Dear Friends,
We have a very problematic couple of verses which open our Torah portion this week. Note the following:
“Speak to the priests and say to them, ‘None shall defile himself (by burial) for a dead person among his kin, except for the relatives that are closest to him: his mother, his father, his son, his daughter and his brother’’”
But, not his wife?!?
A priest may come into proximity of a corpse only if his closest blood relatives, but not his wife, nor his daughter?! Isn’t this troubling?
Torah does not offer an explanation, though centuries of commentaries have tried to do so. Some have suggested it is implied, in that spouses are so close. Others have equally troublingly wrote that women are marginal and thus, marginalized. Others argue that only blood relatives are allowed for the priest to bury, hence, excluding the wife.
In any event, the inequity and the indignity are patent. In earlier biblical text in Genesis, prior to Moses, Aaron and the establishment of the priesthood in Exodus and Leviticus, we read that Abraham buried his wife, Sarah, and Jacob buried his wife, Rachel. So, husbands burying wives does find precedent, but not regarding priests, who had to safeguard their priestly purity.
Our question, however, is not regarding purity, but a concern of ethics, decency and respect. How do we explain such a verse to our daughters and students, when the attempts by our wisest sages are still lacking? Essentially, even though the background for gender rules in traditional Judaism may be explainable, and may even be explained benignly and suggest an elevation of women, it may take turning a text into a pretzel, and sometimes overlooking obvious problematic texts. This is one of those cases.
Thus, there are moments when we embrace the ethos of modernity and Reform Judaism, which demands we engage our Tradition through the lens of our own day. Our current approach is not to placate or to explain, but to recast:
Should a death occur in the family of a priest today, since the priest is no longer conducting sacrificial rituals in the Temple in Jerusalem and thus safeguarding his ritual purity and cleanliness, his proximity to a corpse of a family member is no longer precluded. In fact, the opposite is demanded: that he be present and near, and participate in all grieving behavior.
For any member of his family – male or female. Period.
Let’s own our Tradition, and make it ethically acceptable.
Shabbat Shalom,
Rabbi Douglas Kohn
We have a very problematic couple of verses which open our Torah portion this week. Note the following:
“Speak to the priests and say to them, ‘None shall defile himself (by burial) for a dead person among his kin, except for the relatives that are closest to him: his mother, his father, his son, his daughter and his brother’’”
But, not his wife?!?
A priest may come into proximity of a corpse only if his closest blood relatives, but not his wife, nor his daughter?! Isn’t this troubling?
Torah does not offer an explanation, though centuries of commentaries have tried to do so. Some have suggested it is implied, in that spouses are so close. Others have equally troublingly wrote that women are marginal and thus, marginalized. Others argue that only blood relatives are allowed for the priest to bury, hence, excluding the wife.
In any event, the inequity and the indignity are patent. In earlier biblical text in Genesis, prior to Moses, Aaron and the establishment of the priesthood in Exodus and Leviticus, we read that Abraham buried his wife, Sarah, and Jacob buried his wife, Rachel. So, husbands burying wives does find precedent, but not regarding priests, who had to safeguard their priestly purity.
Our question, however, is not regarding purity, but a concern of ethics, decency and respect. How do we explain such a verse to our daughters and students, when the attempts by our wisest sages are still lacking? Essentially, even though the background for gender rules in traditional Judaism may be explainable, and may even be explained benignly and suggest an elevation of women, it may take turning a text into a pretzel, and sometimes overlooking obvious problematic texts. This is one of those cases.
Thus, there are moments when we embrace the ethos of modernity and Reform Judaism, which demands we engage our Tradition through the lens of our own day. Our current approach is not to placate or to explain, but to recast:
Should a death occur in the family of a priest today, since the priest is no longer conducting sacrificial rituals in the Temple in Jerusalem and thus safeguarding his ritual purity and cleanliness, his proximity to a corpse of a family member is no longer precluded. In fact, the opposite is demanded: that he be present and near, and participate in all grieving behavior.
For any member of his family – male or female. Period.
Let’s own our Tradition, and make it ethically acceptable.
Shabbat Shalom,
Rabbi Douglas Kohn
