Parshas Acharei Mos-Kedoshim: Holiness and Our Parents

The double parsha of Acharei Mos- Kedoshim begins with Hashem’s instructions for Aaron (and any future kohain gadol) on the process of attaining atonement for the Jewish people.  As is well known, the Biblical Yom Kippur service required Aaron to take two goats, one for an offering and the other to receive the sins of Bnei Yisrael and then be cast off a mountain. The Torah describes the process thus: “Aaron shall lay both his hands upon the head of the live goat and confess over it all the iniquities and transgressions of the Israelites, whatever their sins, putting them on the head of the goat; and it shall be sent off to the wilderness through a designated agent” (Vayikra 16:21).

 

Kol avonos Bnei Yisrael – all of the sins of Bnei Yisrael. How in the course of this one ritual could the kohain gadel confess ALL of the sins of Bnei Yisrael? Unfortunately, that would probably take a lot of time. Chizkuni explains, citing Sifre, that the kohain gadol would make a general statement saying: “The Children of Israel committed inadvertent sins, deliberate sins as well as sins reflecting their obstinacy against the Lord.”

 

The ritual was fulfilled by a blanket statement covering every type of aveira because every type of aveira transgressed the defining mitzva of the second parsha of the week: Kodeshim tiheeyu, holy you shall be, and it continues “for holy am I, the Lord your God” (19:2).  The commandment to be holy is a complicated one given that to be holy like Hashem requires a level of perfection that most individual humans cannot even imagine.

 

Parshas Kedoshim then includes an extensive list of mitzvos. Actually, the parsha contains the commandment for holiness in two places. First in the pasuk cited above and again in the next Perek: “You shall sanctify yourselves and be holy, for I, Hashem, am your God. You shall faithfully observe My laws: I, Hashem, make you holy” (20:7-8). It is interesting to note then, that both commandments to be holy are followed by references to halachos of kibbud av v’aim. Vayikra 19:3 says: “Each man you shall revere his mother and his father, and My Sabbaths you shall observe.” Vayikra 20:9: “If anyone curses his father or his mother, that person shall be put to death; that person has cursed his father or his mother—and retains the bloodguilt.”

 

These two mitzvos are a fascinating reflection of the rest of the mitzvos of Parshas Kedoshim in that they included commandments that are both positive and negative. This is, perhaps, an excellent reminder that in our work on being holy, we should neither be fully about restrictions nor only about action. The Torah provides a structure of balance, as well as a recognition that the human condition is…complicated.

 

Think about it: If I revere my mother and my father, fulfilling the first mitzvah, then it seems impossible that I should ever come to curse my parents. All too often, however, life puts us on unforeseen paths that lead us to unexpected situations.

 

But why kibbud av v’aim? Why is this mitzvah so strongly connected to the commandment to be holy? Perhaps we should look at it from the perspective of the famous gemara that says that there are three partners in the creation of a human being – the father, the mother, and Hashem. Thus how we treat our parents is a reflection of our relationship to Hashem. (The optimal word here is “treat,” and this is not to suggest that one must accept an abusive or negative parental relationship. However, even in a negative situation, one can still remember the basic level of hakaras hatov to those who gave one life.) If one cannot treat their parents with some level of reverence for having given them life, for having raised them to adulthood, for having instilled in them the basic morals and mores of being a good person, how can one hope to have the proper reverence to emulate Hashem?

 

How one treats one’s parents is also a significant indication of how one treats other people. The mitzvos listed in Parshos Kedoshim makes clear that the Torah ideal of being holy is firmly rooted in bein adam l’chavero, interpersonal mitzvos. A person’s first and most ongoing interpersonal relationship is, normally, with one’s parents. And while childhood and teenagehood may be fraught with the natural battle for independence, once a person emerges into adulthood, they should be able to see and understand the inherent value of that relationship. A person who demonstrates generosity to the poor and restraint in judgements but who has no boundaries of behavior in this primal relationship cannot attain holiness because they are lacking a fundamental value.

 

Kodeshim tihiyu ki kadosh ani Hashem E-lo-keichem, holy you shall be because holy am I Hashem your God, is also understood to infer that attaining holiness is possible because of Bnei Yisrael’s inherent relationship with Hashem. The relationship comes from our parents. We can be holy because our parents, and our parents’ parents, and our parents’ parents’ parents, and etc, strove to maintain their relationship with the Divine. For while ““The Children of Israel committed inadvertent sins, deliberate sins as well as sins reflecting their obstinacy against the Lord,” they continued, throughout the generations, to strive toward the ultimate goal of being an am kadosh.