Our Torah readings at this time of year from Leviticus (Vayikra) deal with sickness and health, both spiritual and physical. Secular scholars are quick to make a simplistic glib comparison by equating the priest to the doctor. Thus were medicine and religion inter-related and connected albeit in a confusing and indeed ignorant way.
Today however, we sophisticates have over-corrected by going to the other extreme. With our increased knowledge of science we have wholly divorced medicine from religion. We’ve reached a state of affairs where not only are science and religion separated from each other, they are considered “incompatible.” Our attitude as moderns relegates the two disciplines as separate – even if equal – considering their “irreconcilable differences.”
This attitude is symptomatic of a contemporary condition; a conceit that compels us to compartmentalize.
We pride ourselves in living in an age of specialization. The field of medicine in particular is a prime example of this trend. In our day we see the trend of specialization, compartmentalization, and departmentalization via denomination shape, indeed define our religion as well.
Let me cite a story attributed to the Packers (which I’m told is the religion of many of our Wisconsin readers) to make a point. A big game was coming up and the team needed a little extra moral support; a spiritual lift. The coach called the head office to send for the chaplain. The head office was quick to help. “No problem, coach. But which chaplain should we send? The offensive or defensive chaplain.”
When this trend goes that far in our fields of science and religion it does indeed become offensive. And there’s no defense for it.
Let me use football once again as an illustration. I see our education and acculturation process very much like giving binoculars to the fan watching the game from the stands. From a distance he can now pick out the most minute details of the grass on the 50-yard line. But while doing so, he becomes oblivious to the overall game.
And this, my friends, is the point of our Torah readings during these weeks. They consciously combine, integrate and synthesize the overlapping and varied functions of the priest. He is at once deeply spiritual, powerfully religious, and highly skilled in ministrations that would be multi-classified today under biological, medicinal and scientific headings.
Our Torah, when we take time to study it seriously, holds up the priest as a paradigm for all of us. The kohein of our Torah reading is not an anachronistic figure; an exotic relic of history; a primitive prototype of “witch” doctor from our peoples’ past.
No, the kohein of our parsha is a symbol par excellence of synthesis, integrating in harmonious and holistic fashion science with spirituality; medicine with religion.
He is a forerunner to Maimonides, Judaism’s most distinguished Rabbi and prominent physician.
Would that all Jews in our day and age, of any gender, type or denomination, be so inspired as to emulate our kohein who embodies the creative combination of science and spirit and breaks out of the boxes and boundaries of our compartmentalized lives.
We would be well on our way to become “Mamlekhet Kohamim Vegoy Kadosh – A Kingdom of Priests and a Holy People.” (Exodus: XIX – 6)
Loading ...