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In Yoreh Deah 339:1, the mechaber brings a variety of things that one is not permitted to do to a goses (a person on the brink of death), since each of these things causes the goses to die sooner. Since a goses is considered a living person in every respect (הגוסס הרי הוא כחי לכל דבריו) even one who closes their eyes as they are dying is a murderer (וכל המעמץ עם יציאת הנפש ה"ז שופך דמים).

Some of the examples that are given, concerning what may not be done, are of a curious nature, but the strangest (to my mind) is one brought by the Rema:

וכן אסור לגרום למת שימות מהרה כגון מי שהוא גוסס זמן ארוך ולא יוכל להפרד... אסור לשום מפתחות ב"ה תחת ראשו כדי שיפרד

Likewise, it is forbidden to cause the deceased to die quickly - for example, if he has been a goses for a long time and is unable to depart... It is forbidden to place the synagogue keys [or the keys of the bet hamidrash] underneath his head [the head of the goses] in order that he may depart.

Seeing as none of the nos'ei keilim appear to comment on this, and since I have never heard of such a thing anywhere else, I wonder if anybody here can shed light on it? For what reason was it believed in the 16th century that placing the keys of the synagogue (or bet hamidrash) underneath a sick person's head might cause them to expire? Does this have a basis in any older examples of rabbinic literature?

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  • How do you know what ב"ה stands for?
    – Double AA ♦
    Commented May 28, 2013 at 6:02
  • @DoubleAA - I don't. I'm guessing, only because I'm used to seeing it as a reference to synagogues and batei midrashim.
    – Shimon bM
    Commented May 28, 2013 at 6:04
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    Perhaps you should include that uncertainty in the question.
    – Double AA ♦
    Commented May 28, 2013 at 6:21

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Based on the Sefer ha-Hassidim there was a belief that the souls of the dead would pray in the synagogue at night when no one was around... based on that it appears that the belief arose in Eastern Europe that placing the key to the synagogue beneath the pillow of the goses would help his soul escape the body as it would be stirred to join up with the other souls praying in the synagogue. See p. 41-42 of this pdf.

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  • Thank you! That's exactly the sort of information I was looking for.
    – Shimon bM
    Commented May 28, 2013 at 7:29
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    @SethJ, He didn't codify halakha from the Sefer ha-Hasidim. The suggestion is that the Sefer ha-Hasidim served as the source for a belief that spread throughout Ashkenaz and developed its own legs. That it is the folk belief in circulation in the Rema's time/place which he pays deference to. Haym Soloveitchik has written concerning the influence of the work in his essay entitled "Piety, Pietism and German pietism: "Sefer Ḥasidim i" and the Influence of Ḥasidei Ashkenaz," in fn# 37 he notes:
    – Deuteronomy
    Commented May 28, 2013 at 16:57
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    @SethJ cont. As for ghosts and the like, as long as Jews in central and eastern Europe lived in a culture that saw itself populated with the "living dead," and as long as their notions of the active creatures of the "other world" coincided with that of Sefer Hasidim (the demonology did change in part with the spread of Lurianic kabbalah), the counsels of Sefer Hasidim were probably heeded by most. To act otherwise would have been viewed as defying the forces of nature and inviting disaster.
    – Deuteronomy
    Commented May 28, 2013 at 16:59
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    Actually, @SethJ, it's not so strange! Much of this section (in the mechaber's language as well) is a codification of Sefer Hasidim §315. The primary source for this legislation is Semakhot 1:1-4, but that text only forbids actively euthanasing somebody. Sefer Hasidim is the oldest text to permit removing the impediments to death.
    – Shimon bM
    Commented May 28, 2013 at 23:17
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    @seth-j :) ba3zrath HaShem we will all follow holocho properly and will be righteous and beautiful in the eyes of HaShem as in the days of old. Omein.
    – MoriDowidhYa3aqov
    Commented May 29, 2013 at 18:32

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