Grief Books

The first Kushner Book,When Bad Things Happen to Good People, has been one of the most popular books to give someone who is grieving since it first came out in 1981. Another has been the C. S. Lewis book, “A Grief Observed.” I suppose everyone has his or her own special book for solace during the dark night of the soul, and I am always interested in such books.

I remember turning to the films of Ingmar Bergman during a particularly devastating period several years ago and finding solace in the truthfulness of them. I ordered and watched every single one of Bergman's films at that time. There is another Swedish film titled Elvira Madigan that I have seen about twenty-times that has given me untold solace because of its truthfulness. There is something very comforting about seeing the truth in a difficult, complex situation, the truth which is being avoided and denied by almost everyone around you.

A person I respect recently recommended that first Kushner book to me in support of a book I am currently writing, so I re-read it for the first time in thirty-five years. It never really rang my bell and I have wondered what I missed in that first reading so many years ago. It is always intriguing to me when millions of people see something valuable in a book or film or game or country or whatever, and I just don’t see much of anything in it.

Kushner does make some cogent comments on the Old Testament book of JOB, particularly on the three friends who seem to mean well but who actually do Job more harm than good. His wife would have him just curse God and die. That’s just about where Kushner leaves me after my recent reading of his book.

Here are two sentences that just jumped out of Kushner’s book at me this time, waving red warning flags:

p. 28: “Sometimes, because our souls yearn for justice, because we so desperately want to believe that God will be fair to us, we fasten our hopes on the idea that life in this world is not the only reality. Somewhere beyond this life is another world ‘where the last shall be first’ and those whose lives were cut short on earth will be reunited with those they loved, and will spend eternity with them.”

“Neither I nor any other living person can know anything about the reality of that hope.” (My emphasis)

p. 29: “…since we cannot know for sure, we would be well-advised to take this world as seriously as we can, in case it turns out to be the only one we will ever have, and to look for meaning and justice here.”

Oh, wheee! There is a lot more of this kind of thing in the book which would not have been so offensive to me when I was fourteen years old but which now seems not only demeaning and patronizing and plain old dishonest, but horrifies because it comes from an honored, respected Rabbi who has sold it in great numbers to people who are in their weakest moments, to people who need truth, not disparagement, nor deception.