June 18, 2010 | 7 Tammuz 5770

What do parshat Chukat and koodies have in common. Well, they both are short words with only two syllables: Chu-kat – koo-dies.  We are supposed to teach the Chukat (Ritual laws) to our children and similarly children are keenly aware of koodies.  I can go on and on, (which I am sure you would prefer that I don’t) but the main connection is that parshat Chukat spends a lot of time talking about koodies. Of course, the Bible uses the word Tameh – impure – but make no mistake – it’s koodies. A person becomes tameh by touching something that IS tameh, in our parsha’s case, a dead body. There are all sorts of rules and procedures for returning to a state of tahor, a state of purity. And if that wasn’t enough, one cannot see the impurity, nor smell it or even feel it. Nonetheless, once you get it, it’s hard to get rid of it. Sounds like koodies to me. 

So much of the information presented in this week’s parsha lends itself to disconnection from the words of Torah. We might struggle with understanding the concept of impurity – does it mean dirty, evil, bad? As a culture, we shy away from discussions about death let alone the thought of coming into contact with a dead body. However, this week, we are confronted with it all – purity – impurity; death – corpse. What does it all mean? 

Before we delve into the rites and rituals described in our parsha, let’s first understand why such action needs to be taken.  For the Torah, a connection with God mandates a relationship based on service. To participate in this service, a person must be deemed ritually pure. The Torah spends many verses describing the methodology for going from tameh (impure) to tahor (pure) so I will leave that procedure alone for you to explore as we study the Torah this Shabbat. My question is different. Why do we need to be pure in order to serve God?

I believe that an answer is found when we look at the source of the impurity as described in our Torah portion – death. Tending to someone who is dying or has died drastically alters our ability to serve God with the proper mindset and focus.  Experiencing death impinges on the way we see and live our life. For many of us who have lost a loved one, their death drags a piece of us into the next world with them. We even say phrases to describe our anguish… like, “When so-and-so died, a piece of me died with them.” 

When serving and communing with God, this creates a challenge. How can we serve the all living God, the God that is so filled with life that He utters words and life comes into being, when we are consumed with death? Like this week’s parsha, our traditions relating to death help us to transition away from death and move us towards life. Most of the rituals are life affirming. So-much-so that the Mourners’ Kaddish has nothing to do with death. In fact, we say the word “life” three times when reciting the Kaddish. And although Judaism provides what to say about the afterlife and life-after-death, those topics are not taught to our children and the Talmud even urges us to be careful when studying them. 

As Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel once said in an interview when asked about his belief in an afterlife, he replied that he takes his lives one at a time.  Rabbi Heschel was by no means denying that there is an afterlife.  On the contrary, he writes about the world-to-come throughout his book, The Sabbath.  Rabbi Heschel is simply reiterating a truth that we find in this week’s parsha:  Service to God with all our heart, with all our soul and with all our might requires complete immersion and dedication in the life that God so generously gave us.  As one reads through parshat Chukat, the difficulties that arise when death and life come in contact with each other become apparent.  It is a struggle which makes me grateful for all the rituals that surround death and dying in the Jewish tradition, rituals that help escort those who remain in this world back from the valley of the shadow of death towards the landscape of the living. 

Shabbat Shalom.