maggid-Koren, Connecticut and Jerusalem, 2019<\/p>\n","image":{"ID":55486,"id":55486,"title":"judges-ruth-gleanings3","filename":"judges-ruth-gleanings3.jpg","filesize":0,"url":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/05\/judges-ruth-gleanings3.jpg","link":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/en\/struggles-storytelling-and-salvation\/judges-ruth-gleanings3\/","alt":"","author":"7","description":"","caption":"","name":"judges-ruth-gleanings3","status":"inherit","uploaded_to":55288,"date":"2019-05-14 13:26:00","modified":"2019-05-14 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