Sefer Vayikra, which we have now begun to read in shul,
includes a number of fundamental moral precepts. But the
Sefer is most readily identified with the sacrificial
laws with which it begins and which appear throughout it.
The body of halachos regarding korbonos is large
and complex. One of the six Sidrei Mishneh deals
exclusively with those laws and related topics.
And yet, especially in the absence of the Beis Hamikdosh
today, the idea of korbonos perplexes some Jews. The
Torah's moral precepts, even many of its rituals, resonate
agreeably with them. Charity, empathy and honesty; Shabbos,
the sounding of the shofar and Yom Kippur do not discomfit
them, and for many are self-evidently sublime. But killing
animals and birds (or grinding wheat or barley) just to burn
them or parts of them on an Altar — who, they ask, ordered
that?
The answer, of course, is Hakodosh Boruch Hu. And, in
the end, korbonos come close to the realm of chok.
But we might nevertheless attempt some elemental
understanding of at least the concept of korbon.
A good place to begin is with the observation that the word
"sacrifice" is a misnomer. The word korbon does not
indicate forfeiture in any way. Its root, as Rav Shamshon
Rafael Hirsch notes, connotes "proximity," and, taking its
form into account, it might best be rendered "that which
brings close."
An approach to fathoming the import of the word may well lie
in something the seforim hakedoshim describe, what one
might call the hierarchy of creation.
The base level of worldly existence, according to that model,
is domeim, the inanimate, the mineral matter that
comprises the earth on which we stand. The next highest level
consists of tzomeiach or the vegetative, the
representative of life at its most rudimentary. The third
consists of chai, the more meaningfully alive world of
animals, which exhibit not only essential life, but willful
movement and a degree of cognition. And then there is the top
of the creation-pyramid, the medaber, or "speaker," the
human being, possessor of the power of speech and, alone
among creations, free will.
Each of the levels provides support for those above it. The
mineral realm contains the chemicals that make plant life
possible; plants serve as food for much of the animal world,
and for humans; and the animal world, along with the others,
serve the highest level, the human.
A crucial consequence of humanity's lofty position as the
pinnacle and purpose of creation is our ability, and
responsibility, to make choices, even choices that frustrate
our physical natures. We are, after all, not mere animals,
slaves to base instincts and desires, but something
significantly more — something closer, at least potentially,
to the Divine.
There is our word "closer." The more we conduct ourselves as
if we were members of the rung beneath us, the more we
distance ourselves from what is above us, from the One Who
created all and Who wishes us to make choices, and to reap
the benefit of serving Him. And, conversely, the more keenly
we are aware of the essential distinction between the animal
realm and the human, the closer we become to Hashem
According to our mesorah, there was a time in early
human history when humans were forbidden to eat animals.
After the Mabul, however, the eating of meat became
permissible to mankind. One reason suggested for that change
is based on the Midrashic tradition that the
antediluvian generation had lost its essential moral bearings
and considered humans to be mere "meat."
The Divine sanction of meat-eating, in that approach, was a
means of ensuring that human beings recognize beyond question
that they are special, possessive of a spark of holiness
absent in animals.
Might the concept of korbon hold a similar message?
Might the offering of an animal's meat, in other words,
embody the idea that animals exist to serve human beings —
and, thus, that human beings exist to serve what is above
them? If so, some light is surely shed on the meaning of
korbon as "that which brings close."
Certainly, there are deeper elements to the Torah's laws of
korbonos, meanings to their myriad details that are
beyond human ken. But perceiving what we can is still
worthwhile. And in this case the perception might just hint
to an understanding of Vayikra's inclusion of moral
laws amid its laws of korbonos, an understanding that
is both timeless — and timely, in morally confused eras like
ours.
Rabbi Shafran is director of public affairs for Agudath
Israel of America.
