March 26th: Tzav and Shabbat HaGadol
THIS WEEK IN THE TORAH
Rabbi David E. Ostrich
Tzav, the second portion in Leviticus, continues the detailed instructions for sacrificial worship. In the olden days—pre-Temple and during the days of the Temple, our ancestors would bring animals, grain, oil, and wine to the Lord, and these foodstuffs—along with frankincense—would be used for a variety of worship occasions. These rules were very important for they were commanded by the Lord, and they were the official methods of coming close to the Divine. The Hebrew word for sacrifice, korban, comes from the root KRB which has to do with closeness.
The specificity of instructions even extended to what we might consider janitorial chores. In Leviticus 6.1-4, we read: “This is the ritual of the burnt offering: the burnt offering itself shall remain where it is burned upon the altar all night until morning, while the fire on the altar is kept going on it. The priest shall dress in linen raiment, with linen breeches next to his body; and he shall take up the ashes to which the fire has reduced the burnt offering on the altar and place them beside the altar. He shall then take off his vestments and put on other vestments and carry the ashes outside the camp to a clean place.” When dealing with holy things, even cleaning up must be done with kavannah—with concentration and sincerity.
Our holy books are full of this kind of thing—of telling us exactly how to do rituals. We want to be diligent, but sometimes we can focus so much on the rules that we lose sight of the relational process the rules are supposed to facilitate.
There is a Mishna which may help us to reorient ourselves and understand the reason for the rules. It is in the very beginning of the Mishna, Tractate Berachot 2.1. It first addresses the way the Shema is to be read: “If a man is studying the Shema in the Torah, and the time comes to recite the Shema, if he directs his heart, he has fulfilled his obligation; otherwise, he has not fulfilled it.” In other words, just reading the words is not enough. One must mean the words of the Shema and use them to connect with God. Then, there is the matter of interrupting the reading because someone comes up and says Hello. “Between the sections he may salute a man out of respect and return a greeting; but in the middle of a section, he may salute a man only out of fear of him and return a greeting. So says Rabbi Meir.” The concern here is that a potentially hostile Roman may get insulted if the worshipper ignores him. To save one’s life—and perhaps the lives of the whole community, one is permitted to interrupt his fervent recitation of the Shema. By the way, the sections they are discussing are the three paragraphs of The Shema: Deuteronomy 6.5-9, Deuteronomy 11.13-21, and Numbers 15.37-41. Rabbi Judah, however, seems concerned that returning a Roman’s greeting may not be enough. One may need to greet the Roman pre-emptively in order to avoid insulting him. And there is the matter of politeness to friends as well. “Rabbi Judah says: In the middle he may salute a man out of fear of him and return a greeting out of respect; between the sections, he may salute out of respect and return the greeting of anyone.”
I think we can understand the issue of a potentially hostile greeter—and even of returning courtesies in the synagogue, but is this the real issue? Why are the Rabbis concerned about interrupting a prayer at all? Is not a prayer just some words—that we can continue after a brief chat? Not exactly. The problem is the conversation that is taking place in the prayer—the conversation with God! Taking a break in the midst of a prayer suggests that one is not fully involved in the relational process—that words are being recited without kavannah. This is hardly the way to treat the Divine. Even more than that, however, is the plain rudeness of interrupting a conversation with God. Assuming one is fully involved with God in the words of prayer, interrupting the time together is like a conversation in which your partner is constantly looking over your shoulder—searching for someone more important or more interesting. One could even compare it to the way some people answer every cell phone call—even when they are involved in a face-to-face conversation with someone else. There are certainly some phone calls which need to be taken—like the potentially hostile Roman saying Hello, but there are lots of cell phone calls that can wait. We owe it to the people with whom we are conversing to give them priority, some directed attention. And, if we are conversing with God, then it is all the more important to maintain our focus on the holy—on our connection with the Eternal.
As we sit down for our Passover Seders this next weekend, let us pay attention to the details of the Seder—the symbolic foods, the prayers and songs, and the family traditions, but let us also realize that they are all instruments for the real work of the Seder—focusing on the spirit of God that manifests in our lives and on the Presence of God in every human being. We can also celebrate our family and friends, realizing that they are a manifestation of God and that together we can join in our conversation with the Eternal.