The Kohen Gadol Comes Home – Parshat Acharei Mot 2022

Jason Strauss

Nov 1

This year is a bit unusual. We just celebrated פסח, we're in the midst of counting ספירת העומר, looking forward to שבועות in about five weeks. The ימים נוראים, the High Holiday season, is not to begin for another five months. And yet, I've been thinking about יום כיפור for much of the week.

Two Judaic Studies teachers at Maimonides independently remarked to me that when אחרי מות is paired with קדושים as a double פרשה, they always talk about the many מצוות in קדושים and ignore the עבודת יום הכיפורים, the Yom Kippur Temple service described in אחרי מות. They do their best to avoid אחרי מות because it's so complicated and involves a lot of discussion of blood and animal sacrifice. But this year, it was unavoidable.

To me, however, this was not only a challenge but an exciting opportunity – I happen to love talking about the עבודה of יום כיפור during any time of the year. Though the details can feel otherworldly and obscure at first, if you spend a long time going through it, imagining yourself as a participant, putting yourself in the shoes of the כהנים or the כהן גדול himself, the order of the Yom Kippur Temple service becomes a thrilling story to tell. Imagine yourself watching the כהן גדול's heroic efforts to complete almost all of the work by himself, even risking his life by repeatedly entering the קודש הקדשים. Feel the fear and trepidation as the crowd waits anxiously for the כהן גדול to emerge safely, for the report that the scapegoat, the שעיר לעזאזל has successfully been delivered to the wilderness.

Even though, today, we can only read the poem אמיץ כח about the עבודה on יום כיפור and we can't see it with our own eyes, even just envisioning what it was like can have an incredibly powerful spiritual impact. Rav Soloveitchik once told the following story:

"As a child, I keenly felt the kedushas hayom of Yom Kippur.The holiness of Yom Kippur was not merely a phrase; it was an experience I do not know how to adequately relate. The enthusiasm, the ecstasy, the recognition of this holiness reached its pinnacle at the Avodah."

In fact, the Rav even had a family practice to stay up late on the night of Yom Kippur studying the סדר עבודה with his father Rav Moshe Soloveitchik, just as the כהן גדול stayed up all night right before performing the עבודה. Rav Zevin relates that the Chassidic master Reb Shmelke of Nikolsberg was so spiritually uplifted by the recitation of the עבודה on יום כיפור that he would suddenly pause in the middle of אמיץ כח and sing brand new melodies to accompany the description of the Temple service. Many people discovered their own love for the עבודה a few years ago when Israeli pop singer Ishai Ribo released a song adaptation of the Yom Kippur Temple service called סדר העבודה.

There are many details of the עבודה that, at first glance, are hard to understand, among them an unusual qualification for the כהן גדול. We might have expected the main credentials for a כהן גדול to be related to his piety, his familiarity with the Temple service, perhaps his physical endurance. But the Torah implies that there is another prerequisite for a כהן גדול to serve on יום כיפור:

וְהִקְרִיב אַהֲרֹן אֶת־פַּר הַחַטָּאת אֲשֶׁר־לוֹ וְכִפֶּר בַּעֲדוֹ וּבְעַד בֵּיתוֹ׃

Aaron is to offer his own bull of sin offering, to make expiation for himself and for his household.

The Torah says that the special sin offering, the פר החטאת, is offered to atone for the כהן גדול and his family. The גמרא in יומא explains that, at minimum, a household refers to the כהן גדול's wife. He must be currently married to perform the עבודה of יום כיפור. The question is, why? What difference does it make whether he is currently married?

In fact, the גמרא not only insists that the כהן גדול be married but that he be married to only one woman, despite polygamy being Biblically permitted in הלכה and only banned by Rabbeinu Gershom about a thousand years ago. The גמרא infers from the fact that the Torah says he atone for ביתו, his household, that the כהן גדול must only have one household for which to atone. Why would that be?

Let's add another question that perhaps can help lead us to a potential answer. The Mishnah records a debate between the חכמים and רבי יהודה about how far we should go to ensure that the כהן גדול is married during the יום כיפור service. רבי יהודה argues that the כהן גדול should marry a second woman and then divorce both of his wives conditionally so that if one of them dies before Yom Kippur he will be married to the other and if neither dies, he is married only to the first wife and divorced from the second. The other Rabbis say that we can't worry about the כהן גדול's wife potentially dying and marrying a second wife goes too far. Clearly, רבי יהודה thinks this requirement of being married is so essential that we must engage in very unusual marital arrangements to avoid the chance he will be left a single widower on יום כיפור. Why is he so worried about this? And why do the other Rabbis hesitate to take these extra steps?

I think the answer to all of these questions relates to the very beginning and the very end of the laws of עבודת יום הכיפורים. The very first משנה in יומא tells us that, ironically, the כהן גדול is both required to be married on יום כיפור and also to separate from his wife and leave his home for seven days prior to יום כיפור. Paradoxically, because he must be married, he cannot stay at home. He spends the week living alone in a room called לשכת פרהדרין, spending his waking hours with rabbis and experts reviewing the laws, practicing the Temple service, being quizzed on the order of events and the species of animal associated with the various sacrifices.

The simplest explanation for why he separates for seven days, as explained by the גמרא, is that we need him to avoid any chance of becoming טמא, impure, right before יום כיפור. Living alone on the Temple premises make physiological impurity or contact with other sources of impurity much less likely. But perhaps there is another goal, not only to avoid impurity, but to work toward קדושה. Rav Soloveitchik and Rav Shagar both suggest that it could be that the seven day פרישה from home is not intended to treat home as a source of impurity but rather proximity to the בית המקדש as source of spiritual growth, of increasing sanctity.

In fact, the ראב״ד interprets the גמרא to have a הוה אמינא, to consider a possibility that it later rejects, that the כהן גדול needed to sleep in the לשכת פרהדרין but was permitted to visit his wife at home. That only makes sense if living in the לשכת פרהדרין would have a positive impact on the כהן גדול beyond avoiding impurity, which would be compromised every time he went home for a visit to his wife.

In the poem אמיץ כח, which we read on יום כיפור during מוסף as our fulfillment of reviewing the עבודה, there is a line that supports and complicates this notion.

:לְשָׁרֶתְךָ אִוִּיתָה לֵוִי אִישׁ חֲסִידֶךָ. לְהַבְדִּיל מִגִּזְעוֹ מֻקְדָּשׁ קֹדֶשׁ קָדָשִׁים. לִקְשֹׁר נֶזֶר קֹדֶשׁ וְלַעֲטוֹת אוּרִים. לֵישֵׁב כִּכְבֻדָּה פְּנִימָה יָמִים שִׁבְעָה

To serve You, You desired Levi, Your pious one. From his tribe, You sanctified one to be Your holiest to wear the holy mitre and the Urim VeTumim and to dwell like one whose honor is inside for seven days.

Rav Shagar points out that the line . לֵישֵׁב כִּכְבֻדָּה פְּנִימָה יָמִים שִׁבְעָה sounds a lot like a reference to the week of שבע ברכות, the week of celebration following a wedding. On one hand, this clearly asserts that the week of פרישה is more than just avoiding impurity. On the other hand, there is an irony – it is treating a week away from his wife like שבע ברכות, which is the opposite of what a real שבע ברכות week is like, usually packed with celebratory meals and time alone for the newly married couple. Instead, the כהן גדול leaves his wife and caps the week with eating a relatively meager meal and a fast day. It's almost like שבע ברכות in reverse!

In fact, the description of the עבודת יום הכיפורים in יומא ends with the כהן גדול's triumphant return home. After successfully completing the עבודה, surviving entrance to the קודש הקדשים multiple times, confident in the his family and people having received atonement, the Jewish People escort the כהן גדול home, singing all along the way. The משנה writes as follows – please listen carefully:

:וּמְלַוִּין אוֹתוֹ עַד בֵּיתוֹ. וְיוֹם טוֹב הָיָה עוֹשֶׂה לְאוֹהֲבָיו בְּשָׁעָה שֶׁיָּצָא בְשָׁלוֹם מִן הַקֹּדֶשׁ

The people escort him to his home in deference to him. And the High Priest would make a feast for his loved ones and his friends when he emerged in peace from the Sanctuary.

He is escorted to ביתו, to his home, which we said refers to his wife. At the end of the fast, he hosts a festive meal for אוהביו, for his loved ones, presumably, first and foremost his wife. And he does this in response to emerging בשלום מן הקודש, in peace, or with peace, from the בית המקדש. In other words, the Jewish People come to celebrate, in part, the כהן גדול's reunion with his family, and particularly with his wife.

I want to suggest that the כהן גדול's experience of separating from his wife before יום כיפור and reuniting with her on the evening following his emergence from the קודש הקדשים is meant to be a metaphor for the Jewish People. The כהן גדול, who must achieve atonement on behalf of the entire Israel, must transform himself into an avatar for his people. Sin creates a gap, a separation, between ה׳ and כלל ישראל. The seven days prior to יום כיפור are the עשרת ימי תשובה, days when every Jews engages in introspection and the כהן גדול gets ready for his direct encounter with G-d in the Holy of Holies, his effort to reunite his people with the רבונו של עולם, with the Master of the Universe. As he prepares to enter into the most intimate of spaces with הקב״ה, his longing for his wife simultaneously increases and his motivation to return home becomes more and more intense.

Only a כהן גדול who is married, who understands the stakes of sin and distance in a relationship and how important it is to rebuild trust, is appropriate as the Jewish People's avatar. He cannot be married to more than one woman just like the Jewish People understands that it has a relationship with only ה׳. Only after the כהן גדול successfully repairs the relationship between the רבונו של עולם and כלל ישראל can he similarly return home to a renewed relationship with his wife.

The seven days are indeed exactly like שבע ברכות but in reverse – rather than seven days together following the wedding, they are seven days of separation in preparation for a reunion. Only after going through this process does the כהן גדול, and by extension the Jewish People, understand who are his אוהביו, who he loves and what he must do to go home בשלום, with peace in hand. So the need for the כהן גדול to be married is not incidental – it is essential, which is why רבי יהודה is anxious about it. He and the rabbis debate the best way to account for that.

If this is correct, it leaves us with a powerful new lesson about our relationships with our loved ones and with הקב״ה. We cannot take our relationships for granted – they must be tended to, constantly worked on. We must engage not only in avoiding impurity but also in an effort to perpetually further sanctify ourselves and our relationships. קידושין may start a relationship but the sanctity of a relationship fades if we are not always looking to renew it, to find new moments to celebrate those we love, to thank them for being part of our lives. Distance from G-d and from our loved ones happens by default over time – it takes concerted effort, carefully thought out work to come close, to maintain intimacy, to enter and exit the Holy of Holies intact. May we find ways to come home בשלום, with peace in hand, and relearn what it is to celebrate אוהביו, one's loved ones.

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