Today we continue with lessons from Parashat Para.
Once again, Para Aduma, the Red Heifer, is a Mitzvah that is called a חוק/Chok- a Mitzvah that we don’t understand; that doesn’t make any sense to us. Para is called זאת חקת התורה- it is the quintessential Chok, because even the smartest of men could not understand it; It has contradictory concepts. A man that is pure is involved in the process, and becomes contaminated; and the man that was contaminated becomes pure. We can’t understand how this process works.
What is the purpose of this? To purify oneself from the contamination of the dead. If a person goes to a funeral or a cemetery, and they come in to contact with the dead, or they are in a room with the dead, they now have this tumah/contamination on them. Obviously, we can’t explain with the human intellect, how this tumah comes, how it goes or how it works. As we said, it really is a Chok.
But, nonetheless, there is a lesson here for us, with a beautiful thought from a Rabbi called the Esh Daat.
He asks what causes the contamination of the dead. Was it pneumonia or Covid? No. He takes it all the way back to the original sin of man: Adam and Chava ate from the Etz HaDaat ( Tree of Knowledge) and that is what killed man. Death was not created in a laboratory in Wuhan, it was created in a laboratory in Gan Eden. What is the contamination of death? Adam and Chava were told not to eat from that tree, but their holy instincts told them it was good for them. And they were right. As the Arizal says, the Etz HaDaat was a wonderful thing. They just had to wait until Shabbat to eat from it. They ate from it too early. They made a mistake. They trusted their holy, human instincts over the Will of G-d. They thought they were smarter, and that they knew better. The Esh Daat says that the contamination, the source of the disease is “I know better.” That’s the name of the disease. When a person comes into a room with a dead body, they are contaminated with the disease known as, “I know better.”
So how does one purify oneself from that disease? By going through a process that is not understood, by waving the white flag and saying, “I don’t know anything. I am limited in my abilities. I have to trust G-d with his Mitzvot, and I have to trust G-d in how He runs the world. I don’t understand.” That is the way one purifies oneself from the contamination of death.
This is our yearly reminder of this lesson, from the Para Aduma.
Furthermore, Rashi tells us that a Para is a cow. The cow comes to atone for the sin of the Golden Calf.The cow is the mother of the calf. What is the connection? The sin of the Golden Calf was similar. Moshe Rabbenu disappeared, and the people wanted to take religion into their own hands. They thought they needed a leader, an emissary. And even though G-d said not to make any molten images, they took religion into their own hands. They thought they knew better. And again, they brought death into the world, and again we needed to go through the same purification process. That is man’s mistake throughout history. He thinks he knows better. That is the contamination, and that is what we have to fix.
In his Sefer Moed L’Kol Chai, Rav Chaim Palaggi ( chapter 31, letter 102) says that we have to do what we can for Parashat Para, to be as pure as possible. Firstly, men that normally don’t go to the Mikveh should go this afternoon. Furthermore, he quotes the Sefer Maaseh Sedaka which says that Para Aduma is forever. How? We can read about it. But what action can we do to connect ourselves to this Mitzvah?
להפריש איש איש כפי יכולתו לצדקה
By a person separating money for Sedaka
יתר על שאר הימים
More than what he normally gives on a regular day.
ואין דבר המטהר את האדם מן הקליפות
שהם אבי אבות הטומאה דרגא דמותא
There is nothing that purifies a person from the negative forces, which is the grandfather of all tumah, on the same level as death, like Sedaka.
Sedaka is a powerful, cleansing tool. He goes on and asks about a person who has sins- how can he start or do anything if he’s contaminated?
אין עבירה מכבה מצות הצדקה
Sins do not put out the Mitzvah of Sedaka. Sedaka is powerful- as powerful as Torah. That’s what one should do on Erev Parashat Para.
If we don’t have the Para Aduma, at least we can give Sedaka, which is the most powerful purification process.
And, once again, a reminder: We have an opportunity for you- to give money to Lev Chana, an organization that gives clothing cards to people in need.
You can either:
1- click on the link,
https://www.rayze.it/levchana/
2-send a Quickpay to Rabbisutton@gmail.com (the name of a congregation will pop up)
3- send a check to Lev Chana
In care of Rabbi Sutton
1059 East 10th Street
Brooklyn NY 11230
4-If you give to the JCF, the legal name is Cong. Keren Hachesed of Adath Aron V'Israel
Lev Chana of Long Keren Hachesed
The tax ID # is 113-05-2112
Please help. We are getting there but we haven’t reached our goal yet.
Shabbat Shalom.