Within the Blood and Guts [ויקרא/Leviticus 1:1-5:26] and [החודש/Exodus 12:1-20]

B”H

This week, we begin Book Three of the Five Books of Moses with Leviticus 1:1-5:26 or Parshat Vayikra (ויקרא/ "And he called"). Despite its notable presence at the beginning of Leviticus, Vayikra is almost unforgivably dry, as G-D and Moses have one of their famous lengthy chats in the Tabernacle. Now, mind you, when I say lengthy, I certainly mean it; I learned a few days ago that Vayikra is one of the longest parshiyot in the entire Torah! A gantse megillah (Yiddish saying for an overly drawn-out story), as my late bubbe (z"l) would say...

And, what do the Jews even learn from Vayikra anyway?  Answer: the laws of korbanot (קרבנות/ "sacrifices") with special attention to animal sacrifice!! Woohoo!! Get excited!!

Hello? Um...anyone? Anyone at all excited about animal sacrifices? <<Is this mic on?>>

Yeah, I know. After such vivid and grandiose tales in recent weeks such as the assembly of the Tabernacle, the story of Purim, and the like, the religious legality surrounding animal sacrifice is rather lackluster. Reading perhaps with a bit more creative imagery than a law textbook, G-D outlines in this parshah five categories of offerings:

1) Olah (עלה) - sacrifice of the whole animal at the altar

2) Minkhah (מנחה) - sacrifice of a special flour/oil mixture

3) Sh'lamim (שלמים) - sacrifice of animal blood/fat/kidney/liver 

4) Khatat (חטאת) - sacrifice on behalf the High Priest or any Jew of various types

5) Asham (אשם) - sacrifice with 20% additional compensation to the priest

Actually, there are six offerings this week, for this Shabbat, Jews also read Exodus 12:1-20, or Parshat HaKhodesh* (החודש/ "The Month") in which we remember:

6) Pesakh (פסח) - a sacrifice of a lamb and the spread of its blood on door posts remembered in the Passover season.

With all the instructions for animal offerings this week, who's ready for some kosher barbecue...do you want lamb, goat, or bull?

But, in all seriousness, why are there SO MANY different offerings, each of which with the various exceptions, approved substitutions, and gory preparatory minutia generously explicated? Especially as an animal lover, I am put off by the very subject of this week's literature. Furthermore, I joke in reading about these rituals because, in modern-day Judaism, these sacrifices are no longer part of tradition and have been replaced by prayer. Between not keeping my attention in the sea of legal mumbo-jumbo, not aligning with my personal ethics of the treatment of animals, and not representing Judaism of the current era, it would seem that Vayikra would have no place in my mind for contemplation and personal internalization.

Not so fast. 

Let's unpack this question of the quantity of different offerings a bit further by taking a linguistic approach, starting with the roots of the six offerings:

1) Olah is ע-ל-ה (elevate/rise). 

2) Minkhah, to me, is most readily from מ-נ-ח (gift; also: lead/supervised). [Although, for completion sake, it is worth mentioning I have read very rich commentary about the argument for the more active root נ-ח-ה (leader/supervisor), and the duality of the leader-follower relationship in the word minkhah. A subject for another day.]

3) Sh'lamim is most certainly ש-ל-מ (peace). 

4) Khatat is ח-ט-א (sin). 

5) Asham is א-ש-מ (guilt/fault). 

6) Pesakh is פ-ס-ח (pass over/skip).

Thus, we have: Elevate, Gift, Peace, Sin, Guilt, and Passing Over. 

Suddenly, it becomes so very clear why the great rabbis and Jewish religious scholars could replace the acts of animal sacrifice with prayer. In its essence, the sacrifices were means of connection with G-D - a special avenue through which a direct line could be established albeit for atonement, praise, or other circumstances. The breakdown of the details of animal sacrifice provided a mechanism for the communication with the Divine Moses and the Israelites sought so desperately. 

So, too, do people pray for many reasons: for elevation (to enter a better place in this world or the world to come), for gift-giving (to praise the good G-D bestows), for peace (to celebrate good times or to usher in the good when times are bad), for sin (to directly repent), for guilt (to reflect upon and internalize suffering and strife), and for passing-over (to ask for miracles when the world seems bleak).  Among these six categories exist perhaps every impetus for prayer. 

Each category requires a unique personal mindset, diction, thought process, organization, and emotional basis, but even within these six divisions, t'filah (תפילה/ "prayer") is not generic - it is lovingly and personally crafted by the individual who offers it. Every soul has a different way to pray, different reasons to pray, different times to pray, and even different places to pray. In the minutia of the animal sacrifice rituals, I see G-D's acceptance of all prayer from anyone and in whatever form it might be presented, for in Vayikra, G-D allows any and all to sacrifice: individual or community, rich or poor, king/priest or peasant, scholar or fool. 

How beautiful is it, then, to know that G-D awaits (and even commands) us to start a line of communication. All we need to do is pray. So very fitting is such a message at the very beginning of one of the Books of Moses!

Shabbat Shalom, and may your prayer always be heard and answered. 

--

*[N.B.: Parshat HaKhosdesh also revisits how our lunar calendar came to be, with the first month assigned as Nisan (ניסן). This parshah evokes a fabulous discussion of the duality associated with of the beginning of Creation in the month of Tishrei (תשרי) and the beginning of Judaism in the month of Nisan. I encourage readers to search for very enlightening thoughts on these two "beginnings," for such is the subject of many other commentaries of this parshah].

Finding Oneself Beyond the False [כי תשא / Exodus 30:11-34:35]

B”H

To my Jewish readers, Chag Purim Sameakh (חג פורים שמח / Happy Purim Holiday)! May it be a joyous time of celebration of the good in the world, of renewed strength in the retelling of the Megillat Ester (מגילת אסתר / Book of Esther), and of mischloach manot (משלוח מנות / Purim baskets) filled with hamantaschen (המן טאשן/ cookies) and other sweets. To my friends partying the night away, please stay safe and arrange an Uber/taxi/DD…and drink a few for me; I’ll be cramming for my neurology block examination.

This week’s parshah is Exodus 30:11-34:35 - Ki Tisa (כי תשא / “When you take”), one of the more famous parshiyot in the Torah. Every Israelite contributes some money to support the internal architecture necessary for the functioning of the religious sanctuary, and the project will be supervised by master craftsmen Betzalel and Aholiav. The story then cuts abruptly to the handing of the tablets barring the Ten Commandments to Moses, who has been delayed in his journey back to his kin. Back home, the Israelites have turned to Aaron, Moses’ brother, for advice since Moses has been awhile on Mt. Sinai. He instructs the people of Israel to gather their golden earrings, from which Aaron melts and sculpts a golden calf, a false god who is now declared to have delivered them from Egypt. Aaron constructs an altar for the calf, and a festival is arranged the following day.

It does not take an astrophysicist to realize that G-D is perhaps not so keen on the whole false idolatry thing. G-D tells Moses that his people are “stiff-necked,” for they have turned against G-D, and must be annihilated. Moses does some quick thinking and pleads mercy by reminding G-D of all the good G-D has done for the people of Israel and the promise G-D made to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob to allow their people to grow. Good thing for Moses, because G-D decides to back off on his plans. Moses carries the tablets down the mountain, sees the joyous celebration of the Israelites for their new-founded deity, and, in a rage, drops and breaks the tablets at the base of Mt. Sinai. Moses’ rage continues as he destroys the calf, mixes the powdery remains in water, and forces the Israelites to drink their false idol. Aaron comes clean, and Moses forces the idol worshippers to kill one another – indeed brethren killing brethren – for their heinous sin.

I pause here from retelling the story with some personal commentary, for I find this part of the parshah very unsettling. I get that making and worshipping a false idol is a SUPER big no-no, but did such sin truly justify all these deaths? ESPECIALLY when half the reason G-D did not smite the Israelites when Moses was on Mt. Sinai was because Moses remembers G-D’s promise to make a populous nation!! Then, Moses goes and subsequently has 3,000 people killed, and in a violent manner of friends and kinsmen stabbing one another. Perhaps, he was just caught up in the moment in trying to drag the Israelites back to G-D, but I wonder if Moses has indeed himself sinned gravely for inciting such a travesty without any repercussions.

Anyway, some food for thought. Back to the story:

The next day, Moses arises with the hope of garnering G-D’s forgiveness. And he is successful, but G-D promises that the effects of their sin will be felt for several generations. G-D agrees to lead the Israelites and instructs Moses to allow for a revelation of G-D’s presence (which was G-D’s back, but not G-D’s face, for humans cannot live and see the face of G-D). Over the course of 40 days, Moses reconstructs new tablets, is told the Thirteen Attributes of Mercy, and is given a variety of commandments including holiday celebrations and the famous line (among many in the laws dictating dietary customs) from Exodus 33:26:  Lo t’vashel g’di bakhalev imo” (לא תבשל גדי בחלב אמו/ “Do not seethe a kid in its mother’s milk”). As Moses descended from the mountain once again, he had become physically radiant, and the Israelites feared him. Moses veiled himself from the Israelites except to speak with G-D and to teach the law to them.

Around the beginning of this year, I had some internal discord and mental separation from myself. Lately, I have been in a place of deep introspection and self-evaluation; Ki Tisa comes at an opportune time in my thought process. I am realizing that several elements of my life are built around that which is false. I have surrounded myself in an environment which simply does not value the human element necessary for medical practice – perhaps my primary motivation for choosing this career. I am coming to realize people have used and abused me under the deceitful veil of friendship and do not care for my personal wellbeing, but for what I can do for them. I have forgone my personal beliefs and given of myself to others so much that I have lost touch with a part of myself. In such ways, I have constructed false idols in my career/medical education, friendship, intimacy and relationships, physical and spiritual wellbeing. I am on a journey now to once again find my true self. I have found my voice, as Moses did before G-D, and strived for forgiveness before G-D and for self-forgiveness. In the words of the great sage, Hillel the Elder: Im ein ani li, mi li? U’kh’sheani l’atzmi, mah ani? V’im lo akhshav, eimatai? (אם אין אני לי, מי לי? וכשאני לעצמי, מה אני? ואם לא עכשיו, אימתי / If I am not for myself, who will be for me? And when I am [only] for myself, what am I? And if not now, when?)

As G-D revealed to Moses the Thirteen Attributes of Mercy, I reveal myself publically who I am: a Jew, a future physician, a giver, a faithful friend, an honest voice, a reliable person, an understanding force, a forgiving soul, a cheerleader in the best of times, a shoulder in the worst of times, a passionate man, a defender of empathy and human rights for all people, and a dutiful citizen of the world. I care so deeply for the troubles of people around me, especially when I am in a position to actually provide assistance, but I have come to see that my agency is better suited when my offerings are valued, for they forge stronger bonds between me and other people. It is actually detrimental to allow myself to mingle in such circles, for I dilute that which I wish to give to the world. The elimination of the burdens of falseness allows for truer expression of the very things that led me to construct such toxic situations in my life. This time of self-rebuilding is particularly difficult for me, as I muddy the waters of social status quo in defense of myself and construct a meaningful environment in which I will grow as a physician, a friend, a lover, and a person. But, in such way, I am finding happiness and a renewed sense of self.

I encourage you to seek out those elements of your life which serve you no purpose – your “false idols,” eliminate them from your life, and rediscover a deeper version of yourself.