Parahat Acharei Mot – Kedoshim

Another double portion this week. The portion read as a law text; basically it listing off law after law. It starts off with a description of the duties of the High Priest on Yom Kippur, then the prohibition of offering a sacrifice outside of the Temple. Israel is then warned against imitating the ways of the nations, including religious and sexual immorality. It gives of long list of whose “nakedness” you cannot uncover. Then comes the famous, “You shall not lie down with a male, as with a woman: this is an abomination” [Lev 18:22]. Finally there are a series of laws about how to make a Holy society.

There is certainly a lot of laws I could talk about in this portion. But instead, I wanted to talk about the order of the laws. After the first section, we read law after law about sexual practices, sacrifices, keeping kosher, gossip, stealing, lying… But before all that we read about the duties of the High Priest on Yom Kippur.

Yom Kippur is a day when we can obtain atonement for our sins. Before G-d tells us the details of all these laws, he wants us to know regardless of your sin, atonement is possible. Had the order been reversed, we would have seem something like this: G-d gives the people the laws, and they complain “G-d, there is no way that we can do all of this.’ G-d then responds “OK, fine I’ll give you a method to atone when you sin.” That is a very different story that the one we get here. G-d is telling us up front, “Look, I know there is no way that you can be perfect and keep all of these laws. But the point is that you should strive for it. When you sin, you can atone and continue striving for perfection.”

It’s instructive to note, that the Hebrew word that is generally translated as sin, actually means “mistake” or “missing the target”. So in Jewish consciousness, a sin is not the terrible thing that the Christians would have you believe, it simply means you made a mistake, you wee aiming for perfection and missed the mark. In this context, Yom Kippur is a way to realign your sights, and get you back on the right path.

Shabbat Shalom