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Parsha by Gura

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Parshat Vayikra
Leviticus 1:1-5:26
7th Nissan, 5761

In the center of the Torah, in the middle of the great narrative arc stretching from the Creation of the Universe to the banks of the Jordan river, comes a long, extended, exhaustive set of ritual directives. The book of Vayikra, called Leviticus after the tribe of the priests, is, according to Everett Fox, divided into three general sections. Chapters 1-10 expounds on the sacrificial cult, chapters 11-17 on ritual pollution and purification, and chapters 18-27 on issues of holiness. This week's parsha deals exclusively with the sacrificial cult.

This alarmingly long break in the narrative drama is certainly confusing, especially to those of us confounded in the first place by the ideas of (1) a temple, (2) an hereditary priesthood, and (3) a sacrificial cult (or rather, a cult dependent on animal sacrifice-if the sacrifices were limited to fruits and vegetables, we might be concerned about a perceived waste of food, but the seeming cruelty of killing would not be an issue). That we could reconnoiter this territory with the aid of maps laid out in our college anthropology classes, or referring to the guide books of comparative ancient culture, gives us no real comfort. Biblical tradition, and the rabbinic elucidation of it to which we are the heirs, all mandate those three components as necessary and essential elements of an idealized Jewish religious life.

This difficulty is not a particularly contemporary difficulty. One of the defining deeds of the early 19th Century German Reform movement was to name their places of worship "temples". Thus they clearly distinguished themselves, both in their formality and their ideology, from the "archaic" orthodox synagogues which they believed they would replace in time. They also reformed their liturgy, removing prayers that asked for the reestablishment of the temple and its cult in Jerusalem. The modern Conservative movement rejected much of the ideological accommodation the German Reform movement made with German culture when it broke off to the religious "right". However, the Conservative movement retained some sense of its roots in German Reform Judaism by its naming conventions. Sinai Temple is the largest conservative synagogue in West Los Angeles, for example.

Non-orthodox Jews need not feel that they are particularly "enlightened" in their perplexities in this matter. Nehama Leibowitz writes in her introduction to Vayikra, "The sacrificial laws are like a sealed book to us: we comprehend neither their basic meaning nor the purport of their rules and regulations. Indeed, their lapse since the destruction of the Temple may have blunted our feelings for sacrifices." She continues that one may endeavor to understand the sacrificial system by studying the views of the Sages and commentators.

Much is made in some circles that Maimonides in his Guide for the Perplexed seems to model a "modern" solution to this problem, and Leibowitz quotes him at length. Our modern take of his argument runs that since sacrifice was the common mode of religious expression in the ancient near east, and that one could not expect the not-quite-yet consolidated Jewish people to surrender all the religious rituals with which they were accustomed, G-d "let" the Jewish people retain those familiar rites, in the guise of the sacrificial cult. To do so was a critical and important step in weaning the people away from idolatry to a rigorous Maimonidean monotheism. (Leibowitz, in her New Studies in Vayikra-Leviticus, goes to some length both to illustrate the Rambam's point, and to explain how Nachmanides countered it.)

A modern appropriation (and approbation) of Rambam doesn't necessarily do his views full justice. If this were fully his view, one would expect that, in his description of the messianic future, the temple and its cult would be explained away, or ignored or, at the least, minimized. However, in his massive compendium of Jewish law, the Mishneh Torah, in the book entitled "Laws of the Kings and Their Wars", he writes, "In the future, the Messianic King will arise and renew the Davidic dynasty, returning it to its initial sovereignty. He will build the Temple and gather the dispersed of Israel. In his days, all the statues will return to their previous state. We will offer sacrifices (Hebrew: makrivin karbanot), observe the Sabbatical and Jubilee years according to all the particulars mentioned by the Torah. Anyone who does not believe in him (i.e., the Messianic King) or does not wait for his coming, denies not only the other prophets, but the Torah and Moses, our teacher." (Chapter 11, Halacha 1).

Furthermore, Rambam reiterates, "If he (a potential Messianic King) succeeds (in learning Torah, observing Mitzvot, compelling all Israel to observe the Mitzvot and fighting the wars of G-d), builds the Temple in its place, and gathers the dispersed of Israel, he is definitely the Messiah." (Chapter 11, Halacha 4).

So unfortunately Rambam is not a refuge for those of us who would like to find some traditional source on which to hang our principled rejection of the temple and its cult. (Cf. Gunter Plaut The Torah, A Modern Commentary pg. 754, "Such reasoning might seem to suggest that sacrifice was a temporary expedient, no longer of any value. But Maimonides drew no such conclusion. His monumental code of Jewish law includes a full exposition of the sacrificial rites, ready for use when the Messiah should arrive and the Temple be rebuilt.")

If we can't reject the Temple from within the tradition (although one is certainly free to reject it from without!), how do we make sense of it, the hierarchy of the priesthood, the sacrificial system and the whole complicated apparatus?

To further confuse matters, one particular phrase keeps reoccurring throughout this entire section. The concept is first introduced in Genesis 8:21, but comes to fore in Leviticus 1:9. At the end of the first enumeration of sacrificial details, G-d declares, "And he shall wash its innards and its legs with water. And the priest shall burn it all to smoke at the altar, a burnt offering, an offering by fire of a pleasant smell to YH-WH." (Richard Elliot Friedman translation)

Everett Fox reads this as "its innards and its shins he is to wash in water; // and the priest is to turn all-of-it into smoke upon the slaughter-site, // for an offering-up, a fire-offering of soothing savor for YH-WH."" Artscroll makes the last phrase as "a pleasing fragrance to Ha-Shem."

Baruch Levine in the JPS Torah Commentary writes:

"The idiom reah nehoah means 'a pleasant aroma'. The unusual form nihoah probably derives from the verb nuah, 'to rest, be at ease' - hence "experience pleasure, comfort'. In the rabbinic tradition the linguistic connection with nahat, 'comfort, ease,' is emphasized, expressing the thought that sacrifices offered in accordance the G-d's instructions bring Him pleasure, nahat ruah."

Much could be made homiletically that this particular phrase, a pleasant aroma, occurs 18 times in the Chumash. What's pleasing to G-d? A barbecue of freshly slaughtered sheep or bird? The act of placing the sacrifice on the altar? Certainly not the smell itself, no matte how much we'd like to understand it as some retained ritual pertaining to the literal feeding of a god.

We all use the phrases like "smells good", or "it stinks" figuratively ( and literally). Leibowitz quotes Cassuto, the 20th Century Italian rabbi, that the "pleasing odor" (or "sweet savor") an appreciation of "the motives of the offerer." The 16th Century Rabbi Eliezer Askenazi writes , "it is merely a 'sweet savor' of his future acts." Thus Liebowitz understands this to mean that "the sacrifices as such have no other function that to portend a change of heart and the wish to draw closer to the Creator."

Can this work for us? If we know anything for sure, it is that our time and place is estranged from the Infinite One, blessed be the Name. Perhaps we could use any help we could get, and a bit of humility with it. Maybe a prayer to rebuild the Bet Ha-Mikdash wouldn't hurt after all.

Shabbat Shalom,

Dennis