The various sacrifices presented in Parashat Vayikra are
well-organized, making it easy not only to remember them, but also to reflect
upon their deeper meaning. The following table makes this structure immediately
apparent:
|
Chapter
|
Type of Sacrifices Presented
|
|
1
|
Olot – Burnt Offerings
|
|
2
|
Menachot – Grain Offerings
|
|
3
|
Shelamim – Peace Offerings
|
|
4
|
Chata’ot – Sin Offerings
|
|
5
|
Ashamim – Guilt Offerings
|
Of course,
things are not entirely this simple. Grain offerings include both those which
are effectively identical to Burnt Offerings, as well as those which are
similar to Peace Offerings and Sin Offerings. And some of the Guilt Offerings
may well be considered forms of Sin Offerings. The differences between the
various offerings draw our attention and produced deep insights into the
meanings of the offerings.
I was
particularly intrigued this year by the first passage in Chapter 5. There, it
speaks of four circumstances which occasion the bringing of a Guilt Offering
which is called by the Sages a “Korban Oleh v’Yored”, a sliding-scale offering.
This offerings, according to some not a true Guilt Offering but actually more
akin to a Sin Offering, is practically unique among obligatory offerings in
that what is brought depends on the means of the bringer – whether he is
wealthy, poor, or “dirt-poor”, to borrow the terminology of the Sages. It seems
as though the Torah is “going out of its way” to make sure no one can claim
they simply do not have the means to bring this offering, should they run afoul
of the circumstances. There is just one other offering in Jewish tradition
which shares this characteristic to an extent – the Guilt Offering brought by
the leper after he has been cured from an impurity so severe it cast him out of
his town entirely, as part of a set of offerings which mark his return to
purity and the community. It would seem that the impurity and ostracism imparted by these violations - the Sages speak of leprosy as coming in the wake of severe violations of the prohibition of evil speech - are so life-altering that a way back must be provided for members of every socioeconomic grouping.
But what is the
nature of this sacrifice and what are the circumstances in which it is brought?
Here, we should let the Torah speak:
1.
And if any one sin, in that
he hear the voice of adjuration, he being a witness, whether he has seen or known,
if he does not speak up, then he shall bear his iniquity;
2.
or if any one touch any
unclean thing, whether it be the carcass of an unclean beast, or the carcass of
unclean cattle, or the carcass of unclean swarming things, and be guilty, it
being hidden from him that he is unclean;
3.
or if he touch the
uncleanness of man, whatsoever his uncleanness be wherewith he is unclean, and
it be hid from him; and, when he know of it, be guilty;
4.
or if any one swear clearly
with his lips for harm, or for benefit, whatsoever it be that a man shall utter
clearly with an oath, and it be hid from him; and, when he knows of it, be
guilty in one of these things;
and it shall be,
when he shall be guilty in one of these things, that he shall confess that
wherein he hath sinned; and he shall bring his forfeit unto the LORD for his
sin which he hath sinned, a female from the flock, a lamb or a goat, for a
sin-offering; and the priest shall make atonement for him as concerning his
sin.
What do these cases have in common
that they are all included together? Note that the first and last concern what
issues (or should issue) forth from a person’s faculty of speech, whereas the
middle two deal with accidental violation due to unwitting impurity.
The hallmark of the human is
language, it’s what sets apart humans from animals. Despite the great strides
made in research regarding use of something akin to language by animals, the
gulf is so huge that the perhaps quantitative difference are actually
quantitative. Humans need to speak to be human, and those deprived of the
capacity for speech and communication, unless they can develop a replacement
language, are condemned to a life that in some senses falls short of what it
means to be human.
But “החיות בצוא ושוב”, living vitality ebbs and flows, and speech, especially as it
issues forth from one and is directed to another, can be as perfect as the
hammer blow which drives the nail and completes the vessel, or as cruel and destructive
as the hammer blow which crushes the skull of a detested other. There are times
when we must speak, and times when we must refrain from speech.
When a person can testify to something which can resolve a contested
matter, whether civil or criminal, yet refuses to do so, that person has failed
to use his human gift and definition to bring truth and justice into the world.
Perhaps he was given the ability to speak precisely for that one moment of
potential clarification, yet he remained mute and dumb like an animal. The productive
flow of words, generative of the human in him, has been stopped up, he is
impure, he must atone.
When a person need not say anything, when he should not join the mindless
bantering of people’s chit-chat which serves to pass the time and draw one’s
attention away from awareness of standing ever before G-d, that joyous yet
unbearable intensity… and yet he does, and, deigning to impress others with his
conviction and knowledge, he ups the ante and swears an oath that something is
or isn’t the case, using G-d’s name for his own mundane and petty designs. That
person has violate the sacred trust of speech, invoking the Holy Name by which
G-d created all, which is being itself, he has run on at the mouth, his
creative life-essence has overflowed by a surfeit of misplaced zeal, he is
impure, he must atone.
We can sum up the Torah's presentation of this four situations as follows:
|
Verbal Impurity
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Death of Speech
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Animal Like
|
|
Physical
Impurity
|
Death of Body
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Animals
|
|
Physical
Impurity
|
Overflow of
Life-Imparting Liquids
|
Humans
|
|
Verbal Impurity
|
Overflow of
Life-Creating Names
|
Human Like
|
Someone whose words have had great repercussions in our world is reported
to have said, “It is not that which enters the mouth which renders one impure,
but that which emerges from the mouth”. Was he or his listeners aware that the
source for the correct latter part of this claim is to be found right here in
Parashat Vayikra, with much greater depth and nuance?
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