This Shabbat we read a parsha that is near and dear to my heart.  It is called Emor which means, “You will say.”  It is called Emor because the parsha begins with haShem (god) telling Moshe (Moses), “You will say to the cohanim (priests), the children of Aharon…”  What makes this parsha near and dear to me is that the first part of it is all about the priesthood, and since my great, great…great granddaddy was Aharon, it has special relevance to me.

So, lets get into the parsha, shall we?  God tells Moshe to talk to the children of Aharon and to tell them they can only become tamae (mixed) for the soul of an immediate family member.  We are warned that he cannot make himself tamae for one whom he shouldn’t have married.

Now who a cohen can marry is coming, so hold your socks here.  The Torah continues saying that a cohen cannot make a bald patch on their head or cut the edges of their beard or cut their flesh.  This is all because they are kodesh (holy/separate) for their god/powers and they are not to make hollow the name of their god/powers because they cause the fire offerings, the bread of their god/powers to be offered, and so they shall be kodesh.

We now read that a cohen cannot marry a divorcee, a zonah (literally means a woman who goes away, but is also used to mean a prostitute), or a woman who comes from a forbidden relationship (like a brother and a sister) because he is kodesh to his god/powers.  We read that the people make him kodesh and that if his daughter should be a zonah, she should be burned to death.

Next we read about the cohen gadol (high priest) who cannot become tamae from contact with any dead souls including his parents.  He is to remain in the mikdash (sanctuary) and not profane it.  He can only marry a virgin.

After this discussion regarding the cohen gadol, Moshe is told to tell Aharon that any of his children who have a blemish are not to approach the altar.  Then we find out that anyone who is tamae and approaches the holy items will have their soul cut off from haShem.  We are told who in a cohen’s household can eat from food that is kodesh.  The Torah continues by telling us that offerings also have to be free of blemishes, and must be at least eight days old.

Our parsha now changes direction as god tells Moshe to tell the people about the holidays of haShem.

Actually let me rephrase that, for according to the Torah, these are not holidays but holy-days.

The first to be mentioned falls every seventh day and is called Shabbat which means to sit and not do.  Next we are told of Pesach (Passover) and the holy-days of unleavened bread.  On the heels of Pesach we discover the counting of the omer (sheafs of grain) which we do for 49 days, and the 50th day which is when we are to make a new meal offering to haShem.   This offering is the first fruits offering.  This is a holy day, but is not given a name.  We call this day Shavuot which means weeks because it is the day after we count seven weeks of seven days.  The Torah then re-iterates for us that we are to leave the edges of our fields for the poor.

Next holy day is on the first day of the seventh month and is a remembrance of the blowing of the ram’s horn.  Then comes the tenth day of the month, Yom haKipurim or the day of atonement, which is considered a shabbat of shabbats.  We then learn that on the fifteenth of the month begins the holy-days of Succot which lasts for seven days and ends on the eighth day which is a day of public gathering.

After the listing of holy days, god tells Moshe to command the children of Yisrael to make pure pressed olive oil for the lighting of the menorah which should be always lit.  We also learn of the 12 loaves of show bread that get set up every shabbat.

And then we hear of a fight in the camp between a man whose father was Egyptian and a man whose father was a Yisraelite.  The first man curses the name of haShem and gets taken before Moshe.  Moshe checks in with haShem who says that all who heard him curse must put their hands on his head and then the community is to stone him to death.

Hashem continues by saying any man who kills another man will be put to death, a man who kills someone’s animal will replace the animal, an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth.

And our parsha ends with the man who cursed being taking outside the camp and stoned to death.

Wow.  What a heavy parsha.  Let’s see what we can do with it.

I mentioned a few week’s ago that the Torah is like a lover’s guide meaning it is haShem’s way of helping us get close to him.

Now, the more we can emulate or be like god, the closer we can be to god.  I want to keep this in mind as we delve into the thoughts that came to me concerning our parsha.

The other thing to keep in mind is that the name of something is a key to understanding the something.  So, we can use Emor, the name of our parsha to help us understand what the parsha is trying to tell us.  If you recall, Emor is a command meaning, “You will say.”  So, the question is, how does being commanded to speak bring us closer to god?

First off, let’s look at speech.  HaShem spoke the world into being.  We learned this way back at the beginning.  So from this we can see that to speak is to be god-like.

In the last pasha we learned that it is haShem who makes us kodesh (holy/separate) because haShem is kodesh.  From these 2 observations we see three of haShem’s attributes:  he can speak, she can make something kodesh, and he is kodesh.

If we also have these qualities, they will help us connect to haShem.

One we already have:  haShem has made us kodesh.  Another is the name of our parsha:  Emor or, “You will speak.”   If haShem is giving a command to speak, it must be we already can and haShem wants us to use that ability.

So, we have two of the three attributes we are looking at.  What about the ability to make something kodesh?  Can we be god-like and do that?  If we look towards the end of our parsha, we will find the answer, for haShem tells us to make his Moaydim kodesh.

Bingo!  We have the three attributes so we can get closer to haShem!

But let’s take a look at what our Torah is really trying to tell us here.  Just having similar qualities to haShem does not automatically create a connection – they just provide a door.  We still need to open that door and walk in to really connect with haShem.

The question now is:  how do we open the door?

I think our parsha answers that question if we look more closely at haShem wanting US to make her Moaydim kodesh.

I have now used a Hebrew word twice without translating it.  Normally when I use a Hebrew word, I translate it as I use it.

I deliberately didn’t this time because I wanted it to stand out; it is the key word to understand how the Torah is telling us connect with god.

This word is Moaydim.  It is normally translated in this context as festivals or holy-days and refers to Pesach, and Shavuot, and Succot, and the other special days mentioned above and in our parsha.

However it has a much deeper meaning.  The root of the word is ayd which means witness.

So, when the Torah calls the festivals, Moayday haShem, like it does on verse 23:2 of Vayakra (Leviticus), it is really saying:  The witnessing of Hashem.

What we are told to do in that very same verse is, “Mikra-ay kodesh,” them or call them kodesh.

Call them kodesh.

Call witnessing of haShem kodesh.

What a loaded phrase.

First off, to call something is to speak which is a god-like thing to do.

Even more god-like is to call something into a new way of being which is what we do when we make these moaydim kodesh.  What does it mean to make something kodesh?  It means to separate it.

In other words, we are taking our witnessing of haShem and taking it out of time and space just by speaking.

How incredible and god-like is that!

Not only are we removing them from normal space and time with our speech, we are making them separate, sacred space-time entities.  This is what mikra-ay kodesh means.  This is what haShem did to us.  This is what we do to the moayday haShem.  When we do this, we are doing an act of god!

That is not all.  It goes even deeper.  Just as haShem separated us from the rest of the world so he could reside within us, so too, do we separate these moaydim from the rest of the world to reside in them.

And what are we residing in?  We are residing in the other side of the door we opened.  We are residing, not in the regular world, but in a place that allows us to be with haShem, to witness haShem.  This is why we don’t do any work on Shabbat and Pesach – we are not in a place where work means anything.

The place we are is a place to just be.  A place to witness what haShem has done for us.  If we try doing any work, it will take us out of this sacred place and drop us back into the mundane world where we have such a hard time seeing haShem.

If you go back and count the moaydim, you will find that there are eight of them.  The first happens every seven days and we call it Shabbat.  It is a time where everything is complete and perfect and we are just there to enjoy that perfection which is haShem.  This is the first day of creation where haShem created light.  Shabbat is a taste of that original light.  As we go into Shabbat and feel the specialness of Shabbat, we are feeling a taste of haShem creating that light.  We are witnessing the light created on the first day.

The second Moayd is Pesach which is like the second day of creation.  Just as haShem created a separator to separate the waters above and below, on Pesach we are separated and become that separator between the worlds.

On Shavuot we celebrate the first fruits by making bread with the first of the wheat harvest.  On the third day the first grasses and fruit-trees are made.  We can take this to Succot which is the final harvest or the reaping of a completed task which is what haShem does on the seventh day, she completes all the work that he started in regards to creation.

It is such a joy to see ones efforts come to completion.  This is why haShem considers Shabbat, his seventh day, to be a joy.  This is why Succot is the only moayd that we are commanded to by b’simchah (in joy).

And then there is the moayd of Atzeret.  This is the eighth moayd, which is beyond space and time.  It is the moayd where we can connect to god by connecting to everything.  This is the meaning of the word Atzeret:  a public gathering.  When we connect to everything, what we are really doing is witnessing haShem in everything, which allows us to connect to haShem within and without.

When we can connect to god within and without, this is the highest of the highs.  It is to see the paradox of unity and separation.  This is becoming one with god and bringing haShem into this world.  This is eight.  This is infinity.  This is our job, our goal, our task, our purpose.  Atzeret then is when we can get as close as we can to our lover/our god.

I bless you-all to really be able get to that place of being able to really see and witness all that haShem has done for you and for us, and to really be able to form an intimate bond with the divine.

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.