Leviticus - Cycle Two - 1601-1830 - Acherey Moth - 1901-2027 Kedoshim

About ten years ago my husband died. After-death I went looking for him in the fields, by the creek. I could almost see clouds of smoke from his cigarettes. The living took a back seat. People became blank faces. They all knew I was a widow with four children and that made me feel strange. What kept me breathing was John (my late husband) and God. Angels, spirits, prophets, priests. We could all have a party with the water crashing on the rocks and the sun searing a hole in my heart. I’d jump in the creek again and again. I loved it. I had an excuse to cling to my favorite dead, a sacred excuse.

Death is so enticing. We emulate the dead, search for them, keep them in mind. For many, our whole lives are spent responding to the one singular dead. The irony is that while we race about embracing or ignoring our bodies for those gone we perform a do-it-yourself job, a soul suicide.

In Acharey Moth the body/spirit conflict is so palpable you can almost taste it. We begin with the important words moth, bekorvatam and v’yamtoo, death, offering and died. In that order, in these words alone, the human condition becomes a beyond-human condition. Life/death gets over-shadowed by korbanot/death. The march to consciousness rises above life.

Our challenge, of course, is getting beyond body bias even when in shock. How we act after the death of a loved one enables or disables us. But it isn’t easy having equanimity when horror, fascination and fear drive us to drinking gallons of Jack Daniels or metaphorical pints of blood…when our death disease leads us down and dirty far from the tent of meeting. We all wander. What a relief that Acharey Moth jump-starts our return.

First though, let’s see the parasha in context. Let’s do a flashback. Nadav and Avihu die and we find ourselves on a downhill slope. How unfair! Soon we’re at the center of Torah at the large nun, the slippery creatures that crawl on their bellies. Of course, who says wormy things are bad but the metaphor is loud. We’re in the land of thing-ness and the only way to rise out is through recognition of our addiction, through the discernment of our germs, our diseases, our scars, our vanity, our plague. It isn’t surprising that we are immediately hit with two parashas about lepracy. We have, knowing or not, all become lepers. In fact, every letter until Acharey Moth can be viewed within the gaping hole of Aaron’s shocked silence (10:3).

But while body bias (and therefore grief) is the leading cause of leprosy, the leading preventative (proven for millennium) is korbanot. There are preventive measures for preventive measures (18:30 and Rambam intro:25)…laws or fences regarding sexual behavior and blood juxtaposed with the exquisite ritual of Yom Kippur. As for moth, bekorvatam and v’yamtoo, in their logical procession we can see poetry…bodies and souls coming nearer to God. We can see and experience a lekh lekha ( Genesis 12:1) a time to get moving beyond our grief, an explosion into the eternal action of the sacred.

Moth (in my opinion) refers to the body. As a noun, it infers stasis and physical death. As a singular noun (to describe two) it joins all bodily death together, in our minds, in the earth.

Korbanot is the coming closer to God. This can be external but the evolution is internal. Let’s take a hypothetical situation. A thousand years from now we may be able to move through space. We will be questioning each other…but why didn’t they see? What was the reason for all this waste? Why did they need cars to travel? In a similar way today we ask ourselves…but why did they need to kill animals? Why kill for korbanot? Why did Nadav and Abihu have to be killed?

V’Yamtoo refers to soul death. While the noun is a finished thing, the verb is unfinished. Soul death has levels, shades, very possibly seven (16:14). It isn’t cut and dry and it isn’t a reason for drums to start beating. That’s because we all know the darkness of soul death. And we know that those of us who wander can return. As for Nadav and Avihu, even the Zohar says that they ignore malchut and that their death(s) are two-fold. In forgetting the body (despite the circumstance) they embrace it. It’s just the other side of the coin, soul-suicide. The tragedy is that they are so evolved. We want to think that their souls are beyond vulnerability. Maybe the lesson here is that they aren’t. We aren’t. Our souls aren’t. And we must forgive God and ourselves and move on to help each other heal and grow.

The good thing is what comes next is regeneration. If we place the three words together we get offerings that are continually lifting us beyond our errs, fears, blindness, those small moments we’d rather forget. The words reach out like a line proven by Einstein to eternity, death only acting as links. Yom Kippur and Kadosh Kadoshim ritualize this continuum, make it real. What’s clear is that we need physical and spiritual death for both korbanot and kadosh, whether we like it or not. Not only are they connecting agents but their friction creates the energy that carries us closer to God.

So, may we see the force of the first line in Acharey Moth as a wake up call and a catalyst for our healing. May we discern physical from spiritual death. May we raise the human condition to the beyond-human condition. May we understand that there are rules to keep us on the march to consciousness…613. May we be thankful for the beauty of the one ritual of Yom Kippor. May we have patience with those who move slowly and are lost. May we jump in the creek from death to korbanot to death, always returning. And may we guide each other on the endless continuum, offering after offering, with joy, love, compassion and respect.