Tzav: Elevating our Life to God's Love

Tzav continues detailing the offerings to be brought to the Creator in order to be close to Him. We have mentioned (see our commentaries on Parshat Tzav: “Keeping the Fire up” on March 23, 2010 and “The Permanent Fire of Divine Love” on March 13, 2011 in this blog) that in this process three parties are involved: the one who brings the offering, the priest and God, and the purpose is to unify all three.

We realize this union by integrating in our consciousness the Creator through His ways and attributes, which are His love for His creation. After all, He is beyond our comprehension and our only way to “know” Him is through His creation, and His ways to direct it and sustain it. We realize this knowledge through the awareness of our connection with God, and the high priest represents this awareness.

Our offerings are all the traits and qualities in our consciousness (which encompass all aspects of life given to us by the Creator) to lift them up to serve Him through His ways and attributes, and we do that through love as our common bond with Him.

Let's reflect on the wise words of Maimonides (the Rambam) regarding the offerings.

“The location of the altar is very exactly defined, and is never to be changed. It is a commonly held tradition that the place where [king] David and [king] Solomon built the altar on the threshing floor of Arona, is the very place where Abraham built an altar and bound Isaac upon it; this is where Noah built [an altar] when he came out from the ark; this is where Cain and Abel brought their offerings; this is where Adam, the First Man, offered a korban when he was created, and from [the earth of] this place he was created. Thus the sages have said: 'Man was formed from the place of his atonement'.” (Mishneh Torah, Laws of the Holy Temple, chapter II)

Our life and all that it encompasses are the offerings, the place is our consciousness through which we are aware of our Creator, and we have said that atonement is the transforming process from unawareness and separation from Him to the certainty that we are united with Him. This transformation takes place through divine fire, which is the love of God.

Analogically, the process is similar to the effect of fire as a catalyst to transmute one state of matter into another for a specific purpose. In this sense, a high fever has the potential to transmute a physical condition for better or worse, but seen in another way we can say that a cloud has a silver lining.

The priest lights up the fire as our ardent love to join the Creator, who also provides His fire for us. The process of elevating our life to Him indeed implies atonement as the means to purify all aspects of consciousness in order to turn them into the empty vessels that the Creator fills with His ways and attributes.

Then we have two catalysts: the priest as the permanent awareness of our connection to God's love, and our love as the essence that yearns to be close to Him. This is how the offerings are sublimated to the Creator. 

Adam, the first man, had it more clear than us because he was alone with the Creator and realized easier his connection with Him. Cain and Abel realized it through their individual experiences in the material word. Abel did it through a higher awareness of the Divine Presence in His creation; while Cain did it through what his ego, senses and instincts led him to experience.

Cain and Abel represent the divided and opposed, dual, fractured consciousness as a result of Adam's transgression. Abel's offerings were preferred because he elevated all the potential goodness in the material world for the service of the Creator's ways and attributes as our purpose in life. Cain's offerings were disregarded because he rather followed ego's material fantasies and illusions and sensuality (represented by vegetable life) as the purpose of life.

Noah's mission was to unify human consciousness but he fractured it even more through his three sons. Shem (the higher consciousness or priesthood), Japhet (the conscious mind as potentially able to discern right from wrong), and Ham (the attachment to sensuality and the potentially negative aspects of lower consciousness).

By his own awareness, Abraham realized that human consciousness is destined to act and express all its aspects and dimensions as the unified and harmonic vehicle to reflect the unity of the Creator and His ways and attributes in His creation. In this realization, Abraham and his son Isaac both offered their lives to the service of the Creator in the full awareness that all comes from Him and belongs to Him.

In this knowledge there is no room for the vanities and futility of ego's fantasies and illusions. In this same awareness, Jacob realized the legacy of his fathers Isaac and Abraham as the destiny to be fulfilled by him and his descendants.

This is our destiny as legacy and inheritance, and in order to fulfill it let's be mindful that Israel's lineage comes from Shem through Abraham, Isaac and Jacob as inheritors of the priesthood as the highest consciousness of God's love, in the knowledge that His ways and attributes direct His creation.

Our forefathers chose this destiny for them and for us, their descendants, and we also must choose back to God's love as our essence and identity that makes us different from the other nations. We choose back to our priesthood because the Creator commands us to be a kingdom of priests to proclaim His kingdom on Earth, which is His justice and righteousness. These are the material manifestations of His love in order to guide all nations in His ways. 

Individually, we internalize this commandment to direct and guide all aspects of consciousness in love's ways and attributes, opposite to falling into the negative dominion and subjugation of ego's materialistic fantasies and illusions, represented by the “nations” and “peoples” of the Earth.

Only love's ways and attributes represent true life, and this is why we ask our Creator.

“And say: 'Redeem us, O God of our redemption, and gather us together and deliver us from the nations, [so] that we may give thanks to Your holy name, [so] that in Your praise we may triumph'.” (I Chronicles 16:35)

Triumph as redemption comes when we become His ways and attributes by being and doing the goodness of His love as our true identity, and this is the meaning of our praises to Him. The Torah commands us to act, and our actions are our praises to God. We act according to His ways and attributes. We ask Him to lead us in our destiny to gather us together and deliver us from ego's fantasies and illusions.

Our praises are our offerings as the good actions to elevate all aspects of life to God's love, and in them we indeed are gathered together and redeemed. This is our legacy and destiny we want permanently in our lives, because His ways are His compassion, loving kindness and truth that protect us when we do goodness, as He commands us.

“Do not withhold your compassion from me, O Lord. Let Your loving kindness and Your truth always protect me. All the ways of the Lord are loving and faithful for those who keep the demands of His covenant.” (Psalms 40:12, 25:10)

The goodness of our actions as love's ways and attributes are the offerings we elevate in our highest awareness of His presence.

“Send forth Your light and Your truth, let them guide me; let them bring me to Your holy mountain [the Tabernacle, the Temple of Jerusalem], to the place where You dwell.” (43:3)

That place is our highest awareness of our connection to God's love.

Parshat Tzav: The Permanent Fire of God's Love

In Tzav the offerings in the Sanctuary are detailed as well as the service of the priests (kohanim): "And the Lord spoke to Moses, saying 'Command (Tzav) Aaron and his sons, saying, "This is the law of the burnt offering: That is the burnt offering which burns on the altar all night until morning, and the fire of the altar shall burn with it"." (Leviticus 6:1-2) and it is also emphasized that the fire in the altar must be lit all the time: "And the fire on the altar shall burn on it; it shall not go out. A continuous fire shall burn upon the altar; it shall not go out." (6:5-6).

We mentioned that the offerings of "sacrifices" that we bring to our Creator in the Sanctuary represent every trait and quality of the different dimensions of consciousness. These include not just our thoughts, feelings, emotions, passions and instincts, but also our desires and the intentions behind them.

Every aspect of our individual identity must be consecrated to the Creator simply because we are His Creation and He sustains us constantly in the material reality that He created for us. Let's insist and reiterate that we are here because of His Love, and His Love is our own Essence. Hence, the offerings are the ways we relate and communicate with His Love, and ultimately to become united to Him. The permanent awareness of our connection to Him (represented by Aaron, the High Priest) is our means to achieve this unification.

In a practical sense our offerings make us maintain this awareness all the time. Our Love (the "burning fire") and God's Love (the "Heavenly fire") must be lit together in order to realize that we are His image and likeness. We realize this awareness when we know that God's Love is always with us, as we praise in our daily prayers' modim (we thank): "(…) We shall thank You and relate Your praise (evening, morning, and afternoon) for our lives, which are committed to Your power and for our souls that are entrusted to You" because our existence and all existence emanate from Him and are sustained by Him; "for Your miracles that are with us every day, and for Your wonders and favors in every season" and we have to be aware of this (the burning fire) permanently. "The Beneficent One, because Your compassion is never exhausted; and the Compassionate One, because Your loving kindnesses never ended, always have we put our hope in You.", the always good and kind Love of God that we praise when we guide every dimension of our consciousness with His Love. And let's be aware that this praise is not just with our words but with our actions.

This thanksgiving prayer is reaffirmed by our Sages: "the God of all flesh, our Molder, the Molder of the universe", because we are His Creation. Therefore, "Blessings and thanks are due Your great and holy Name because You have given us life and sustained us. So may You continue to give us life and sustain us and gather our exiles to the Courtyards of Your Sanctuary, to observe Your decrees, to do Your will and serve You wholeheartedly."

Let's understand that the exiles are not only our fellow Jews who live far from the Promised Land but also the traits and qualities of our consciousness that we have to integrate in the unity that the Tabernacle symbolizes as our permanent connection to God's Love. His Love empowers us to follow His ways and attributes (His "decrees") which are the means to serve Him with all our heart.

The permanent awareness of our connection with God (represented by the High Priest) is what blesses us, as it is written: "Thus shall you bless the people of Israel. Say to them: 'The Lord bless you and keep you, the Lord shine His face to you and be gracious to you. The Lord turn His face to you and grant you peace. So shall they put My Name upon the children of Israel, and I will bless them.' (Numbers 6:24-27).

These are the blessings of His Love because it is about His Love for us. As we said earlier, this portion relates to our offerings and particularly about the means to elevate our life in order to be unified with the Creator. Our intellect gives us the knowledge of Him through a clear notion of the Truth that sustains the Creation. The intellect and the knowledge that provide for our understanding are represented by Moses, our teacher.

"And Moses took some of the anointing oil and some of the blood that was on the altar, and he sprinkled it on Aaron and on his garments, and on his sons, and on his sons' garments, and he sanctified Aaron, his garments, his sons and his sons' garments with him." (Leviticus 8:30). The oil symbolizes our awareness of God's Love, and the blood represents the passion with which we live His Love in the material world. Both must be impregnated in our garments that represent every dimension of our consciousness. The portion ends highlighting this fact: "And Aaron and his sons did all the things that the Lord commanded through Moses." (8:36).

The haftarah for this portion reminds us this awareness: "And this thing I commanded them, saying: 'Hearken to My voice, so that I am your God and you are My people; and walk you in all the ways that I command you, so that it may be well with you'." (Jeremiah 7:23) which is the main message of the Hebrew Scriptures.

In the knowledge of the Creator and in our connection with His Love we are truly fulfilled in the material world: "Thus says the Lord: Let not the wise man boast of his wisdom, neither let the mighty man boast in his might, let not the rich man boast in his riches; but let him that boast exult in this, that he understands and knows Me, that I am the Lord who practices living kindness, justice, and righteousness on the Earth; for in these things I delight, says the Lord." (9:22-23) and these things come from God's Love.

Parshat Tzav: Keeping the Fire up

In the previous portion of the Torah, Vayikra, the different kind of offerings for the Tabernacle are described in detail, and in Tzav the attention is focused on the Kohen Gadol, the High Priest. As we mentioned in our commentary on Vayikra, the High Priest represents the highest level of consciousness through which we are able to communicate and relate to our Creator.

In Tzav, which is the imperative form of the Hebrew verb to command, there are clear indications for Moses to instruct Aaron and his sons (also his future descendants) to follow specific instructions from which one echoes among our Sages.

“And the fire upon the altar shall be kept burning in it; it shall not be put out.”, (and later emphasized), “A constant fire shall burn upon the altar, it shall never go out.” (Leviticus 6:5-6)

Rabbi Moshe Alshich (1521-1593) explains in his commentary on the Torah that the fire burning in the Tabernacle is the Love for God that burns within every soul, and says that the task of the High Priest is to maintain permanently lit this fire, as God's Love is constantly present for us. It is a reciprocal Love in which we see in the altar both Divine and human fires blended together in one.

Again, we evoke our Sages on the High Priest's role.

“Be of the disciples of Aaron, a lover of peace, a pursuer of peace, one who loves the creatures and draws them close to Torah.” (Pirkei Avot 1:12)

In its constant connection with God's Love, our higher consciousness is endowed to harmonize the lower aspects of our human traits, bringing them together to also achieve closeness to the Creator. This is the purpose of the sacrifices in the altar.

We experience constant, permanent awareness of God's Love as our Essence and identity when our higher awareness is guiding all levels of consciousness. Why God's Commandment to keep the fire of our Love for Him constantly burning is mentioned twice? There are many Commandments in the Torah that are repeated several times, and in their repetition there is an implicit warning: if we don't fulfill them, we separate from Him.

It is always our choice to separate from God's Love, but let's never forget that He never separates from us. The semantic root in Hebrew for commandment, mitzvah, also means connection and that reference is clearly related to God in the context of the Torah. We learn from parshat Tzav that we are solely responsible to empower our higher consciousness, the High Priest of our awareness of God, to maintain our closeness to Him.

We are here in this world to be and do God's ways and attributes. In order to fulfill this Divine destiny we have to constantly embrace Him with the most ardent Love, like a fire that never extinguishes. Let's never forget that this fire, His and ours, is the unbreakable bond that nurtures and sustains us.

“It is their portion, which I have given to them from My fire.” (Leviticus 6:10)

This Divine fire is God's Love.