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Parshat Kedoshim
By: Rabbi Moshe Goodman, Kollel Ohr Shlomo, Hebron

בס"ד

לשכנו תדרשו

Cleaving to the Holy Presence in Our Holy Land

קדושים תהיו

"Blessed are You HaShem our God King of the Universe Who has made distinction between holy and mundane, between light and darkness, between Israel and other nations, and between the seventh day and the six day of work, blessed are HaShem Who differentiates between holy and mundane".

The name of this week's parsha is kedoshim, which according to Rashi and our Sages means "to make separation", for holiness rests on matters that are separated apart from the mundane or the impure. The differentiation between the holy and the mundane continues to be a dominant theme in Judaism not only among time and people but also in regard to location as we have shown in general in regard to the Holy Land, Hebron, and in specific in regard to the ten levels of holiness surrounding the Temple we have been discussing throughout the parshiot of Vayikra.

This week we will focus on the seventh holiest section of the Temple called the "Heil", literally "the Wall", for it is the relatively short section of ten hand-breaths that surrounds the wall of the Temple's main house-like complex. This section of the Temple is unique in its exclusion of those made impure due to contact with a corpse ("tmei met"). If we contemplate the nature of this impurity we may say that it is tied to the innate human misconception that life ends with death. Of course, Judaism teaches that there is an afterlife after death, but with the same token Judaism does not ignore this innate human reaction to death, and therefore mourning is mandatory in some cases and also impurity is rendered upon all that come in contact with a dead body. At the Temple of the Eternal God Who supplies souls with an afterlife it is not befitting for such an individual tinged with this contact and impurity to enter its boundaries. Therefore, even before entering the "walls" of the Temple no such impure individual may enter.

Here too we find the "sparks of Hebron" in the Temple. Hebron is place of the Maaras HaMachpela, the place of ascent for all souls to the afterlife, therefore constituting a testament of the afterlife. 

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Real Stories from the Holy Land #169

"On one visit by my parents I lost a small earring. When I re-visited my parents a few weeks later, I just happened to find this very earring laying as if un-touched on the earth on the pathway to my parents' apartment building..." (M.H) 

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