Imu Shalev: Welcome to Into the Verse, where we share new and unexpected insights about the parsha … diving deep into the verses to uncover the Torah’s own commentary on itself.

Hi, I’m Imu Shalev, introducing our very first parsha episode! This week’s Torah portion is Kedoshim. (Except in Israel, where it’s Emor. Sorry about that.) So we’ve had a few episodes that focused on Pesach, one of the most dramatic holidays in the Jewish year, and also on Sefirat HaOmer, which is a time of anticipating the next holiday, the holiday of Shavuot. After those high points, talking about Parshat Kedoshim feels kind of challenging. I mean, it doesn’t have any stories, just laws. A lot of laws. 

And these laws, they seem like kind of a random selection, from topics like Sacrifices, Not Harvesting in the Corners of Your Field, and Not Lying. It doesn’t seem as if there’s even a theme here. I mean, Not Lying seems like a pretty serious topic in ethics and morality; that’s worth hearing more about, right? Couldn’t Parshat Kedoshim have spent a little more time teaching us how to be more truthful, more honest in our daily lives, instead of running off to talk about priests and offerings?

Here’s the amazing thing, though: When we look really deeply into this parsha, it’s possible to see that these very different kinds of laws… they’re actually related to each other. And not only are they related to each other, but when we take them all together, it turns out they do teach us quite a bit about morality, about how to relate to each other and to God. All together, they teach us about the meaning of holiness. 

I want to let you know that when this episode first aired on Aleph Beta, it was part of a series that Rabbi Forhman was doing on Sefer Vayikra. So he had developed, each week, more and more of a theory on korbanot. And in this episode on Kedoshim, he relates to that theory in making his argument. I’ll be popping in, in the middle of this episode, to explain the basics of his theory. So if you hear from me in the middle of the episode, don’t skip – it’s not a commercial! Okay, here’s Rabbi Fohrman.

Rabbi David Fohrman: Hi everybody, this is Rabbi David Fohrman, and welcome to Aleph Beta. Parshat Kedoshim contains almost a maze of seemingly unrelated laws, and today I'd like to focus on a few of them with you and see if we can decipher why it is that these things go together.

And to do that, I'd like to play our favorite Sesame Street game with you: “Which One of These Things is Not Like the Other?” Which one of these things just doesn't belong?

Some Laws of Social Justice

So here's one category. It's going to begin with verse 9 in chapter 19:

וּבְקֻצְרְכֶם אֶת-קְצִיר אַרְצְכֶם לֹא תְכַלֶּה פְּאַת שָׂדְךָ לִקְצֹר וְלֶקֶט קְצִירְךָ לֹא תְלַקֵּט: וְכַרְמְךָ לֹא תְעוֹלֵל וּפֶרֶט כַּרְמְךָ לֹא תְלַקֵּט לֶעָנִי וְלַגֵּר תַּעֲזֹב אֹתָם אֲנִי יְקוָה אֱלֹקיכֶם:

(Leviticus 19:9-10)

When you harvest your fields, don't reap the corners of the field, and don't gather in all of the wheat; leave some of the gleanings behind. Don't take every last grape when you harvest your vineyard; leave them behind for the poor, for the stranger. I am God.

So that's one set of laws, having to do with being nice to poor people. Let's keep on moving.

לֹא תִּגְנֹבוּ וְלֹא-תְכַחֲשׁוּ וְלֹא-תְשַׁקְּרוּ אִישׁ בַּעֲמִיתוֹ: וְלֹא-תִשָּׁבְעוּ בִשְׁמִי לַשָּׁקֶר וְחִלַּלְתָּ אֶת-שֵׁם אֱלֹקיךָ אֲנִי יְקוָה:

(Leviticus 19:11-12)

You shouldn't steal; you shouldn't lie; you shouldn't deceive other people. You shouldn't swear falsely in God's name, and you’d profane God's name by doing that; I am God.

So far all these laws kind of go together, right? All these wonderful social-justice laws. But what happens if you back up a little bit, just a couple of verses right before this? What's the set of laws that immediately precede all of this social-justice stuff?

Strangely, what we hear right before this is the minutiae of sacrificial law.

Laws of the Shelamim Offering

וְכִי תִזְבְּחוּ זֶבַח שְׁלָמִים לַיקוָה

(Leviticus 19:5)

And if you offer a peace offering to God… and then we get the finest of details regarding this peace offering: It needs to be eaten on the day that the offering is slaughtered, or the next day; it can't be eaten on the third day. Not only can't it be eaten on the third day, you can't even think about eating the meat on the third day when you're slaughtering the offering, and if you do, the whole offering becomes disqualified just by virtue of that thought.

These, by the way, are the laws of piggul, the idea that if you're thinking the wrong thing in the early stages of a sacrificial offering, the whole thing becomes disqualified – which is itself just kind of a strange law. I mean, it's one thing if you do the wrong thing, but over here it's like you slaughter the offering right, you even eat the meat at the right time… but when you were slaughtering the offering, you thought about eating the meat at the wrong time. Then the whole thing is disqualified.  It's such a strange law. What’s even stranger than the law is what it’s doing here. Why is this the great introduction to these social-justice laws that come right afterwards?

So I think whenever we play this game with the Torah – “Which One of These Things Is Not Like the Other?” – and we find something that ostensibly is not like the other, usually the answer is that it really is like the others; they really do belong. What really is the underlying commonality here?

Imu: Hi, Imu again, picking the baton back up from Rabbi Fohrman, because, as I mentioned, there’s a key theory that you’ll need to know in order to understand Rabbi Fohrman’s argument here in Parshat Kedoshim. 

So what Rabbi Fohrman is about to do is explain the connection between social-justice laws and sacrifices, by referring to a particular theory he’s developed about different types of sacrifices – the shelamim, the sacrifice we talk about here in our parsha, as well as the olah and chatat. They’re the three major types of korbanot that are talked about all over Sefer Vayikra. Once we understand how Rabbi Fohrman sees the differences among these korbanot, we’ll have a clue for understanding something that may be going on under the surface of these seemingly disparate laws: the laws about social justice, lying, stealing, leket, peah… and sacrifices. Something that makes them feel far more connected than what first meets the eye.

Domains and Boundaries

So here’s Rabbi Fohrman’s theory: He suggests that a good way to understand the three types of sacrifices is to think of them in terms of domains that belong to different people. Picture a field with a boundary down the middle. What’s on the left? That’s my part of the field. The right? That belongs to God. If I cross that boundary, if I violate it, and maybe take something from God’s field and go back to mine – well, I’ve got to make it right. That is the energy of the chatat, or the sin offering. That’s for when we’ve taken something we weren’t allowed to or done something we weren’t allowed to do. That’s one way of relating to God: We respect His boundaries, and when we violate them, we make restitution.

We also relate to God on the other side of the field, on my side of the field, and that's where the olah or burnt offering comes in. The word olah means to go up completely to God. My offering is burnt on the altar, entirely consumed by God. This one is totally different from the chatat. The olah is for when we give up something that would normally belong to us. I’m on the left side of the field, I haven’t crossed any boundaries, and not only did we not violate a boundary; we’re actually opening the boundary and saying: Here, come on in to my domain, you can have what’s mine. 

There is a kind of propensity within the human spiritual world to sometimes feel a sense of abandonment to God, to offer everything up to God. The paradigm of the olah is Abraham's olah, when he has offered literally everything, his legacy, his life, his future… he was willing to offer Isaac himself. A child is supposed to be yours, right? But sometimes that’s not right. Abraham doesn't actually do it – God says no – but that's the sense of abandonment. 

Sometimes complete awe and abandonment is appropriate in our relationship with God.

The third type of offering is the shelamim, and it represents a third way of relating to God. Shelamim means a peace offering or maybe a “wholeness” offering. After the offering is sacrificed, some of it is eaten by the kohanim, the priests in the Temple, and some of it is eaten by the people who bring the offering, the owners of the offering itself. And some of it is offered up on the altar.  The shelamim is sort of a covenant offering. 

What is a covenant? It's when we meet in the middle, when I give you something and I hope that you give me something back, when there's a hoped-for transaction. And it's a great thing, a covenant. In the human world, the happiest covenants we have are the marriage covenants, where I give to you and you give to me.  If we’re back on our field, there’s me in my domain, independent, with integrity; there’s you in your domain on the right side of the field, also independent… but we’re meeting in the middle. This is a great sense of wholeness that we have with each other; these two halves make a whole. So a covenant with God involves a shelamim offering, an offering of wholeness, an offering that’s shared with God, as it were – since part of it is burnt on the altar – and shared with the priests, and with the one who’s bringing the offering. So that’s the shelamim. But taken all together, the three types of offerings express yours, mine and ours. 

And that’s Rabbi Fohrman’s theory on the three major types of korbanot. To relate to God effectively, you've got to relate to God with all parts of the field: chatat, olah, and shelamim.

Now, if you keep these three different ways of relating in mind, the seemingly disparate laws in Kedoshim don’t seem so disparate. The different energies of these korbanot come back and express themselves in the laws of this parsha, but only if you listen carefully. And I’ll hand the mic back to Rabbi Fohrman in a moment to show you what I mean. But before I do, consider this: Perhaps these domains and boundaries don’t just represent different ways of relating to God, but also different ways of relating to people. Here’s Rabbi Fohrman again.

Acting Justly in My Domain

Rabbi Fohrman: Remember those laws we were talking about, the ones that had to do with being nice to poor people? You know, that's one way to phrase them – “be nice to poor people” – but there's another way to phrase them too. Listen to how the text phrases it. 

וּבְקֻצְרְכֶם אֶת-קְצִיר אַרְצְכֶם… וְכַרְמְךָ לֹא תְעוֹלֵל

(Leviticus 19:9-10)

When you're taking your gleanings, leave things over for the poor. Your vineyard – don't take every last little grape. God’s talking to me about mine. How should I deal nobly, correctly, justly, with the part of life that's really mine? Technically, I'm entitled to all of it. But you know what doing the right thing is? Have most of it. Leave a little bit for the poor.

What about your side of the domain? How shall I relate to the side of the world that doesn't belong to me? Well, that's the next set of laws.

Acting Justly in Other People’s Domain

Don't steal, don't lie, don't deceive, don't use God's name in order to do it. What’s the Torah saying here? What’s the right way to deal with the other fellow's domain? Don't violate that domain. Respect that domain; don't take the thing on the other side that you'd like to have that doesn't really belong to you. If the other person has stuff, don't steal it; if the other person has a right to information, don't take that from them. And don't violate God's domain by taking the one, special thing that God has, His name, in order to perpetrate those crimes.

When it comes to others' domain, don't violate that domain; respect it.

Yours, Mine, and Ours

And now the middle realm: Not the mine, not the yours, but the ours. And here we meet the shelamim once again. The middle realm is the realm of a covenant, the realm when we meet in the middle, and I give to you and you give to me.

And what's the greatest crime that you could ever make in the sealing of a covenant? It's one thing to make a covenant and then years later to find yourself unable to live up to its terms. What's even worse is to seal the covenant, but even as you ostensibly agree to the terms, to have in mind to violate them, and that is the sin of piggul.

Here you are, you're coming to God, meeting Him halfway, saying: God, I'm trying to give You something and I hope that You'll give something back to me, and let's have some sort of covenant between us. To express that, here's this wholeness offering. But you're not whole with God, because you're thinking about betraying the covenant even as you seal it.

Symbolically, what does that look like? In the little feast that you have, to honor that covenant-making, there's certain terms of that covenant, certain times when the meat should be eaten and when it should not be eaten. And even as I engage in that covenant, I think about betraying it. I'm going to eat the meat when I'm not allowed to… symbolic of making a covenant that on some level you aren't really serious about living up to. Don't betray the wholeness of the covenant as you're in the process of sealing it, with insidious intent to violate its terms.

Each One of These Things Really Is Like the Other

Do you see what's happening here in Parshat Kedoshim? The Torah is taking principles that it once expressed purely in terms of sacrificial law and now mixing and matching sacrificial law with social justice. It's all one thing. How you relate to God, how you relate to others – it's all about yours, mine and ours, and living justly and nobly with all of those parts of the field. 

If you can live up to this challenge – to do the right thing with what's yours, leave a little bit over for the poor; do the right thing with what belonged to the other, don't steal, don't take from them; and do the right thing in the realm of the covenant, don't seal covenants that you're not serious about – then, and only then, will you really live up to the namesake of this parsha: קְדֹשִׁים תִּהְיוּ – being holy to God.

Imu: Hi everyone, hope you enjoyed. So as always, I want to share my reflections with you. For me, Parshat Kedoshim is sort of confusing. When I think of holiness, I think of something that is lofty and transcendent, something sort of unattainable by humans. And so of course when you approach this parsha and you get a bunch of laws – some about sacrifices, some about leket, peah, social justice – it’s jarring. But I think that’s what’s special about this piece. On the one hand, the laws of holiness are practical. Holiness isn’t about spending time in meditation and prayer; holiness seems to have something to do with not transgressing the boundaries of others. About being whole and complete in your relationship with God. About making space in your own field, in your own domains, for people who don’t have resources, for them to come into the corners of your field. Somehow those very practical moral ideals are holy. But how does that fit with that notion of something transcendent, something unattainable? Did we just get that wrong? 

So here’s what I think. The parsha begins with קְדֹשִׁים תִּהְיוּ כִּי קָדוֹשׁ אֲנִי יְקוָה – you should be holy because I, God, am holy. God is holy, omnipotent, omniscient, wholly unattainable. And yet He asks us to emulate Him. If you think about God and boundaries, He’s omnipresent; God is everything. And yet God, this omnipresent being, does create boundaries. He created a space within Himself for us to reside. And He respects those boundaries. He created a human world with real rules – gravity, physics – and He respects those rules. And it’s a space for humanity, for the world, to thrive. So God is the original Creator of boundaries, the One who respects boundaries. And in this week’s parsha, we’re asked to emulate Him, to take something that’s transcendent and lofty and to literally bring it down to earth. 

And so we have our own version of holiness where we respect the domains of our brothers and sisters, but we make space within our domains, for those who are less fortunate. And then in turn, we can choose to relate to that holy and transcendent God, sometimes with the energies of olah, sometimes with the energies of chatat, and sometimes in covenant, with the relationships of the shelamim. Thanks for listening.

In our video series, called “Shavuot: What’s So Exciting About a Bunch of Laws?” Rabbi Fohrman explores and sheds light on the meaning behind this period of Sefirat HaOmer. I can tell you, personally, that it’s entirely changed my appreciation of Sefirat HaOmer and helped me understand why Sefira creates this perfect energetic and exciting build-up to the giving of the Torah. But I don’t want to give away too much… Check it out for yourself at alephbeta.org or in the link in the description below.

Celebrating Shavuot: What's So Exciting About Getting a Bunch of Laws?

Credits:

This episode was written and recorded by our lead scholar, Rabbi David Fohrman. 

When this episode originally aired on Aleph Beta, it was edited by Rivky Stern. 

Into the Verse editing was done by Sarah Penso.

Our audio editor is Hillary Guttman. 

Our CEO and editorial director is Imu Shalev. 

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Thank you so much for listening.

Interested in Rabbi Fohrman’s idea on the three types of sacrifices in Parshat Vayikra? Learn more about it here: How Can We Relate To Sacrifices Today?