We can learn a lot from Rabbi Yehuda HaNasi’s last days on earth TB Ketubot 103

Rabbi Yehuda HaNasi’s last days daf are described on daf Ketubot 103. We can learn a lot how to live from his example.

“§ The Sages taught: At the time of the passing of Rabbi Yehuda HaNasi, he said: I need my sons. His sons entered his room. He said to them as a last will and testament: Be careful with the honor of your mother. He said further: My lamp should be lit in its usual place, my table should be set in its usual place, and the bed should be arranged in its usual place. Yosef Ḥeifani and Shimon Efrati; they served me during my lifetime and they will serve me in my death.” (Sefaria.org translation)

Honoring your mother or stepmother is obvious and need no explanation.

Why did Rabbi Yehuda HaNasi aka Rebbe want his lamp be lit in his usual place, his table set in its usual place, and his bed made in its usual place? After he died, Rebbe would visit his home every erev Shabbat (a Jewish ghost story in time for Halloween?) “The Gemara explains: Every Shabbat eve, even after his passing, Rabbi Yehuda HaNasi would come to his house as he had done during his lifetime, and he therefore wished for everything to be set up as usual.” (Sefaria.org translation)

Rebbe was considerate of the reputation those tsaddikim who died before him. “The Gemara relates the following incident: It happened on a certain Shabbat eve that a neighbor came by and called and knocked at the door. His maidservant said to her: Be quiet, for Rabbi Yehuda HaNasi is sitting. When he heard his maidservant reveal his presence to the neighbor, he did not come again, so as not to cast aspersions on earlier righteous individuals who did not appear to their families following their death.” (Sefaria.org translation)  

He was also concerned about the reputations of Ḥeifani and Shimon Efrati. At first the Gemara thinks that Rebbe wants them to take care of his funeral arrangements and burial, but that was not the case for they predeceased him. “And the reason he said this was so that people should not say: There was something wrong with them, and until now, too, it was the merit of Rabbi Yehuda HaNasi that benefited them and prevented them from dying due to their sins. Now that Rabbi Yehuda HaNasi is dying, his merit no longer protects them. Rabbi Yehuda HaNasi therefore clarified that the reason for their deaths was in order to enable them to escort him in death as in life.” (Sefaria.org translation)

If Rebbe was so concerned how his actions would adversely affect the reputations of those who predeceased him, how much more so should we behave in a manner that brings honor to the living!