ABSTRACT
The [TzelemN’shamah]1 relational model, described in Chapter 1 of this book-“The charge each of us caregivers is faced with is to search out, tune in to, stay focused on, respect, nourish, sustain, and sponsor the [Breath-TakingModel of Divinity], first in all our “selves” and then in others”—finds itself manifest in caring for the sick and dying, for, by definition, this caring must be relational. In Hebrew, the phrase for this mitzvah2 is bikur cholim,3 meaning “visitation of the sick.” Taking note of the word visitation, the relational dynamic between the person visiting and the person visited becomes evident. You must be in some kind of physical relationship, at least a sharing of a space, during the visit. Although an individual or a congregation, without the ill person present, can offer a Mi Shebeirach,4
this prayer does not fulfill the mitzvah. The mitzvah can be fulfilled only when the visit occurs, as it says in the Code of Jewish Law: “When a person gets sick, it is the duty of every man to visit him, for we find that the Holy One, Blessed be He, visits the sick.”5
