This week we start the third of the five books of haShem’s (god) words as scribed by Moshe (Moses). The book, and the parsha (weekly Torah portion) that we read are called vayikra which means, “And he called,” as in, “And he called to Moshe and haShem spoke to him,” which is how our parsha starts.
God is calling to Moshe to tell the people about offerings or sacrifices. First we read that the acceptable animals that a person can offer must come from the domestic cattle family or from the sheep family. We then jump into the details of the offering, often translated as a burnt offering. The Hebrew word used is olah, which means to go up, and all of this offering goes up to haShem in flames on the altar. First we read the details of a cattle offering, and then we read what is done if the animal is from the sheep family (either a lamb or a goat). This offering can also be turtledoves or young pigeons, and we read how they are sacrificed as an olah offering. On the heels of these offerings are the details of meal offerings. They can be offered in a variety of ways and we read about that here.
The next offering we read about is the shlamim or peace offering. We read the details of it, first if it is cattle, and second if it is sheep. Strangely, the Torah takes this moment, after telling us about shlamim offerings, to say that we are not permitted to eat any fat or any blood. One of the things I find strange is that we have already been told not to eat blood because it is the nefesh/soul of life. The fats, on the other hand, we have never been restricted from, and what this is saying is that the fats that belong to haShem, the ones that go on the altar to be burned, we are not to eat when we eat animals that are not sacrificed.
Next, we read how god told Moshe to tell everyone how they can rectify unintentional sins. This section starts with what an anointed priest does when he inadvertently causes the people to sin. It then goes into what the congregation needs to do when they discover they have done something they weren’t supposed to do. We then read about what an individual does when he does something he wasn’t supposed to do. Next we read about someone who sees or hears something and does not tell, that they bear his iniquity. We also read about someone who finds out they had been around dead bodies or made an oath and was reminded of it later.
And again haShem speaks with Moshe telling him to tell the people something. This time it is what to do when one unintentionally uses something holy. God then tells Moshe to tell the people how to correct it when a person betrays god’s trust and sins by denying he took a pledge from someone, or if he robs a person, or if he exploits a person, or if a person finds a lost object and denies it, or swears on a lie. Upon hearing how a person rectifies these last cases, our parsha comes to an end.
Last year, I have talked about the parsha in an overview. This year I am being struck by one thing in particular that god says. It is toward the end of the parsha where the Torah is talking about unintentional sins. Starting on verse 5:17, this verse reads, “And if a soul that will sin and do one of the mitzvot of haShem that she is not to do and doesn’t know, she is guilty and bears his iniquity.” The thing that troubles me about this verse is why is it here? I mean, we just finished reading details and details about everyone from the community at large to the individual who sins inadvertently and then discovers it. This is what chapter four was about, starting with verse 13 and going to the end of the chapter. So, why does the Torah bring it up again?
One of the commentators in my chumash (a book of the first five books of the Torah) goes by the name of Sforno and he seems to be bothered by this enough to give us an answer. What he says is that chapter four is talking about when it becomes clear to you that you have sinned. Here, you are not sure.
Now, at first, I had a hard time with this. I mean, how can you not know, either you did it (and somebody told you) or you didn’t. But then I got to thinking about it a little more. How many of you out there have left the house and wondered if you had forgotten to turn off the lights or water, or if you had locked the front door or not? How many times have you driven home from work or shopping or school, parked the car, and wondered how you got home – that you had no recollection of the drive. Now that I have started the ball rolling, I am sure you-all can come up with many, many more instances.
Essentially what I am talking about, and what Sforno is saying the Torah is talking about here is a case where a person spaces out and doesn’t remember what they just did. This creates doubt. Yoseph just gave me a present and is now down the street. Did I thank him for it? I don’t remember. If I didn’t I will feel guilty for not having thanked Yoseph for the nice thing he did. How interesting, I just used the word guilty here. That is just what the Torah says: a person will feel their guilt.
Now, this guilt is very interesting. It is not the guilt of doing something wrong. It is guilt because you don’t know that you did something wrong. And if you don’t know that you did something wrong, what do you do? You can only make amends if you did something wrong. Oh what cruel irony to find oneself in, feeling guilty for something you might not be guilty of at all. Stuck for the rest of your life carrying around guilt for something you might not be guilty of.
And that is where to Torah comes in. The Torah says that you don’t have to be stuck – that there is a way out. The Torah continues in verse 5:18 to say that if you are stuck not knowing if you did something god asked you not to do, you need to bring an offering to god, with a value based on what you might have done wrong, and it will be treated like an unintentional sin offering. In other words, the Torah is saying that if you are not sure if you did something that god asked you not to do, rather than feeling guilty about it the rest of your life, bring to god an offering as if you had done something wrong, and then you will no longer need to feel guilty. If you did wrong, you have made amends and if you haven’t, no harm has been done. In fact, you will have shown god that you really do care! Cool.
I hear a few of you grumbling that this is all nice for something between a person and god, back in an ancient time when we had sacrifices. However, how does this help us today when it is between people?
The answer to that is in exactly the same way. What the Torah is saying is that if you did something that might have hurt someone else, but you don’t know, go and make amends as if you did do something wrong. Either you did the wrong and you have now corrected it, or you didn’t and you have shown the person that they are important enough to you that if you did hurt them, you would make it up to them. Either way, the results are that you are no longer stuck holding onto your guilt and you have improved the relationship between you and the other person.
If you don’t believe me, imagine being the Yoseph from the above example. Imagine you have given a friend a gift and said goodbye and are now walking down the street. Suddenly that person comes running up to you to thank you for the gift and asking forgiveness if they didn’t do it before. Won’t that make you feel better if they hadn’t thanked you? Won’t that give you a warmer feeling towards that person if they had already thanked you?
The Torah is so full of these little ideas on how to move past the negative things in life, and how to improve relationships between you and me and everyone and everything in the world. I thank you haShem for giving it to us, to help us be better people in the world you created for us.
May we all be able to turn our doubt into certainty and at the same time improve our relationship with our world and our creator.
If you care to read what I wrote about this parsha last year, click here.
About the Author
Shmuel Shalom Cohen spent 10 years studying Torah in Jerusalem. Six years ago, he started Conscious Torah to help Jews connect to their tradition in ways they didn’t think possible. Shmuel also started, and is the executive directory of Jewish Events Willamette-valley, a non-profit whose mission is to build Jewish community, pride, and learning. In his free time, Shmuel likes walks in nature, playing music, writing poetry, and time with good friends.