Parshas Shemini: Choose Kosher Living - Choose Life!

Our Torah portion this week, Shemini: Vayikra (Leviticus)  9:1-11:47, includes the Laws of Kashrut, the guidelines for what we eat and how we eat. The portion delves into purity and impurity, and what actions cause a person to be made impure physically or spiritually, what restrictions apply during the time of impurity, and how a person can be cleansed from their impurity. The portion also relates the untimely deaths of Aaron's two sons, Nadab and Abihu. Wishing to bring incense offerings to God, the brothers enter the purified sanctuary without permission, a well intentioned though unholy action that triggers a Divine firestorm, engulfing them in flames.

Actions that cause impurity mentioned in Parshas Shemini are eating in violation of the laws of Kashrut and handling dead animals. More actions are referenced in other places in Torah, for example, in Leviticus chapters 13 and 14 about mold and mildew exposure, and in Numbers chapter 19, concerning impurity and separation from God and community that result from touching a dead human body. Repentance, ritual sacrifice, and immersion in a Mikveh are three methods suggested in Torah to restore one's purity, the choice of which depends upon the action that causes the impurity.

Regarding kosher laws, the first dietary guideline in Torah bans eating meat that is taken from a live animal. This rule appears in Genesis 9:4: “But meat, with its soul [which is in] its blood you shall not eat.” This refers to the common practice back then of cutting off a food animal's leg for today's dinner, cauterizing the wound and letting the animal suffer until another leg is cut off for tomorrow's dinner, etc.

Volumes have been written about the reasons for Torah's rules about what animal protein to eat, what animal protein not to eat, the way in which animals are slaughtered, the preparation and combinations of foods, and the containers and utensils that hold and handle them. Opinions vary from, "Just follow the rules and don't ask why because God knows what is best for us," to scientific and cultural explanations for optimum digestive function, avoidance of disease, mercy for animals, and deriving maximum spiritual benefit from food.

The multi-dimensional focus on kosher eating and living in Jewish culture goes back many generations. The word kosher actually means clean, proper or fitting. Kosher eating supports the formation of kosher living in all areas of life such as ethical guidelines in business, social engagement and family relations. However, when adherence to dietary practice rests on spiritual pride or compulsive rule following rather than humility and a desire for clean living beyond the kitchen, it has little positive effect on life or consciousness.

This explains people who follow what they consider to be clean dietary practices yet fail to recognize the dirty business of child sacrifice. For example, abortion supporters often include vegans who won't eat meat because they consider doing so murderous, or yoga practitioners seeking peaceful bliss while finding virtue in depopulation policies based on abortion homicide and community destruction. Mercy and empathy for pain capable human beings in the womb isn't operative. Recognition of the harm women and men suffer from the irreversible act of destroying their own children isn't expressed. Abortion businesses that manipulate, deceive and kill for profit continue receiving donations.

Our Haftarah portion this week, Shmuel II (Samuel) 6:1-19, relates a similar story to that of Nadab and Abihu. In this narrative, Uzzah takes an action well intentioned though unholy and dies for it. David oversees the delicate task of transporting the Ark of the Covenant from the house of Avinada to Jerusalem. Along the way, the oxen hauling the precious cargo stumble. Despite warnings earlier in the Bible in Numbers 4:15 that touching any holy article brings immediate death, Uzzah steadies the Ark with his hands. He expires on the spot!

Uzzah, Nadab and Abihu disregard God’s instructions and do what is right in their own minds. What could possibly be wrong in worshipping God and steadying a sanctified object?  Nothing, except that these particular ways of doing so come from their own minds, thoughts that ignore holy instructions and warnings given to them by God.

A susceptibility for reasoned thinking divorced from holiness continues to plague human society. In a different but similar way, abortion supporters find virtue in unholy acts that seem right to them. What could possibly be wrong with helping women, saving children from poverty and abuse, and avoiding over population? Everything, because these actions defy God's words in Torah that tell us to 'choose life,' and help the unwanted and orphan survive and thrive, and specifically prohibit sacrificing children for any seemingly 'worthy' cause.

All human beings have one Father in Heaven who loves each of His children, no matter the circumstances of our conception or social status. The demise of millions of babies around our world every year produces a serious soul sickness felt by everyone but acknowledged by only a few. For Jews, this attack on innocent human life is made worse by the halachic prohibition against tearing apart or mutilating a human body. It's all too horrific to contemplate, and yet this gruesome practice finds favor among too many misinformed Jews and many non-Jews, too. 

Mercifully, anyone who suffers the after effects of supporting or engaging in these senseless attacks on unborn babies can return to a place of purity and covenant with God and community. In Judaism, much latitude is given when a person's moral failings are caused by lack of access to the truth and vulnerability to lies. In the midst of ignorance born of prideful conceit or overwhelming peer pressure, many times it is only the pain of our actions that opens us up to a loving example of God's reality and mercy. Our healing program, Tikvat Rachel, offers hope and healing to Jewish women and men who suffer after abortion. We feel blessed to have this program, and our educational resources and referral services for pregnancy care, as we champion kosher living beyond the kitchen.

Please share this post on your social media to amplify our message in this troubled world. Thank you.

Cecily Routman

May there be abundant peace from Heaven, and good life upon us and upon all Israel. Amen.

Cecily Routman is the founder and president of the Jewish Pro-Life Foundation. She opposes abortion homicide in general and among Jews in particular and laments secular policy making in Israel that results in loss of Jewish life and delays the messianic redemption. She envisions a Torah based holy Land of Israel and a world that respects the life of every human being from conception.