Despite specific, religious instructions for the burial of a New Jersey woman, she still ended up in the wrong cemetery and in someone else’s clothes, according to a new lawsuit. The court papers allege that Janet Kay, who died Oct. 3, 2020, was improperly interned by Bloomfield-Cooper Jewish Chapels, which shipped her body to a North Jersey cemetery when they requested she be laid to rest in Marlboro’s Morganville area. The family discovered the error when they attended the funeral service, where a representative made it clear they had lost Kay’s body.
But it gets worse. Shortly after, a Bloomfield-Cooper representative called the family over FaceTime, showing them a woman who was not their mother but was in her clothing and jewelry. “Janet Kay’s final corporal moments in the eyes of the Jewish faith were not presented to her full family and friends,” Kay’s daughter, prominent Trenton attorney Robin Kay Lord, wrote in the lawsuit. Kay’s body was exhumed from the wrongful resting place on Oct. 7 and buried again, properly, later that day. Read more at NJ.com.
We must fire the company that gives the hechsher.
What are you talking about?
I agree. They need to bring in a new, competent chevra kadisha that performs its services according to halacha. The current vendor is not doing so.
So I have semicha, including in Hilchos Aveilus, and I spent a long time learning the dinim of shmira, tahara, etc. from the seforim: Chochmas Adam, Nitei Gavriel, Gesher haChaim, Zichron Meir, Darchei Chesed, etc. The issue is that this funeral home engages unqualified people for the “chevra kadisha.” Manalapan does not have a chevra kadisha, just like it does not have its own kashrus (and we saw the churban that this resulted in this week). The shomrim he uses are typically people do not have ne’emanus. They watch television, including on shabbos, in the various NJ funeral homes they go to. They do not say tehillim for 15-20 minutes per hour, as they are supposed to. They disappear from the chapels for hours on end, whether to buy food, do errands, go to minyanim (they never heard of osek b’mitzvah patur min hamitzvah, I suppose), or to eat in people’s houses for shabbos meals. They don’t interview these guys, and nobody checks for Orthodox rabbinical references. The fact that they watch television makes them suspect, even moreso that they ask the goy who works in the chapel to turn it on for them on shabbos. So the shomer isn’t doing his job, they’re sleeping for hours at night, and for this, the families are paying hundreds of dollars.
Regarding taharos, they do not have 4 metaherim, as the seforim say and as R’ Zohn paskens. They often do taharos with 2 people. I have been told by funeral directors that they have sent men to perform women’s taharos. They do not have the adequate supplies (Monsel’s Solution, chux, tegaderms, etc.) needed to perform taharos k’halacha. They often perform taharos 2 days or 3 days in advance of the levaya, instead of the night before the levaya, if they are there already to “get it out of the way.” And for this, I.D.B. is charging upwards of 400 dollars, or more. I’ve seen them do taharos before shkias hachama, at 3 in the afternoon, a clear violation of the din that tevilah takes place after shkiah. They leave all types of chatzitzos on the niftar. How else can 2 men walk into a tahara room and finish in 15 minutes, as I’ve seen? They don’t say tefillos, they don’t clean under the nails and toenails, and they skip over all the necessary steps in order to be done quickly. I know this because I’ve sat shmira in these chapels and I’ve seen these abuses occur with my own eyes. Among their incompetence is not being mindful of the niftar’s identification, apparently, as this article states.
I would hope that the two scandals to rock Manalapan this week would encourage its rabbis to reach out to me. I provide chevra kadisha services under the hashgacha of a NJ beis hora’ah and everything is done k’daas v’din. Our shomrim are yirei shamayim and bnei torah. Our metaherim are from Lakewood and operate under their own chevra, as well, throughout South Jersey. Hasagas gvul wouldn’t apply here, as it is clear that the current operator does not perform taharos and shmiros according to halacha, and they are clearly incompetent, as the above article indicates. We need strong rabbinical leadership on matters of kashrus and kavod hameis and cannot outsource this work to others. I am willing to undertake efforts in Manalapan to create a vaad and do the hands-on work, given my experience in taharos, shmiros, and also in hashgacha.