Parshas Emor begins with the laws of purity of priests.[1] Something which is pure is not mixed with
anything else. When we say that gold is
pure, for example, we mean that it contains nothing but gold. When we say that a person has pure
intentions, we mean that his actions have no ulterior motives. The priests’ service in the mishkan exemplifies
serving God with purity. How can we
serve God with purity? What technique
can we apply in order to serve God with no ulterior motives?
The first Midrash[2]
on this week’s parsha addressing this question brings the pasuk in Tehillim (12:7),
“אִמְרוֹת ה' אֲמָרוֹת טְהֹרוֹת .../God’s sayings are pure sayings…” “אִמְרָה/Saying” alludes to the ten מַאֲמָרוֹת/sayings with which
God created the world. The Sfas Emes
explains that the saying itself gives existence to the Creation. The creating power of God, through the
saying, is hidden within the Creation.
It follows that the saying is the source of purity within
everything. To stress the point, the
beginning of this week’s parsha, dealing with the laws of purity of priests,
repeats the word “say”, “אֱמֹר
אֶל־הַכֹּהֲנִים בְּנֵי אַהֲרֹן וְאָמַרְתָּ אֲלֵיהֶם .../Say to the
priests the children of Aharon and say to them…” (VaYikra 21:1) The redundancy is glaring.
The repetition is significant and gives us a clue as to how
we can attain purity in our own actions.
A similar repetition in parshas Ki Savo sheds light on our parsha. In parshas Ki Savo we find, “אֶת־ה' הֶאֱמַרְתָּ הַיּוֹם/Today you have made God unique.” (Devarim
26:17) In the next pasuk we find, “וַה' הֶאֱמִירְךָ הַיּוֹם/And God has made you unique today.” Chazal[3] explain that the nation of
Israel made God unique by declaring, “שְׁמַע יִשְׂרָאֵל ה'
אֱ-לֹהֵינוּ ה' אֶחָד/Listen Israel, God is our Lord, God is One.” (Devarim 6:4) God made Israel unique by declaring, “מִי כְּעַמְּךָ יִשְׂרָאֵל גוֹי אֶחָד
בָּאָרֶץ/Who is like your nation Israel, one nation on earth.” (Shmuel
II 7:23)
When we consider a relationship to be unique, we mean that
there is a special connection that we have that excludes all others. The relationship is pure in the sense that it
applies to one and to no other.
Considering God unique to us is the essence of pure service. We reject all others. We reject our own desires and we subjugate
ourselves to the will of God. The word
used for “unique” in these p’sukim has the same root as “אִמְרָה/saying.”
In parshas Ki Savo we learn how to attain a level of pure
intentions in serving God. There is a
two step process in attaining purity.
First God brings us close to Him.
He makes us unique among the nations.
Then, we accept this closeness and make Him unique. Instead of following our own desires, we will
follow only His. This is the essence of
purity. To the extent we subordinate our
own desires to God’s we become pure.
The Torah contains other examples of this two step process in
reaching a level of pure intentions in our actions. Each example serves to clarify the process so
that we are better able to apply it to our daily lives.
The first example is the relationship between the Exodus and
the mitzvah of counting the Omer. First
God brought us close to Him by bringing us out of Egypt. Our subservience to Him was a natural
reaction to the miracles and revelation which we witnessed. In addition to freeing us from our bondage to
the Egyptians, He freed us from our bondage to our own desires and subjugated
us to Him. Then, during the period of
Sfiras HaOmer we accepted His closeness, quelled our own desires in favor of
His and our worship became pure.
The Sfiras HaOmer itself hints at the idea of accepting God’s
closeness and purity of worship. But how
can we finite beings come close to the infinite God. How can we receive anything from or even
relate to Infinity? In order to be able
to receive from and relate to God, He created a mechanism through which the
finite Creation can draw God’s infinite blessing into it. This mechanism is called midos/measures[4] implying that although God is
infinite, His blessing reaches us in measured doses that we can receive.
There are seven midos which correspond to the seven
primary personality traits[5]. Each of the seven weeks between Pesach and Shavuos corresponds to one of these midos. It is a time that is particularly conducive
to working on our personality traits to use them only according to God’s will;
to draw upon the Godly midos to this end. We did this between the Exodus and receiving
the Torah and it applies today as well. In fact, purification is one of the reasons
for the mitzvah of Sfiras HaOmer. The
prayer following Sfiras HaOmer begins, “Master of the Universe, You commanded
us … to count Sfiras HaOmer in order to purify us …”
A second example of the two step process in attaining pure
intention is found in the relationship between Shabbos and the days of the
week. On Shabbos, God is more manifest
in the Creation. It is easier to focus
only on God. God brings us close to Him
on Shabbos so that after experiencing Shabbos, we can draw that special
revelation into the week.
Finally, the redundancy at the beginning of our parsha, as
well, alludes to this process. “אֱמֹר/Say” connoting
connection and purity, suggests that God brings us close to Him. We are a unique nation unto God. “וְאָמַרְתָּ אֲלֵיהֶם/And you will say to them” suggests that we
accept His closeness in everything that we do and in our desires. He is unique to us. To the extent that we accept God in our
actions, our motives become pure.
[4] The midos are also referred to
as sefiros in Kabbala literature.
See Terumah 5631 First Ma'amar for more on the concept of midos.
[5]
The seven midos are Chessed-Lovingkindness,
Gevurah-Restraint, Tiferes-Beauty, Netzach-Dominance,
Hod-Empathy, Yesod-Foundation, Malchus-Kingship. For an illuminating discussion of the midos
see the excellent book Inner Space, Chapter 4, by Rabbi Aryeh Kaplan zt”l.
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