Quick - which sacrificial offering is more hamur (serious, substantial, and therefore, sacred): an asham (guilt-offering) or a chattat (sin-offering)? Conventional wisdom - and the order in which they are presented in this week's parashah tell us that it's the chattat, Thats the offering one brings for committing a serious transgression - such as eating a chunk of forbidden fat or chametz, violating Shabbat - unvittingly. The penalty for intentional violation of such prohibitions can be as serious as death, and unwitting violation cannot be let go with nothing. Lack of mindfulness about one's actions is in itself an indictment. Thus, the Torah prescribes the bringing of a particular offering as part of the process of atonement. There is much behind the symbolism of the act of bringing a sacrifice that time and space and mine (my limited one) does not permit us to explore here, but suffice it to say that the chattat is part of a reconciliation with Hashem, coming out of a deep awareness of the wrongdoing born of inattentiveness.
The asham has a different set of rules governing it. Different animals, offering in different ways, for different reasons. The Ramban, when discussing the asham on this week's parashah, actually posits that it is the sacrifice brought for the more severe violations, not the chattat. Now, there's actually a whole list of transgressions for which an asham is brought - we say (better: rattle off) this list every morning as part of "Azeh Mekomam", the chapter of Mishnah listing all the sacrificial offerings which concludes the preliminary section of the Shacharit prayer. At first glance, it's hard to see what they have in common. But when looked at deeper, they share a feature most explicit in the "Asham Talui". This type of Asham is brought when, for example, I know I ate a chunk of fat, but I don't know if it was forbidden fat or not. Since I don't know if I transgressed, I cannot do teshuva properly - I cannot confess to a transgression that perhaps I did not commit. Thus, since I am uncertain, I cannot bring a Chattat, so instead, I bring an Asham, which suspends punishment UNTIL I remember, and then I can do teshuva properly and, as part of the process of atonement, bring a Chattat.
Why is it, then, according to the Ramban, that an Asham is more "Chamur" than a Hattat? I'd like to offer an answer. Uncertainty is a cloud behind which we hide from Hashem, our responsibilities, indeed, ourselves. MAYBE is the source of all excuses. Confronting our wrongdoing is hard, it hurts, at times it feels impossible. So we like to weave around our lives a web of uncertainty. In the post-modern vogue, doubt, vagueness, allusion, uncertainty is "in". But the cloud of obfuscation we spray by strewing our minds with so many equivocal stances allows no definite stance. MAYBE we actually ARE close to Hashem, so why bring a "korban" to drave close?
Sin is objective; Guilt is subjective. Sin can be made right; guilt trickles into the gutters of our own self-loathing and propagates itself there, refusing to clean up its own mess. The trap of subjectification is that what looks like a way out MAYBE a way out, or perhaps just another secret passage back into our own heads. To KNOW that we were mindless, thoughtless, senseless, and therefore, so far from the One who "grants mindfulness" as His first gift, is in itself a gift, for it allows us to understand that, just as there is "far away", there is also "ever-so-close".
During this week when Amalek casts his net of uncertainty, doubt, over the world, then do you think that MAYBE, just MAYBE, we can stand firm and refuse to be caught up in it? I'm CERTAIN we can!
Shabbat Shalom,
Yehoshua Kahan
The asham has a different set of rules governing it. Different animals, offering in different ways, for different reasons. The Ramban, when discussing the asham on this week's parashah, actually posits that it is the sacrifice brought for the more severe violations, not the chattat. Now, there's actually a whole list of transgressions for which an asham is brought - we say (better: rattle off) this list every morning as part of "Azeh Mekomam", the chapter of Mishnah listing all the sacrificial offerings which concludes the preliminary section of the Shacharit prayer. At first glance, it's hard to see what they have in common. But when looked at deeper, they share a feature most explicit in the "Asham Talui". This type of Asham is brought when, for example, I know I ate a chunk of fat, but I don't know if it was forbidden fat or not. Since I don't know if I transgressed, I cannot do teshuva properly - I cannot confess to a transgression that perhaps I did not commit. Thus, since I am uncertain, I cannot bring a Chattat, so instead, I bring an Asham, which suspends punishment UNTIL I remember, and then I can do teshuva properly and, as part of the process of atonement, bring a Chattat.
Why is it, then, according to the Ramban, that an Asham is more "Chamur" than a Hattat? I'd like to offer an answer. Uncertainty is a cloud behind which we hide from Hashem, our responsibilities, indeed, ourselves. MAYBE is the source of all excuses. Confronting our wrongdoing is hard, it hurts, at times it feels impossible. So we like to weave around our lives a web of uncertainty. In the post-modern vogue, doubt, vagueness, allusion, uncertainty is "in". But the cloud of obfuscation we spray by strewing our minds with so many equivocal stances allows no definite stance. MAYBE we actually ARE close to Hashem, so why bring a "korban" to drave close?
Sin is objective; Guilt is subjective. Sin can be made right; guilt trickles into the gutters of our own self-loathing and propagates itself there, refusing to clean up its own mess. The trap of subjectification is that what looks like a way out MAYBE a way out, or perhaps just another secret passage back into our own heads. To KNOW that we were mindless, thoughtless, senseless, and therefore, so far from the One who "grants mindfulness" as His first gift, is in itself a gift, for it allows us to understand that, just as there is "far away", there is also "ever-so-close".
During this week when Amalek casts his net of uncertainty, doubt, over the world, then do you think that MAYBE, just MAYBE, we can stand firm and refuse to be caught up in it? I'm CERTAIN we can!
Shabbat Shalom,
Yehoshua Kahan
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