Tzav – The Import of the Ashes

An interesting Midrash is cited by Rav Yosef Nechemia Kornitzer (1880-1933), a great-grandson of the Chasam Sofer who served as the av beis din of  Cracow before World War II. The Midrash is found in the Tanchuma manuscript discovered by Solomon Buber, published in 1885.

The Midrash speaks about the end of history and quotes Ovadiah (1:18): “And the house of Yaakov will be fire and the house of Yosef flame; and the house of Esav, straw. And they will light them aflame and devour them. And there will remain nothing of the  house of Esav…”

Rav Kornitzer quotes its continuation: “And where did Moshe say this? [In the words] ‘it is the olah on its mokeid throughout the night until the morning… And the kohein will lift up the deshen [ashes ]… and place it next to the mizbei’ach’ ” (Vayikra 6, 2-3). A puzzling citation.

To explain it, he quotes his forebear the Chasam Sofer as casting the kohein’s lifting of the terumas hadeshen as the need for the kohein to not avert his eyes from the “lowly of worth.” He has a responsibility to lift them up and bring them to a holier place. 

Rav Kornitzer asserts that the kohein’s responsibility is paralleled in our own vis-à-vis the rest of humanity – that we are in galus (the “night”) to spread knowledge of the Torah and to, by our dedication to Torah, attract those among other peoples, the “deshen”, to join us. That, he contends, is what will bring about the fulfillment of Ovadiah’s prophecy, the destruction of evil.

He then quotes another Midrash: “Rabi Yosi ben Kisma’s students asked him when Moshiach will come. He responded ‘This is the law of the olah’ ” (Vayikra 6:2).

Concludes Rav Kornitzer: “When the Jews fulfill their mission and ‘lift up the deshen’… Ben Dovid will arrive, may it be soon in our days.”

Sadly, the galus didn’t end in Rav Kornitzer’s days. May it end in ours.

© 2025 Rabbi Avi Shafran

Vayikra – A Phenomenal “Fat”

Among the eimorim, the portions of non-olah animal korbanos that are burned on the mizbe’ach, in contrast to the animal’s meat, which is eaten, is the cheilev she’al hak’layos – the “fat atop the kidneys.” 

That reference is not to “fat” as we define the word, but, rather, to the yellowish glands that sit upon the kidneys of mammals and birds. That is to say, the adrenal glands.

Those structures are what produce epinephrine, also known as adrenaline, which plays the dominant role in the “acute stress response,” often  called the “fight-or-flight” reaction, to a danger.

Epinephrine might be thought of as an “amplifier” or “heightener” of a body’s readiness to act. When produced, it causes pupils to dilate, allowing more light to be sensed; it opens airways wider; it directs blood to muscles and makes hearts pump harder and faster. 

We don’t know, of course, how korbonos “work,” what effects they have in the spiritual realm. And those who offered them can be assumed to have lacked knowledge of what physiological effects the “fat atop the kidneys” have on organisms. But it can certainly be argued that korbonos are, if not exclusively then largely, expressions of determination and decisiveness, of readiness to take action. 

And so it’s intriguing that the cheilev she’al hak’layos are associated physiologically with “acute stress response,” or what we might deem a “call to action.”

© 2025 Rabbi Avi Shafran

Pekudei – One Thing Leads to Another

It’s intriguing that, just as Chazal place importance on being masmich geulah litfillah – placing a reference to redemption immediately before prayer, i.e. the amidah (Berachos 4b, 9b) – we find something similar in the Torah itself.

The first part of Sefer Shemos, the Torah’s book of geulah, concerns, of course, Yetzias Mitzrayim, the redemption from Egypt. And the latter parshios deal with the mishkan, the place of korbanos, which were accompanied by, and eventually replaced by, tefillah. And the sefer is followed by Vayikra, the sefer of korbanos.

What’s more, the segue into the concept of tefillah is hinted at as well in the final parsha of Shemos. As the Yerushalmi notes, there are 18 times in parshas Pekudei that the phrase “as Hashem commanded Moshe” is used, corresponding to the 18 brachos of the amidah. (And the phrase “as Hashem commanded” occurs without an object once, which could correspond to the added nineteenth bracha, birchas haminim.)

And, although the Gemara regards the introduction to the amidah, the short prayer “Hashem, open my lips and let my mouth speak Your praises,” as part of tefillah, it, too, may itself hint at the geulah, since the word for “my lips” is rooted in the word for the seashore, the “al sfas hayam” of kri’as Yam Suf we reference in Shacharis leading up to the bracha of Go’al Yisrael.

Why being masmich geulah litefillah is a desideratum isn’t obvious, but it might be because, as we are about to beseech Hashem, hakaras hatov, recognition of His favor toward us, embodied in the concept of geulah, is something on which to concentrate.. 

May our tefillos lead, in turn, to the geulah ha’asidah.

© 2025 Rabbi Avi Shafran

Ki Sisa – Wealth Recycles

A famous palindromic word in the Torah is venasnu, in the second pasuk in the parsha. It means “and each man must give,” in the context of contributing the machatzis hashekel, which the Torah describes as “monetary atonement for [the giver’s] life” (Shemos, 30:12). The word reads the same forward and backward.

The Baal HaTurim sees that as a hint to the Gemara’s contention that one should “tithe so that you will become wealthy” (Taanis, 9a), that giving charity will result in the giver’s benefit .

The Vilna Gaon discerned a somewhat different message in the palindrome, namely, that life plays havoc with fortunes, and therefore giving tzedakah to others will merit others’ supporting us or our descendants in our times of need. What goes around, in other words, comes around. 

He cites the Gemara in Shabbos 151b:

“Rabbi Ḥiyya said to his wife: When a poor person comes to the house, be quick to give him bread so that they will be quick to give bread to your children. She said to him: Are you cursing your children? 

He said to her: the yeshiva of Rabbi Yishmael taught that galgal hu shechozer ba’olam – it is a ‘cycle that repeats in the world’.”

In other words, wealth and destitution come and go, in individual lives and in family lines. Great fortunes are made and lost, and rags can lead to riches.

Media mogul and billionaire Oprah Winfrey was born into an impoverished family in Mississippi; she went to college on a scholarship.

Socialite Jocelyn Wildenstein, who inherited billions from her art dealer husband, died dependent on $900 Social Security payments.

And those people’s descendants might find themselves in entirely different statuses from their antecedents. Wealth recycles, something to remember when approached by a beggar. 

© 2025 Rabbi Avi Shafran

Tetzaveh – When Obscenity is Apt

The imperatives of civility and refined speech are strongly stressed in the Talmud and in halacha. Yet, like all ideals, even those have their limits. An exception – the only one – to the imperative to avoid verbalizing crude characterizations is when it comes to idolatry.

As Rav Nachman says (Megillah 25b): “All mocking obscenity is forbidden except with reference to idol worship.” And the examples the Gemara offers are almost all about defecation.  The characterization of all idolatry as “avodas gilulim” in various places in Tanach may also be intended as a scatalogical reference, since galal is a word for biological waste.

And then there is the specific case of  Pe’or, the major idolatry whose entire service involves hallowing the act of defecation itself.

Rav Shimon Schwab, zt”l, brings up Rav Nachman’s dictum to suggest an intriguing understanding of one of the bigdei kehunah, the “priestly garments.” Rashi points out that it seems to him that the garment is apron-like, but worn in reverse of how aprons are usually worn, tied in the front with the bib in the back.

The Gemara, Rav Schwab reminds us, assigns an atonement that is effected by each of the bigdei kehunah. The ephod atones for the sin of idolatry (Arachin 16a).

Idolatry, notes Rav Schwab, is ultimately about worship of the physical, about veneration of the base. And that is why, as per Rav Nachman’s statement, it is derided by the navi, and permitted to be derided by us, as scatalogical in its essence. 

And so, he then posits, it is fitting that the ephod, the beged kehunah that atones for the sin of idolatry, is worn, oddly, in a way that covers the wearer’s lower back, subtly recalling its particular role among the bigdei kehunah.

© 2025 Rabbi Avi Shafran