Daily Talk

Whole Before the Fire

The Torah counts one hundred and forty ways a body can bar a priest from the altar, down to one ear that differs from the other. And then, in the very next chapter, it rules that a stranger who lights the lamps of the menorah has done nothing wrong at all. Between the blemished priest, the stranger at the flame, and the blemished offering, these chapters ask one question: what must be whole at the center, and what becomes of the one who is not.