The value of Life in Rabbinic Literature

Abstract

Life is the most valued gift granted by God, and death, as end of the life, the most frustrating fact. But the sages of Classic Judaism are before a fatefull reality: life and death belong to the divine plan. The value that the rabbis grant to the life, from questions as mundane as the daily well-being up to the deepest meditation on life and death, faces in many cases the practice of the religious rules. It is possible to determine the attitude that these sages adopt in the matter. What freedom men enjoy and which is the God's authority along life and death are two questions that repeat themselves in the legal argumentation of the Misnah and Tosefta.