Hello! I'm in the process of writing a superhero story, and one of the main characters is Jewish. His daughter, as well as her mother, are also Jewish - but the mother is deceased. I was wondering if it's offensive for the mother to be a benevolent spirit that follows her daughter around, sort of like a guardian?
To clarify, the Jewish characters who are alive would never contact the deceased mother, though contact would be had by an outside third party
Jewish mother is a benevolent “guardian” spirit who follows her daughter around
We do have a concept that might fit! In folklore there is the concept of an ibbur, which is the spirit of a good person, who is trying to do a mitzvah after death. That might reasonably be stretched to include watching over a daughter until bat mitzvah age, or until marriage or something like that. In the stories I've read, the ibbur usually joins the body of the person they are following. I've heard it described as a peaceful possession, but I've also seen it described as one soul moving over to make room for a second soul for a time, which has echoes in other traditions too, so I prefer that way of looking at it, personally. The only things I would caution about for this is to make sure that it doesn't drift into ancestor worship, which we can't really do. I suggest reading up on ibbur (ibburim is the plural) and on their sort-of conceptual opposite, the dybbuk, who are considered negative. That might help give some ideas to go on.
Wikipedia: Ibbur
Myjewishlearning: Demons, Dybbuks, Ghosts, & Golems
-- Dierdra
