Sin, Ritual Pollution, and Divine Alienation

Mar 28, 2009 By David Hoffman | Commentary | Vayikra

Why begin a young child’s Torah education with something as remote from his or her own life experience as sacrifices and Temple pageantry? Leviticus is difficult for adults to find relevant, let alone children. Give young students the drama of the Exodus and the moment of the Covenant at Sinai. Take children through the family narratives of Genesis that might captivate their imagination as they navigate their own familial dynamics as sons and daughters and brothers and sisters. Teach them the Book of Deuteronomy, which amounts to a review of the entire Torah. But to what ends might we throw them into a world of entrails and gore, the burning of frankincense, the sprinkling of blood, and the choreographies involved with the various sacrificial offerings?

The Psychology of Sacrifice

Mar 31, 2001 By Joshua Heller | Commentary | Vayikra

The sacrificial order laid out in the fourth and fifth chapters of the book of Leviticus may seem alien to modern readers, but in its textual organization and minutiae of ritual, it reflects a deep psychological understanding of the nature of error and atonement in public and private life.

Between Prophets and Priests

Mar 15, 2008 By Edward Feld | Commentary | Vayikra

The relation with God is fraught with uncertainty and doubt.

Our Individual Responsibility to the Community

Mar 20, 2010 By Matthew Berkowitz | Commentary | Vayikra

Four months ago, an Orthodox rabbi here in Israel made headlines by urging his yeshiva students to resist any orders to evacuate settlements in the West Bank. In his book entitled Revivim, Rabbi Eliezer Melamed writes, “a simple halakhah is that it is forbidden for any person, whether a soldier or an officer, to participate in the strictly forbidden act of expelling Jews from their homes and handing over any portion of the Land of Israel to enemies . . . Those who violate this violate several commandments of Torah” (Ha’aretz, November 18, 2009). Rabbi Melamed’s directives rightfully caused a stir in all segments of Israeli society.

Finding Inspiration in Bullocks and Bloodstains

Mar 12, 2011 By Abigail Treu | Commentary | Vayikra

Reading Leviticus, it is clear that the reality of the people who generated the text is radically different from our own. It is a book that reads as ancient, obsolete, and irrelevant. In fact, one recent popular edition of the Bible left it out altogether. So what are we, regular readers of the Torah text and seekers of higher meaning gleaned from it, to do with the next three months of Levitical parashiyot?