I grew up a goy, a Seventh-Day Adventist. It was not until I came to America at age 11 that I went to funerals with open caskets.
In a 2010 lecture titled “R. Avraham Shapiro” for Torah in Motion, professor Marc B. Shapiro says: “Many of R. Joseph Messas’s decisions (psakim) are incomprehensible today because of the meta-halachic concerns that make us look like Christians.
“It’s clear that Jews have to be buried in a separate cemetery. R. Joseph Messas’s says it is permitted to bury Jews in a cemetery with other religions so long as the Jewish graves are at least four cubits apart from the rest.”
“In Christian countries, you could never have decisions like this. Jewish graves near Christian graves with crosses? It wouldn’t work.”
“R. Joseph Messas’s was asked if it was permitted to view the dead and to put flowers on the coffin? A posek (decider of Jewish law) in Europe would never agree. It’s obvious that these are non-Jewish practices. Most of us have never seen a dead body because we do not have open caskets.”
“R. Joseph Messas’s says this is permitted. It is the original Jewish approach. He’s dealing with societies in the Muslim world where no one had open caskets.”
“He sees no problem with flowers on caskets.”
“Fifteen years ago, there wasn’t one essay on R. Joseph Messas’s. Now there are loads.”
“R. Joseph Messas’s shows us that traditional Judaism can encompass a wide variety of thought.”
