>> Torah portion
Ilf
°lace To Feel
Nearer To God
Sunday July 20, 2014
12:00 p.m. - 3:00 p.m.
Heartland West Bloomfield
Parshat Pinchas: Numbers 25:10-30:1;
I Kings 18:46-19:21.
6950 Farmington Road
West Bloomfield, MI 48322
(on Farmington Road between 14 Mile & Maple Roads)
I
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n its introduction to the last two
chapters of this week's Torah
portion, chapters 28 and 29 of
the Book of Numbers, the Etz Hayim
commentary notes that "with the
division of the land and the suc-
cession to Moses now determined
[Joshua having been chosen by God
to lead the people after
Moses' death], the Torah
turns to the establishment
of the religious calendar
that will prevail in the land.
Thus the Israelites' first
duty upon settling in their
land is to institute the prop-
er lines of communication
with the Lord through the
medium of the sacrificial
system ..." [p. 929]
The list of offerings or
sacrifices is quite lengthy.
It begins with the daily offerings and
continues with the Shabbat, Rosh
Chodesh (New Month), Pesach,
Shavuot, Rosh Hashanah, Yom
Kippur, Sukkot and Shemini Atzeret
offerings. All seven days of Sukkot are
listed, each exactly the same except
for the numbers of bulls to be offered
each day.
How can this long list of sacrifices
and offerings be understood today,
in a time period in which such sac-
rifices and offerings are no longer
performed? One answer that some of
our commentators suggest is that our
ancestors saw these offerings as a way
to be near to God. Rabbi Harvey J.
Fields, in his commentary on Vayikra,
the first portion of the book of
Leviticus, explains it quite beautifully:
"The word korban... [usually trans-
lated as "sacrifice"], literally means
"draw near" and reveals the purpose
of the Temple offerings. They were
meant to unite the worshiper with
God. By offering sacrifices, a person
said thanks to God or sought forgive-
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32 July 10 • 2014
JN
ness for sins. The drama and beauty
of the sacrificial service, along with
the music, prayers and strong odors
of incense, created an atmosphere of
awe.
"In presenting a sacrifice, one
was giving something important
of oneself to God. For the ancients,
the smoke of a burning
sacrifice on the altar was
proof of a person's love and
reverence for God and for
God's commandments." [A
Torah Commentary for Our
Times: Volume 2: Exodus
and Leviticus, p. 100]
These sacrifices not
only brought our ances-
tors closer to God, they
also brought them closer
to one another; they came
together to make offerings
at one centralized place.
We, too, come to "make offerings"
at one centralized place: our syna-
gogues. Our offerings are of a differ-
ent type, but still we come together
to pray, to be of comfort to mourn-
ers, to be with others like us and to
work toward building a better world.
We do all of this in the synagogue,
sometimes in conjunction with other
organizations and sometimes not, but
always with each other and in God's
presence.
Despite the advent of social media
and the "communities" that people
become part of through these newer
forms of media, we still have the need
for human contact. To see people, to
shake hands with others, simply to
be together — we come together just
as our ancestors did. Our ways may
be different than theirs, but we seek
to achieve the same thing: to draw
nearer to God and to each other.
❑
Amy B. Bigman is rabbi at Congregation
Shaarey Zedek in East Lansing.