WITHDRAWING OR WITHHOLDING NUTRITION

or shake, the rabbis understood this to be a simple muscular reaction, not an indication of any life. While Maimonides did not discuss the moment of the soul’s departure and how to determine it, he clearly understood that this twitching headless body was soulless, and thus lifeless. But not so the individual with the broken neck. While it is unlikely that this person would live long, the moment following the accident would not of necessity be the moment of the"departing of the soul." We can imagine the modern case of an automobile accident where one passenger is decapitated, while another has his or her neck shattered and the flesh ripped open. Upon reaching the scene of the accident paramedics would likely begin a triage process. The decapitated individual would be ignored, for there is nothing to be done. The person with the broken neck might well be looking 2t the paramedic. Eyes stare, though no sound can be made. All voluntary movement is prevented by the spinal cord injury. None the less, the paramedics begin to work. An IV is started, blood pressure is taken, and transportation arranged to the trauma unit. At the trauma unit the patient is placed on a ventilator, a cardiac assist and an EEG is taken. After a few hours brain stem activity ceases, and the family is consulted about the deceased being an organ donor. At the moment of the accident this individual was not dead. The status of this individual was qualitatively different from the status of the decapitated person. The decapitated person was dead. The person with the broken neck was dying. How do we understand this"dying"? What is the common quality of both of these individuals which allows the halakhah to see them as the same?

Maimonides uses the term sheteitzei nafsho as the designation of death. The departure of the soul becomes the moment of death, and the definition of a corpse a"soulless body." This"soulless body" differs from the animated body in that it no longer can be in relationship with God . The soulless body can no longer perform mitzvot. The theological significance of death is that the covenant between God and this previously animated person now must be enacted in some other plane (perhaps the olam habah). There are many categories of individuals who cannot perform mitzvot and who live in a state of an unfulfilled covenant.