Addict Torah: Tzav 5784/2024

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Rashi on Leviticus 6:2

(1) צו את אהרן COMMAND AARON — The expression “Command …!” always implies urging on to carry out a command, implying too, that it comes into force at once, and is binding upon future generations

Rabbi Mark Borovitz, Finding Recovery and Yourself in Torah, p. 169

This week’s parashah is Tzav (command). God tells Moses to command Aaron and the priests to do certain things; these are most definitely not suggestions, they are commands. Many of us have problems with this word. We all want to be free to do as we please. “Command” connotes force, having to do something to which we are opposed. Here is a paradox for us: we are created with free will, we can make choices; but if we are commanded, then our free will is taken away. Yet, when we are controlled or commanded by our emotions or our thoughts, is this really free will? We are all compelled to do things by others, by our own needs, and by our desires.

USCJ & RA, Etz Hayim: Torah and Commentary, p. 613

1. the fire on the alter is kept going on it. The last Hebrew word can also be read 'within him' (instead of 'on it'). This prompted the comment that the fire on the altar must be paralleled by a fire in the heart of the officiating priest, whose enthusiasm for teh sacred nature of the work must never be lost.

Richard Elliott Friedman, Commentary on the Torah, p. 1541-1542, Kindle edition

6:4. he shall take off his clothes and wear other clothes. The priest wears the special priestly garments when he gathers the ashes in the Tabernacle courtyard, but he changes to other clothes when he carries the ashes out of the camp. Why? Because the sacred garments can be worn only in the sacred place. This is another case of zones of holiness.

Rabbi Samson Rafael Hirsch, The Hirsch Chumash: Sefer Vayikra I, p. 200

4. He shall take off his clothes and wear other clothes. these too are priestly clothes, but they are inferior to the others, which themselves could be - perhaps should be - older and more worn-out than the priestly garments worn throughout the day.

George Robinson, Essential Torah, p. 407-408, Kindle ed.

This is a dirty and probably unpleasant job. But it must be done by a kohein. There is a Jewish saying from the Palestinian Talmud that speaks directly to this legal requirement: Ein gedulah b’falatin shel melekh/In the king’s palace no rank is recognized. In other words, no one should approach the Almighty, the true Sovereign, with a superior attitude. In the eyes of God, all are alike, children of Adam, created b’tzelem Elohim. (At the same time, notice that the priest removes his priestly garments before taking the ashes away; as the Talmud says, “The clothes worn to cook a stew for one’s master are not worn to pour wine for him.” Proprieties must be observed in the public sphere.) What intrigues me about this tidbit is the implication that, although he has an exalted relationship with Adonai (remember the urim and tumim), the priest is still just an ordinary guy, especially when he’s out of his robes of office. And even though his role is exalted, he is not the only one responsible for maintaining a relationship with God. In the Temple in Jerusalem, there was a system of twenty-four watches kept over the two permanent flames; for this all-important job, not only kohanim and levi’im were selected. Jews from all walks of life and levels of education and income participated in the watch.

Hizkuni, in Carasik, The Commentator's Torah: Leviticus, p. 35

4. He shall...carry the ashes. Since the text does not specifically say 'the priest shall carry the ashes,' we learn that this may be performed by a blemished priest, who could not perform the other priestly tasks.

Rashi on Leviticus 6:3

(3) והרים את הדשן AND HE SHALL TAKE UP THE ASHES — He raked a full pan of ashes from the innermost consumed mass of ashes

Sefer Hahinukh, 13th c., in Nehama Leibowitz, Studies in Vayikra, p. 42

It is a positive commandment that the priest remove the ashes daily from the alter and this is what is termed terumat ha-deshen [the offering of the ashes]...

Rabbi Samson Rafael Hirsch, The Hirsch Chumash: Sefer Vayikra I, p. 200

The terumat ha-deshen [the offering of the ashes] begins with the avodah of the new day by recalling the avodah of the previous day. Terumat ha-deshen, on the other hand, signifies that, at the same time, the Jewish nation must begin its task anew each day. The start of every new day summons us to set out upon our task with full and fresh devotion as though we had never accomplished anything before. The memory of yesterday's accomplishments must not inhibit today's performance. Thoughts of what has already been accomplished are likely to choke off all initiative for new accomplishments. Woe to him who is smug with satisfaction over his past achievements, who does not begin the work of each new day as though it were the very first day of his life's work!

Yoma 20a

Rav said: One verse says: “It is the burnt-offering that goes up on its firewood upon the altar all night until morning” (Leviticus 6:2) and he shall burn it, indicating that the sacrificial limbs may be burned throughout the night. And one verse says: “All night…and he shall remove the ashes” (Leviticus 6:2–3), meaning that the ashes may be removed throughout the night. How can these texts be reconciled? Rather, divide the night into two sections: Half of it for burning the limbs, and half of it for removal of the ashes. Rav Kahana raised an objection. It was taught in the mishna: Every day the priests would remove the ashes from the altar at the crow of the rooster or adjacent to it, whether before it or after it, and on Yom Kippur from midnight, and on the Festivals from the end of the first watch.

Isaac Abarbanel in Carasik, The Commentator's Torah: Leviticus, p. 36

to a clean place. Though they are ashes, being brought from before the Holy One they must be disposed of in a clean place...this was a particular clean place.

Richard Elliott Friedman, Commentary on the Torah, p. 1542-1543, Kindle edition

6:6. Fire always shall be kept burning on the altar. It shall not go out. If it will always be kept burning, of course it will not go out. This is redundant, and this makes it emphatic: this ritual law has special significance because it brings together space and time. YHWH tells Moses to command Aaron and his sons to keep an eternal fire burning at the altar. This law thus provides for a visual expression of the idea that the ritual structure that is starting here is to prevail for all time to come. This fire that is not to be quenched is also reminiscent of the account in Exodus of Moses’ encounter with YHWH at a bush that burns without being consumed. Like the laws of distinction that are reminiscent of the creation in Genesis 1, this passage serves to connect the law and the Torah’s story. In both cases, the priests are required by the law to perform an act that is imitative of something that God has done in the narrative—which further points to the bond between law and history in the Torah.

Isaac Abarbanel, questions in Carasik, in The Commentator's Torah, Leviticus, p. 36

Why are we told so many times - in v. 2, v., 5, and again in v. 6 - that the fire must be kept going?

Rabbi Shefa Gold, Torah Journeys, p. 108, 109

Tzav begins with the instructions for keeping a perpetual fire burning on the altar. Without the constancy of this fire, all of our sacrifices, our prayer, our holy work would cease. This fire on the altar of our hearts is the pre-requisite for all spiritual practice. Tzav directs us in the tending of that innermost fire. If the fire should go out, our priesthood will be worthless...Tzav asks us to enter within and inspect the condition of the innermost fire upon the altar of the heart. We are challenged to look at our lives and ask teh serious and probing questions about what supports that fire as well as what puts it out. The fire itself speaks to mea nd says, 'You must provide the spark. Be with the people who spark your creativity and enthusiasm. Keep reading and learning. Seek out places of beauty. Let yourself be challenged by difficult and interesting projects. Make music and colorful art. Travel to exotic places. Find reasons to celebrate. Seeing that I am listening, the fire grows bolder saying, "And I need space to burn. Spacious air. The breath of life. Spirit. Wind. Open spaces. If you schedule every minute of your day, if you fill the silence with words; if you clutter up your life with so much stuff...how can you expect me to have enough space to burn? The fire begins to open to me and so I speak to hear directly. 'What will you use as fuel? What keeps you burning?' The fire flickers brightly at my question and whispers, 'The love that you give and the love that you receive, that if my fuel. For love is as fierce as death, no river can sweep it away.' 'And one more thing,' says the fire, flashing righteously, 'you must remove the dead ashes every day. I cannot burn clean and pure if the refuse of the past is allowed to accumulate within you. Each morning you must remove that which is old and done.'

Rabbi Nicole Auerbach, in Block, Rabbi Barry H.. The Mussar Torah Commentary, p. 157-158, Kindle ed.

In Tzav, the Israelites use the asham [guilt-offering] sacrifice to acknowledge when their behavior has become disordered and to bring themselves back in line with the expectations of society. We can see a similar use of ritual today in twelve-step programs, like Alcoholics Anonymous. Just as Parashat Tzav prescribes a list of detailed steps that will bring individuals back into “right relationship” with God and society, AA and other such programs offer a very specific seder, namely those twelve steps, for achieving sobriety. According to the Hazelden Betty Ford Foundation, the purpose of these twelve steps is “to recover from compulsive, out-of-control behaviors and restore manageability and order to your life. It’s a way of seeing that your behavior is only a symptom, a sort of ‘check engine’ light to discovering what’s really going on under the hood.” Much like the Israelites who brought an asham offering, members of twelve-step groups gather in community to reflect on how their disordered behavior has affected their lives and the lives of those they love, aiming to realign and reorder their behavior. And like the Israelites, each serves the others as a witness, encouraging them and holding them accountable. From the beginning, God has a preference for order over chaos. And from the beginning, people struggle to order their own behavior in ways that align with God’s commandments. Tzav’s description of the asham offering is at once an acknowledgment that human lives, unchecked, will tend toward chaos and an example of how we can use ritual to refocus our attention and to reorient and bring order to our behavior.

Rabbi Dr. Bradley Shavit Artson, The Everyday Torah, p. 168, Kindle ed.

In the Talmud, the sage Resh Lakish asks the same question, "Why does the Torah say, 'This is the torah of burnt offerings'? In order to teach that if someone studies the laws of an offering, it is as though they had actually offered the sacrifice themselves." Resh Lakish offers a remarkable notion: that study is vicarious action, that reading about something with sufficient imagination and identification constitutes doing it. Upon that idea—the power of the mind to create images that are as forceful as life itself—the entire enterprise of Judaism stands and thrives.

David Zvi Hoffman, cited in Nehama Leibowitz, Studies in Vayikra, p. 47

Shelamim is derived from the root meaning 'peace' or 'perfect' (shalem), It signifies the state of mind of the worshipper who enjoys peace and contentment and recognises that this has been achieved thanks to his cleaving to God.

USCJ & RA, Etz Hayim: Torah and Commentary, p. 618

An individual brings an offering of thanksgiving (todah) in response to having been spared from disaster, which produces probably one of the most profound emotions that person will ever know. The Talmud (BT Ber 54b) identifies the circumstances in which a person should bring a todah...The custom continues to this day in the Gomel blessing offering in the synagogue, during the Torah reading, by a worshiper who has avoided or survived misfortune. The talmudic text states that people need to bring a todah rather than are obliged to bring one, perhaps to suggest that the grateful individual brings the todah to fulfill a psychological need rather than to meet a religious obligation.

Lord Rabbi Jonathan Sacks, Leviticus: The Book of Holiness, p. 107-108, Kindle ed.

Insurance companies tend to describe natural catastrophes as “acts of God,” but we do the opposite. God, we sense, is in the good news, the miraculous survival, the escape from catastrophe. That instinct – to offer thanks to a force, a protective presence, over and above natural circumstance and human intervention – is itself a signal of transcendence. That is what was once expressed in the thanksgiving offering, and still is in the HaGomel prayer. It is not just the feeling of gratitude that seeks religious expression. Sometimes the causality is in the opposite direction. It is religious expression that trains us to feel grateful. Prayer can be a form of cognitive transformation.

Vayikra Rabbah 9:6

(6) Rabbi Pinchas, Rabbi Levi and Rabbi Yochanan [said] in the name of Rabbi Menachem from Gallia: In the time to come, all sacrifices will be annulled - but the sacrifice of thanksgiving will not be annulled. All prayers will be annulled, but the prayer of gratitude will not be annulled.

Kimhi in Carasik, The Commentator's Torah: Leviticus, p. 42

12. For thanksgiving. The translations are incorrect; the Hebrew word means not 'thanksgiving' but confession. It is not a sin offeriing or guilt offering, but the offering that one brings when he wants to confess all his sins and return to the right path.

Isaac Abarbanel in Carasik, The Commentator's Torah: Leviticus, p. 44

15. None of it shall be set aside until morning. This is essentially a way of forcing the one who celebrates to invite others to celebrate and share the meal with him.

Rabbi Shai Held, The Heart of Torah, vol. 2, location 834, Kindle edition

Gratitude is, psychologist Robert Emmons insists, a “moral emotion” in that it “leads to behavior intended to benefit others.” A crucial component of authentic gratitude is an urge to repay or pay forward the kindness we have been shown. Gratitude is the bridge between the realization of how much I have been given, and the commitment to be a giver myself. What I am suggesting is that the laws around the consumption of the thanksgiving offering are intended to express and inculcate a core religious value: When one has been the beneficiary of God’s kindness, one is expected to bestow kindness oneself.

Rabbi Shai Held, The Heart of Torah, Vol. 2., location 872, Kindle ed.

In their very first encounter, God promises Abraham (then still named Abram) that “I will bless you,” and then adds that “I will make you a blessing”29 (Gen. 12:2). God seems to want Abram to know right away that being blessed and becoming a blessing are thoroughly intertwined. “The same double blessing is given to us: If we just enjoy good things without passing them on, if we are blessed without being a blessing, then we fail in our purposes as channels. We are givers because we were made that way, and if we don’t give, we are at odds with ourselves.”...Leftovers...suggest that the lessons of slavery and liberation have not yet been fully learned and internalized. Leftovers indicate a failure of empathy.

Richard Elliott Friedman, Commentary on the Torah, p. 1566, Kindle edition

...people had prayer and charity and fasting in biblical times, too. So these are not replacements for sacrifice. They existed beside sacrifice all along. My question is: what do we have now that they did not have? Answer: study. What we have that no one in the biblical world (until Ezra) had is: the Torah. What we have that no one at all in biblical times had is the full Tanak. Our task is to study it, to shine our own new light on it, and to shine its light on us. This is our task individually, in groups, and as a community.

Rambam on Leviticus 8:2

Moses understood of his own accord that the command concerning the Tabernacle remained valid as before, and he then commanded Israel regarding it, as I have explained in the section of Vayakheil. After they had completed the work, he was then told the section of On the first day of the first month shalt thou set up the Tabernacle of the Tent of Meeting, and he was then told, And thou shalt bring Aaron and his sons unto the door of the Tent of Meeting etc. Thus Moses knew that Aaron and his sons also remained in their esteemed and beloved position before G-d. Here He urged them again on the first day of the consecration, at the time of performing the command [And thou shalt bring Aaron and his sons etc.]

Rabbi Mark Borovitz, Finding Recovery and Yourself in Torah, p. 175

In this parashah, we are being taught that we can always be elevated, we can always rise above our previous errors. Aaron is elevated to a place of honor and reverence after his great mistake. When studying this parashah with my teacher Rabbi Edward Feinstein, he explains that it is, in fact, because of Aaron’s experience of error that he is uniquely qualified for the job as High Priest. Too often, we shun the people who have erred; we get angry at the people we have counted on when they have not come through in the way we wanted and/or we did not get the results we wanted. God does not do this with Aaron, and God does not do this with any of us. God does not expect us to be perfect and does not have delusions that things will always work out the way God wants or in the way we want. Rather, God rewards us for our t’shuvah, for learning from our mistakes about how to live better.

Rabbi David Kasher, ParshNut, p. 207, 209, Kindle edition

What a devastating moment this must have been for Moses, not only to have to walk his brother to his death, but to be the one to physically strip him of his regal garments, leaving him to die as naked as he was born. How heavy those robes must have been, how agonizing every successive removal, as the two brothers said goodbye in silence. But now we realize that the experience was weightier still. For Moses had done this all before, in reverse. In this final undressing, how could he not have been thinking of the day when he dressed Aaron in these same clothes, preparing him for holiness and glory? All of that honor, all of that beauty, all of the promise of that moment is over forever...Brought them forward – vayakreiv – is the same language we use for bringing forward offerings – korbanot – onto the altar. Aaron then becomes, in a sense, the first offering in the Tabernacle. If that is true, then when Moses ties Aaron tight, first with one belt and then another, it is as if Aaron is being bound to the altar – just as Isaac once was. For as Aaron takes on this new role as High Priest, he is essentially offering up his life. This is dangerous work, after all. In the very next parsha, we’ll see two of Aaron’s sons die for lighting the wrong fire in the Tabernacle. And every year on Yom Kippur, we sing about how, when the High Priest emerged from the Holy of Holies, we were elated – in large part because if anything had gone wrong, he would have died. Not to mention that the whole job is to oversee a constant stream of slaughter and sacrifice. Aaron will literally be surrounded by death. So it is no wonder that the very moment he dons the priestly robe, it is glimmering with little flickers of ominous light, casting the foreshadows of his own death.

USCJ & RA, Etz Hayim: Torah and Commentary, p. 625

33. seven days These days parallel the seven days of Creation. The existence of the tabernacle and its capacity to atone for human sinfulness and imperfection make it possible for an imperfect world to survive in the sight of a just God. The Midrash emphasizes that 'if God demands absolute justice, there can be no world. If God desires a world, there cannot be absolute justice (Lev. Rabbah 10:1)

Richard Elliott Friedman, Commentary on the Torah, p. 1582-1583, Kindle edition

8:35. seven days. This parashah (, Command) ends with Aaron and his sons sitting for seven days at the Tabernacle’s entrance, preparing for the climax that is coming in the next week, building anticipation for the inauguration of the priesthood. And so, if we follow the weekly cycle of readings of the Torah, we emulate what is happening in the text: we wait for seven days! To be sure that we get the connection, the next parashah is titled šmînî Eighth. If we pay proper attention to this, we come to the story of the inauguration with anticipation, so we appreciate the story, and we appreciate the power of what goes wrong in the story: the catastrophe of Nadab and Abihu.