Rabbi Daniel Greyber, May 9, 2009/ 15 Iyar 5769
The mitzvah of Birkat Cohenim – the blessing of Israel by the Cohenim – does not occur until a few weeks from now in Parshat Naso, the book of Bamidbar 6:22-27. It reads:
And the Lord spoke to Moses,
saying,23.
Speak to Aaron and to his
sons, saying, On this wise you shall bless the people of Israel,
saying to them, The Lord bless you, and keep you; The Lord make his
face shine upon you, and be gracious to you; The Lord lift up his
countenance upon you, and give you peace. And they shall put my
name upon the people of Israel; and I will bless
them.
But I am going to speak about the mitzvah of birkat Cohenim this week for three reasons:
First, because the first part of this week’s parshat Emor focuses on the many restrictions and rules surrounding the Cohenim that make them qualified for the service that they would do in the Temple. So…it’s not totally off topic.
Second – full disclosure, I am a Cohen so I am "nogeah badavar" – I have a vested interest in the birkat Cohenim because I find great meaning in participating in this special mitzvah.
And third, I spoke with Norm Saiger who told me that, at a ritual committee meeting of the Library Minyan this past Sunday, it was decided that at Musaf on the first day of Sukkot, for the first time since I started coming in 1997, the birkat Cohenim will be as part of our tefillot. It is important for such a moment not to "just happen" but rather we should think and learn about the potential meaning of this ancient mitzvah for our community and, in that spirit, I hope to kick off a period of study and reflection about what could and what should this ritual mean for our community?
I want to begin by acknowledging head-on that I know some people have reservations as to the place of a ritual such as birkat Cohenim within an egalitarian minyan. To those who do have reservations, I want to publicly thank you for your willingness to have the Library minyan be a place of spiritual and religious openness to a mitzvah that, at first glance, may seem mysterious and even make some people uncomfortable. For those of us who find great meaning in this mitzvah, its absence has made the yom tov davening at the Library Minyan less meaningful than it could have been. Our mutual willingness to "hold one another in community" is a sign of strength, not weakness, in our community and while I do not claim to represent those who desired to have this as part of our davening, I can at least speak for myself in saying that I am grateful for your willingness to experiment with having this be one way that our praying community reaches out to God.
Acknowledging that I may not persuade anyone, I also want to at least explain, from my own perspective, why the incorporation of the birkat cohenim fits into an egalitarian setting such as this one. Is birkat Cohenim – is giving the levites the special task of washing the cohens’ hands and is having the cohenim pronounce the words of the priestly blessing for the community - "unegalitarian?" In one sense, yes. These are tasks not open to everyone; rather they are open only to those who are the son and, in our community, the daughter of a cohen or levi – that may seem un-egalitarian. Furthermore, it was the rabbis, not the cohenim or kingship, that were victorious in Jewish history. When the kingdom fell and the Temple was destroyed, the rabbis won the primary place within Judaism and, at the core of the rabbinic way of thinking was egalitarianism. The rabbinic world is a meritocracy of the highest order. We will be reminded in the coming weeks when rabbinical students at HUC and AJR and our own Ziegler School of Rabbinic Studies that anyone can become a rabbi J by which I mean, that one becomes a rabbi by virtue of one’s dedication to the study of Torah. One is not born a rabbi, and is not given the title of rabbi by virtue of one’s father or mother, or wealth or power. The mishnah teaches Torah is earned, by sweat and effort – it can be acquired by any who desire to give of themselves.
The status of Cohenim – and levi’im – stands in sharp contrast to the values of the rabbinic system and it is a strange, and in my opinion very beautiful, twist of history that the victorious rabbis left in place a remnant of the very system they replaced. We know: not everyone can become a Cohen. We all know the joke. A man comes to his rabbi and pleades, "Rabbi, make me a Cohen. I really need to be a Cohen!" "No. I can’t do that," says the rabbi, and sends him away. The man returns, "please – I’ll make a gift to the shul of $1,000." "No." "$10,000." "No." $100,000. The rabbi pauses to think – for a $100,000 maybe I’ve got to figure this out! "But why do you want to become a Cohen so badly?" "My father was a Cohen. My grandfather was a Cohen!"
In one sense, there is something un-egalitarian about the status of Cohenim & levi’im. But in another way, allowing people who know themselves to be Cohenim to offer the priestly blessing and levi’im to wash their hands is the most egalitarian thing we can do. Bringing the mitzvah of birkat Cohenim into our community is "anti-egalitarian" only if egalitarian means everyone must be and do the same things. My vision for an egalitarian community does not mean everyone must think and believe and be able to do the same things. Rather, it means that we create a community where each person is given the best opportunity to fully express their Jewish selves and their humanity in the world. I believe each person has a special, holy role to play in the world – their avodat hashem, service of God, but each person’s holy task is not the same. The infinity of God’s tasks unique to each person reflects the infinity of God’s greatness. My hope and prayer is that we seek to create a praying community where each person can find his or her unique role in the world and, within our community, live out his/her relationship to God.
It is arrogance of the highest degree for me to presume that being a rabbi or a Cohen or a prayer leader – or many of the other roles to which we ascribe importance – it is arrogance to believe that one of these roles, including being a cohen, makes me better or more important than a person who is a Levi or Yisrael. I remember going to see my rabbi once when I was trying to figure out what I should do with my life. I listed for him many different professions when he stopped the conversation and told me I was making a fundamental mistake: "you are equating what you do for a career with what your life is about. Daniel," he said to me, "you can be a grocery store clerk and be a good Jew and live a good life." The same point is made in the story of Reb Zusia who on his deathbed fears not that he will be asked why he wasn’t Moshe Rabbeinu, but rather why wasn’t he Reb Zusia. Too often our society ascribes importance to particular things. In the secular world, what or who is important are those who go to the best school, or has the biggest car, the slimmest body, or the person with the most knowledge about science and math. In the Jewish world, we think the best is the one who can read lots of Torah, who keeps Shabbat and kashrut, maybe even those who can stand up in front of the community beneath a tallit and say the birkat cohenim. But Pirkei Avot teaches we should not judge a major mitzvah from a minor one – for we do not know their reward. The blessing of the Cohenim is one of 613 mitzvoth – each of which is an equal and holy path to God.
In a truly egalitarian community, by providing a space both for Cohenim to pronounce, and for the community to hear, this blessing, we are making space for more people in our community to find a path to God, and to fully live out their role in the world which happens to be as Cohenim.
Let me say clearly: being the Cohen who says the blessing and the words of the priestly blessing is no more, nor less, important than being part of the community that hears and receives the blessing. In Sefer Haredim, it is written: "Not only the Cohenim fulfill the mitzvah when it is done, rather all of the community standing in silence and with kavannah and who answer amen after their blessing, are partners in fulfilling this mitzvah of the Torah."
Acknowledgment of the Cohenim’s task need not – and does not in my own mind – imply a higher or lower status. It is a particular task we happen to have in the world. Just as saying that the Jewish people are a kingdom of priests does not have to imply that we, the Jewish people, are better than everyone else but rather we have a special task/role to play in the world, Cohenim – the priests of our kingdom of priests – have a special task to utter the words of this blessing. I am glad those words will now have a place within the way our community reaches up to God in prayer.
Some people’s reservations about this mitzvah may stem from an unfamiliarity with exactly what happens during the birkat cohenim. What actually happens? In Israel the birkat Cohenim is part of prayers every week or, in some communities usually in Jerusalem, even every day. In the Diaspora, "duchaning" (as it is also called) takes place during the repetition of the Amidah at Musaf on Holidays. After the kedusha, Levi’im and Cohenim go to the nearest sink. It is the job of the Levi’im to pour water over the hands of the Cohenim as a symbolic purification before the blessing, much like we all wash our hands before saying motzi, not for cleanliness but as a symbolic purification and preparation for the ritual. Unlike netilat yadayim but eating bread, this washing of hands requires no blessing. All return to the service and when the Shaliach Tzibbur reaches the "Retzei" blessing, the Cohenim slip off their shoes and stand in front of the ark, facing the ark with their tallitot over their heads. When the shaliach Tzibbur concludes the Modim blessing with the words "hatov shimcha u’lecha na’eh l’hodot," the shaliach tzibbur calls the Cohenim to begin by calling out, "Cohenim" at which point the Cohenim recite a special blessing acknowledging that God has commanded us "to bless His people Israel with love." On a personal note, when I begin the birkat cohenim, I try to focus and have kavannah for a love for the Jewish people.
As the cohenim conclude this blessing, they turn around, still underneath their tallitot, raise their hands – the tallit actually covers their hands so the hands and faces are not seen. The shaliach tzibbur then recites the ancient priestly blessing word by word, with the Cohenim repeating the words of the blessing after the shaliach tzibbur. Jewish law requires the congregation to be in front of the Cohenim – that’s why they are up at the ark and not in the middle of the room – and the community’s task is to focus and accept the words of the blessing with love. When the blessing is complete, the Cohenim turn around and remain up at the ark until the end of the Amidah, at which point they go back to their shoes, put them on, and return to their seats.I would add that, aesthetically, Jewish parents have historically often been anxious to be sure that their children are present during the birkat Cohenim, not only to be sure their children receive the blessing, but also to share such a special and meaningful moment with their children. Many children have fond and rich memories of the hagim, of Jewish holidays, remembering being underneath their father’s tallit or standing with their ima as the blessing is recited. Parents and grandparents, children and grandchildren, might also have a memory of being underneath their mother’s and father’s tallit in our minyan if the birkat Cohenim becomes a regular part of our prayer experience.
I want to conclude with two teachings about birkat cohenim for us to consider in the weeks and months as we prepare for the birkat Cohenim during Sukkot:
One is a story told by Rabbi David Wolpe of Sinai Temple to keep in mind as the blessing is said and heard. Once, early on in his rabbinate, he was called to the bedside of a dying person. When he got to the hospital, the person was unconscious and the family was gathered around and they asked him to say the vidui, the deathbed confessional. Rabbi Wolpe returned home and told his wife how uncomfortable, unworthy, he felt saying the deathbed confession for someone he’d never met before. "I don’t feel worthy to do that for someone else," he said, to which his wise wife, Elie, responded, "you’re not. You’re not worthy. But nobody is – it’s being done through you." To the Cohenim, and to our entire community, please remember it is not the Cohenim who provide God’s blessing. God’s blessing is not magic – it not something physical that magically flows from our hands because they are shaped like this – SHOW HANDS (since a new Star Treck movie is out, I should mention that Leonard Nimoy is a cohen and apparently he developed the Vulcan sign from the shape of the hands of the cohenim during this blessing. God’s blessing is not magic being done by the cohenim, rather, it is being done "through you." The more our ego is a part of this, the less room there is for God. The more we aim, both in this ritual, and in life, to make of ourselves a vessel for God’s blessing, the more room there is for that blessing to come into the world. I think our world would be a different place if we all aimed a little more for things to be done through us, rather than by us.
Finally, I want to each one more law about this ritual from the Shulchan Aruch, a law that, at first glance may seem unfair, but, I think, is profoundly beautiful and important. Rabbi Yosef Karo teaches: "One who has a defect in his body that will cause people to be distracted from the blessing, he should not raise his hands." Sound pretty bad, doesn’t it? Sounds like discrimination against Cohenim who are physically deformed. But he goes on to teach: "Before Cohenim would cover their faces and hands in a tallit, Cohenim who had deformities in their fingers or faces, would not go up to bless. But today," he writes, "since all Cohenim now cover their faces and hands with a tallit, these things do not prevent one from going up to bless." But what if one has another deformity – either in one’s voice, or in a part of one’s body that is covered – you ask?
He continues to explain that Jewish law is that IF THE COMMUNITY is used to it, and will not be distracted, the person may bless. What does this mean? It means that a community that is tolerant, and is able to see beyond the physical, and attune itself to the true source of the blessing – God, instead of being distracted by physical deformities, that community will be able to receive the blessing of the Cohenim. But if the community is unable able to get past the physical difference of that Cohen – they will not be blessed.
What a beautiful teaching about how we see those with are different in our community – they can be sources of blessing for us, but only if we are worthy to be blessed, only if we teach ourselves to see God’s blessing within each and every member of our community – that is egalitarianism at its best.
That teaching is also an important reminder about what will, or won’t happen, a few months from now. The rabbis teach: "B’itaruta d’letata talia itaruta d’laliya" – by means of an awakening below comes an awakening above. What will happen a few months from now is not magic - it is not some magical set of motions and words that cause this magical thing called "beracha" to descend. It doesn’t happen if we just waive our hands and speak a spell - rather – the blessing depends upon us. Are we a community that can see past what is physical in a physical world, can set aside our ego and make room for God to be found in a sacred moment? Can we prepare ourselves as a community so that together, we can receive God’s love? For the more we desire to receive God’s blessing, the more, the rabbis teach us, God’s desire to bless us will be awakened above.
God has indeed commanded the Cohenim to bless Israel with love – my fervent prayer is that we will be ready and open to receive what God wants to give.
Shabbat Shalom