Chukat-Balak

This is the d’var Torah I delivered on Friday, June 26, at Congregation Neveh Shalom.

There is something deeply human about wanting an explanation. We like categories. We like certainty. We like being able to answer the question, “Why?”

But Parshat Chukat begins with a mitzvah that refuses to offer one. “Zot chukat haTorah.” This is the decree of the Torah. The red heifer is Judaism’s ultimate mystery. It purifies the impure while simultaneously rendering those who perform the ritual temporarily impure. It doesn’t fit neatly into our logic. Even our greatest sages admitted they could not fully explain it.

Perhaps the Torah is teaching us something profound before it teaches us anything else: Not everything holy has to make complete sense to us. Our tradition is built not only on understanding, but on humility. There are realities that invite us to stop trying to explain and instead begin by honoring.

As we celebrate Pride Month, I find myself returning to this idea. For generations, LGBTQIA+ Jews have been asked to explain themselves. To justify who they are. To answer questions that many of us would never think to ask of someone else.

Chukat offers a different posture. What if our first response to another person’s identity wasn’t, “Help me understand”? What if it were, “Help me honor the holiness before me”? The Torah repeatedly reminds us that every human being is created b’tzelem Elohim, in the image of God. That truth doesn’t depend on whether I fully understand another person’s experience. It depends on my willingness to recognize God’s image reflected in them.

Ironically, Chukat is often described as the portion that teaches us the limits of certainty. That may be one of the greatest spiritual gifts we can receive, because love does not require complete understanding. Respect does not require complete understanding. Dignity does not require complete understanding. Sometimes faith asks us to embrace mystery, not because mystery is frightening, but because mystery is where God so often dwells.

Our charge this week is to practice holy humility. To resist the temptation to categorize every person we meet. To honor the sacred complexity of each soul. And to remember that the most faithful response to another human being is not always explanation. Sometimes it is simply blessing.

The scene in Fiddler on the Roof where Tevye and the rest of the town sing about tradition really resonates with me, but not for the reasons you might think. While I often accept tradition as the “why” for what we do as a Jewish people, I also question it. For me, this song always had a certain tongue-in-cheek element, satirizing a much bigger moment of “why.”

As Jews, so much of what we do falls under the “we do this because we’ve always done this” reasoning. In large measure, that’s true, but the ways in which we question and then change those traditions are also distinctly Jewish. Consider the example that, for many decades now, we have had women as clergy.

This week we read a double parshah, Parshat Chukat–Balak, which is full of plot twists and new experiences for the Israelites. In both of these stories, we see the Israelite people nervous about what comes next and concerned about what they are responsible for. The lands of Sichon and Og are conquered, both Miriam and Aaron die, and we learn that Moshe will not be allowed to enter into the land of Israel. Chukat details the significance of a month of mourning, with a focus on the passing of Miriam and Aaron. Balak asks us to examine our preconceived notions when we view others. And together, they teach us about transition.

Why is there this focus on processing death? Why is transition a necessary part of tradition? It’s partly because in this week’s double portion, the Israelites expose their grief, and God prescribes a way to deal with this loss and move forward. It’s the most human of emotions, with a very human way of responding attached to it. The Torah tells us that when someone dies, we have concrete actions to take. It’s a series of steps: do this, then do this, then do this. The Talmud continues this instruction by adding more specific laws to shiva, the first seven days of mourning, sheloshim, the first 30 days, and then the entire year.

The crux of each of these texts is how we respond to change, and specifically loss. The Jewish traditions of mourning we still practice today originate right here. To be honest, transition isn’t easy for me, and it’s these traditions that are why I love Judaism.