Parsha Acharei Mot (Leviticus 16-18)

The Scapegoat

"The goat will bear upon itself all their iniquities..."
(Leviticus 16:22)

Our Parsha begins with the discussion of one of the most perplexing ceremonies in the Torah; the offering of a "scapegoat" to atone for our sins - the goat that is pushed over the cliff on the Day of Atonement and carries away all the sins of the Jewish people on its back.

Maimonides tells us that the "scapegoat":

...[Has the capacity to] atone for all the sins in the Torah, whether they be light or grave, whether the transgression was committed unintentionally or with deliberation, whether the sin is known to the perpetrator or whether it is not ... (Laws of Repentance 1:2)

By way of explanation the Midrash offers the following idea:

This goat [the scapegoat, called sair in Hebrew] refers to Esau, as it is written: "but my brother Esau is a hairy [written as soir in Hebrew] man" (Genesis 27:11) [The Hebrew words sair, "goat," and soir, "hairy" are spelled identically.]

[It is further written]: "The goat will bear upon itself all their inequities (avonotam)." In Hebrew the word avonotam can be split into two words avonot tam, meaning "the inequities of the innocent." This is a reference to Jacob about whom it is written: "Jacob was a wholesome (tam) man" (Genesis 25:27). The word tam in Hebrew means wholesome or innocent. (Bereishis Rabba 65:15)

The scapegoat represents Esau, and the Midrash suggests that this explains how it works; the sins committed by Israel are somehow traceable back to Jacob, as we are all his descendants. Jacob's sins can somehow be blamed on Esau, and therefore it makes sense that the goat, which represents Esau, carries away all of Israel's sins. Is there any way we can bring these seemingly strange concepts a little closer to earth?

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HUMAN SCAPEGOATS

This week's Torah portion opens with an incident involving human deaths that is reminiscent of the scapegoat concept:

"God spoke to Moses after the death of Aaron's two sons, who brought an [unauthorized] offering before God and they died." (Leviticus 16:1)

As we might recall from Parshat Shmini (Leviticus, Chap. 10) Aaron's sons were consumed by fire when they entered the Holy of Holies unbidden in an attempt to bring an unauthorized incense offering.

Moses offered Aaron the following words of consolation:

"Of this did God speak, saying: 'I will be sanctified through those who are nearest Me, thus I will be honored before the entire people.' And Aaron was silent." (Leviticus 10:3)

The Talmud interprets the meaning of this verse with the help of a Midrash:

Moses told Aaron: "Aaron, my brother, I knew that the Temple would be sanctified through someone very holy and close to God. I thought it had to be either you or me ... but now I see that they, Nadav and Avihu, are greater than we are [as they were selected]." (Talmud, Zevochim 115b)

Moses consoles Aaron with the thought that the deaths of Aaron's two sons were required to sanctify the Temple. Apparently two of the holiest Jews alive had to die in order for the Temple to be properly sanctified. Moses thought that he and Aaron would be selected, and he was somewhat surprised when Aaron's two sons were chosen instead. If so, Nadav and Avihu were also scapegoats of a sort; their deaths were required to inaugurate the Temple for the rest of us.

Although bringing the unauthorized incense is explicitly stated as the reason for their deaths, the Talmud is suggesting that it was not the ultimate reason. While Nadav and Avihu would not have died had they done nothing wrong, the punishment of their sin took into account the fact that their deaths would have secondary effect; there was something still missing in the Temple and their deaths were needed to supply the missing factor.

How can people's deaths do that? What was missing? Doesn't the Torah abhor the very idea of human sacrifice?!

The scapegoat concept is integral to atonement. To understand it better, we must understand atonement better. Atonement is the conclusion of a long process that begins with repentance. To understand atonement better we must do a little work on repentance first.

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REPENTANCE AS A PROCESS

Atonement is conditional upon repentance, and repentance has definite rules. At the very beginning of the Laws of Repentance, when he is discussing the rules of repentance, Maimonides explains that repentance requires confession, and that confession contains three elements:
Admitting to having committed the sin.
Expressing sincere regret for having committed it.
Making a firm commitment never to do it again.

Without a confession that contains all these elements, complete atonement is impossible to attain no matter how sincere the sinner may be in his heart concerning his or her repentance.
Maimondes discusses the issue of repentance specifically in the context of the Day of Atonement in the second Chapter (ibid.):

The Day of Atonement, Yom Kippur, is a time of repentance for everyone - for the individual as well as the congregation. It marks the final stage of forgiveness and pardon for Israel and therefore, everyone is commanded to repent and confess on Yom Kippur ... The confession that Israel has adopted to say on Yom Kippur is: But we have sinned, and this is the essence of confession. (Laws of Repentance 2:7-8)

It is perplexing to note that two of the three elements Maimonides himself earlier stressed as being essential requirements of confession are missing from the Yom Kippur confession he cites - the expression of regret over having sinned, and the commitment never to repeat the sin. If Israel as a nation adopts a standard form confession to recite in order to fulfill the repentance requirement of the day of Atonement and incorporates it into the public prayer all Jews are told to recite, how is it possible that the more important aspects of confession are missing from it?

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WHY CONFESS?

Let us begin by attempting to understand the role confession plays in the repentance process. We Jews do not confess our sins to a priest who is empowered to give us absolution. Given that repentance really takes place in the heart, what possible role does confession play in it?

Repentance is based on change. A person's actions reflect his beliefs, his character and his personality. Repentance is about changing one or all of the above: If we would enunciate the penitent's claim to forgiveness it would probably sound something like this, "I am no longer the person who committed the sin. I have changed, and the sin I committed no longer expresses the person I am. I look back at the person who committed the sin, and I no longer recognize myself in him or her. Since the new 'me' cannot be identified with the sin it isn't fair to punish me."

When this statement reflects the inner actuality of the speaker, God accepts it and takes note of the change. Since the person has changed, and the sin no longer reflects his character and personality, it is irrational to hold the person of today morally responsible and liable for the acts of a person who no longer exists; God duly pardons the sin.

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THE PROCESS OF CHANGE

Unlike God, we humans are unable to see into people's hearts; we can only see each other's deeds; we are therefore unable to factor repentance effectively into human justice systems. But most of us do appreciate the rationale of linking repentance to forgiveness. We generally agree that the essence of a person is character, and when there is a profound character change in someone, we are dealing with a brand new person. Most of us can relate to the principle of atonement - if a sinner becomes a genuinely different person from who he was when he or she committed the sin we can all see the justice of excusing him or her from having to suffer the consequences.

In effect then, repentance involves the shedding of old character traits. We are unable to alter our height, our I.Q., or our age, but we are able to change our characters. When we repent we are changing our inner furniture, leaving only the outer shell intact. In the view of most of us, such a change makes us another person entirely.

We cannot shed our character traits without tinkering with the innermost core of our beings, throwing out parts of the old operating system that was in charge of directing the drives and motivations that prompted us to sin. To step away from our old selves we need to shed these old motivators like a snake sloughs off his worn out layer of skin and emerge with a brand new operating system that drives us toward the good.

Speech is the only method at our disposal for externalizing our inner selves. It is through the medium of speech that we express the feelings in our hearts and the thoughts in our minds. When they are expressed they become part of the outer world in a sense. Verbalizing our feelings of repentance by confessing the sins we have committed is our way of discarding old thoughts and attitudes; we eject the feelings that prompted the commission of our sins by speaking them out; we symbolically throw them out of our inner environment wrapped in the packages of our words.

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THE DIFFICULTY OF CHANGE

Change is difficult. We often regret our actions as soon as we complete them, but rarely do we succeed in really changing ourselves. Most often we repeat our past mistakes and regret them each time all over again. The third requirement of repentance, the resolution 'never to do this again' is the sticking point that generally defeats our sincere desire to become better people. As everyone who owns a computer knows, when there is something basically wrong with your operating system you are in big trouble. We need serious help to change. This is where the Day of Atonement comes in.

Let us attempt to trace how Yom Kippur operates by looking at the Temple service and applying the spiritual symbols to the individual Jewish heart.

On Yom Kippur, the High Priest entered the Holy of Holies, and performed precisely the same act that caused the deaths of Aaron's sons. We are reminded at the very outset:
"And God said to Moses: Speak to Aaron your brother - he shall not come at all times into the Sanctuary (the Holy of Holies) within the curtain, in front of the cover that is on the Ark, so that he should not die; for in a cloud will I appear on the Ark-cover." (Leviticus 16:2)

Rashi explains:

Why did God couple the death of Aaron's sons with the commandment restricting Aaron's entry into the Holy of Holies? Rabbi Elazar ben Azariah compared this to a sick person who had to be cautioned not to eat cold food or sleep in a damp place. One doctor merely gave him the instructions without elaboration, but a second doctor told him, "Unless you avoid cold food and damp places, you will die as so-and-so died." Clearly the second doctor's warning was more effective. (Sifra)

The first part of this week's Torah portion is devoted to
describing the special conditions that are required to
render Aaron's annual entry into the Holy of Holies safe.