The Right Way -- CHRONICLE Online/The WORD 04/24/25

Weekly On-line Rabbi's D'var-Torah

April 24, 2025

26 Nisan 5785

Parashat Shemini

Everything was going great. The new Tabernacle was up and running. The Priests had been installed. The very first sacrifices were offered in the Tent of Meeting. And then tragedy struck.

Nadav and Avihu—two young priests, the sons of Aharon, the nephews of Moshe—were killed. They were engulfed by flames in the Tabernacle itself. According to the Torah, they had offered up to God an “eish zarah—אש זרה,” a foreign flame, and it consumed them (see Leviticus 10:1ff).

Despite Moshe's trying to comfort his brother, the Torah tells us simply that Aharon was silent. There was nothing he could say that would bring back his two sons.

Over the years, many commentators have tried to figure out exactly what Nadav and Avihu did that was so wrong. Perhaps, they were engaged in idolatry. Or the foreign flame was drug use. Maybe they did not work in unison based on the fact that the verse says each had a flame in his own censer. Or maybe they offered a sacrifice for which God did not ask. They could have been drunk when they offered the sacrifice based on the juxtaposition of this story with the ensuing passage forbidding the priests from drinking on the job. Or they were not wearing the proper garb when they entered the Tabernacle. Perhaps, they did not wash properly upon entering the Tabernacle. Or, it could have been something else altogether.

All we know is that God made it clear that there was a right way and a wrong way to offer sacrifices in the Tabernacle. And the consequences for doing things the wrong way were as dire as could be. It feels like the punishment did not fit the “crime.”

I was thinking about the right way to do things versus the wrong way to do things as well as the proper consequences for a suspected misdeed while I sat through an interminable city council meeting this past Tuesday night into Wednesday morning.

I listened to at least 100 speakers talk about the proposed ordinance in our city that would prohibit sleeping in public spaces, with one of the possible punishments being incarceration for up to 90 days. It was clear to me then—and it is still clear to me now—that incarceration for the “crime” of having no place to sleep other than public spaces is simply wrong. Not only is it unjust, but it does nothing to solve the problem. The minute the person walks out of jail, they will once again be homeless.

It is the wrong way to go about things. Fortunately, our City Council got the message from the seemingly endless parade of speakers at the meeting. They decided to hold off on this proposed ordinance. By doing so, they acknowledged that there just might be a better way—a right way—to go about solving this thorny problem. Hopefully, they’ll figure it out in the coming days.

Shalom,

RAF.