I want to start this week's blog with a quick disclaimer: Last week's post was not meant to be taken seriously, it was Purim Torah, meaning humorous, satirical material appropriate to the holiday of Purim. Some people asked why I didn't clarify that somewhere in the post itself, and unfortunately that's just not how I operate. Personally, I feel that a joke is inherently ruined if you have to say, "this is a joke." So beware, folks, more Purim Torah may appear here from time to time, and no, I will not warn you ahead of time. I will include this type of explanation after the fact, but that's as far as I'll go. Thank you to everyone who commented on it; I'm glad some people found it funny! :-)
Sometimes you have to wonder if the Torah is ALSO dabbling in satire, but without offering an explicit disclaimer. The closest thing we get to outright mockery was last week's holiday story, the Book of Esther. It's filled with spoofs, slapstick, and silliness; yet even that story is taken by some to be serious, factual material. If people can't find King Achashverosh funny, what hope is there for the rest of the Bible?!? This week, we are celebrating one of four special Shabbatot leading into Passover, namely Shabbat Parah - the Shabbat of the Cow. As if the name isn't strange enough, the story we are marking is even stranger.
In the Book of Numbers, 19:1-20, we read about the ritual of the Red Heifer, the proverbial Brown Cow. This special cow was to be taken out of the Israelite camp, slaughtered, and burned to ashes. When people became ritually impure in Biblical times, the only way to become "pure" again was to have water mixed with heifer-ashes sprinkled on you. Obviously. And if the ritual
wasn't peculiar enough, every person involved in the slaughtering, burning, or handling of the ashes would become IMPURE for the rest of the day; so the purifying agent itself renders the user impure. This ritual is SO strange that the ancient rabbis imagined King Solomon himself, one of the wisest men in history, saying, "I have labored to understand the word of God and have understood it all, except for the ritual of the brown cow."
So what do we make of all this? We get so caught up in being dumbfounded by the specifics of this Ruddy Calf, we often forget to take a step back and think about it conceptually. Red Heifer? Sometimes it acts more like a Red Herring! One thing that the Burgundy Bovine teaches us is that faith is about acceptance, not understanding. In many ways, this ritual tests our devotion more than other, more famous, passages. It's isn't hard to believe in God when we read, "Love your neighbor as yourself." And most of us believe the challenging parts of the Torah, like "Eye for an Eye, Tooth for a Tooth," or "Whoever does work on the Sabbath shall be put to death," are opportunities for us to reinterpret law and evolve as a religion. But what do we do about the parts that are just weird? They don't offend us, but they also don't enrich our lives, or inspire us to action. Like fasting, waving a lulav and etrog, and some of our other peculiar rituals, some things we do because they make us feel Jewish. And in Biblical times, this was one of those things.
To me, the Red Heifer reminds us that we don't need to explain ourselves to anyone else. Yes,
being Jewish comes with some weird, wacky practices, but so what? Who ever said everything needs to be rational, logical, and low key? Certainly not the Bible! And even though we no longer have a Temple, I think the Torah is still speaking to us when talking about the Maroon Milking Machine. It's one part satire and one part challenge. It's showing us how we've evolved our tradition since then, while also demonstrating what people were willing to do to demonstrate their deep faith. We may not still have the ritual, but, asks the Torah, have we retained the sentiment? Which actions/customs/traditions do you observe that make you feel truly Jewish? Practices which make you feel connected to your ancestors... even as they embarrass you a little at the same time? Especially as we approach Passover, this is an interesting question for all of us to consider.
Sometimes we are swift to censure satire and silliness, simply because it isn't serious (say that five times fast...). But I can tell you from personal experience, humor is often very hard to write, and takes a great deal more ingenuity than most somber topics. Comedy is also intricately linked to culture and values. When learning a new language, one of the final indicators of true comprehension and proficiency is the ability to understand, and tell, jokes. Amidst all its peculiarity and irony, the Rosy Ruminator is still very much a part of what makes us Jews.
Photos in this blog post:
1. CC image courtesy of wotashot (taking a break) on Flickr
2. CC image courtesy of Olívia perdida na alemanha! :O) Lost in Germany ! on Flickr
3. CC image courtesy of Kristian D on Flickr
4. CC image courtesy of geraintandkim on Flickr
6. CC image courtesy of Thunderchild7 on Flickr
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