Therefore shall ye abide at the door of the tabernacle of the congregation day and night seven days, and keep the charge of the LORD, that ye die not: for so I am commanded.

 

Therefore shall ye abide at the door of the tabernacle of the congregation day and night seven days - He warned them not to leave the door of the tabernacle by day or night, that is to say, until they completed all the work that was incumbent on them at that time, and this is a commandment practiced over the generations, that a Priest must not leave his service and go out, and this is what it said about the High Priest (Lev. 21:12): "Neither shall he go out of the sanctuary, nor profane the sanctuary." When is it that he does not go out and does not profane? Let us say: during the service, and if he did so, he is liable for execution, as it is say, lest you die, and from the negative commandment you infer a positive one.

And in that they warned them not to go out of the door either by day or by night, the intention of the verse is during the time when it was proper to dwell there, for flesh and blood must perform bodily functions, and similarly the Bible says about building the temple (1 Kings 1:6) "and they built it over seven years," and Solomon built his house in thirteen years, which does not include Sabbaths and Festivals, for the meaning is days that are proper for labor. Here, too, they warned them not to go out of the door during the hours that it was proper to dwell there. And the Midrash (Tanhuma Shemini 1) writes: "and you shall sit in the door of the tabernacle day and night" - these are the seven days of mourning for Nadav and Avihu, for the Holy One blessed be He first watched over His world. They explained that He mourned for the world that was going to be destroyed in the generation of the flood, as it says (Gen. 7:4), "For yet seven days, and I will cause it to rain upon the earth," and they said there that one mourns for the dead before he dies, but a man who does not know what is going to be cannot mourn until the dead person has died, but the Holy One, blessed be He, who knows what will happen, watched over his world at first, here to the Holy One, blessed be He, said "and they shall sit by day and night for seven days," watch over your brothers for seven days the way I watched over my world for seven days, and this is why it says, "and keep the charge of the Lord."

(Rabanei Behay ibid.)

 

 

From the Temple Service to Worship within the Heart

Daniel Lehman

Parashat Tzav is bounded by two contrasting experiences, which dwell together under the roof of the Temple and its service. The portion begins with the regular, permanent service: "And the fire upon the altar shall be burning in it; it shall not be put out: and the priest shall burn wood on it every morning ... The fire shall ever be burning upon the altar; it shall never go out" (Lev. 6: 12-13). However, the second half of the Parasha deals with special services, out of the ordinary - the days of the inauguration - a unique service that accompanied the dedication of the tabernacle and nothing else.

The beginning and end of Parashat Tzav thus hint at the constant tension that characterizes the Temple service - and worship of God in general: between the quotidian and the unique, between the banal and the special, between the perpetual sacrifices in their order and the additional sacrifices according to their laws. People feel the need for a constant system of relations with God, even though the regular worship may sometimes seem Sisyphean, even boring - and at the same time they desire a special and formative experience, which will testify uniquely to their connection with the Creator. All our worship is composed of these factors, and the challenge is incumbent upon each individual to find the correct balance between the constant and the additional.

One way or another, however, we are dealing with worship that has been dictated in advance: the perpetual in their order and the additional according to their laws. An individual's personal, spontaneous worship is lacking. Sometimes we feel that the words, which have been determined in advance, by other people, in another age, are not enough. Desire burns in our bones - the need to meet the Holy One in our full selfhood and earthliness, accompanied by our values, our opinions, and our truths. The need burns in our bones to stand before God in our own particular way, in a manner that we ourselves have determined, and that need is left without any practical expression. The Torah whispers: there are clear and paved ways to worship God - people are permitted to try to bridge, to try to translate, those ways to their personal situation, but they are forbidden to deviate from them in any way.

It could be that permanently determining the ways of worshiping God reflects the absurdity and the retrospectiveness implicit in any human being's effort to come close to the Creator. How can a person dare to initiate an encounter with the Omniscient and the Omnipotent? How can a person reduce God to the four ells of a structure, as splendid as it may be? How can a person dare to imagine standing before a Being that is characterized by "no man person see me and live" (Ex. 33:20)? And if permission is actually given to human initiative - it must be restrained. A person can of course desire to come close to God, but this must be done in specific ways, prepared in advance - and mainly in ways that the person did not initiate. Thus a certain essential distance is maintained between people and the Holy One, an absolute boundary for human initiative with respect to the encounter with God.

If we accept the approach prevalent among the commentators (e.g.: Midrash Tanhuma Ki Tisa, sig. 31), according to which the sin of the golden calf made it necessary to build the tabernacle, then the need for restraint, as it is implied by these verses is understandable. The people decided to demonstrate their worship of God in a certain way, and they built a golden calf. This was a forbidden human initiative. The people had just been commanded "thou shalt make no graven image" (Ex. 20:3), and, even worse, they sought to limit God to a physical image "this is your god, Israel" (Ex. 32:4)! The human initiative led to dangerous places. Therefore, the need arose for significant restraint, for a uniform manner of worship, prescribed in advance and organized: the need arose for a tabernacle, for its service with the perpetual in their order and the additional according to their laws.

However, as in every case of friction between an artificial barrier and a natural urge, the tabernacle and its service could not entirely prevent the natural instinct of every individual to worship god in his or her own way. This natural urge, if it wishes, is always capable of finding a fissure in the barrier that was erected. In the framework of the Temple service as well the Israelites found a place for subjective worship. "And Nadab and Abihu, the sons of Aaron, took either of them his censer, and put fire therein, and put incense thereon, and offered strange fire before the LORD, which he commanded them not" (Lev. 10:1). Despite the restraint of the tabernacle, an opening was found for personal, spontaneous worship of God - for worship of God that was not prescribed in advance. And although the sons of Aaron were very severely punished for their worship - though the reason for the punishment is somewhat puzzling, as many and varied commentaries upon it show - the motivation for it remains powerful: Hannah worshiped God in an unconventional manner, personally, in her prayer - Eli the priest believed she was drunk! - and her prayer was answered (1 Samuel 1:12-20).

Hence we should not place our trust in an artificial barrier. It is impossible to prevent people from blazing new and unique paths of their own in the worship of God. On the contrary: people must be trusted, as rational creatures, to reach personal conclusions, conclusions that they can identity with, conclusions that will obligate them with respect to their own worship of God. People, as rational creatures, must be trusted to balance restraint, the necessary distance between themselves and God, and their subjective desire. Indeed, a person might fail and come to improper ways of worshiping God, but that possibility is preferable to an artificial barrier that actually does not block and only creates opposition.

And perhaps when people try to form their own personal connection with God, they become partners in a relationship that is far stronger, far more durable, than that of others, who submit to the instructions of prescribed conventions.

Daniel Lehman is a third year student at the Har Etzion Yeshiva.

 

 

Command Aaron... this is the law of the burnt offering ["that which goes up" in Hebrew] - the law of he who raises himself

The Holy One said: everyone who raises himself finally will walk in fire, as it is written, "it goes up on the fire."

The generation of the flood for saying, "who is Shaddai that we should worship him" (Job 21), and therefore they were condemned to fire, as it is written (Job 6:17): "when they become warm, they vanish, when it is hot, etc." and it is written: "and the fire devoured their remainder" (Job. 22).

And also the people of Sodom (Gen. 19), "and the Lord rained brimstone and fire on Sodom and on Gomorrah."

Pharaoh said (Ex. 5), "Who is God, that I should listen to His voice," and he therefore raised himself, saying, "the Nile is mine and I made it" (Ezekiel 29), on to its fire, for he said (Ps. 18): "and God thundered from heaven at the brightness that was before him thick clouds passed hail and flames of fire," and thus he said (Ex. 9): and there was hail and burning fire."

And Sennacherib also raised himself, as it is said (2 Kings 19): "I went to the heights of the mountains and the depths of Lebanon." And what happened to him? "by the hand of your messengers, you reviled God," and what happened to him? "and an angel of the Lord smote the Assyrian camp," and he was cursed by an angel, and therefore the angel smote him, and what did he do: (Isaiah 10) "and beneath his honor the flame will burn like fire."

(Tanhuma Tzav sig. 2)

 

And he shall put off his garments and put on other garments and carry forth the ashes without the camp unto a clean place.

(Lev. 6:4)

 

The holy service requires modesty

Rabbi Yehuda Halevi the son of Rabbi Shalom said: the actions of the Holy One are not like those of flesh and blood - why? A person of flesh and blood who cooks has fine clothing, when he goes out to the market he wears them, but when he stands and cooks, he removes his fine clothes and wears torn and soiled clothes, and also when he scrapes the stove and the oven he wears even worse clothing, but before the Holy One when the Priest scrapes the ashes from the altar he wears excellent clothes, as it is said (Lev. 6): "and the Priest shall put on his linen garment, etc." In order to "take up the ashes." Why is this? Only to show there is no pride before the Place and thus you find the Elazar the Priest would behave with humility before the Place.

(Bemidbar Raba ch. 4)

 

The Rabbis taught: (Lev. 6): "he shall put off his garments and put on other garments and carry forth the ashes" - this sounds to me like Yom Kippur, when he removes holy garments and wears profane garments? This must be understood: "he shall put off his garments and wear other garments" - we infer the garments he wears from the garments he puts off, if the latter are holy garments, so the former are also holy garments.

If so, why does it teach other garments? Which are lesser?

Rav Eliezer said: "others" is meant to exclude - it teaches about Priests who are blemished but fit for removing the ashes.

A rabbi said: "Others" - lesser than them, as taught by the School of Rabbi Ishmael. For it was taught in the school of Rabbi Ishamel: clothes in which he cooked a stew for his master - he will not pour a cup of his master in them.

(Bavli Yoma 23b)

 

The remnants of yesterday's service must be removed and placed at a distance in order to begin today's service a new in a renewed place, entirely cleared. According to this way of looking at things, we are given a warning not to be preoccupied with yesterday's doings: the removal and perhaps also the raising up - we are commanded to do them in worn and tattered clothing. One must not dress up with pride for what was done in the past, for it is shunted aside because of the new commandment, whose fulfillment is demanded by every born day.

 (Rabbi S. R. Hirsch, ibid.)

 

"Blood is the soul"

"And you shall not eat any blood": because someone with a soul should not eat a soul, because all souls belong to God, for "as with the soul of man so with the soul of the animal, they have the same fate, as this one dies, so will that one die, and there is one spirit for all of them (Ecclesiastes 3:19).

(Nachmanides Lev. 17, 11-12)

 

It also may be said about the prohibition of blood: for beside the badness of its humor, for it is bad humored [ref. to the bodily humors of pre-modern medical theory], in eating it there is also some degree of cruelty, that a man might devour that in an animal which is like him in body, that very thing in them, upon which animals are truly dependent, and their soul is attached to it. For it is known that animals have a "soul," which the Sages called the "vital soul," that is to say, it is not intellectual; and it also seems that their souls have an aspect that is preserved, when one falls into a pit, and in some other things.

(Sefer Hahinukh 148).

 

It is not the very substance of blood that is life, but blood bears the spirit of life in animals, it is connected very closely to the spirit of life, and both together ("its blood and its soul") are the living soul. Blood is a tool of the soul, by means of which it performs its actions.

 (according to Rabbi David Hoffman, as quoted in New Studies of Leviticus by the late Professor Nehama Leibovitz).

 

Recognition of the shame shall be the beginning of the cure: "so that you will remember and be ashamed and atone!" Cover the blood. Remove your shame! The actions will bear their fruit, and over time the generations will be educated. The silent protest when it comes now (that is to say: after generations of eating meat, but eating within a system of prohibitions and specific positive commandments regarding slaughtering and examination and salting) it will become a thundering voice with great noise and it will triumph. The commandment of sacrifice in a special system, by alleviating the pain, gives the impression that this is not a matter of irresponsible behavior, that you are dealing with an automaton with no spirit of life, but with a living soul.

(Rabbi Abraham Isaac Kook of blessed memory: Dewdrops of Lights, cited in N. Leibovitz, New Studies of Leviticus)

 

Remember what Amalek did to you... and smote the hindmost of you, even all that were feeble behind you, and he feared not God. Blot out the remembrance of Amalek from under heaven. Do not forget.

"Blot out the memory of Amalek" - Israel said to the Holy One: Master of the Universe, you tell us to blot out the memory of Amalek?! We are flesh and blood, we are for just an hour - you who live and abide for ever and every, you will remember!

The Holy One said to them: "My sons, you only have to read the portion about Amalek every year, and I will regard you as though you had erased his name from the world."

(Pesikta rabati ch. 12)

 

And remember your former love, O Lord our God. We have already written about the warning regarding memory, as it is written (Deut. 25, 19): "you shall surely erase the memory of Amalek from beneath the heaven, do not forget." This means that a person must erase and uproot and nullify from within all memory of the evil impulse in him, that which arouses him and reminds him of appetites and the needs of this world in vain and insipid things, and also during prayer and Torah study when a person sets his heart to be correct and stand before the blessed Name, it confuses him with its trickery and reminds him of worries about this world and the needs of his household and livelihood. Therefore even what he learns at that time is a kind of forgetting, because he cannot serve in joy. Therefore the Bible warns, "you shall surely wipe out the memory of Amalek," which is the evil impulse," because it reminds you and confuses you, wipe it from the tablet of your heart. By so doing you will not forget all the words Torah that you learn. However, this will rise up in one's memory, that one is about to serve before the blessed God.

(Tiferet Shlomo by Rabbi Shlomo Hacohen of Radomsk on the festivals)

 

"And they did not set their hands upon the spoil" - the Distinction between Rescue and Redemption

"And they did not set their hands upon the spoil" (Esther 9:10)

Even though it was written in the king's name, "and their spoils for plunder," in the event they did not take the spoils so that the king would not say that their intention was not to save themselves from their enemies, but to plunder, and therefore, "they did not set their hands upon the spoil." To show that they are innocent of that. Also, you should know, that they behaved as is proper for that miracle, because the miracle was not so that the Jews should acquire wealth, but to bring down their enemies, and this is the difference between this redemption and other redemptions, because in other redemptions, they had a material benefit. For when they went out from Egypt, which was a redemption to raise up Israel and to be free, they profited from the redemption, but this miracle was only to remove the enemy and not to gain any more than what they had before, because even after the miracle happened for them, they were still under Ahasuerus. Hence the Jews at the time of Ahasuerus did not acquire more than they had at first, even though the fear of the Jews fell upon them, this was to remove the enemy and not to rule over them, as will be shown below. And if they had taken their money, as if the miracle had been to gain from the redemption, this would certainly not have been a profit, since they were still in exile.

(New Light on Purim by the Maharal of Prague, p. 208)

 

 

 

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