The chapter begins with a striking heading: “God said to Moses: Speak to the entire assembly of the Israelites and say to them: ‘Be holy, for I, the Lord your God, am holy.’�ĝ The text lends this chapter special weight when it instructs Moses to gather the entire people to hear it, something that does not often occur in Leviticus, which is mostly directed at the priests. Indeed, many of the instructions laid down in  would, if observed, produce a society of very high standards: Respect your parents; leave part of your harvest for the poor and the stranger; do not steal, embezzle, or lie; don’t oppress your fellow man; don’t delay payment to your employees; don’t curse the deaf or trip the blind; don’t pervert justice; don’t go around bearing tales; don’t nurse a grievance, take revenge, or hold a grudge; respect your elders and protect the stranger; don’t cheat in business; and, in the middle of the chapter, the ringing and nearly impossible challenge to love your neighbor as yourself.

But the chapter doesn’t begin “Be moral, for I the Lord your God am moral” or “Be righteous, for I the Lord your God am righteous.” It begins “Be holy, for I the Lord your God am holy.” Indeed, everything that surrounds  is about holiness. Our double parashah begins by instructing Aaron not to enter the most holy precinct of the Tabernacle whenever he chooses but only once a year, under particular conditions and pursuant to particular rites, subject to a penalty of death; it seems that the holy is not only an ideal state to be strived for but a force to be treated with caution. The laws of prohibited sexual relations are tied to holiness, for they are preceded and followed by the admonition: “Make yourselves holy and be holy, for I am the Lord your God” () and “Be holy for me, for I the Lord your God am holy.” Holiness seems to involve both a moral and a ritual state: it is to be pursued, in some cases; and to be avoided—or at least, treated cautiously—in others.

The dangers inherent in holiness are mentioned often in the Torah. The warning to Aaron about not entering the holy site builds on the shocking account of the death of his two sons () that resulted from their unauthorized entry into the holy place to make an unauthorized offering of incense (). The Torah does not say that God struck them down; it says that fire emerged from God’s presence—i.e., from the sanctuary itself; they were killed by a force that seemed to be triggered automatically, like an electric shock. And to drive the lesson home, God explains their death by stressing its connection with His holiness:

Through those nearest me will I be shown to be holy,
And before the people as a whole, I will be shown to be glorious. ()

Thus, the Torah commands us to be holy, but it also warns us to beware of the holy.

Our tradition has resolved the tension between the command and the warning by pointing to another meaning of the word kedoshim, the word normally translated “holy.” In many passages in the Bible, words that mean “holy” imply separating or distinguishing. Relying on this usage, tradition explains “You shall be holy” (kedoshim tihyu) as meaning “You shall be separate” (perushim tihyu) (e.g. Sifra Kedoshim 1:1). This usage can be observed in the laws of the Sabbath: when we are commanded to make the Sabbath holy, the meaning is that we are to separate the Sabbath day from weekdays through special observances.

By analogy, when we are told “Be holy, for I, the Lord your God am holy,” the meaning would be that we are commanded to separate ourselves from bad practices, such as the forbidden relations listed twice in our double parashah. The injunction could imply separating ourselves from other nations, in accordance with the heading of Chapter 19: “Do not do the kinds of things that are done in the Land of Egypt where you formerly dwelt, and do not do the kinds of things that are done in the land of Canaan to which I am bringing you.” The injunctions to be holy would imply that, as God is separate and different from the world and everything that is in it, we are expected to be different from the other nations in holding ourselves to a higher standard.

But there is another line of rabbinic interpretation. To be separate, some ancient rabbis explained, means that to be holy, we should separate ourselves, i.e., abstain, even from things that are permitted to us. The law permits us to drink wine, but that does not mean that we have license for drunkenness; the law permits us to have sexual intercourse with our spouses, but should practice it in moderation; the law does not explicitly forbid foul language, but we should avoid it out of our own sense of holiness. (e.g., Ramban) The Pharisees of antiquity were a sect of Jews who adopted stricter rules of ritual purity and obligatory gifts to the priests and Levites than those observed by most Jews. Tradition explains the name of the sect as deriving from parush, “separate,” the very word that the Rabbis used to explain kadosh, “holy.”

Pushed a little further, this idea of holiness could devolve into asceticism. The satisfaction of going the extra mile in serving God, particularly in the form of self-denial, is appealing to a certain religious sensibility and is attested in the history of Jewish religious practice. For spending thirteen years in a cave studying the Torah, the second-century rabbi Simeon bar Yoḥai has come to be considered a saint; his tomb in the Galilee is revered to this day. There were pietists in antiquity who observed a second day of Yom Kippur, resulting in a forty-eight-hour fast. Medieval European Jewish pietists imposed upon themselves extreme mortifications that were similar to those of the monks of medieval Christendom. Kabbalists since the twelfth century have undertaken extreme fasting and periods of isolation from human contact. A person who undertook such restrictions was known in Yiddish as a ��ó�������, a “separated one.” Most rabbis historically, while showing respect for persons who went beyond the law’s minimal demands, have preached moderation. But the ascetic trend in Judaism, though not mainstream, has been continuous.

Not everyone agreed that asceticism was a good thing. The author of Ecclesiastes advocates moderation even in matters of religion, saying, “Do not be overly righteous; why should you make yourself desolate?” Most of us moderns probably incline more to Ecclesiastes’s view than to the views of the ascetics. For it is not only themselves that the too-holy make miserable by choosing to miss out on so many of life’s healthy and permissible pleasures. We have all observed the tendency of the too-holy to take pride in their piety and to look down on the rest of us, even on those who strive to be merely holy. There is even an English word for the smug too-holy: sanctimonious, derived from the Latin word for holy, sanctus. They are a social type from which the rest of us are happy to be separated! Perhaps it was these extremists to whom Hillel addressed his admonition, “Do not separate [tifrosh] yourself from the community” ().

But the holiness that is enjoined on us cannot simply be an avoidance. God’s holiness radiates outward, so can the holiness that He expects of us be merely a turning away? God’s holiness is a positive; can ours be merely a negative? We are commanded not merely to avoid something but to do something. Our chapter’s injunctions to love one another and to love the stranger must be a start in the direction of holiness. But the danger that radiates from the holy suggests that something more than mere obedience, more than even fastidious obedience, more even than love is implied in the command to be holy.

God’s holiness is surely not merely a set of restrictions and requirements but the power that created and sustains the universe and that has the capacity to bring it crashing down. We cannot achieve that kind of power, of course—and woe betide the one who thinks he can! But insofar as it is compatible with our powers as human beings and the capacity of social institutions to tolerate it, we are to emulate this force by living actively, engaging positively and intensively in whatever we do, however we live, whatever choices we make.

This commentary was originally published in 2018.

The publication and distribution of the 91�첥 Commentary are made possible by a generous grant from Rita Dee (��”l) and Harold Hassenfeld (��”l).

Consider this scenario: you are walking through the halls at school, or at work, and someone bumps into you. There is so much room in the hall, but he bumped into you. “What a rude person!” you might think, “I’m going to bump into him next time I see him!” It’s natural for an individual to want revenge, or to want to hold a grudge for even the most trivial of actions.

Parashat Kedoshim begins by laying out dozens of mitzvot, including the prohibition against idolatry and the mitzvot of charity, Shabbat, honesty in business, honoring one’s parents, and the sanctity of life. Perhaps the best- known mitzvah is לֹֽא־תִקֹּ֤ם וְלֹֽא־תִטֹּר֙ אֶת־בְּנֵ֣י עַמֶּ֔ךָ וְאָֽהַבְתָּ֥ לְרֵעֲךָ֖ כָּמ֑וֹךָ אֲנִ֖י יְ-הֹוָֽה׃ (Lev. 19:19) “You shall not take vengeance or bear a grudge against members of your people. Love your fellow [Israelite] as yourself: I am the Lord.” Rabbi Akiva famously names this as a fundamental value of the Torah (Sifra, Kedoshim 4:12).

What does it mean to love another as oneself? Rabbi Shai Held writes in his 2024 book, Judaism Is About Love, that the Hebrew “does not say ve-ahavta et rei’akha kamokha,” love your neighbor as yourself, but instead says “‘ve-ahavta le-rei’akha kamokha,’ which translated hyperliterally [sic], would seem to mean ‘love for your neighbor as yourself’” (Held, 106).The contrast is important because God is not commanding us to love someone directly, in an interpersonal relationship, but commanding us to love others whether or not they love us, by treating people with respect, kindness, and consideration. Whom are we supposed to be loving? The verse says “your fellow,” but who is your fellow? Some scholars say that the verse means to command us to love “at a minimum, all Jews” (Held, 106). Ben Azzai, a distinguished Tanna from the 2nd Century, says that “your fellow” applies to all human beings as we were all made בִִּּדְמ֥וּת אֱ־לֹהִ֖ים (Gen. 5:1) in the likeness of God. Most religious scholars come to the consensus that the message of “your fellow” is a universal one.

Why is the commandment on love linked to not taking revenge or bearing a grudge, two principles that are the foundation for communal ethics, guiding justice and fairness in a society? It teaches that we should not act out of vengeance or hold grudges but instead respond with compassion and understanding towards others. In terms of justice, it calls for fairness, where conflicts are resolved by reconciling with others rather than perpetuating cycles of harm. Fairness is reinforced through a commitment to treating everyone with respect regardless of their actions, promoting the idea that all individuals, regardless of their status deserve to be treated with dignity.           

It’s hard to treat all people with genuine kindness, thus applying this tenet to our life can be difficult. How do you love someone when you hold a grudge? In the context of the pasuk, love for one’s neighbor may involve forgiveness. People are easily offended; for example, someone forgets a birthday, or a friend is inexplicably distant. The pasuk comes to teach that you should not retaliate. Instead of reciprocating negative actions, you should remember their birthday or reach out to your friend. Applying  לֹֽא־תִקֹּ֤ם וְלֹֽא־תִטֹּר֙ (Lev. 19:19) means choosing kindness and respect even when you are wronged.

Perhaps love for your neighbor also requires an element of self-love. The Baal Shem Tov (Israel ben Eliezer), a mystic and healer who is regarded as the founder of Hasidic Judaism, taught that loving others begins with seeing their inherent holiness, something only possible when one acknowledges one’s own worth. In the words of Rabbi Yisrael Salanter, the father of the Mussar movement—a Jewish spiritual practice focusing on character development and self-improvement—true love, or truthful and honest love, for others stems from self-awareness and growth. If a person lacks self-respect or is consumed by self-criticism, they may struggle to extend genuine kindness to others. Both perspectives—despite coming from different Jewish traditions—interpret self-love and growth as enabling factors for us in truly being able to have love for others.

Returning to that hypothetical I posed at the start, where one person holds a grudge against another person because they bumped into them in the hall, where we have become divided over trivial issues and start conflicts with one another all the time, we ought to be taking וְאָֽהַבְתָּ֥ לְרֵעֲךָ֖ כָּמ֑וֹךָ (Lev. 19:19) to heart. Major and minor conflicts can tear up communities, making people hate those holding the opposing view so much that they can’t see another way to converse with them. It can make this commandment difficult to truly apply, as it is a natural instinct for people to reciprocate what others do to them. We should start to apply this today by not treating someone the way they treat us but rather treating everyone with genuine kindness and respect. We also need to begin to look inward and to love ourselves. By committing to these forms of love, one can immediately make a positive impact on others—making someone’s day better or treating them with genuine kindness—which can hopefully encourage them to do the same for others.

It is a challenge for all of us to think this way, and I want to specifically challenge you to think about one way that you can actively embody this mitzvah in your life. When you go out in the world, embody this mitzvah and encourage others to do so as well. Finally, I would like to end with a blessing for a world infused with more love, understanding, and holiness.

Shabbat Shalom.

A brief Hasidic tale reflects some skepticism about the extent to which the presence of the dead is like that of the living. I heard it from my friend Rabbi Shimon Schneebalg, a neighbor on the Lower East Side. It is said that the Rebbe of Lelev had the practice of giving his deceased father-in-law aliyos, that is, calling him to recite the blessings over the reading of a section of the Sabbath Torah portion. The son-in-law claimed that he was able to hear his father-in-law pronounce the blessings, and it was further said that the congregants reported hearing the son-in-law respond “omeyn.” When the Rebbe of Ger was told about this practice, his response was “Takke? Me zol im gebn hagbeh,” that is, they should see if his father-in-law can lift up the Torah scroll. So maybe it’s easier to talk to your own dead than to believe that others talk to theirs!

We should not, in any case, suppose that the idea of death as at least partial oblivion is entirely a modern aberration. As long ago as the Rabbinic period and doubtless long before, the question whether the dead had any consciousness, let alone agency, was being actively debated. The Babylonian Talmud (Berakhot 18), famously debates this issue. I quote from the ArtScroll elucidation: “R’ Chiya and R’ Yonasan were walking in a cemetery, and R’ Yonasan’s tsitsis were dragging over the graves. Whereupon R’ Chiya said to him: ‘Lift up your garment, lest the dead say: “Tomorrow they will be joining us and now they mock us!”’” (The mockery referred to here has to do with the mitzvahof tzitzit: by letting his fringes touch the ground, R’ Chiya suggests, R’ Yonasan would be in effect teasing the dead, reminding them that they are no longer able to place these fringes on their own bodies and indeed, can no longer fulfill any mitzvotthemselves.)  “. . . . R’ Yonasan said to him: But do [the dead] know so much about what is going on in this world? But it is written [in Kohelet] ‘For the living know that they will die, but the dead know nothing at all.’�ĝ

In the course of the ensuing discussion, one attempt to prove that the dead remain aware is brought as a baraita, that is, a statement attributed to the tannaim who are the authorities of the Mishnaic period. Remarkably, while most such statements quoted in the Babylonian Talmud tend to be short, declarative, and deal with halakhic issues, this one (beginning at Berakhot 17b) is an extended folktale.

It happened that there was a certain pious man who gave a dinar to a poor man on the eve of Rosh Hashanah in a year of famine, and his wife reproved him for it, so he went and spent the night in a cemetery. There he heard two spirits conversing with each other. Said one to the other: My friend, let us roam the world and hear from behind the [Divine] curtain what misfortune is to come to the world this year. Her friend replied: I cannot come with you, because I am buried in a matting of reeds [apparently, this spirit didn’t have the right “clothes” to venture beyond the cemetery]. But you go, and come back and relate to me whatever you hear.

Upon her return, the wandering “spirit” relates that she had heard the future foretold: “[T]he crops of anyone who plants this winter at the time of the first rain will be destroyed by hail. Hearing this the pious man went and planted at the time of the second rain. Everyone’s crops were destroyed except for his.”

The tale continues with the pious man spending a night at the cemetery the following year, and overhearing the same conversation between the two spirits, this time with an opposite future foretold: “I heard that the crops of anyone who plants this winter at the time of the second rain will be blasted by a dry wind. Hearing this he went and planted at the time of the first rain. Everyone’s crops were blasted but his.”

The pious man’s wife—cast, it should be acknowledged, as the villain of this story—wonders why the pious man has “guessed” right about the time of planting two years in a row, and the pious man tells her about the conversations he has overheard. “They say that it was not a few days later when a quarrel broke out between the pious man’s wife and the mother of that child whose spirit he had overheard in the cemetery. The wife said to the mother: Come, I will show you your daughter buried in a matting of reeds”—evidently, a putdown to a family that couldn’t afford better burial shrouds for their daughter. The third year, when the poor man goes to the cemetery, the spirit buried in reed matting refuses her friend’s proposition altogether: “My friend, leave me be! The words that we spoke between ourselves in years past have already been heard among the living.”

Thus the spirit declares that she doesn’t want to know what next year’s crops will be, for such foreknowledge has already been exploited by the living, and instead of gratitude her dead spirit has been insulted (“your daughter is buried in a matting of reeds”). The Talmud takes this as proof that, indeed, the dead do know what goes on in the world of the living.     

What’s most remarkable about this whole Talmudic passage is perhaps that R’ Yonasan never seems even to imagine that the quote from Kohelet might mean what it suggests to a modern reader: that the dead have no awareness whatsoever. For him, it could only suggest their complete divorce from the affairs of the living. The modern idea that “when you die that’s it,” that nothing remains of the person whatsoever, was likely inconceivable to him.

Is proof from a folktale enough to counter the declarations of Kohelet, traditionally regarded as written by none other than the wise King Solomon? We don’t really need to decide, and the question must remain open. But I’m inclined to think that the view of not only most scholars in our tradition, but most of our people throughout the centuries, has been that the dead remain somehow with us—and that without them, we the living wouldn’t begin to know how to be Jews.

The publication and distribution of the 91�첥 Commentary are made possible by a generous grant from Rita Dee (��”l) and Harold Hassenfeld (��”l). 

One of the ways in which we exercise this holiness is by making distinctions between the holy and the ordinary: in particular, through carving out sacred time in the calendars. Pirkei Derabbi Eliezer, commenting on the first-ever havdalah (after the first-ever Shabbat when Adam and Eve were expelled from Eden), notes that, “Everyone who does make havdalah, the Holy Blessed One calls them to be God’s holy treasure, and delivers them from affliction” (20:28). It then goes on to cite the penultimate verse from our parashah: “As it is said, ‘And you shall be holy to me, for I God am holy’” (ibid.). We have a responsibility to, every week, find ways to separate the holy from the ordinary. Even though the seventh day is already inherently holy, our holiness to God highlights the importance of our work in marking the end of our holy time as we enter the rather ordinary week. Havdalah itself is named after our ability to separate the holy from the ordinary—and it is that ritual act of separation that allows us to end Shabbat and begin our weeks.

However, we also can leverage our holiness to create something holy out of something completely ordinary. Exodus Rabbah (commenting on Exod. 12:2) connects the idea that we are to be holy to God, to the commandment to sanctify the new month, the very first mitzvah that the Israelites are given:

“This month shall mark for you (Exod 12:2):” One who sees the new moon—how should they bless it? At the time when Israel sanctifies the new month, there were some among the sages who said, “Blessed is the One who renews the months;” others among them who said, “Blessed is the one who sanctifies Israel,” for if Israel did not sanctify the new month, then there would be no sanctification of the new month at all. And we should not be astonished that the Holy Blessed One made Israel holy, as it is said, “And you shall be holy to Me, for I God am holy.” Because they are made holy by the heavens, that which Israel sanctifies is made holy.

In other words, we, Israel, are the ones who make Rosh Hodesh, the new month and the new moon, holy through noticing it and through our prayers and blessings—and without us doing so, then the first of the new month would just be any other day. In the present moment, we combine the two blessings mentioned in this midrash in Musaf for Rosh Hodesh, and include a blessing that ends with, “Who makes Israel and the new months holy.” This midrash also helps further bring into focus another idea: we are not just commanded to be holy (as we are at the beginning of the parashah) but we are made holy through God and in turn have the power to turn otherwise ordinary things, such as a normal date on the calendar, or the almost invisible new moon, holy.

While Shabbat is inherently holy, and our role is merely to mark its holiness through our words and rituals, the new month is different. The moon waxes and wanes on its own schedule; without us doing anything, Rosh Hodesh would not exist. Shabbat exists on its own, but we must actively create Rosh Hodesh by imbuing what otherwise be any other date on the calendar with holiness.

When the new month was established by the beit din (and not just based on the calendar, as we do it today), it was declared sacred only once it was decided that the new month had indeed begun. Witnesses would present themselves to the court, saying that they had witnessed the new month; after the court had verified the legitimacy of the witnesses, they would declare that the new month had begun and alert other communities of the new month. The process of elevating the seemingly ordinary date on a calendar and making it into something holy is what makes us unique and what it means to be not just holy, but holy to God specifically. This midrash also helps us understand something crucial about the ways that holiness and chosen-ness intersect: Perhaps we are holy because of our ability to encounter the ordinary dates on a calendar, the invisible moon, and see their holiness and elevate them above the ordinary. And just God has the ability to take ordinary things make them holy, render the invisible visible and marked through their holiness, we have that power as well. 

Our second midrash ends: “Said the Holy Blessed One: I, I am already holy, and for my own sake I make things holy. Rather, behold: I make Israel Holy, and they make me holy, as it is written, ‘And you shall be holy to Me.’�ĝ

Being holy to God is to be in the world and find new ways to make the ordinary sacred—even when it is sometimes hidden from view like the new moon—and, in doing so, we are also, making God holy. Our role is not just to take and celebrate the things that are already holy, like Shabbat, but to constantly find ways to elevate the things, the people, and their experiences that have not been seen as holy in the past. In the process, we can, in turn, make God holy as well.

The publication and distribution of the 91�첥 Commentary are made possible by a generous grant from Rita Dee (��”l) and Harold Hassenfeld (��”l).   

Morning Torah Reading

Expelling our Own Scapegoats (Rabbi Matthew Berkowitz)

The Great Escape (Marc Gary)

Afternoon Torah Reading

Who is the Stranger (Linda S. Golding): Responding to the shame that hatred, fear, and resentment breed

The Palace of Torah Expanded: 15 Years Later (Rabbi Daniel Nevins): Despite the prohibition in the Torah, welcoming the LGBTQI+ community

Where is Authority Found (Dr. Benjamin Sommer): Text can be uncomfortable, but it is up to “communities of committed and observant Jews” to help traditions evolve.

Passover in the Light of Yom Kippur (Chancellor Emeritus Ismar Schorsch): “The Yom Kippur liturgy appropriates both chapters 16 and 18 in order to stress the totality of Judaism as a system of belief and practice, of ritual and morality.” 

Morning Haftarah

Is This the Fast I Desire (Rabbi Julia Andelman): “The haftarah is a sharp indictment of the notion that ritual practice and moral behavior can exist in separate realms.”

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Barukh atah Adonai Eloheinu melekh ha’olam meshaneh habriyot.

Blessed are You, LORD our God, King of the universe, who differentiates the creatures.

What a great invitation, I thought, to write a d’var Torah on Aharei Mot!  The opening verses that include “Tell your brother Aaron that he is not to come at will into the Shrine behind the curtain . . . lest he die” came immediately to mind. The directive to be mindful and thoughtful when entering God’s presence and the presence of others certainly aligns with a chaplain’s way of being. When entering a hospital room, for example, I know that the Shekhinah, God’s healing presence, is at the head of the patient’s bed. Holiness is already in the room, and I must be prepared to pay attention. 

But I very quickly realized I could not avoid taking up a verse that appears later in the parashah, Leviticus 18:22: “Do not lie with a male as one lies with a woman; it is an abhorrence,” an injunction that has caused decades if not centuries of pain. To ignore the verse or to set my focus on a different section would deliberately contradict my practice of chaplaincy as an act of advocacy for those in my care; for spiritual, social and health justice; for diversity and inclusion; and for God’s presence in the world. 

This verse reminded me of Jack, a patient from long ago. He was a frail, elderly man in a hospital bed, who raised both arms in frustration and shouted, “I am going to Hell! I have done things I am not supposed to do, bad things.” Quite a conversation opener for a chaplain, me, just beginning her pastoral training! My mind raced through a list of possible bad things until I calmed down enough to say, “Hmmm. Such as . . . ?” Jack, who identified as Christian, told me there were religious rules he had broken for which he would be punished. 

I wondered if Jack was telling me he was gay. I knew nothing about Jack’s specific religious beliefs or experiences, but Yom Kippur and its intensity was still fresh in my ears and my heart, as was my community’s annual choice to read the alternate afternoon Torah portion—that is, to substitute Kedoshim (Leviticus 19:1–18) for Aharei Mot (Leviticus 18:1–30) in order to avoid the public reading of the painful verse. (The Kedoshim reading itself, of course, stops ahead of the repetition and enhancement of the verse, with a call for death in 20:13.) 

As a hospital chaplain, I describe my role as helping patients, family and staff to remember who they are when they are not in such vulnerable circumstances.  My work is to help them articulate their core beliefs and values even as they are ill, suffering, struggling.  Physical therapists tell me that patients begin to lose muscle tone after about 48 hours in a hospital bed, and I believe those same patients also begin to lose “person tone”, aspects of their identity, in that same time frame. Families’ lives are turned upside down as they try to cope with a loved one’s illness, and staff struggle with the same anxieties and agitations around the pandemic, and local, national, and global affairs as the patients and families.

My daily work includes listening to stories. I am attentive to the narrative as well as the spaces between the words and to what is unsaid. I reflect back what I hear to help people hear themselves; to encourage them to confront and release concerns and fears from their bodies so they have room to breathe and to heal; and to help them re-orient, re-member through the chaos of illness or work. Every day I meet strangers for whom the hospital, a temporary structure made of concrete and steel, and its language and customs, are foreign. I try to welcome each person to themselves, even in this time of crisis. I know what it feels like to be a stranger to myself and to others; to be trapped in crisis and illness, in a web of bias, judgment, and isolation. I do not pretend to know what anyone else’s versions feel like. As a chaplain I have the honor, pleasure, and responsibility to help reduce these feelings in others and commit daily to keeping my eyes, ears, and heart open.

Encountering Leviticus 18:22 is a sharp reminder that the world is filled with hatred, shame, resentment, and fear of the other even in the best of times. There are people who use this verse as a weapon against themselves as well as against others. Sometimes this verse is the only one people know, forgetting about caring for the poor, leaving gleanings for the hungry, treating others as they wish to be treated.

What of Jack? Over the course of our visits, I learned he had grown up in New York City, was retired from civil service, had never married, and lived alone. He did not socialize much, or go to church, and desperately wanted to be discharged home. When the hospital social worker went to check the apartment for safety, he returned with the sad truth that the apartment was in such a state of disarray and filth that it was not habitable. Jack would be discharged to a nursing home, and his apartment emptied and returned to the landlord.

I never did learn which religious rules Jack believed he had broken or why he was sure he would be punished in Hell. I did, however, learn some basics of the chaplaincy I try to practice every day—to care for the person in front of me as she/he/they present, to rejoice in difference as much as in similarity, to welcome the stranger in each of us, and to tolerate the uncertainty of not knowing the answer.

These words from Rabbi Elazar ben Azariah in the Talmud (BT Hagiga 3b) speak volumes: “May we acquire an ear like a funnel and a perceptive heart to understand all the contradictory voices.”

Amen.

The publication and distribution of the 91�첥 Commentary are made possible by a generous grant from Rita Dee (��”l) and Harold Hassenfeld (��”l).

We encounter this paradox already in the first chapter of Genesis. It is a wondrous and inspiring account of the origin of life on earth. The Torah declares everything wrought by the Creator to be good, understands humanity to be fashioned in the divine image, and teaches people to take responsibility for others and for the world itself. We may read these texts dozens or hundreds of times over the course of our lives, cherishing them and gaining insight even if their central premise—creation of the Universe over the course of a week—is falsified by modern science. Like ancient starlight reaching modern eyes, the words of Torah convey wonder even when their original radiance must be refracted through a new lens.

When we reach Parashat Aharei Mot–Kedoshim the paradoxical encounter with Torah reaches a new intensity. Many of the Torah’s most powerful and meaningful ideas are found in these chapters. We learn to love our neighbor as ourselves, to dignify our elders, to respect and protect people living with disability, and to create a livable spiritual practice (vehai bahem—live through the mitzvot, Lev. 18:5). Some of its commandments such as the prohibition of incest and adultery remain compelling, and others such as the ban on mixed species challenge us with their obscurity. However, some statements found here are foreign and hurtful to contemporary readers.

When the Torah prohibits sexual intercourse between two men, calling their lovemaking an abomination, there is no avoiding our discomfort and increasingly our disagreement with this ancient text. The Rabbis gifted us with techniques of non-literal interpretation, and modern readers have offered more acceptable approaches to these verses. For example, they might be read to prohibit only cultic, or coercive, or unloving, or incestuous sex between men. Still, the most honest and useful approach is to admit that these verses have been understood for millennia to condemn sexual intimacy between men. Today we understand this ban to be hurtful and oppressive. What is to be done?

Every year thousands of Jews present essays and speeches struggling with these texts, using them as a foil for our own evolving understanding of gender and sexuality. This itself is a redemptive response, but we also need to revise communal norms. Within Conservative Judaism we have tried different approaches, some effective but none entirely satisfying. Fifteen years ago, I joined with two other rabbis in composing that placed the Torah’s heteronormative assumptions in tension with its own teachings about human dignity and the value of intimate partnership in life.

We argued that the Torah’s declaration that “it is not good for a person to be alone” (Gen. 2:18), its commandment to love one another as ourselves, and its warning to avoid humiliating and harming others were all in tension with the ban found here on gay sex. So too with the expansions added by the Rabbis on sex between women: the cultural assumptions of their time undermined some of the Rabbis’ most beautiful teachings about respecting and protecting one another. The ancient Rabbis said, “So great is human dignity that it supersedes a negative principle of Torah” (BT Berakhot 19b and elsewhere). As modern rabbis we applied this powerful idea to our contemporary reality and to protect the dignity of all people in our day.

I would like to take this opportunity, nearly fifteen years later, to appreciate the positive impact of our responsum, and to revise some of its less beneficial claims. On the positive side, almost immediately after our paper was approved in 2006, Jews and other people of faith began to discuss sexuality through the lens of dignity. The tone of the discourse changed, certainly within our own denomination, and so did the policies. Synagogues, schools, and camps changed their rhetoric, and queer youth, adults, and families were gradually, and then suddenly, embraced as dignified members and leaders of their communities. Our seminaries in New York and Los Angeles quickly shifted to admitting gay and lesbian applicants, as did our school in Jerusalem five years later. Dozens of remarkable rabbis and cantors who openly identify as LGBTQI+ now lead our communities, and we have benefited from a richer and more diverse covenantal community.

It is hard to remember just how different things were fifteen or twenty years ago. Encountering ancient text on matters so intimate is always difficult. Sometimes a text from only fifteen years ago can feel ancient, and I admit that this is true of my own work.

We used the word “homosexuality” in our title to signal a scholarly and unbiased approach that might convince skeptical readers, including fellow law committee members whose votes we needed. But for many readers that term already felt passe and even hurtful in its clinical tone. We should have been consistent in using the language preferred by gay and lesbian Jews, for whose benefit the paper was intended.

Our core halakhic claim was that sexual orientation is a fixed feature for many people, and that the prior demand that gay and lesbian people suppress their sexuality and try to pass as straight was demeaning, cruel, and futile. As such, it violated the rabbinic principle of human dignity, causing shame and suffering, which are themselves biblically forbidden. In passing, we commented that for bisexual people it might be difficult but not impossible to restrict themselves to the ancient heterosexual norms. This comment was problematic at the time, and has caused pain and anger, which I deeply regret. Bisexuality is its own identity, often misunderstood, that deserves respect and protection from hurtful comments and policies. Our paper should either have included bisexuals in its conceptual framework, or left their questions for a different responsum, much as we left transgender issues for a different project.

The interpretation of Torah is an evolving and expanding activity. For millennia male rabbis argued that only men were obligated to study Torah, and they fought to preserve their monopoly on the spiritual inheritance that rightfully belongs to all Jews. Men built this patriarchy, and men may be partners in the task of dismantling it. But it is the scholarship and activism of women that have been the driving forces in this change. The same is true of LGBTQI+ Jews who have emerged from being objects of rabbinic interest to subjects and authors of Jewish discourse. The prior closeting and oppression of these Jews is an ongoing source of pain and shame; the new era of openness and gay pride is the beginning of a holier and greater stage of Jewish history.

As I approach the end of my term as a 91�첥 dean, I am inspired and thrilled by the diverse identities of our students and alumni. Many of our wisest and most prominent teachers today have identities that were recently excluded from leadership. This is true not only for sexual and gender identity, but also for Jews of Color, and those living with disability. As a straight white male who was raised Jewish, I recognize how privileged my position has been. I have committed myself to removing barriers so that the Torah can be enriched by diverse perspectives, and our communities can rise to their potential. Much more work remains to expand the palace of Torah so that its paradoxes can become constructive challenges. Only then may we fulfill the Torah’s most expansive command, “You shall be holy, for I Adonai your God am Holy.”

The publication and distribution of the 91�첥 Commentary are made possible by a generous grant from Rita Dee (��”l) and Harold Hassenfeld (��”l).

In , Howard Gardner and Katie Davis argue that the frequency with which one uses Facebook significantly shapes his or her perceptions of other people’s happiness, arguing that teenagers “spend hours looking at the achievements of peers whom they know only through Facebook and that this voyeuristic activity makes them feel both competitive and vulnerable.”

Frankly, the authors could just as easily be talking about anyone who uses social media, the great force multiplier of status anxiety. What I am describing is not a surprise, at this point; any moderately informed person knows that it is chic to criticize social media, as if digital tools are the cause of depression and social disfunction, to say nothing of racism, anti-Semitism, and political vitriol.

However, part of me feels that the conventional wisdom about social media lets people off the hook too easily. In reality, social media is a tool, and we decide how to use it. We may take the easy path and make a laundry list of every way these devices can hurt our world, and yet, in a time where most of us are confined to our homes with no end in sight, it makes those critiques seem quaint, almost naive. Furthermore, a close read of this week’s parashah reveals that the sanctity of something is much more in our hands than we would like to believe.

Chapter 19 of Vayikra opens with God’s command that Moses speak to the Israelites and say, “You shall be holy, for I, the Lord your God, am holy” (Lev. 19:2). When our Medieval commentators examine this verse, Rashi and Ramban debate whether or not this verse should be read narrowly or broadly. Rashi writes:

“You shall be holy”: abstain from forbidden relations and from sin. [The concept of] holiness always accompanies the laws of sexual relations . . . .

Rashi’s commentary asserts that the statement “You shall be holy” must be connected to the forthcoming prohibitions of illicit sexual relationships, associating the broad principle with the specific laws that the Torah lists. If we read the verse from our parashah narrowly, we can see the appeal in Rashi’s interpretation, as it limits the principle of “You shall be holy” to that which immediately follows it.

However, when the Ramban examines the same verse, he argues that Rashi construes the verse too narrowly, and ignores the broad principle that is explicated through this entire passage. The Ramban states:

In my opinion, this “separation,” is not, as Rashi holds, confined to separating from forbidden sexual relations, but rather that which is referenced throughout the Talmud with its adherents called Perushim [i.e., abstemious, saintly]. This is so because the Torah forbids certain relations and foods, and permits intercourse with one’s wife and the consumption of meat and wine . . . .Therefore, after outlining absolute prohibitions, we are given a general command of restraint [even] from things that are permitted.

According to the Ramban, the purpose of this commandment is command people to exercise restraint even when something is permitted. For example, while the Torah prohibits specific sexual relationships, the Torah also states that it is a mitzvah to procreate. Similarly, while Torah describes that the nazir must completely abstain from alcohol, the Torah does not completely prohibit alcohol consumption. In each case, the Ramban argues the verse from this week’s parashah provides a powerful lesson about creating holiness through restraint.

Applying these commentaries to social media, we are free to limit our digital consumption at all costs, yet for most of us this is neither practical nor desirable. Instead, most of us are more likely to take the Ramban’s approach, where social media is permitted and ubiquitous, and those who use it wisely are those who use it with restraint.

Mircea Eliade of the University of Chicago was one of the most important religious thinkers of the twentieth century, changing how we understand what it means to call something “sacred.” In The Sacred and the Profane, he writes:

“By manifesting the sacred, any object becomes something else, yet it continues to remain itself . . . A sacred stone remains a stone . . . nothing distinguishes it from all other stones. But for those to whom a stone reveals itself as sacred, its immediate reality is transmuted into a supernatural reality.”

According to Eliade, anything can be made holy if we imbue it with sanctity. However, anything holy can also be made profane, if our actions serve to deny the sanctity of that same item. As such, the choice to sanctify or not sanctify something lies with us.

Attempting to provide a paradigm for how to utilize social media, Gardner and Davis argue that we must use social media in an “enabling spirit,” enhancing our collective accomplishments and understanding, and resist the temptation to use social media in a “dependent spirit,” leading ourselves on a path that causes us to assume that perceived presence in cyberspace is the only barometer of professional and personal success.

Watching social media over the past month, when most of us are confined to our homes, shows how that enabling spirit is possible, and not just in moments of crisis. My happiest moments living in this era of unprecedented connectivity occur when I found a Jewish text I needed by simply posting the question to my Facebook friends; watched people who would never set foot in a brick-and-mortar synagogue attend a virtual minyan; or watched hundreds of people help raise money for a dear friend going through cancer treatment: moments when technology allowed us to achieve collectively what we could not achieve alone.

Someday, and hopefully soon, we will return to a pre-COVID-19 world, and will not be confined to our homes and our screens. Will we use these powerful tools as we do under duress, or will return to the world where they represent the worst of the human condition? That choice is ours, and ours alone.

The publication and distribution of the 91�첥 Commentary are made possible by a generous grant from Rita Dee (��”l) and Harold Hassenfeld (��”l).