BLEMISH and HANDICAP by Rabbi Baruch Cohon

Posted on May 7, 2012 by Baruch

        The Torah sets out strict rules for the sacrifices that formed ancient worship and for those who were charged with the duty to offer those sacrifices.  Just as any animal brought to the altar must be as near perfect as possible, so the kohen, the descendant of Aaron the High Priest who slaughtered that animal must be free of physical blemish.  Leviticus chapter 21 goes into explicit detail.  Blind, lame, hunchback, dwarf, cockeyed, scurvy, castrated – these and other defects like a broken arm or leg disqualified a man for sacred service.  He could eat his priestly portion.   He could take part in upkeep of the sanctuary.  He was still a kohen.  He just could not officiate.                  

         An interesting observation is what defects are not mentioned in this list.  The three standard conditions that set people apart in all walks of life were deafness, insanity and underage.  People in those conditions were not held responsible for carrying out most commandments.  Our ancestors had no way to cope completely with the problem of how to teach the deaf, or to make the feebleminded or deranged understand.  And of course an underage child changed status only on reaching the age of maturity.  So these three do not appear here, and presumably it was taken for granted that they would not consider officiating at the altar.

        In our day, with no sacrifices to offer, the kohen has much more limited duties.  A very important one is the task and privilege of blessing the people.  In Jerusalem this happens every day.  Outside of Jerusalem it happens on select occasions, depending on the tradition of the community.  Every Sabbath in some Sephardic congregations. (By contrast, many Ashkenazi congregations never have this ritual on Sabbath.)  On Festivals and High Holy Days in all traditional synagogues.  Do the Biblical restrictions apply to dukhenen, the act of pronouncing the Priestly Benediction?   After all, the act requires each kohen to ascend in front of the Ark, and that could be difficult for a lame or blind man.  Also he has to hear the cantor intone each word before he and the other kohanim repeat it to the people.  His hands, spread in the traditional position with the ring finger and middle finger widely separated, have to hold his tallis out in front of him.  Could he do that with a broken arm?   No wonder the Talmud in Tractate Taanis states that a kohen who has a moom (a blemish) shall not “raise his hands” in blessing.                                                                      

        In fact, when the time comes for this blessing in many synagogues, we seldom see a handicapped kohen  join in it.                                          

        Now wait a minute.  We are not living in the days of the Talmud, and certainly not in the century of the Sanctuary.  We have a different view of how to treat handicapped people today, and we don’t call them “blemished.”  There must be some way to open an opportunity for a blind or lame kohen to spread the Divine blessing.  Suppose he is the only one available.   Should his community not get blessed?                          

        Well, the Code of Jewish Law, the famous Shulhan Arukh, anticipated that question, about 500 years ago.  It sets out exceptions to the Talmudic edict.  It states that if the kohen is well known in his community, so that the people will not be distracted by his handicap but will just listen to his blessing, then he is qualified to take part.  And the standard of being well known is defined as living in that community for at least 30 days.                      

        My friend Rabbi Binyomin Lisbon of my local Chabad synagogue tells me that Chabad encourages handicapped kohanim to perform the blessing, providing helpers for those who need them.  Indeed Chabad favors “fixing the place of people with disabilities in the very heart of the community, and allowing each and every person to take part in our shared effort to repair the world by the light of the Torah.”  

The one requirement that supercedes all others is found in the last word of the brocha that each kohen says before pronouncing the Benediction, praising G-d “…who has sanctified us with Aaron’s sanctity, and commanded us to bless the people Israel b’ahavah – with love.”                          

As a kohen, I am grateful for the opportunity to do that.  And I can only encourage my fellow kohanim to join me, whatever blemishes we have.

Posted in Baruch Cohon, Cantor, Jerusalem, Jewish, Jewish Blogs, Jewish Law, Judaism, kohen, Sabbath, Shulhan Arukh, Talmud, Torah | Comments Off on BLEMISH and HANDICAP by Rabbi Baruch Cohon

49 and counting

Posted on April 24, 2012 by Baruch

                            

          This could well be my blog for last week, this week and the month to come, but it probably won’t.   Something else always can be expected.  But starting on the second night of Passover we began doing something that will continue until Shavuot, the next festival on our calendar, this year falling on the 27th and 28th of May.    We began counting the days.

          Leviticus 23:15-16 instructs this count: “Count for yourselves from the day after the rest-day, from the day you brought the wave-offering (a sheaf of newly harvested grain that the priest waved in the holiday ceremony, called omer in Hebrew), seven complete weeks, until the day after the end of the seventh week, count fifty days.”  The words themselves are noteworthy in this commandment.  The rest-day, first day of Passover, is called shabat – even though it might not fall on Saturday.  (OK, this year it did, but more often it does not.)  The end of the week is called shabat.  And the seven complete weeks are called shabatot – “sabbaths.”  Then the fiftieth day, the day we celebrate as Shavuot, literally the feast of Weeks, is also called Pentecost, from the Greek word for fifty.  The fiftieth day.  And in the Talmud, Shavuot goes by the name atzeret, the concluding festival, as if finishing what Passover started. 

          What is going on here?  Why is it a distinct mitzvah, a sacred duty to count these 49 days?   Indeed, we learn that every Jew should pronounce the blessing of sephirat ha-omer – “counting the omer” – every night.  Miss a night, and you can count the next day – but without the blessing, because you missed the time.  And these seven weeks are called the season of sephira – the season of counting.  Why?   Because this is one more opportunity to dramatize our history.  It took 50 days for our ancestors to make their way from the Red Sea to Mount Sinai.  Those 50 days completed a whole change of identity, from a motley crowd of fugitive slaves – to a nation.  Seven weeks and a day is not a long time to effect such a change.  Every one of those days had its own importance.   So does every one of our own days.

          During most of the sephira season, Jewish weddings are traditionally banned.  While exact dates of the ban vary in different communities, one day – the 33rd day of sephira, called Lag Baomer – is a happy day for weddings everywhere.  Tractate Y’vamos recounts that a plague was devastating Rabbi Akiba’s students and Bar Kochba’s soldiers and that it came to an end that day.  Clearly a good day to celebrate.  This year it coincides with May 10th, so if you’re planning nuptials this spring…

          Modern times add considerable color to the sephira season.  Take last week’s Yom haShoah – Holocaust Memorial Day on the 27th of Nisan.  Or this Wednesday and Thursday when Israel observes Yom haZikaron – the Memorial day for those who gave their lives in Israel’s wars – followed by Yom haAtzma-ut – Israel Independence Day, a day of gala parades and parties in Israel, which will be honored in most of the U.S. on Sunday the 29th. 

Indeed we can count some important days here.   And I want to mention a contemplated future holiday to follow Yom haShoah, when we can celebrate the end of the Holocaust and the survival of our people despite history’s worst attempt to destroy us.  Let me know what you think of that idea.

          Why keep and augment these customs?  Because we need to fulfill the mitzvah of counting sephira. 

Count your days, to make your days count.

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Posted in Baruch Cohon, Cantor, Cohon, Counting, Jewish, Jewish Blogs, Jewish Traditions, Judaism, Mitzvah, Omer, Passover, Rabbi, Sephira, Shabat, Shavout, Talmud, Torah, Yom haShoah | Comments Off on 49 and counting

AN IDEA TO CELEBRATE

Posted on April 9, 2012 by Baruch

 

 At our Seder, a teenage guest named Natalie asked a question that is not in the Haggadah.   “We have Pesach to celebrate the end of Egyptian slavery,” she said, “so why don’t we have a holiday to celebrate the end of the Holocaust?”

Why, indeed.  Just as we mention the Exodus in many of our prayers, we certainly mention the Holocaust in numerous connections all the time.  Survivors who kept silent for half a century are now telling and writing their stories.  That is one kind of celebration.  Before we realize it, those survivors will be gone.  The rest of us still need to put the Holocaust in perspective.

Future generations may well be bombarded with repeated denials of history.  For them, for us, and for the survivor generation alike, we do need to observe the ultimate triumph of the Jewish people over the most terrible effort at genocide.  The Haggadah itself reminds us that “in every generation there arise those who would wipe us out.”  B’chol dor va-dor om’dim aleynu l’chaloteynu.  They fail.  We succeed.

True, we have a Yom haShoah every year on the 3rd day in Iyyar – this year coinciding with the 25th of April.  It is a sad day, observed as a memorial to those who were murdered in the Holocaust.  Similarly the State of Israel holds a Yom haZikaron (Memorial Day) on the 9th day in Iyyar honoring those who gave their lives in defense of the Jewish state.  But that is followed just one day later by Yom haAtzma-ut, a day of joy celebrating Israel’s independence.  Why not follow Yom haShoah with a worldwide celebration of Jewish continuity, a day to give thanks for being part of the Eternal People, to bless our destiny and our living creative presence in the world in spite of everything? 

I submit that young Natalie is right.  We need a religious and communal tribute to our ongoing existence – not as victims but as victors.  We need a day to declare our connection to Klal Yisrael – the total Jewish people – to its past and its future, a day to celebrate the end of a tragedy and to bless the beginning of triumph.

What form should this new Yom Tov take?  What ritual would be appropriate?   What should be its name?   How can we make it a worldwide holiday?

Legitimate questions, all.   In search of legitimate answers and a workable plan, hopefully for next year, we at the Cohon Memorial Foundation seek your ideas and suggestions.  Please share your thoughts, herewith or on our email: rabco613@hotmail.com  

Thank you,

Rabbi Baruch Cohon, 

Vice-President, Cohon Memorial Foundation  

http://www.cohonaward.com/

Posted in Baruch Cohon, Cantor, Cohon Award, Exodus, Holocaust, Israel, Jewish, Jewish Blogs, Judaism, Passover, Pesach, Rabbi, Seder, Yom haShoah | 2 Comments

WALKING TOGETHER IN 5772

Posted on September 25, 2011 by Baruch

Here comes a New Year, Rosh Hashanah 5772. The Torah calls Rosh Hashanah “yom t’ruah” — the day of the Shofar call. A sound we look forward to all year long.

For all my readers, I hope and pray that this will be a good year.

Whatever High Holiday services you attend, you will hear some classic passages from the Torah. Of all of them, I believe the Akeyda — the story of the sacrifice of Isaac — is the most dramatic. We see our father Abraham tested. We watch him pass the test. We dread the moment when Isaac could lose his life. And then we hear the Voice from on high stopping Abraham when he is holding the knife in his hand. “Do not put your hand on the boy, do nothing to him!”

What about Isaac? Can we imagine the thoughts going through his mind as his father binds him on the altar, on top of the firewood?

The Torah gives us an inkling of the depth of Isaac’s faith. When they first arrive at Mount Moriah, they dismount from their donkeys. Abraham takes the firewood and puts it on Isaac’s shoulder while he carries the flame and the knife. “And the two of them walked together.”

On the way, Isaac asks where is the lamb for the offering — he sees all the other requirements but no animal to sacrifice. Abraham cannot give him a straight answer, so he just says “G0d will provide the lamb.” And again we read, “The two of them walked together.”

That refrain is profound. No more needs to be said between them. The two of them walk together in silence. The Torah narrative does not say as much, but the fact that Isaac does not pursue the point, added to Abraham’s putting him off, tells us that Isaac knows the real answer. What’s more, he accepts it. Human sacrifice was common in his time, and young Isaac fully expects to give up his life for G0d, and probably to receive some mysterious eternal reward for his self-sacrifice. He walked with his father; he felt his father’s feelings. He shares them. Yes, the two of them walked together, on a grim and fatal errand.

But Isaac is spared. He lives to propagate a race that still looks back to him as ending the heathen practice of parents committing sacred murder of their children. When Abraham is stopped, he looks around and sees a ram caught in a thicket by his horns. In gratitude for his son’s life, he grabs the ram and offers it as a sacrifice instead of Isaac.

So the ram caught by his horns becomes a symbol of freedom from human sacrifice. And the horn that caught that ram becomes our shofar. Our prayerbook calls us to “blow the great shofar for our freedom!” The

New Year should find parents and children joined in the happy experience of “Yom T’ruah,” the day of the shofar call, the call to freedom, the call to family unity and trust.

Have a Shanah Tovah, a really good year.

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STANDING TOGETHER

Posted on September 19, 2011 by Baruch

Deuteronomy chapters 29-30 takes place on Moses’ last day. Here he concludes his parting message to his people. First he details all those who stand before him, not just standing — as in the Hebrew verb “om-dim” — but firmly as if to say Here we stand — “nitzavim” — ready to make a covenant with G-d. He mentions the chiefs, the tribesmen, the elders, the officers — in other words, the men who administer the laws, those who must live by them and those who enforce them. He goes on to name the children, the women, and the strangers in their camp who chop the wood and draw the water. And he is still not finished. “Not with you only do I make this covenant. But both with those who are here today with us, and with those who are not here.”

Not here? Who could that be? The commentators agree that this refers to future generations. Divine justice and compassion is hereby extended to world Jewry forever. All we have to do is accept it.

Moses summarizes the rewards of faithfulness and the dire results of unfaithfulness. He even predicts the reactions of other nations who will witness those dire results for the Jewish people — destruction of the land they are about to enter, and exile for their descendants.

Finally we get the people’s answer, phrased so eloquently that two of its words in Torah scrolls and in printed Hebrew Bibles are topped with 11 dots: “The hidden things belong to the Lord our G-d, and the revealed things belong to us and our children (lanu ul’vaneynu, the dotted words) forever, to put all the words of this Torah into action.”

Hearing the commitment to pass this heritage along, Moses predicts that even though future generations endure violence and exile, once they return and listen to the Divine teaching and seriously undertake to follow it, G-d will return to them and gather them in. No matter where they are scattered — even “in the far ends of the sky” says Moses. The sky, indeed? Could he be talking about another planet? Another universe? Maybe not. After 40 years traversing the desert, maybe any distant place could seem like a different world. The promise, however, is to gather that repentant generation and restore it to its land.

Clearly the key to this promise of future redemption is found in those two dotted words: lanu ul’vaneynu. By training our children in our faith, by educating them in Torah, we build toward that redemption.

One question we could ask is: What redemption? Is Moses talking about the Messiah? Or Theodor Herzl?

Chapter 30 verse 6 gives the Torah’s answer. After returning to the Land, “G-d will circumcise your heart and the hearts of your descendants, to love G-d with all your soul and all your being, so that you may live.”

A people, a nation, united in commitment to a code of conduct and a sacred tradition can weather storms and survive. Sometimes that unity looks unachievable. But in one amazing paragraph the Torah answers that objection:

“For this Mitzvah, this commandment I give you today, is not too mysterious for you, and not far away. It is not in heaven, that you should say: Who will go up to heaven and get it for us and let us hear it so we can do it? And it is not overseas, that you should say: Who will cross the ocean and get it for us and let us hear it so we can do it? [No,] it is very near you, in your own mouth and your own heart, to do it.”

No wonder many congregations read this section on Yom Kippur. It certainly reminds us to take responsibility for ourselves and our future. That is what the High Holidays are all about, isn’t it? Facing a new year — apples and honey and all — Nitzavim give us a memorable shot in the arm.

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