Last Saturday, I turned 60. That means that, if I’d had a bar mitzvah at 13, it would have been in 1977, and Tzav would have been my portion. At that age, I think I would have felt very hard done by to get this parsha, with its exhausting minutiae on sacrifices: what flour and oil to use when, which birds and animals to offer, what the priests should wear, which parts of the body to anoint, who should stand where, what to do if you spilt something, what should get burnt, and what should be eaten and by whom, and on which day. And of course, whoever got something wrong was to be cut off from the people. Forget about the bar mitzvah boy, I have to say that, even at age 60, there are still some passages in Torah that I don’t exactly warm to!
But, when I was asked if I might leyn this morning, it seemed only right to see how I could include in my Jewish studies something I might normally choose to exclude. So, what can we learn from the rules of sacrifice, and from the four verses I leyned this morning? Rabbi Jonathan Sacks wrote: “[S]acrifices were not an end in themselves. … It was the genius of Judaism to understand that what was central in avodah, the service of G-d, was the intention, not the precise form of its symbolic enactment.” So what might be an inner meaning for today’s reading? To help us in this, I was grateful to find a commentary on Sefaria.org[1] that links my four verses[2] about the shalom offering with others in Leviticus[3] to lead to what I hope are some useful thoughts.
First, in verse 29 there’s a chiasmus, a statement in which the second half reverses, to mirror the first half of the statement, so pulling our attention to the centre of the statement: “The one who supplies the coming-close-offering of a shalom-sacrifice for G-d, they themselves must present the coming-close-offering, to God as a shalom-sacrifice.” The point is re-emphasised in the next verse: “with their own hands, they are to burn it for G-d.” All other kinds of sacrifice are handled by the priests. But the shalom-sacrifice is singled out to be presented, and burnt on the altar, by the provider—a non-priestly, regular member of the community.
The second point that the Sefaria commentator makes is that, if the fats of the animal are burnt and therefore go to G-d, and the breast goes to Aaron and his sons, i.e. the priests, then there’s still a lot of the animal left over. What happens to that? Lev. 7:15 reads: “And the flesh of his thanksgiving sacrifice of well-being shall be eaten on the day that it is offered; none of it shall be set aside until morning.” Everything must be used up on the same day as the shalom-sacrifice itself. The implication seems to be that G-d gets a portion, the priests get a portion, and the provider gets to share in eating the rest of the animal.
I’d like to add my own third point, and look at the name of this particular sacrifice—zevach sh’lamav—and what it’s inner meaning could be. The root word shalom connects us not just to peace, but also to wellbeing and wholeness. For this to be designated a shalom offering, the provider is more than just a supplier of the animal. The provider stands alongside the priest as an equal, interacts directly with G-d in the ritual moment, and shares in the meal with G-d and the priests—and probably their own family and community as well. Everyone has a place at the table, eating together, close to one another, sharing the ritual space. That is a model of community wellbeing and wholeness. No one goes without. All are honoured. All share the ritual space.
So how well do we match up to this in modern religious life? Well, the inclusiveness of the Siddur Masorti[4] of 2019, with its gender-neutrality, egalitarianism and addition of non-binary Hebrew, is a breath of fresh air. But, sadly, I know, for example, a young non-binary person who fails to see themselves reflected in the language and liturgy of their particular shul, and therefore feels let down by some of their Jewish elders. I’m currently in a small cohort of participants from different traditions—Hindu, Sikh, Christian, Muslim, Druid, Jewish—convened by the Faith Belief Forum to look at LGBT+ allyship. We’ve been sharing stories of being caught in the isolating, painful choice between either being rejected by parts of our faith community for our sexual orientation or gender identity, or being rejected from the diverse LGBT+ world for coming out as religious. I’m also involved with a national interfaith charity in introducing a much needed and long overdue framework for active inclusion and allyship in its own responses to people with a wide range of characteristics—race, disability, age, religion—that are protected by the Equality Act 2010.
Understanding, respect, inclusion, kindness, are not a given, even in—and sometimes especially in—interfaith and Jewish spaces. At the beginning of my drash, I said that I struggled to accept some passages of Torah. I also struggle to accept some people. I’m not proud of that, and I also know that we all have our limits. But I also know that a tzibbur (TZ-i-B-u-R), a congregation that prays together, includes the TZadikim-the righteous, the Rashi-the not so righteous, and the Beinoni-those in-between. And who really knows who is which?
We’re none of us saints. In our choices of observance, who do we leave out? Who do we exclude from our circle of prayer? How do we justify that to ourselves? What do we lose by doing so? What do they lose, and do we care? What messages are we giving to our children? What good might come from making a place at the table for people or approaches to prayer we personally find discomforting or challenging? A shalom offering, however well-intentioned, is not peaceful or whole unless it includes everyone. Who are we still cutting off from our people? We still have a way to go. As the late United Nations Secretary-General and great peacemaker Dag Hammarskjöld wrote: “No peace which is not peace for all. No rest until all has been fulfilled.”[5]
Footnotes
[1] ‘From the Heart Flows Life’, Forest Hills Haftorah Series – https://www.sefaria.org/sheets/279639?lang=bi
[2] Lev. 7:28-31
[3] Lev. 7:15, and Leviticus 3
[4] https://opensiddur.org/compilations/liturgical/siddurim/weekday-siddur/siddur-masorti-2019/
[5] Dag Hammarskjöld (1963) Markings: Spiritual Poems and Meditations – https://www.daghammarskjold.se/publication/readers-guide-dag-hammarskjolds-waymarks/