CHUKKAT THE RITUAL OF THE RED HEIFER
(and it’s what you do with it that counts)
Parsha Chukkat starts off with what seems to be, and in my mind is, a rather strange ritual. God tells Moses and Aaron to take a pure red cow which had never done any work and give it to Aaron’s son Eliezer. He is to take it outside the camp and have it slaughtered in his presence some the calf’s blood and sprinkle on the altar. He is then to have. Eliezer is to take the cow burned completely, in his sight (does this make him the first recorded mashgiach?) with certain additives to the fire. Eliezer, or any future
succeeding priest I s then impure, as is the person who did the actual burning. They must bathe and wash their garments and return to the camp but they are impure until evening. Someone else must then gather up the ashes and set them outside the camp and when they are mixed with water which becomes a purifying agent. It is to be splashed, on the third and seventh days, on anyone who becomes impure by contact with the dead and this will purify them.
This is indeed a strange sounding process, and perhaps its strangeness is fodder for another drash but I want to focus on the cow. Or really on the fact that it is a cow that is being used as the source of purification. Several weeks ago, about two years before in biblical narrative time, in Parshat KI Tissa we, read about the Chet HaEgel the sin of the golden calf. In this incident a calf was the focal point or instrument of Israel’s greatest sin, the act of faithlessness inherent in building a physical god (or manifestation of God). Here, in our episode, a cow is the source of purification. Rashi sees this oddity too and explains it with a parable that has the mother, a cow, having to clean up the defilement caused by her child, the calf.
What I am seeing here is that a cow whether young or adult can be the source of defilement or purification. The animal itself is neither good nor evil. It is of itself neutral, Good or evil, pure or defiled, is a function not of what it is but how it is used. I believe that this simple principle can be applied to so much of the world around us. Fire, for instance, can be used for heating our homes, cooking our food, providing light. Or in the case of Yom Tov or Shabbat candles symbolizing joy and Godliness. Fire can also, if mishandled either carelessly, accidentally of maliciously, be a source of terrible destruction injury or death.
I think the strongest and most compelling example of this neutrality until we decide how to use the object Is the spoken or written word. We can use words to instruct or edify. We can use words to express affection or approval. We can use words to heal the wounded heart. Thus the use of words can be an agent for good in many ways. But words can also be used to spread misinformation of outright lies. Words can be used the hurt or malign. Impropery chosen words can even exacerbate rather than relieve emotional pain. A number of years ago Rabbi Joseph Telushkin wrote a wonderful book called “Words the Hurt Words That Heal” I recommend it highly. One short sentence was attached to my refrigerator for many years until the paper deteriorate “Words have consequences”
My point is that we must choose wisely the manner in which we use the gifts we have been given. All acts, not only words, have consequences which must be carefully weighed before we act.
