(1) Hashem spoke to Moses, saying: (2) Speak to the Israelites and say to them: If anyone, man or woman, explicitly utters a nazirite’s vow, to set himself apart for Hashem, (3) he shall abstain from wine and any other intoxicant; he shall not drink vinegar of wine or of any other intoxicant, neither shall he drink anything in which grapes have been steeped, nor eat grapes fresh or dried. (4) Throughout his term as nazirite, he may not eat anything that is obtained from the grapevine, even seeds or skin. (5) Throughout the term of his vow as nazirite, no razor shall touch his head; it shall remain consecrated until the completion of his term as nazirite of Hashem, the hair of his head being left to grow untrimmed. (6) Throughout the term that he has set apart for Hashem, he shall not go in where there is a dead person.
(13) This is the ritual for the nazirite: On the day that his term as nazirite is completed, he shall be brought to the entrance of the Tent of Meeting. (14) As his offering to Hashem he shall present: one male lamb in its first year, without blemish, for a burnt offering; one ewe lamb in its first year, without blemish, for a sin offering; one ram without blemish for an offering of well-being; (15) a basket of unleavened cakes of choice flour with oil mixed in, and unleavened wafers spread with oil; and the proper meal offerings and libations. (16) The priest shall present them before Hashem and offer the sin offering and the burnt offering. (17) He shall offer the ram as a sacrifice of well-being to Hashem, together with the basket of unleavened cakes; the priest shall also offer the meal offerings and the libations. (18) The nazirite shall then shave his consecrated hair, at the entrance of the Tent of Meeting, and take the locks of his consecrated hair and put them on the fire that is under the sacrifice of well-being.
טעם החטאת שיקריב הנזיר ביום מלאת ימי נזרו, לא נתפרש. ועל דרך הפשט כי האיש הזה חוטא נפשו במלאת הנזירות, כי הוא עתה נזור מקדושתו ועבודת השם, וראוי היה לו שיזיר לעולם ויעמוד כל ימיו נזיר וקדוש לאלהיו, כענין שאמר )עמוס ב יא( ואקים מבניכם לנביאים ומבחוריכם לנזירים, השוה אותו הכתוב לנביא, וכדכתיב (לעיל פסוק ח) כל ימי נזרו קדוש הוא לה' והנה הוא צריך כפרה בשובו להטמא בתאוות העולם:
Ramban (Nachmanides) on Numbers 6:14
And the reason that he must bring a sin offering on the day that he completes his days of being a Nazirite? It is not explained, but the most simple explanation is that this man sins against his soul on this day of the completion of his Naziritehood; for until now he was separated in sanctity and the service of God, and he should therefore have remained separated forever, continuing all his life consecrated and sanctified to his God, as it is written (Amos 2:11): ‘And I raised up prophets from among your sons and nazirites from among your young men.’, and also later in Numbers, verse 8, ‘Throughout his term as Nazirite, he is holy to Adonai.’ Thus he requires atonement, since he goes back to be defiled by worldly desires.
(יד) וטעם ה'נזירות' מבואר מאד והוא הפרישות מן היין אשר הפסיד הראשונים והאחרונים 'רבים ועצומים כל הרוגיו' "וגם אלה ביין שגו וגו'. ובא מדין ה'נזירות' מה שתראה מאיסור "כל אשר יצא מגפן היין" - להרחקה יתרה עד שיספיק לאדם ממנו הדבר הצריך כי הנשמר ממנו נקרא 'קדוש' והושם במדרגת 'כהן גדול' ב'קדושה' - עד ש'לא יטמא' אפילו 'לאביו ולאימו' כמוהו זאת הגדולה - מפני שפרש מן היין:
(14) The object of Nazaritism (Num. vi.) is obvious. It keeps away from wine that has ruined people in ardent and modern times. "Many strong men have been slain by it" (Prov. 27:26). "But they also have erred through wine. . . . the priest and the prophet" (Isa. 28:7). In the law about the Nazarite we notice even the prohibition, "he shall eat nothing that is made of the vine tree" (Num. 6:4), as an additional precaution, implying the lesson that man must take of wine only as much as is absolutely necessary. For he who abstains from drinking it is called "holy"; his sanctity is made equal to that of the high-priest, in not being allowed to defile himself even to his father, to his mother, and the like. This honour is given him because he abstains from wine.
Maimonides declared that once we indulge in an extreme, the solution is to turn to the opposite extreme for a while, till our system has been detoxified. For example, one prone to anger should practice extreme tolerance, and one prone to procrastination should practice extreme discipline. We continue on this extreme path till we have regained our balance, and only then do we return to the middle path.
This is the context of the nazir’s vow. Wine is a metaphor for all worldly pleasures. When we become addicted to a particular indulgence, we must wean ourselves from the addiction by abstaining completely until we have recovered. The vow serves to reinforce the discipline that is required for such abstinence.
Some of the traditional commentators posit that people took this vow because they had previously indulged to excess, and the vow helped restrain those impulses. My father, Rabbi Jonathan Rubenstein, posits the Nazirite vow may have functioned like a twelve- step program, which is to say that maybe people didn’t make vows of abstinence in order to become a nazir, but rather, people might have become nazirim in order to have a structure for abstinence.
The fear of the slippery slope is persistent, but the Nazir and the husband of the Sotah point us to the dangers of living in fear, of blowing things out of proportion, of not being able to strike a balance and to be willing to run the risk that is part and parcel of a small amount of freedom. They also deprive themselves of the advantage of living on the slippery slope. When you are on the slant you have to take care not to slide down. Living with some ambiguity keeps you vigilant and wary, keeps your muscles engaged, and keeps you alive and participating in your own moral choices and personal development.
The jealous husband restricts the yetzer hara by imposing restrictions on someone else and the Nazir tries to impose restrictions on him or herself. But in both cases, these overly harsh restrictions can backfire. It’s important to have rules and boundaries. And it’s also important to have space to breathe, to trust ourselves and to trust others.
Is the aim of the moral life to achieve personal perfection? Or is it to create a decent, just, and compassionate society? The intuitive answer of most people would be to say: both. That is what makes Rambam so acute a thinker. He realises that you cannot have both. They are in fact different enterprises.
A saint may give all his money away to the poor. But what about the members of the saint’s own family? A saint may refuse to fight in battle. But what about the saint’s own country? A saint may forgive all crimes committed against him. But what about the rule of law, and justice? Saints are supremely virtuous people, considered as individuals. Yet you cannot build a society out of saints alone. Ultimately, saints are not really interested in society. Their concern is the salvation of the soul.
A sage Chacham is not an extremist, because he or she realises that there are other people at stake. There are the members of one’s own family and the others within one’s own community. There is a country to defend and an economy to sustain. The sage knows he or she cannot leave all these commitments behind to pursue a life of solitary virtue. For we are called on by God to live in the world, not escape from it; to exist in society, not seclusion; to strive to create a balance among the conflicting pressures on us, not to focus on some while neglecting the others.
Maimonides was a sage who longed to be a saint, but knew he could not be, if he was to honour his responsibilities to his people.
https://www.rabbisacks.org/covenant-conversation-family-edition/naso/sages-and-saints/
Moral life is not always simple: a matter of black and white, good and evil, right and wrong. It usually is, but not always. Viewed from the perspective of personal perfection, the nazirite is good and holy. But from the perspective of Jewish faith as a whole, such a life is not an ideal. Judaism wants us to celebrate life, not retreat from it... It is holy to retreat from the world and its challenges – but holier still to engage with them
Here is what I find most beautiful. The laws surrounding the Nazirite are followed in our parashah by the priestly benediction, Birkat Kohanim (Numbers 5:22-27). This blessing is transmitted by the priests but ultimately comes from God. “A mortal does not know with what to bless another,” notes the Ketav Sofer (Hungarian, 19th century), “for what he thinks may be good for another person may in reality be bad for him, and vice versa. Rather, may God, who knows what is good for you, bless you.” Parashat Naso recognizes that as human beings — in all our individuality — we make mistakes, and we are flawed; it is not despite this, but because of it, that we are worthy of blessing.