Our Biblical commentators have long been puzzled by the exact significance of the deaths of Nadav and Abihu,the sons of Aharon the Kohen Gadol. In Parshat Shemini they enter the sanctuary and offer an ‘unauthorised fire’, a sacrifice of incense (prayer) which causes them to be wholly consumed in a Divine fire.[1] The responses of Moshe Rabbeinu and Aharon Ha Kohen Gadol are ambiguous and defy the ingenuity of our greatest scholars as they balance off interpretations that either condemn these two kohanim as rebellious criminals or extol them as saints of the highest order.[2]
I side with those commentators who (like the Sfas Emes and the Chatam Sofer) see these two as “saints” rather than “sinners”. Those who support the good name of Nadav and Abihu were also championed (in the mid thirteenth century) by R’Avraham ben Ha Rambam in his “Kifaya” when he writes:
Our Sages have blamed the deaths of Nadav and Avihu—[eternal] peace be upon them—on an element of pride (Vayikra Rabbah 20:10). Many misguided people take this statement superficially,as they take the other comments about them in the Midrash, thinking that they were extremely arrogant. [However,to believe this] about such great men is unacceptable...Nadav and Abihu were among the first annointed and among the greatest of prophets...Therefore to criticize them is a terrible sin...The bottom line,though, is that the cause of their problem was that they deviated slightly from humility.[3]
The account of the death of these two tzaddikim is immediately followed in the Torah by an admonition against inebriation during liturgical worship, and this has led some commentators to accuse Nadav and Abihu of being drunk on alcohol. The idea that they were intoxicated with the love of God rather than drink, but made a misjudgement in their zeal might reconcile the texual difficulties concerning the immolation of these two in the divine fire. For them, such a death was a blessing. The fire that consumed them has also been seen as a sacrifical fire of mystical union, and not a punishment.
The
complex arguments on each side are convoluted and beyond the scope of this chapter, but as you might expect, I see them as pioneer Mitkarevim
who wished to ‘draw near’ to the Divine
in a way which was beyond acceptability in their historical time-period.
For me, their immolation resembles more
the Fiery Chariot of Eliyahu that bore the prophet to full union with the Divine than
it might represent a particularly
fierce and almost vindictive Divine punishment. To me it is very much a Sufic ‘fana’
event. R´Hayim ibn Attar writes in
his Ohr Ha Chayim:
“They came
close to G‑d and died” (Vayikra 16:1)—they approached the supernal light
out of their great love of the Holy, and thereby died. Thus they died by a
“Divine kiss” such as that experienced by the perfectly righteous. The righteous die when the Divine kiss
approaches them, whereas they died by their approaching it... Although
they sensed their own demise, this did not prevent them from drawing near to G‑d
in attachment, delight, delectability, fellowship, love, kissing, and
sweetness, to the point that their souls passed from them.[4]
Some of
us share their impulse, and many of us are most definitely aware of a call to
be ‘near’ G-d which does not elevate us over others; does not lead us into
power-games with the spiritual world; and which is not an escape from
community—but an expression of profound involvement in its mission.
Such contemplatives have the single-mindedness
which is expressed in the cry:
One thing do
I ask of the Lord, and only that shall I seek: To dwell in the house of The
Lord all the days of my life, to behold G-d’s beauty, and to meditate in His
Sanctuary.[5]
All contemplative
Jews aspire to this, but a Dedicated Jewish Contemplative is a Jew with
a single-mindedness to devote every moment of their existence to the practice
of such nearness. Not as a form of self-perfecting asceticism, but as act
of religious community service; a sacrifice of prayer and devotion which
envelops all creation. It is not an
escape from society or responsibility. It is an embrace.
I have
not seen this better expressed than in the following passage from the writings
of Rav Kook:
Whoever feels within himself, after many trials,
that his inner being can find peace only in pursuing the secret teachings of
the Torah must know with certainty that it is for this that he was created.
Let him not be troubled by any impediments in the
world, whether physical or spiritual, from hastening after what is the essence
of his life and his true perfection. He
may assume that it is not only his own perfection and deliverance that hinges
on the improvement of his character, but also the deliverance of the community
and the perfection of the world. [6]
I would go further
than Rav Kook, and state that to discourage the minority of Jews who wish to
live like this from doing so— might actually be preventing the light of
the tzaddikim from reaching
all the nooks and crannies it is
intended to reach. The responsibilities
of the contemplative (and of the full-time yeshiva and kollel
student) are as necessary and as valuable as are the more pragmatic or more
easily quantified aspects of Jewish societal philanthropy and inter-personal tzedakah.
Putting
this in a nutshell, I am saying that if an intentionally dedicated Jewish Contemplative -a mitkarev- (or
any contemplative Jew) wants to be one of G-d’s ‘nearest and dearest’ practitioners of
Justice and Good Deeds, the most direct path for them is
to focus exclusively on becoming ‘near’ to G-d.
(From “The Mitkarevim: Jewish Contemplatives and the Return of Prophecy”)
©Nachman
Davies
Tzfat
2022
[1]
Vayikra 10
[2] The almost endless (if largely negative) opinions on the incident are catalogued here: https://aish.com/48923142/and there is a stimulating set of essays on the subject at "thetorah.com": see https://www.thetorah.com/article/how-god-was-sanctified-through-nadav-and-avihus-death and https://www.thetorah.com/article/the-incident-of-nadav-and-avihu A remarkably positive and highly recommended discussion is to be found at https://www.nitzotzos.com/post/parshas-shmini-consumed-by-a-strange-fire?fbclid=IwAR3x4bKr5twJOcXEXWZ_rven8yf10TpCLwyWzfmV-Qbsx8R5kedZRVDlBKA
[3] Translated by R’Ýaakov Wincelberg in The Guide to Serving G-d’, R' Avraham ben HaRambam, p115-117 ( Feldheim Jerusalem/New York, 2008)
[4]
Ohr Ha Chayim commentary on Vayikra
16:1
[5] Tehillim 27:4
[6] Orot
Hakodesh vol 1, pp. 88-89 as translated by Ben Zion Bokser in ‘Abraham
Isaac Kook: Essential Writings’ pp. 201-203 (
Paulist Press, Mahwah,New Jersey,1978)
