The Ultimate in Acceptance

The ultimate in accepting suffering is to accept one's death.

When Rabbi Meir Shapiro, head of the yeshiva in Lublin and originator of Daf Hayomi (the study of one page of Talmud each day), was on his deathbed, he requested that his students come into his room to dance and sing.

Rabbi Shapiro was no longer able to speak, but he wrote down two Hebrew words: "Rak b'simcha" (only with joy). As he was dying, his face was bright with joy, and he kept motioning with his lips: "Only with joy, only with joy..."