The Eternal said to Moshe: Speak to the priests, the sons of Aaron, and say to them: Let none [of you] defile himself for a dead person among his kin.
Vayikra 21:1
With these words the Torah introduces a complex set of laws that apply to kohanim, those who by patrilineal descent are instructed to serve in the Temple as priests. The most notable law is this one: They are forbidden to touch a human corpse, to be in close proximity to it, or to be involved in its burial.
Remarkable is the fact that this prohibition is presented in a compound way. The verse begins with, “Say to the priests, the sons of Aaron,” and then it continues “and say to them.” Why the repetition? Would it not have been sufficient to say: “Speak to the priests, the sons of Aaron: Let none defile himself for a dead person among his people”?
To warn the adults concerning the minors
In commenting on this verse, Rashi cites the Talmud[1] to explain that this twofold expression speaks about fathers and children: “this repetition is intended to admonish the adults about their children also.” This means that the older kohanim have an obligation to ensure that the younger ones — those who are not yet 13 years and one day (Bar Mitzvah) and therefore not yet fully responsible — do not defile themselves either.
The problem with Rashi’s explanation is that it does not seem to fully explain the twofold expression. Firstly, Halakhah always obligates parents to teach their children not to transgress a law even before the children have reached 13 years and one day; or, in the case of girls, 12 years and one day (Bat Mitzvah).[2] This is part of their Jewish education. Children need to become accustomed to observing the laws of the Torah so that by the time they have grown up they will be fully committed. Secondly, in two other cases the Sages use the expression “to warn the adults concerning the minors.” In both cases — the prohibition against eating insects[3] and the prohibition against consuming blood[4] — there is no repetition (“speak to them” and “say to them”).
The missing support system
Rabbi Zalman Sorotzkin z.l. (1881–1966), the famous rabbi of Lutsk, offered a remarkable answer to our question.[5]Regarding the prohibitions against eating insects and blood, the idea is that parents must make sure they do not cause their children to eat insects or blood, even if the children are totally unaware that they are doing so.
However, the children of kohanim are confronted with a completely different kind of educational problem. In general, children are educated not only by their parents and teachers. They are also greatly affected by their environment, where the values are often far removed from those of the home. Even when parents and teachers expend great effort to educate a child, the external environment is capable of undoing it all. Children are, after all, most impressionable.
Parents should therefore consider themselves greatly blessed when they are able to live in a community that sends a message to their children that matches the one they receive at home. This is why religious Jews throughout the ages did everything in their power to ensure a Jewish education for their children, in a Jewish neighborhood. That way, when parents teach their children to eat kosher, observe Shabbat, and refrain from speaking evil of other people, they are supported by the environment.
Educating a child in an environment that is not conducive to Jewish values is a much more difficult task and can be detrimental.
But the parents of a child who is a kohen have an even more difficult task. Even if they have chosen for their children an environment fully committed to Judaism, they still have a major problem in educating their child as a kohen. For these children, their environment does not offer a support system. Most of their religious friends and neighbors do not belong to a community of kohanim. They are “just” Israelites and do not have, for example, any obligation to stay away from a dead body. In fact, they are obligated to attend to the dead and bury them as quickly as possible!
The Kohen-parent cannot fall back on a support system offered by their community; there is none. Parents such as these have a special and difficult task to ensure that the child will indeed observe all the laws relating to the kohanim. And this is why the Torah repeats itself: “Speak to the kohanim, the sons of Aaron, and say to them,” thus teaching these parents that they must constantly emphasize and repeat to their children that they are kohanim and are not allowed, for example, to defile themselves by touching the dead.
This observation has profound implications for Jewish education in general. On the one hand, every Jewish child should be surrounded by proper Jewish values and learning. Nothing is more crucial than that. Especially during their younger years, children must be educated in a full and uncompromising Jewish environment. But at the same time, this education must instill in each of them great pride regarding their own personal distinctiveness. Nowhere does the Torah suggest that kohanim should live separate from others in order to ensure a closed support system for young kohanim — one that does not allow for any outside influence, even from a religious environment of non-kohanim.[6]
Increasing pride
From our verse in Vayikra, chapter 21, we learn that parents and teachers are expected to educate a child in such a way that the knowledge of being a kohen increases his pride in being different, without making him feel at a disadvantage because he is a kohen. After all, the kohen-child does encounter the outside world. Proper and profound Jewish education should be able to inspire the child to live up to his priesthood even if he is surrounded by those who are not priests.
Somehow, then, the kohen-child is educated by two opposing philosophies. On the one hand, he needs to live in an immersive Jewish environment, taking full advantage of its support system. On the other hand, he must be able to be independent and greatly treasure his uniqueness. In other words, the Torah is prepared to grant the child only partial protection, but is unwilling to go all the way, because it is the distinction between him and the people surrounding him that develops and strengthens the child’s self-esteem.
Lessons for Jewish education
The same is true for all of our children. They need an environment conducive to their development as Jews, while at the same time their Jewish education must provide them with so much pride that later in life they will be able to deal with the outside world as well and still be fully committed Jews. They need to know the art of integration without becoming subsumed in another culture. The formidable task of parents and teachers is to help their children navigate this complicated path.
But what is often overlooked is that such an education cannot consist of holding on to old ideas and living by dogmas and doctrines. Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel once remarked that “in the realm of the spirit only he who is a pioneer is able to be an heir.”[7] Spiritual plagiarism is a death blow to all religious education.
Living Judaism must be able to stand up in the arena of ideas that are highly un-Jewish, and at the same time be open to new ideas. But this can be achieved only by fostering a disposition towards spiritual dissent rooted in eternal ideas that have the capacity to re-invent themselves. It can be accomplished only by radical thinking and audacity informed by deep learning and faith. There is no way to say “No” to old ideas, if it is not replaced by an uncompromising “Yes” to better ones.
Thus, we, as parents, have an awesome responsibility.
Questions to Ponder
- Rabbi Cardozo discusses the need for a profound Jewish education that instills pride in being a Kohen while also preparing children to interact with the outside world.
- How can parents and educators strike a balance between preserving traditional values and embracing modern ideas without compromising either?
- Is it possible to fully integrate into a contemporary society while maintaining a distinct religious identity? What strategies can be employed to ensure that integration does not lead to cultural or religious assimilation?
- Rabbi Cardozo warns against “spiritual plagiarism” and stresses the need for original, radical thinking in Jewish education. How would you go about fostering an environment that encourages innovative and critical thinking while still grounding children in traditional Jewish teachings? What are the risks and rewards of encouraging such educational dissent?
- The Jewish people are called to be “a Kingdom of priests.” In what sense is every Jew a priest and in what sense are only the Kohanim priests?
- Why is it that the Jewish tradition insists on certainty about Jewish identity — who is a Jew — but is ready to live with a considerable degree of uncertainty about the authenticity of Kohanic identity? After all, the Kohanic status is inherited through the father, whose identity may be questionable. Whereas the identity of the mother is more definite.
- Do you feel that it is right that Kohanim are subject to very significant restrictions which do not apply to other Jews even now? Some assert that this a necessary affirmation of the eternal significance of the Temple and what it represents. Do you agree? If the restrictions on Kohanim are justified, is the integrity of their purpose partly or completely undermined by tolerance of exceptions, such as allowing the Kohen to be in proximity to a dead body if it is that of a very close relative?
- Do you feel that a Kohen — or a Jew in general — should feel pride in being part of a tradition to which they did not choose to belong? Do converts have more reason to be personally proud because they chose to attach themselves to the tradition of which those who inherited it are proud?
Notes
[1] Yevamot 114a.
[2] See Mishne Torah, Hilchot Ma’achalot Asurot 17:27 Shulchan Aruch, Orach Chaim, 343.
[3] Vayikra 11:42.
[4] Ibid 17:12.
[5] R Zalman Sorotzkin, Oznaim Latorah, Vayikra (Jerusalem: Machon Hade’ah Vehadibur, 2005), 250.
[6] In biblical times, the Kohanim used to live together with the Levites in special towns Levites, however, have no obligation to stay away from the dead or observe other laws related to the status of a kohen.
[7] Abraham Joshua Heschel, Man Is Not Alone: A Philosophy of Religion (NY: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 1977), 164.
