BEHAR_LEVITICUS XXV:1-XXVI:2
According to Harav Yosef Dov HaLevi Soloveitchik, the Torah was delivered at Har Sinai with Kolot uverakim, “thunder and lightning”, so that Humanity would learn that the Jewish people deserved Divine attention and, in this way, kavod, honor, was returned to the people who were gradually losing the appreciation of everyone. While Avraham gained the respect of many, this sentiment diminished in the case of Yitzchak and even more so with Yaacov and his sons, who ended up under the yoke of Egyptian slavery.
The Divine revelation at Sinai was intended to restore to the Hebrews the esteem of the nations. Everyone realized that God had chosen the Jewish people. A kind of Kiddush Ha’Am, “the sanctification of the nation”. In previous chapters we had read about Kiddush HaShem, the obligation to sanctify the Name of God, and the prohibition Velo techalelu et Shem Kodshi, “and not to desecrate My Sacred Name”, a norm that requires one to offer hia life in certain fundamental cases, such as incest, murder, and idolatry. That is, the Jew must choose death and not transgress any of the three imperatives mentioned.
However, the Talmud questions that, if a person flouts the Yehareg veal ya’avor imperative, “to choose death and not to violate the law”, in the case of idolatry for fear of being sentenced to death, can he be considered to have violated the prohibition of serving an idol? The answer should be obvious: in the case of idolatry, a person must choose death. The fact that the Talmud raises the question suggests, according to Soloveitchik, that the problem lies not so much in the idolatrous act as in the transcendent effect of the action.
In the course of history, when Jews were forced to publicly renounce their faith, even when it was not a matter of violating one of the three previous statements, the obligation was not to succumb, even to offer life, if necessary. According to Maimonides, Chananya, Mishael and Azaria chose to throw themselves into the flames of a furnace rather than prostrate themselves before Nevuchjadnetsar. With this act of bravery, which consisted of refusing to bow to the evil king, they were fulfilling the imperative of Kiddush HaShem, the Sanctification of the Name of God.
During the tragic period of the Holocaust, there were many cases of Kiddush HaShem that did not correspond to incest, idolatry, or murder. There is the case of a group of young people who opted for suicide so as not to be turned into a kind of harem for the carnal pleasure of Nazi officers. Those same executioners who mocked their victims by questioning where their God was to defend them, had to face the courage and ardor of those who preferred death to indignity and immorality.
Although there are precise rules with reference to Kiddush HaShem, this imperative also depends on the specific situation, for example, when a public renunciation of the faith was demanded, especially during the “autos de fe” prevalent in various religious persecutions, especially during the period of the Inquisition.
For centuries there was Chilul HaAm, contempt for the people and irreverence for their nature. The maximum expression of this nihilism occurred during the Nazi period, when an attempt was made to dehumanize the Jew, tattooing him with a number to identify him, ignoring his right to even a name that qualified him as a human person.
The establishment of Medinat Israel can be framed under the concept of Kiddush HaAm, the return of honor, and the Sanctification of the Name of the people of Israel. For this reason and for many other reasons, the State of Israel is, at the same time, an ideal and a reality that belongs to the entire Jewish people, even those who do not reside within its geographical limits.
MITSVAH: TORAH ORDINANCE IN THIS PARASHAH
CONTAINS 7 POSITIVE MITZVOT AND 17 BANS
- Leviticus 25:4 Do not work the land during the Sabbath year
- Leviticus 25:4 Do not work with trees in the Sabbath year
- Leviticus 25:5 Do not reap what grows spontaneously in the Sabbath year
- Leviticus 25:5 Do not gather the fruit of the tree in the Sabbath year in the way it is harvested each year
- Leviticus 25:8 Counting 7 cycles of 7 years
- Leviticus 25:9, 10 Sound the Shofar on Yom Kippur in the Jubilee Year (on Rosh HaShanah the obligation is to listen to the Shofar)
- Leviticus 25:9, 10 To sanctify the Jubilee Year
- Leviticus 25:11 Do not work the land in the Jubilee Year
- Leviticus 25:5 Do not reap what grows spontaneously in the Jubilee Year
- Leviticus 25:11 Do not reap the fruit of the trees in the Jubilee Year in the way it is harvested each year
- Leviticus 25:14 Doing Justice between Seller and Buyer
- Leviticus 25:14 Do not deceive in buying and selling
- Leviticus 25:17 Do not verbally oppress a Jew
- Leviticus 25:23 Do not sell land in the Land of Israel permanently
- Leviticus 25:24 Return the land in the Land of Israel to its original owners in the Jubilee Year
- Leviticus 25:29 Redeem an inherited property in a city in the year (of its sale)
- Leviticus 25:34 Do not disturb the empty grounds around the cities or fields of the Levites
- Leviticus 25:37 Do not charge interest when lending to a Jew
- Leviticus 25:39 Do not force a Hebrew slave to do degrading work like a Canaanite slave
- Leviticus 25:42 Do not sell a Hebrew slave at auction
- Leviticus 25:43 Do not force a Hebrew slave to do forced labor
- Leviticus 25:43 Permanently keeping a Canaanite slave
- Leviticus 25:53 Do not allow a Hebrew slave to be forced to work extremely by his non-Jewish owner
- Leviticus 26:1 Do not prostrate yourself on an engraved or sculpted stone, even in the veneration of God
