Greenwood Cemetery opened a dedicated area for “green burials” in 2014, making it the first Jewish cemetery in the state of Wisconsin to do so. Today, it continues to offer the service for those who would like an option where everything is biodegradable.
Local rabbis got the idea started. “Rabbi [Jay] Brickman from Congregation Sinai got in touch with me,” said John Pereles, president of Greenwood Cemetary’s board of directors. “He said that they had been talking about green burials at the Wisconsin Council of Rabbis.”
Rabbi Dena Feingold was also an early advocate of such burials, in a Jewish context, in Wisconsin. Soon, the cemetery’s board passed a motion to create a green burial area, Prairie Green, which opened in 2014. That area is about half an acre, while Greenwood itself is about 10 acres.
When Rabbi Brickman, obm, died in 2022 at age 97, Pereles said, he had opted to be buried at Prairie Green.
Prairie Green hosts only a couple of green funerals each year, although Pereles said many more people are buying lots, an indication that the practice’s popularity is growing.
What does a green burial entail?
Unlike a typical burial, a green burial does not use a vault — the receptacle that a coffin goes in to help prevent it from sinking into the soil. Vaults are typically made of metal or concrete, and thus do not decompose.
Though not required by law, most Wisconsin cemeteries use vaults to help keep the land uniform, according to Pereles. When a grave sinks into the soil, it can make the burial grounds unlevel.
But in a green burial, “everything is biodegradable,” Pereles said. “There’s no embalming fluids, no metals, no jewelry.”
Instead of a vault, a green burial might use “literally a cardboard box,” he said, “something rigid that the body is going to be lowered into the ground in.”
The other unique thing about the green burial area is that no individual grave markers exist.
“We have what I call a ‘naming boulder,’” he said. Families typically list the name, birth and death dates, and sometimes the Hebrew names of the deceased. Once a naming boulder is filled up, another one is started, Pereles said.
Greenwood also offers GPS technology for locating graves. Those opting for the green burial option do not need to buy a vault or a headstone.
Non-Jews are allowed to be buried at Greenwood, but the plot owner is required to be Jewish. The cemetery also does not allow non-Jewish religious symbolism.
Rabbi Dena Feingold, who recently retired from Beth Hillel Temple in Kenosha, told the Chronicle in 2014 that a couple had come to her inquiring about Jewish green burials specifically.
“A green or natural burial is a perfect fit for what a Jewish burial should be like,” Rabbi Feingold said then, noting that in Israel, the deceased are often buried only in shrouds.
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