May 17th: Emor
THIS WEEK IN THE TORAH
Rabbi David E. Ostrich
We all know that Talmudic (Rabbinic) Judaism is much different from Biblical Judaism. One need only compare the Sacrificial Worship of the Temple to the Prayer Book Worship of the synagogue to get a glimpse of the wealth and breadth of changes. Over the millennia, our religion has undergone a number of developmental innovations, and we are thus heirs to a rich and multi-layered tradition. Inasmuch as we see ourselves as continuing the religious traditions of the Bible, it is worthwhile to reflect on these changes—why and how they were made, and why further changes have been made over the centuries. This week’s Torah portion has some interesting entrées into some of the Rabbis’ innovations.
First, it is important to realize that the Rabbis began their reformation of Judaism well before the Temple was destroyed by the Romans in 70 CE. Though the biggest historical change is the substitution of sacrifices with prayers, Rabbinic/Talmudic Judaism had already developed some significant enhancements.
Possibly originating with the Scribes mentioned in the Bible, “The Rabbis” began as a group of scholars who, around 200 BCE, developed some unique approaches to our communal relationship with God. Calling themselves Perushim (separatists), these scholars sought to break away from the cultural tidal wave of Hellenism that dominated everything in the Eastern Mediterranean—including religion. The English name for these Perushim is Pharisees, and they were organized enough to come to power around 165 BCE.
If this date sounds familiar, it is: 165 BCE is when the Maccabees drove the Greek Syrians from the Temple and rededicated the Temple—ushering in our festival of Chanukah. The Maccabees—also called the Hasmoneans—replaced the Hellenized Temple Priesthood with a less assimilated set of Kohanim from Judah Maccabee’s priestly clan. As part of their campaign for public support, the Hasmoneans brought in the newly emergent Rabbinic/Pharisaic group to be their legal interpreters. Though the Pharisees were not priests themselves, they were experts in the Torah and could evaluate and instruct the new Kohanim in the sacrificial worship system. They also introduced and encouraged personal prayer and piety for the rest of our people—the ones not actively engaged in the Temple worship on a daily basis. They did not seek to minimize the importance of the Temple. However, regular Jews only made the pilgrimage there three times a year—on Pesach, Shavuot, and Sukkot, and the Pharisees believed that regular Jewish life would be more holy and more spiritually meaningful if individuals could develop a personal relationship with God. It was part of their separating from Hellenism and its idolatry, and they patterned some of their changes on the holiness practices of the Kohanim. Again, it was not a matter of usurping the Priestly role ordained in the Torah. Rather, the attempt was to adapt some of the Priestly observances so that individual Jews could feel a more personal connection to God.
Just as the Kohanim wore special Priestly garments, the Pharisees began to adopt special spiritual garments. Just as the Kohanim ate ritually slaughtered meat at worship, the Pharisees adopted a spiritual food system with ritually slaughtered meat—a system now knows as Kashrut. Just as the Kohanim officiated at worship services twice daily, the Pharisees developed prayer services twice a day that were prayed simultaneously with the Temple sacrifices—only from far away.
What we have in this Torah portion are a few of the Priestly customs that were adopted and adapted for non-Priestly holiness. Note the opening of Leviticus 21. “The Lord said to Moses, Speak to the Priests, the sons of Aaron, and say to them…” What follows are instructions for the Kohanim (and not for everyone else), among them the prohibition of being near a dead body. Proximity to the dead renders a Priest ritually unclean—a condition that requires special rituals and several days of being off-duty. This was not applied to the non-Kohanim because someone had to be able to attend to the deceased and their resting places. However, in Verse 5, the Kohanim are forbidden from the pagan mourning customs of “shaving smooth any part of their heads or cutting the side-growth of their beards, or making gashes in their flesh.” These prohibitions were part of priestly ritual holiness—and only applicable when a priest was in mourning. However, the Pharisees adopted this prohibition and adapted it as a permanent (all the time, not just while mourning) practice for their followers. Thus do we have the ritual custom of payyot/side curls and beards that are so idiomatic in traditional Judaism.
In Leviticus 22, the Kohanim are instructed to be scrupulous about the ritual holiness of any meat they consume—and, in Verse 8, they are especially warned against eating “anything that died or was torn by beasts (trefah!), thereby becoming unclean.” When the Rabbis applied these priestly food regulations to regular Jews, we got our prohibition of eating trafe—any meat that is not ritually slaughtered. What had been applicable only to the Priests was now voluntarily adopted by Pharisees seeking their own measure of holy connection.
Interestingly, not all of the priestly restrictions were adopted. Whereas the Kohanim were prohibited from marrying divorcees (21.7), regular Jews were permitted. And, whereas physical deformities disqualified a Kohen from serving as a Priest (see Leviticus 21.16-23), the Rabbis had no such limitations; such physical disabilities were not an impediment to piety.
A modern twist involves women’s roles in worship. Though women were not allowed to serve as Kohanim, the wives and daughters of Priests were considered “holy-adjacent” and were able to eat meat from the sacrifices. This is how the Priests fed their families. In recent times, as women have taken their places as full participants and leaders in Judaism, the term for a Priest’s daughter has come back into play. Since the Bat Kohayn was able to eat the consecrated (sacrificed) meat, the custom has developed that women whose fathers are/were Kohanim are given the Kohayn honors in being called to bless the Torah.
These Pharisaic innovations and adaptations were a gradual and expansive effort that took some 400 years of development before they were recorded in the Mishnah (225 CE). Then the discussions and adaptations continued for another three centuries before they were ultimately recorded in the Talmud. Thus a pattern has been set that continues to this day. Ours is a living tradition of innovation and pious adaptation in which we revere our holy past and work for our holy future.