PERFECTION? DESTROY THAT NOTION!

Parashat Chukkat

Tammuz 9, 5785 / July 4-5, 2025

Torah: Numbers 19:1 - 22:1

Haftarah: Judges 11:1-33

---------------------------------

This d’var torah is offered for a refuah shleimah for the hostages.

This d’var torah is offered for a refuah shleimah for the wounded and injured.

-------------------------------------------

Lunch and Learn meets Mondays at 12:30 PM on Zoom and Facebook Live. 

On July 7, we'll be at Ein Ya'akov Yevamot, p. 39 (BT Yevamot 49b) - 

 '... תניא בן עזאי אומר' - "We are taught that Ben Azai says..."

Ein Ya'akov (Glick edition) is available for on-line reading or as a downloadable PDF at:

https://hebrewbooks.org/9630 
A pointed Hebrew text version with different pagination is available at Sefaria: 
https://www.sefaria.org/Ein_Yaakov?tab=contents  
---------------------------------------------------------------------- 
Check out our wonderful community, and get lots of info about our various programs and becoming a Member at: https://bnaihayim.org/ 
----------------------------------------------------------------
Please feel free to pass this on to a friend, and please cite the source.

------------------------------------------------------ 

PERFECTION? DESTROY THAT NOTION!

And the Lord spoke to Moses and to Aaron, saying, "This is the ritual law which the Lord has commanded, saying, ‘Speak to the Children of Israel, that they bring you a red heifer without spot, which has no blemish, and upon which there has never been a yoke.'" Numbers 19:1-2

How could the slaughter of a perfect red heifer, and the scattering of its ashes on someone who is ritually impure, make that person ritually pure? How does the ritual of the red heifer actually function? And, what does it mean for us today?

I have read many attempts at rationalizing this ritual; I am not about to try to formulate my own explanation. Rabbi Harold Kushner, z’l, in Chumash Etz Hayim, suggests the following, from a modern commentator whom he does not name. He says that the ritual serves a vital psychological purpose. For one who is burdened by a sense of wrongdoing, who feels spiritually impure, we offer up to God a perfect animal, as if to say that perfection has no place in this world - it cannot exist in this world.

What a relief! Let's expand on that. We know intuitively that we are not perfect, and that we cannot become so. (And we have all sorts of not nice ways to describe someone who thinks they are perfect!) But we also know that very often we try or are pressured to achieve perfection. When we fall short of that impossible goal, when we feel impure and guilty, we can offer up, we can sacrifice the very idea that we can be perfect. We can destroy that notion, take up the ashes and scatter them, and re-establish our sense of wellbeing.

Note also: We all too often expect perfection from others. We need to smash that notion as well. For when we demand perfection from others, it is so damaging that it could be understood as a sign that we really want to have no relationship with them at all. (Note: in this parashah, Moses is punished for demanding too much of the Israelites) And when someone demands it of us, we must call them out.

It is true that we are instructed to emulate God, by feeding the hungry, and clothing the naked, and by trying to perfect (better I should say "improve") the world. Although we cannot be perfect, we have the ability and the obligation to strive to be better, to be the best that we can be. Don't let perfection be the enemy of the good.

Shabbat Shalom! And have a meaningful and thought-provoking Independence Day.

Rabbi Richard A. Flom, Rabbi Emeritus

Temple B'nai Hayim

.הוּא הָיָה אוֹמֵר, לֹא עָלֶיךָ הַמְּלָאכָה לִגְמֹר, וְלֹא אַתָּה בֶן חוֹרִין לִבָּטֵל מִמֶּנָּה

He [Rabbi Tarfon] used to say: It is not your duty to finish the work, but neither are you at liberty to neglect it. Pirkei Avot 2:16

---------------------------------------------------------

My weekly divrei torah are available through free subscription to the Cyber Torah e-mail list. No salesman will call! Cyber Torah list management:

To subscribe to Cyber Torah, send an e-mail from the receiving address to: ravflom@sbcglobal.net with the heading “Subscribe Cyber Torah”.

To unsubscribe from Cyber Torah, send an e-mail from the receiving address to: ravflom@sbcglobal.net with the heading “Unsubscribe Cyber Torah”.

To dedicate a Cyber Torah in honor of a simchah in memory of a loved one or for a refuah shleimah, send an e-mail to: ravflom@sbcglobal.net with the heading “Dedicate Cyber Torah” and provide details in the message body.