Moral Values - The Torah Way

Parshat Tzav

In the first chapter of our parsha, Moshe is told to (6:18) "Relate the following message to Aaron and his descendants: This is the law of the sin offering: The sin offering (korban chatat) must be slaughtered before God in the same place that the burnt offering (korban olah) is slaughtered. It is holy of holies."

The term "holy of holies" often refers to the partitioned area where the Ark of the Covenant lay. On the other hand, many pieces of the sacrificial puzzle are also referred to as "holy of holies" – Kodesh Kodashim. The most common use beyond the room housing the Ark is the Mizbeach, the altar upon which animal offerings (korbanot) were to be burned, which is often defined as being the holiest of places. Beyond that, different foodstuffs that the kohanim are instructed to eat, and not to leave over, are also considered to be "kodesh kodashim."

Rabbi Samson Raphael Hirsch explains this verse in a way which, perhaps unknowingly, is quite profound.

"The burnt offering is occasioned by the failure to actualize moral aims. The sin offering is occasioned by the lack of adherence to moral values. And the source of the problem in both instances is the heightened influence of material and of the senses. Only self-sacrifice in the material and sensual side of life leads to adherence to moral values, as it also leads to ascent and advancement. It is Holy of Holies because the basis of the sin offering, like that of the burnt offering, is the consecration of actions, and what underlies this consecration is the sanctification of the material and the sensual."

The sin stems from a lack of adherence to moral values. The problem stems from the influence of the material and the senses. I think I begin to understand.

This week has been tremendously devastating for me. I am sure it is true for many of us as well.

A few too many korban olahs were brought in Israel this past shabbos. I am beginning to think that this is bothering me more than a suicide bomb of a bus or a pizza store, even though that method typically results in more killed, and many more maimed for life. The goal in that case is wanton destruction, with no real aim in mind, which makes it less real, more distant. At the same time, there is nothing new in many members of one family dying together in one attack.

I think that here, it was mostly the method which got to all of us. In the "comfort" of their own home, while they were resting or sleeping, where they had no opportunity to even attempt to be vigilant because the cowards came in after bedtime, stabbed and slit throats of parents, children and baby.

Hirsch said it exactly right – there is a lack of adherence to moral values. The monster(s) who perpetrated the crime are the lowest form of life on this earth. The political pundits who say "we condemn such murders, but they are because of the occupation" don't rank that much higher on the totem pole. Such justifications, in Hirsch's words "must stem from the influence of the material and their morally corrupt senses." In actuality, such thoughts make NO sense (aside from being morally corrupt).

What will make this right? Nothing will bring back the lost members of the Fogel family. Not even the capture of their killer, whoever he or they may be.

Taking a homiletical leap off of the Torah's written page, might I suggest that the next step is to (find and) slaughter the sin offering at the same spot where the burnt offering took place? No, in this case it will not make anything "Holy of Holies," most certainly not the sin offering.

In Hirsch's words, the offerings achieve "the consecration of actions, and what underlies this consecration is the sanctification of the material and the sensual." On a simple level, actions speak louder than words. And Israel needs to achieve a better understanding of moral clarity, and needs to take action that will send a message loud and clear that Israel will not accept "korban olahs" any more, unless the Arabs are willing to become the "Korban Chatat" who is killed at the same spot, to have everything come full circle. I speak not of suicide bombers, who take their own lives, but of capital punishment for heinous crimes against humanity and the Jewish people.

If Samir Kuntar can get life in prison without parole, and is now living free as you and me, and if Abdelbaset al-Megrahi (Pan Am 103), who also had a life sentence, is now alive and well in Libya*, there is something very wrong with the legal system that allows people who should never have a free breath on earth to once again enjoy freedom. They and their ilk should perish from the earth.

In these days before Purim, as we recall the efforts of Haman to wipe out "All the Jews, young and old, children and women" (Esther 3:13), we must recall how the evil people of his time met their respective ends. Haman met his end four days after his decree was written, at the end of a rope that was displayed high for all to see.

His sons and cohorts met their ends on the 13th of Adar 11 months later, when those with moral clarity and an understanding that you can't just kill Jews because they're Jews and expect to get away with it stood up to fight and kill (no drawn out trial, no justification for their hate necessary) the filled-with-hate enemies.

May we merit to see moral clarity enter the eyes, minds and hearts of the morally blind. And may the crimes of these hateful terrorists be viewed by Israel as crimes against the Jewish people, with an end no different than the one meted out to the only prisoner who ever found himself at the short end of an Israeli noose. His name was Adolf Eichmann.

* Abdelbaset al-Megrahi died 5/20/2012 - more than a year after this was written