'Do not turn to mediums or seek out spiritists, for you will be defiled by them. I am the LORD your God." (Leviticus 19:31)

Anyone who has grown up in a traditional Jewish home, will remember frequent visits to the cemetery to visit the graves of relatives. The older people would weep. There were usually people around the cemetery who were available for a few dollars to recite a prayer for the dead, and give words of praise for the family who are so devoted as to spend their time visiting. If the family in which you grew up was Hassidic or Mizrachi (Mid East Sepharadic), you also visited the graves of the righteous. I have met many people who see Judaism primarily as a cult of the dead. Kaddish, Yahrtzait, Yizkor, seem to be the central events in the life of a Jew. Every major holiday (in Ashkenazic tradition), features the Yizkor memorial prayers. Many who are less observant, will guesstimate the time for Yizkor, so as to avoid the worship service. Yet, RAMBAM rules that it is forbidden to even visit a grave, and memorial prayers are totally absent from his vocabulary. Judaism is about life, not death. Yet, we have a letter which he wrote while visiting the Holy Land, in which he speaks about two great experiences; his visit to the Temple Mount, and his visit to the Cave of the Patriarchs and Matriarchs in Hebron, "where I kissed the graves of my Mothers and Fathers". True, some claim that the letter is a forgery, but they offer no proof for this assertion. Might he have changed his mind? Or perhaps there are different types of grave visits. The Zohar explains this, and similar passages, in a way that raises further questions. "Do not contact the dead", refers to he wicked who are as dead. (I actually saw a modern Christian source that suggested the same answer). But the Zohar goes on: "Besides, when pagans visit graves, they go with idolatrous and magical rites. When we go, it is with repentance, fasting, prayer and charity". That would appear to be a "cop out". If the act is forbidden, how would these acts make it better? Rather, the Zohar appears to be saying that visiting, or contacting the dead is only forbidden if it is accompanied by pagan rituals. There is only one such incident in Tanach. King Saul, abandoned by G-d, seeks out a witch (most of whom he has had killed), to contact the spirit of the Prophet Samuel. RAMBAM sees this as mere trickery on the witch's part, and foolish superstition on Saul's part. But is the real problem in the story that Saul knew he was abandoned by G-d, so he went to other gods to help? The Talmud has many stories of people interacting with the dead. One great third century rabbi is said to have returned home from the grave every Friday night, in order to recite Kiddush for his family. In the Zohar and ARI, there are many such incidents of the dead appearing, as well as tzaddikim who haven't been born yet! There is an entire volume in the "Writings of the ARI" (actually written down by his disciple, Rabbi Hayyim Vital) of what to do, pray and meditate at the graves of the righteous. ARI and his students would ask many questions of the dead, concerning the meaning of life, deeper meanings of Torah, and how to find G-d. The same act that for the pagan was a form of idolatry, for the Kabbalist became a form of connecting with everything holy; achieving insights not normally available to living people. So is the Torah forbidding the very act of visiting, or communing with the dead, or is it seeking to avoid idolatry at every turn? An additional inherent danger, is deifying the dead. I have witnessed people pray to the dead for health, prosperity, and a host of everyday problems. They are not gods, and they cannot grant these things. But, from the Kabbalistic perspective (also to be seen in the Talmud), it is fine and proper to ask the dead to pray for us.Only G-d knows the future. The dead can guide us in that direction. I will examine a few other issues in this topic. But the pattern should by now be clear. For RAMBAM and other "rationalists", if we don't understand something, it is superstition, and hence forbidden. For the mystic, there are infinite possibilities, so long as we do not stray from G-d, or try to "outsmart" or circumvent Him.