Our parasha Emor teaches us about worship during our holidays.
The Torah tells us that the bread that comes as offering during the holiday of Shavuot (Shavuot is always the 50th day after Passover) must be Chametz – a leavened bread – opposite of Passover when we are allowed to use only Matza. What is the reason? What is special about exclusively using Chametz as the offering for the holiday of the Torah Giving (Matan Torah)?
The Chametz that symbolizes the ‘evil instinct – Yetzee Hara’, is seen as the ‘motor’ – the main contributer for the society and human economy construction.
Yetzer Hara – the ‘evil instinct’- the leavening – Chametz, has a real role in the service of God. Without it, we’re not able to live life!
The Midrash describes a discussion in heaven before Moshe is receiving the Torah. In the sky Moshe encountered a resistance from the angels who don’t understand why the Torah is given for humans.
Moshe answered: “Lord of the world, the Torah that you give me, what is written in it? “I am the Lord your God who brought you out of the land of Egypt.”
Moshe said to the angels: “Did you go down to Egypt and become slaves? How can you identify with the Torah? What does the Torah say again? Thou shalt not murder, thou shalt not commit adultery, thou shalt not steal. Jealousy is there among you and evil makers are there among you? How can you apply the Torah?” Immediately the angels gave up.
In the debate between Moshe and the angels, Moshe wins, because he understands that the perfection of the angels is what makes the Torah impossible and irrelevant for them. Slavery, idolatry, jealousy and the desire for evil – all these are not part of their being; Precisely because of this they are not entitled to deal with the mitzvot and they are not entitled to try and be God’s partners in the creation.
Only those who stand with both feet in the earthly reality and accept that the chametz is part of our personality, will be able to deal with the Torah. Without recognition of our weaknesses and having a firm stand on our responsibility to decide the fundamental decisions that will shape his life, the Torah will become no less dangerous than freedom could be without the limitations of purification from the ‘hametz’.
Maybe this is the reason that the sacrifices in Shavuot are coming from chametz, to remind us of our vulnerability as human beings and our task to combine ‘chametz and matzah’ two elements that sustain our lives, the spiritual life and the fiscal life. Our task and purpose is that spiritual life will occupy major space and volume.
Shabbat Shalom,
Rabbi Refael Cohen