Turn it and turn it

Lev. 8:14-21 This week we are reading about the inauguration of Aaron and his sons into the priesthood - the High Priesthood in Aaron’s case. The fifth aliyah concentrates on two of the sacrifices, a bull offered as a sin offering and the first of two rams, which is an olah, or a whole burnt offering. Blood is daubed or poured in various places, such as at the bottom of the altar and, in the sixth aliyah, on various parts of the new priests’ bodies. All in all, this is a very messy business, the thought of which makes today’s services look a lot better. One of the local non-Orthodox rabbis commented once that a lot of sincere Orthodox Jews whom he knew, although they prayed every day for the restoration of the Temple, really were not looking forward to this part. What, then, can we learn from this ritual, which seems so alien to our modern, urban sensibilities? Most of us, while unwilling to give up meat, get squeamish even thinking about how that makes it into those relatively neat

Lev. 4:1-26 Atoning for sins committed unwittingly - for the high priest, entire community, and chieftain, but not for a regular person. That is in the sixth aliyah.

Ex. 39:2-21 A detailed description of the making of the High Priest’s ephod and breastpiece.

Ex. 34:1-9 The carving of the second set of tablets after Moses broke the first set, and after his and God’s little “tiff” about whether or not God should exterminate the Israelites then and there. This aliyah also contains the “Thirteen Attributes” of God, which are chanted before the open Ark on holidays.

Ex. 29:19-37 Continuation of detailed instructions for the ordination of Aaron and his sons as High Priest and not-so-high priests, respectively, starting with the sacrifice of the second ram. I’m sure there’s a wonderful d’var torah in that division, if I can only figure out what it is.

Ex. 26:31-37 Specifications for the curtain that goes in front of the Ark of the Covenant, instructions for assembly, and the screen for the entrance to the “Tent” (of Meeting?).

Ex. 23:6-19 Some commandments that Jack Abramoff should really have read, about bribery, subverting the rights of the needy, and oppressing strangers, although of course the people he was involved in oppressing were here first and might consider him the stranger. The sabbatical year, Shabbat, Passover, Shavuot and, for the first time, that vexing “thou shalt not boil a kid in its mother’s milk.”

Ex. 19:7-19 This is the big sound and light show on Sinai. Before that, however, Moses goes back and forth between God and the people, acting as messenger-boy, as it were, although it’s not clear exactly why God needs someone to tell Him what the people said.

Ex. 15:27-16:10 In the fifth aliyah for this portion the Israelites come to (and leave) the oasis of Elim and set out into the desert, where they begin to have second thoughts about leaving Egypt. God, needless to say, gets really annoyed. Neither God nor Moses seems to be cut out for this job, both having notoriously short tempers.

Well, we’re actually into Leviticus now, but I thought that what I would do was at least to post the names of the portions in between and the verses that we’ve been concentrating on, and maybe if I come up with something brilliant I can just add to that post.

For anyone who may be checking out this blog for new material, I have to apologize. I'd set myself an "assignment" of writing something on the Torah portion every week, but the creative juices just haven't been flowing lately. I hope to be able to get back into the swing of things eventually, either with previous portions that I've missed or with future ones. Please check back occasionally.

Ex. 12:21-28 ..you shall say, “It is the passover sacrifice of YHVH, because He passed over the houses of the Israelites in Egypt when He smote the Egyptians, but saved our houses. The people then bowed low in homage.” - Ex. 12:27 This is the first of the four places in the Torah in which the Israelites are told by Moses to tell their children about the Passover experience, but there is a jarring difference between this passage and the one that is the most familiar to us. (Ex. 13:8: “It is because of what YHVH did for me when I went free from Egypt.”) Why the difference? It is on the basis of the second verse that Jews of today are told that we should feel that we, too, were slaves in Egypt, but the words of the verse in our aliyah make it sound as if the whole thing happened to someone else, not even the ones who are to tell of it from firsthand experience. To be sure, there is the word “our” in “our houses,” but it sounds very generic and feeble compared to the power of the later

Ex. 8:7-18 (Oops, I originally had Genesis - sorry.) “But on that day I will set apart the region of Goshen, where My people dwell, so that no swarms of insects shall be there, that you may know that I YHVH am in the midst of the land.” - Ex. 8:18 This verse is traditionally understood to mean that the Israelites were spared from suffering the effects of the last nine plagues, but we know that in the real world this is not so. Rebelling against oppression is not easy; in fact, it is more likely to make things worse for those who seek justice. Unfortunately, the story of the Israelite slaves being forced to hunt for their own straw and still turn in the same quota of bricks every day is much more true to life. Dissidents and rebels are smeared, ridiculed, ostracized and worse, even when their hearts are pure and their causes are just. How, then, can this story speak to us in the modern world, where God does not protect the oppressed with miracles? I believe that the answer lies within

Exodus 3:16-4:17 The main thing that jumped out at me about this aliyah is the fact that, for all that God is supposed to be angry at Moses for lack of faith in the people, it really seems to me that God is the one who lacks faith. He tells Moses that if “they do not believe you or pay heed to the first sign (turning the rod into a snake), they will believe the second (the hand in the robe turning leprous). And if they are not convinced by both these signs and still do not heed you,” then Moses is to do the Nile-into-blood trick, although only with some water on the ground, not the whole river, which is much more impressive. As for the reason why Moses is doing “Egyptian magic tricks,” which came up in our beit midrash last week, obviously he has to show the Hebrews that he can meet their oppressors on their own turf, as it were. Also, as someone else pointed out, the Hebrews have been part of that culture for quite a while, if not necessarily 400 years, so it makes sense that they

Gen. 39:1-6 This very short aliyah, highlighting the rise of Joseph in Potiphar’s household after his sale into Egypt, ends with the statement that “Joseph was well built and handsome.” Generally the assertion is considered to be an introduction to the following episode, in which Potiphar’s wife attempts to seduce her husband’s good-looking young slave, but if that were so, it would make more sense at the beginning of the next aliyah. The present division seems to imply that Joseph’s appearance has something to do with his high status in the eyes of his master as well. Despite centuries, possibly millennia, of admonitions from parents to children that “handsome is as handsome does,” and “You can’t tell a book by its cover,” modern studies show that good looks are still an advantage in everything from hiring to sentencing. It has even been suggested that we are biologically programmed to prefer a more symmetrical appearance as a sign of healthy genes in a possible mate. Interestingly,

Gen. 34:1-35:12 Deborah, Rebekah’s nurse, died, and was buried under the oak below Bethel; so it was named Allon-bacuth. - Gen. 35:8 I have lived a long life and seen three generations of my young mistress’ family grow to adulthood, but never have I been so grieved and ashamed as I have been by the actions of her grandsons Simeon and Levi. And the howls of despair and grief that come from the women’s tent as my youngest lady, Dinah, bewails her lost husband, are enough to break this old heart in two. The young fools! If she had been taken unwillingly, at least their sister would have been an honored wife, mistress of a household – and what is left for her now? But young men do not think of these things when their blood is up and their honor is wounded. How I remember my first nursling, young Rebecca, running breathlessly home, her eyes alight with excitement and the bracelets that Abraham’s manservant had given her jangling about her wrists. Her brother Laban was no prize, but what i

Gen. 30:28-31:16 When Jacob decides to leave Laban and return to his ancestral land, he tells Leah and Rachel that Laban “has cheated me, changing my wages time and again.” But is this accusation a just one, borne out by the facts of the case as provided in the text? Jacob’s main complaint is presumably Laban’s substitution of Leah for Rachel, but while his intent was obviously deceptive, Laban could certainly claim (along with many modern politicians) that his response to Jacob’s request was “legally accurate.” “Better that I give her to you than that I should give her to an outsider. Stay with me,” is, in the words of Etz Hayim , “a statement of consummate ambiguity naively accepted by Jacob as a binding commitment,” and Laban did, indeed, eventually allow Jacob to marry Rachel. Perhaps Jacob, whose previous experience in deception consisted of outright lies like “I am Esau, your firstborn,” can be forgiven for missing the subtlety in his uncle’s more sophisticated technique. However

Gen. 26:30-27:27 REBECCA: Foolish old man! Thank God he has a healthy appetite for game, even in his old age. He provided me with the perfect opportunity to prevent the disaster that would come if he allowed his doting love for Esau to blind him to reality. I had the idea of substituting Jacob for his brother when it first became obvious that Isaac could not tell one son from the other in the dim light inside the tent, but the problem had always been how to make the switch. Now Isaac himself had solved it for me. Please don’t think that I don’t love my older son, but he is a simple, uncomplicated man who acts on a whim, definitely not suited for the responsibilities that should by custom fall upon him as the eldest. Jacob, on the other hand, takes after me and my brother Laban. Even his hesitation came more from his fear of being caught than from any scruples about what I was asking of him. He feared appearing as a trickster to his father, not being one. On my side of the family, we a

Gen. 24:53-67 After that unnerving, dream-like experience with my father and the subsequent death of my mother, I fled. I could no longer bear the burden of being the focus of all his impossible expectations – that strange, God-touched man, my father. And where did I go? I sought out my brother, Ishmael, whom I had not seen since I was a child. I barely remembered him, but in those memories he was a huge, god-like figure, strong and outgoing with a booming laugh that seemed to make the earth vibrate under my feet. I found him at Beer-lahai-roi, where his mother had first heard the voice of God – one more thing for which my mother had never forgiven her. He was still the same, large and hairy and smelling of the outdoors, and he welcomed me with tears in his eyes and a bone-crushing hug. We spoke about the abandonment we had both suffered at the hands of our father, and how he had come to terms with it. Expansive in his feelings as well as his gestures, he had long ago forgiven Abraham,

Gen. 21:5-21 With the last of my strength I flung my beloved child the last few feet into the only shade available, and moved slowly, feebly, like an old woman, to sit down and give way to despair. My eyes were dazzled by sun and sand, my skin blistering, and my lips and throat were parched. It seemed like hours ago that I had forced the last of the water down Ishmael’s throat, and now he moaned and tossed in a delirium that I could not bear to witness. How could Abraham have done this to us - to his firstborn son, at least, however little he thought of me? Yet his eyes had borne a stricken look as he placed the supplies on my back, and there had been tenderness in the hand that brushed a stray lock of hair out of my eyes. As he bent over me, he had whispered some hurried instructions to the nearest oasis, but I had either misunderstood or made a wrong turning, an error we would pay for with our lives. If only I had never gone back to Sarah! I had been deceived; it had been no divine b