Vaikrá 5777 - English

Rabbi Gustavo Kraselnik

Congregacion Kol Shearith Israel

Parashat Va-yikra (“[God] called”) introduces the third book of the Torah, which bears the same name (in English, Leviticus) and leads us through one of the main themes of the ancient religious experience: sacrifices.

To the contemporary reader, few rituals are so far removed and alien as the complex system of offerings that constituted the heart of Jewish religious life, from its origins up to the destruction of the second Temple in Jerusalem in the year 70 CE.

Part of the trouble in understanding the deep meaning associated with this rite emerges from the lack of understanding of the term “Sacrifice”, usually related with the idea of renunciation, an act of self-denial.  Although the etymology of the word means “to make things sacred” (from the Latin, sacro and facere), sacrifices are viewed as resignations, where the offering party delivers something valuable so as to show his/her loyalty and devotion to the divinity.

In Hebrew, the word Korban is used generically for all type of offerings (it appears in the Torah 78 times), and its root is K-R-B, which means “to approach”.  In a primitive sense, it conveyed the idea of bringing the offering closer to the altar.  In the ancient world, food and beverage were brought to the gods, to the purpose of satisfying their needs.  The Torah contains some vestiges of this concept, using in relation to offerings the terms Lechem Elochav, “God’s bread or nourishment” (Lev. 21:17, 21 and 23) and Korbani Lachmi, “My offering, My bread” (Num. 28:2).

In a later stage, of which the Torah gives countless examples, offerings were burnt in a desire to connect with the divine through the Reach Nikoach, the “pleasing fragance” that ascended, as it appears several times in our parashah (Lev. 1:9, 13, 17, and more) and in other passages (Num. 15:3, 7, 10 13, and several more).  From this perspective, we could say that by raising the offering, the bidder aims to “get closer to” God.

Classical prophets added a new dimension to the act of offering, through the condemnation of an empty ritual devoid of any ethical conduct.  For them, sacrifice as a mechanism of relating with the transcendental is only valid when accompanied by specific actions in favor of social justice.  The sharp criticisms hurled by them (Isaiah 1:11-13, Amos 5:22-24, etc.) are summarized in the words of Hosea (6:6): “For I desire mercy, not sacrifice, and acknowledgment of God rather than burnt offerings.”

The destruction of the First Temple, in the 6th century BCE, gave rise to new ritual expressions. In the times of the Second Temple, offerings are already accompanied by the declaration of formulas, intonation of psalms, and reciting of prayers.  With the fall of the Second Temple, rabbis accelerated the transition towards liturgy with the implementation of the Amidah, and by the formal incorporation of the regular reading of the Torah.  The physical offering (animal or plant) was replaced by the delivery of words representing the offering from the heart, Avodah shebalev, literally, “deed of the heart.”

Although there are some who yearn for the Temple’s reconstruction (with the arrival of the Messianic age) and restoration of the sacrifices, I prefer to continue with the prayers.  Looking back, I like to see the replacement of the offerings with prayers as part of a spiritual evolution of our tradition.

As early as the midrash, Rabbi Pinchas affirms, on behalf of Rabbi Levi, that sacrifices were sort of a divine concession, necessary to bring the Israelites out of idolatry (Va-yikra Rabbah 22:8), and Rambam (Maimonides, 12th century) points in that same direction, in a well-known passage of his Guide for the Perplexed (book 3, chapter 30):  “For this reason, God allowed this kind of service to continue, gathering for Himself the worship  previously offered to created beings… offering Him sacrifices, bowing down before Him, and burning incense unto Him.”

Anyway, even if we view prayer as an instance that exceeds offerings, it is still valuable for us to know the rituals used by our ancestors to express their own spirituality.

To dive into the biblical world of offerings, in an attempt to understand their diversity and symbolism, seems an essential exercise for the understanding of liturgy and, therefore, our own manner of relating with the sacred.

May our prayers help us recognize God’s presence in our lives, so that they can express with honesty and passion our most profound commitments, being witness of our own devotion and surrender.

Let us follow the example of that humble woman, mocked by the priest for her scant offering until he heard, in his dreams, an admonishing voice that said, “do not reject her, consider it as if she had offered her own life” (Va-yikra Rabbah 3:5).

Shabbat Shalom,

Gustavo