Tazria: The Impurity of Life

The first of the Great Ten Commandments reads: I am the Lord your God. You shall have no other gods besides Me.

What is remarkable about the event when the Commandments were given is that it was a revelation to an entire people. Until now God had only revealed His Essence and Will to a chosen few. Noah, Abraham, Hagar, Sarah, Jacob, Isaac and others were the pre-Sinai recipients of the Word of God. They were singled out.

After the Sinai experience revelation was again restricted to individuals. Moses, Manoah, Hannah, Solomon and many prophets heard God. Throughout the long epochs from then until our day, never again were a people given the Message, only individuals.

One of the cited reasons for the mass revelation was that no one could proclaim that they alone were privy to the legislation of God. No person could assert they were singled out as special by the Holy One, blessed be He. Every participant at Sinai was equal. With this simple understanding of the greatest event in history will unfold the highest ideal for humanity.

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Tazria is a skin ailment. Some Sages declared that the skin disease came because the person was flawed. They had sinned through the words they spoke. The telltale mark on their flesh was an outward punishment of the malicious slander they spread. Only atonement could wash that mark away. Other commentators told that it was simply a disease that needed to be diagnosed, quarantined and cured. Perhaps it was neither. Perhaps it was both.

What is most telling from the Text is that when a person was seen to have the affliction people would cry out, tameh!, tameh!. "Unclean!" "Unclean!"

What humiliation! Not only did they suffer the embarrassment of a visible disease but it was trumpeted throughout the people. There was no hiding from their shame now.

The Talmud also questions why Tameh! would be shouted by neighbors. It reveals that the word Tameh! was the signal to pray for the person that was marked by the skin disease. People were moved by the announcement to come out of their homes, their workplaces and pray for the person that was wracked by emotional pain. In other words, they were not shunned or turned out. People were moved to action on their behalf.

Is this human behavior? Do people really act this way? If it were true there would be no leper colonies. If people behaved this way at public gatherings people would make as much conversation with the one-footed man as the well-coiffed debutante. Do they?

Elsewhere in the Talmud there is a fascinating and insightful discussion about good and bad prayers. What makes one worthy and another unworthy? In a dramatic example they give the following case: A person is coming home and they see flames leaping out of a house. Immediately they fear the worst and they utter a prayer, May it not be my house burning!

That is a vain and awful prayer, the Talmud tells. Why? we may wonder. Is that not a normal reaction? Would not most people say a similar prayer? Please let the house not be mine!

The Talmud instructs us it is indeed a reckless and vain prayer. In essence the prayer contains the undercurrent that it would be better if it were the blazing house of someone else. Not mine. The prayer wishes the pain be placed on another person. We are deliberately told to not say a prayer that insinuates another to suffer.

Somewhere deep in our minds is the belief that if another person loses, we win. Where our brother fails we succeed. While we may overtly pity the entrepreneur that flounders and drowns many of us thank God it was not us.... Now there is a better chance we have to succeed with less competition!

The message of Sinai is that we all stand together. Sinai seeks to change that mindset. When a single limb of the body is injured the body as a whole suffers.

In one of the most emotionally laden tales I have ever read about the Shoah, a father begged his rabbi to tell him what to do. It was erev Rosh Hashanna 1944 when hundreds of young boys were rounded up by the Nazis to be taken to the furnace the next day at Auschwitz. Many men found that their only sons were taken from them. One man went to a rabbi and told him that he had the ability to save his son from the murderers. They both understood he Nazis were determined to murder a specific number of Jews. If his son were saved another would die in his place. What should I do? he cried to his teacher. 1

What would Judaism teach? How would it instruct us to make a decision?

May God protect all His people, it should never happen again, and yet we are faced with similar quandaries every day. How we choose to slander and malign others for their apparent deficits happens countless times each day. If we decide to cut off lashon hara, idle chatter about people or ruthless slander, that will have an impact on the way we view ourselves and the way we see others.

Perhaps the deep lesson of the Torah is that every person is tameh and needs our concern. As broken creatures the worst thing we can ever do is break another one of the creations of God.


1 Rabbi Tzvi Hirsch Meisels in Medkadshay HaShem

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D'var Aher:

TAZRIA

This week’s Torah reading is about decay of the body, but from from ordinary processes.  Something is obviously wrong and a disease has taken hold of a person.   We have been ill or have relatives who have been stricken with disease.  Sometimes there are cures for the ailment; sometimes there is only palliative care.

We do everything we can live pain free and disease free.  People have practiced medicines since the inception of humankind to free us from all kinds of afflictions.

The Torah approaches this subject from a different perspective.  Although the question is never formally articulated, underlying the text is, “What do you learn from pain?”

Nothing in life should pass us without allowing us an opportunity to grow from that experience. Good and bad are both powerful teachers. In this sense there are two kinds of healing, one, which is physical and other, takes place on a far deeper level. I have seen many times when a disease enfolds a person and they cry out in dismay, “What did I do to deserve this?” It is a query that knows that nothing we did brought this affliction on.  We are not guilty of infusing our body with the disease and yet here we are. Here it is.  The spiritual healing that can happen afterward is acceptance and learning to live with, or die from, the disease.

But the Torah pushes us in a nuanced direction.  It asks us to look at what our tongue has done.  Have we spoken ill of people?  Has our mouth caused psychic lacerations on acquaintances?  Has our acerbic language been as devastating as cancer?

Torah is asking us to redirect our energies away from feeling sorry for ourselves and redirect them outward to heal ourselves and become a source of healing to others.

Disease does not always have a cure but it always has gifts tucked inside.

The Torah that we study, learn, teach our children and has been handed to us through the generations knows that we are potentially much better than we are.  That is why we “turn it over, turn it over because everything is in it.  And grow old in it” *

Pirkay Avot 5:22

Shmini, Silence

We do not know what we do not know.

Sometimes we even do not know what we do know.

Man was endowed with reason. When the first being was cast into life in the Garden, the Torah teaches that Adam was created in the “image” and “likeness” of his Creator. Rashi commented that the first description means that the first man was cast into a certain mold. The second description, likeness, points to the man having the power of reason. It is our gift of understanding.

From the time when God took the golem-form from the earth and breathed into the Breath of Life to the moment of overwhelming lust to have open eyes to the universe we became people in search of ourselves.

We fervently desire to understand what life means. We want to know why we live. What is our purpose? That is why stories such as the one told here is Shmini are so vexing. They raise more question than provide answers.

Here, Nadav and Avihu, sons of Aaron, die. Near the holy altar of God they are enveloped by a conflagration that excoriated their inner being while leaving their body/husk intact. A pitiful father has watched his sons die. What does this passage mean?

Some scholars tell that Nadav and Avihu were drunk. Intoxicated, they approached the holy of holies and were punished by a burst of heavenly fire.

Others tell that Nadav and Avihu were presumptuous. They came into the holy of holies unbidden. For the trespass they died.

Another commentator expresses the belief that they offered up incense out of their zealousness rather than follow the instructions of their father.

What is the truth? The Midrash and Talmud are littered with numerous ideas about the death of the two young kohanim. Some make sense while others leave us incredulous.
God comes to father Aaron to have a word with him after the inferno that left his sons dead. Through Moses, He tells him, “I will be honored in front of all the people.”

B’krovai ekadesh. “The ones whom I love will be made holy,” said the Holy One.

At these words Aaron was silent. Vayidom.

Did Aaron understand what God meant? Was his silence the response to hearing the explanation of God? Mute acceptance?

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Many, many years later a great Sage, Rabbi Yehudah, lay dying. His disciples arranged themselves around his bed and prayed for their teacher. They looked into the holy books, fasted and begged God to listen to their prayers and grant their leader life.

The servant of Rabbi Yehudah left the group and opened her heart before God. She prayed, “In the upper world they want our master. They call him. In the lower world the rabbis keep Rabbi Yehudah with their prayers. Listen, Lord, to the voice from Above. Let them be the stronger.”

She then took a jug and hurled it onto the ground so that all the holy men were momentarily distracted from their prayers. In that instance the Angel of Death kissed the venerable leader.

What did the maid servant do? Was she guilty of killing the holy rabbi? In distracting the Sages from their prayers she lifted the protective veil keeping Rabbi Yehudah alive. Was she to be blamed for his death?

One the Sages, Bar Kappara, investigated and found the girl. He saw what she had done and then commented, “Both angels and human beings were clinging to the holy Ark. The angels overpowered the humans and the Ark has been taken from us.”

Bar Kappara told his contemporaries that Rabbi Yehuda was like the holy Ark. They were both gone. What is gone is gone.

Yet, Bar Kappara did not blame the servant. He did not rail against the heavens. The end of the story closes abruptly.

Vayidom. And he was silent.
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Rabban Yohanan ben Zakki was in mourning for his son. His colleague and friend came to console him. Elazar ben Azariah said, “A long time ago a king gave a subject a precious gem to care for and watch. Each day the man guarded the jewel and fretted when the king would one day return to reclaim his property.

“The same is true for you, dear friend. You had a son who was rich in learning, steeped in lore and law. Now you have retuned the loan.”

Vayidom.

One commentary elevates Aaron for his silence. It was not just a silence in the face of the judgment of God, although that would be enough. Before an event we must take precautions to avoid mishap. After such an occurrence what can we do?
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The son of the Gerer Rebbe died just before the sun set on a Friday afternoon, before Shabbat. No one wanted to tell the great leader of the loss. No one wanted to deliver the message on the sacred day until one follower, a devout and meek hasid offered his condolences to the rebbe. The rebbe listened and then said, “Shh. Nu? It is Shabbos.”

The day continued and until the sun set on Saturday the rebbe still sang and taught with great joy. When Havdalah came the rebbe ripped his clothes, sank to the floor and cried and mourned for the shiva. Silent until Shabbat had ended, the pain of the Gerer Rebbe seemed to now hold no bounds.

Could this be real? Did this actually happen?
Whether or not it did happen perhaps the rays of light that are expelled from the story tale teach a lesson about our life.

The Zohar says that whoever weeps at the fate of Nadav and Avihu when they read this story will not suffer the same fate. Perhaps the lesson of silence is about acceptance.

Tzav: Forgiveness and Return

An anomaly: The fire on the mizb’ach, Tabernacle, was fed from heaven and earth at once. Commanded by Torah was to have three fires continually burning there. Each was fed by the dual sources. What is the point of tending an earthly fire when a heavenly fire is doing the same thing? Is that not redundant? Why not just have heavenly flames consume the sacrifice?

Compounding the problem, the kohane – the officiant at the miz’bach -- was also charged with the responsibility of stoking the flames. He had to add new wood to the pyre to keep it burning hot. This takes an already nonsensical issue and makes it even odder. Why was it necessary for the kohane to keep adding wood? They could spend more productive time elsewhere doing other things.

The ancient ones said that there are two moments in our lives that require God’s rapt attention. In fact, they go further by revealing that these two moments are more rigorous and taxing than the Splitting of the Sea. What are they? Connecting people to their livelihoods and to their spouses is a greater miracle than the part of the Sea!

Is it strange that in the process of obtaining a good job or finding a mate God rarely enters into the verbal picture? How many people thank HaShem that they found a good paying position? How often do we hear that a person praises God for finding their counterpart? The usual reaction to these life-changing situations is utter joy and self-congratulations. It is almost unheard to find a person praise God for such events.

For unanticipated events of life it is not unusual to hear the cry of “Oh my God!” On the other hand, for the blessings of life it is unusual to hear, “Thank God.” Human propensity is to take pride in our personal actions and heap the rest upon God.

The Torah recognizes that it is instinctual is to take credit for our accomplishments. Even if the Sea parts before our eyes we must have had something to do with it!

Is it really odd then that the kohane was charged with adding fuel to the burning fires of the mizb’ach? Is it strange that the kohane had the ongoing responsibility to stoke the flames despite the heavenly intervention?

While recognizing our human weakness Torah also seeks to gently point out to us the value of humility. The kohane brings fire to fire, a nearly useless exercise that teaches a profound lesson: All that we possess is a gift. The power that we exercise today is like fleeting vapor in the breadth of the universe.

Baruch HaShem for the newly sprouted buds on trees.
Baruch HaShem for the grass.
Baruch HaShem for our food.
Baruch HaShem for our light.
Baruch HaShem for companionship.
Baruch HaShem for our legacy.
Baruch HaShem for our job.
Baruch HaShem for our spouse.

As the siddur teaches us, “even our dominion over beasts is an illusion.”

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So much of Vayikra, the previous parsha, and this week contain similar information. They are both full of the regulations of the sacrifices. At first blush it seems pretty repetitive. There is, however, one striking difference between the parshiot. Last week there was no mention of Aaron at all! How could this be? Is not Aaron integral to the whole sacrificial rites?

According to a midrash, Moshe was carefully combing through the holy Text when he noticed that his brother, Aaron, was not mentioned once in the entire portion. All that the parasga Vayikra stated was a mention of the “sons of Aaron.” Moshe turned to God and questioned Him.

“Can it be that You hate the well but not the water that flows from it?” Moshe was really asking the Lord how He could turn His Face from Aaron while embracing his sons.

Moshe rightly assumed that the absence of the name of Aaron from last week was intentional. After all, Aaron was involved in the creation of the Golden Calf. His participation - however reluctant - was still sinful. True, Aaron had repented. Yet only God knows the inner workings of the heart. Perhaps his teshuva was incomplete.

Moral? Rambam reveals the final stage of teshuva, a full repentance, is when a person changes their inner self. So complete is this teshuva the person has moved to a higher level of being so that the sin is now so repugnant it is unthinkable. Until this stage is reached repentance is incomplete. Was Aaron not yet there? Is that why his name was conspicuously absent?

Moshe suspected that his brother was not forgiven. “Can it be that You hate the well but not the water that flows from it?” he begged God to forgive.

“For your sake it is done,” the Holy One responded.

In the second pasuk of this parasha this week, HaShem says, “Command Aaron and his sons saying..." The forgiveness is complete.

Idea: A primary reason many of the mitzvot are reiterated this week is for the sake of Aaron. Last week the Israelite nation learned about the mizb’ach and their relationship to God. Now, the actors of the rites, Aaron and his progeny are told in great detail how to effect those sacrifices.

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Imagine how it looked: The sin offering was given when a person did something wrong. The Jew then brought an animal to the mizb’ach as an act of contrition. They had seen in their heart they had done wrong. It was time to make amends.

In the same place at the altar another Jew would bring an olah, a simple gift to God. When their heart would open up and desire to bring an offering out of love they would come to the exact place by the mizb’ach as the one would had committed a sin.

As the two Jews would come to the same location at the mizb’ah to offer a gift or bring an expiation of their sin, no one could tell which one they brought to God. No one would know who was guilty and who was jubilant.

Moral? The respect we give to other people is paramount. We must avoid humiliating people at all cost.

Vayikra: The Sacrifice

Text: "Speak to the Israelites. Tell them that when a man from one of you brings an animal for a sacrifice…."

Commentary: From one of you: This means that any person wishing to bring a sacrifice to the Holy One must first bring himself as a sacrifice. The act of bringing an animal to be offered to God is insufficient; it is not enough to accomplish meeting the desired outcome. Bringing an animal to the altar of God must be preceded by the person first coming before the Holy One with an open heart; one not tainted by wrong-mindedness. The mind and hands must act in tandem. The first sacrifice is the ego.
Bring to HaShem only your purest self.


Text: "And he shall press his hands on the head of the animal to be sacrificed: Only afterward will the sacrifice be acceptable as atonement."

Subtext: Any Jew could bring a sacrifice to the Lord in order to achieve personal healing and wholeness. Touching the animal the person would beg God, “I have sinned. I have rebelled and gone astray. These are my sins…” The supplicant then goes on to list the specific reasons for this act of contrition. The words must be deliberate and honest.

Commentary: Prayer of the heart can only take us so far. Torah tells us to take the ideas in our head and make them concrete by saying them aloud. In putting our deepest pains and joys into words we make them more real.
Have we lost the facility of communicating with God? Has prayer become rote? It can be recaptured by enacting what no other creature in the universe can do: expressing feelings, intangibles into the media of words is a gift of God. Aspirations, frustrations, dark anguish and dreams can all be placed on the altar of God. In words.

D’var Acher: The liturgy of Yom Kippur which attempts to heal all our shortcomings for an entire year is not enough. Without an accounting of the raw nature of the sins there can be no forgiveness.
Confession means candor.

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Four categories of sacrifices are listed in this parasha:

1. Olah- an olah is a male animal sacrifice. A person brings an olah because they are strongly moved to do something bad. That is to say, they have not acted upon this impulse yet but fell themselves tilting towards the forbidden.
A male animal is a specified for the olah because they need to be strong to resist and overcome the inner temptation.

Idea: When we contemplate evil in speech or deed a great well of strength must be marshaled to resist the urge. The first wall of defense against sin is critical for when this primary wall is breached it is far easier to sin a second and third time.


2. Hatat – For the realized sin a female animal is brought to be sacrificed.
Hatat is not just a sin; it is purposeful. The intent was to perform evil. That is why it is called a hatat, a willful sin offering.

Idea: Acknowledging that we have done wrong is no small step. Most people prefer to excuse their behavior. Statements like “they deserved it,” or “they it coming to them,” are common phrases in excusing our actions. It is much easier to blame than take responsibility.
A female animal is brought to gently bringing us back to a place where our sense of self is not threatened. When someone has sinned the Torah attempts to ease them toward teshuva, allowing them to rejoin society. That is why they bring a female sacrifice.

3. Asham- This korban, sacrifice, may be either male or female animal. An asham is an atonement for an inadvertent sin. Once a person realizes that they have performed an evil act, it is acknowledged by bringing the korban. An important reminder is that the sin was not premeditated. Asham sounds like the word “ashamed”, does it not? Is that a coincidence? In shame we bring our personal testimony for our faults.

4. Shlamim- Like the asham, this korban may be male or female. Unlike the other sacrifices, shlamim are not brought to mend a wrong but to acknowledge an inner state of peace. This sacrifice is a celebration of calm. Shlamim comes from the root shalom indicating 'whole' or 'peace'.
A korban shlamim is the gift of a grateful person. Such a person is so expansive in their desire to bring the entire universe to proximate their wholeness they rejoice with this korban.

Idea: We ask God to bless us with peace and tranquility. This is a downward movement. Coming from Above the blessing originates in heaven and wends its way to our realm far below. Yet the great mystic tradition believes that our hands can also generate the seedlings of wholeness and spread them outward. This is an upward movement. Starting from the earth we place into being the kernels of cosmic redemption. The shlamim sacrifice is that blossoming flower.

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Text: “This is the Torah of sacrifices….”

Question: What does this mean this is the Torah of sacrifices? Is not the whole Bible Torah?

Answer: Torah means “instruction”. Every time this specific word is used in indicates direction. Here, the “Torah of sacrifices” means these are the directions of how they are enacted.

Subtext: The purpose of the sacrifices is to come out of our personal exile and draw near to God. The Hebrew korban actually means to come close, not sacrifice. That is why the parasha delineates different kinds of sacrifices from the great to the meager. What matters is that the heart yearns for HaShem.

Commentary: Reb Simcha Bunem of Przysucha said, “It is all one; whether you do more or less as long as you direct your heart to heaven.”

Pekuday: Forgiveness and Zeal

This is the day after.

The sun had set on the Day of Atonement. Like the almost palpable quiet after a tumultuous and crowded gathering of desperate clawing towards a single ray of salvation, it was over. It was not just a new day but a new beginning. Is that not the purpose of life? "Though your sins be as red as scarlet I will make then white as snow," said Isaiah. The eleventh of Tishray is the first day of life renewed.

The initial language of this new life describes the Ark. It is called the Mishkan Edut, the Ark of Testimony. To what did the Ark testify? Absolute forgiveness and the opportunity for a new start.

Torah teaches a profound lesson about forgiveness here: forgiveness is not contingent. It is absolute. God does not remind the people of their past behavior. He does not say they are forgiven yet act in such a way as to undermine that. We are taught that when we forgive it needs to be a complete forgiveness, not one when we still harbor the bitterness of that past.

This confession is found in the Mahzor for the High Holy Days:
I hereby forgive all who have hurt me, all who have done me wrong, who deliberately or by accident, whether by word or by deed. May no one be punished on my account. As I forgive and pardon fully those who have done me wrong, may those whom I have harmed forgive and pardon me, whether I acted deliberately or by accident, whether by word or deed. I am now ready to fulfill the commandment of "to love my neighbor as myself.

What is the point to saying these words if they do not speak the entire truth? If we are still bearing resentments? That is why the way of Judaism provides three steps to true forgiveness:

1. We say we forgive the person/deed. Then we proceed to act upon that forgiveness by praying for their well-being.

2. We remove the filaments of anger that still dance around the edge of our psyche.

3. We reestablish our relationship with them. That is why the Talmud speaks of anger as a donkey lying on its back. The donkey cannot right itself. It seems impossible to forgive when we do not allow ourselves to first get up. Baba Metsia 33

Maimonides offered this insight:
We should be slow to anger and easily appeased. And when our forgiveness is requested, we should grant it with a whole heart; not bearing grudges even for a grave injury. This is the way of the upright Jew.

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The stone tablets had been delivered to the Israelite nation. Moshe Rabbenu gathers the people to fully explain the import of the gift. This was not a time for any division. Moshe speaks deliberately to "all the community of Israel." No one of any age, gender or vocation was excluded.

In this vast gathering of the Israelite nation the people build the Mishkan.

What was the antidote to the Golden Calf? The Mishkan. What does the idolatrous cow have to do with the Ark? The earlier actions of the people betrayed that they needed a specific place where they could access God. It was not enough to have manna rain from heaven or wells appear from the desert floor. The people needed a space that was sacrosanct. That is why the word mishkan means dwelling. The mishkan became the dwelling place where the people could point and say, our God is here!

Further, the aspect of God that inhabited that sacred space was the Shechina.

D'var acher: Mishkan is related to mishkon, pledge. The Ark housed the gift of God to the people, the hewn stones of the Word of God. They were a pledge. If the people kept the commandments they would be deserving of the gift. If they did not, the pledge could be withdrawn.

When we read Torah we look for novelty, excitement, character failings and impossible growth. These are the things that make the holy Torah come alive in the imagination. Instead what we find here are detailed descriptions about planks, strips of wood. Rabbi Elie Munk notes this bland narrative along with the sonorous repetition of the minute details of the Mishkan. The long stretches of narrative are even more surprising because such passages are usually terse in Torah. Munk reminds us that where the Torah repeats an idea there is a nuance that it wants us to notice. Baba Kama 64b.

Imagine love. It is not hard to do. Imagine then what you would do to show that love, to display the full force of those inner emotions. What would be the limitations? Why not the same for the Holy One? Why not buy the best pair of tefilin? The grandest tallit? The most beautiful kiddush cup? Why not build an edifice to God that correlates to a supreme brimming love? Such was the Mishkan.

Perhaps then the lesson of the tedious narrative to to adopt the stance of Betzalel, the architect of the Tabernacle, whose enthusiasm was so intense it could be barely contained. Every plank, each fabric was carefully chosen, sorted and crafted to reflect the love of the artist. Would it not be the same for our shul, our sacred spaces? It is holy work and the work of the holy.

The Talmud goes so far as to equate the wellspring of love that arises from the study of the laws of the sacrifices to the building of the Mishkan and offering the sacrifices. Taanit 27b. In other words, just the simple joy of reconstructing in our minds how it appeared for the glory of God is equivalent to having built it.