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Tzav

by Rabbi Samuel M. Cohon

This week’s Torah portion is the second in the Book of Leviticus, Tzav, the section that establishes the rules for the various sacrifices offered in the Tabernacle in the Wilderness, the Mishkan, and in the Temple in Jerusalem .  There are many different types of sacrifices commanded: burnt offerings, guilt offerings, sin offerings, and so on.  But one group of sacrificial offerings stands out: the offerings of peace, the zevach shlamim.  And among this higher category of offerings one in particular stands out even higher: the zevach haTodah, the thanksgiving offering. 

The rabbis thought so highly of thanksgiving to God that they are quoted in the Talmud saying that when the Messiah comes all sacrifices will have completed their mission, and all will be discontinued, with one exception: the thanksgiving offering.  That sacrifice will last forever.  Even in a perfect world we must remember to give thanks, to be grateful for what we have. 

This Shabbat is the great Sabbath that precedes Passover, called Shabbat haGadol.  As we approach the holiday of Pesach we do well to remember that gratitude for what we have is both the most essential of all religious motivations—and the hardest to keep in mind.  If we can each take a moment today to write or email or phone our thanks to someone who is important in our lives, we will begin to renew this great commitment of our Torah portion.  We have so much for which to be grateful.

And if we can also each take a moment to thank God for what we have, and to be more conscious of those who have less, we will begin to make this a better world.  For thanksgiving should not lead us to complacency…

Louis Untermeyer, best known as the great American anthologist of other poets, was a fine poet in his own right and one who dealt often with Jewish themes.  In a poem called Prayer he wrote:

God, though this life is but a wraith,          

    Although we know not what we use,     

Although we grope with little faith,   

    Give me the heart to fight—and lose.   

Ever insurgent let me be,               

    Make me more daring than devout;      

From sleek contentment keep me free,   

    And fill me with a buoyant doubt.          

Open my eyes to visions girt  

    With beauty, and with wonder lit—         

But always let me see the dirt,         

    And all that spawn and die in it.   

Open my ears to music; let    

    Me thrill with Spring's first flutes and drums—        

But never let me dare forget   

    The bitter ballads of the slums.   

From compromise and things half done,           

    Keep me with stern and stubborn pride;        

And when at last the fight is won,    

    God, keep me still unsatisfied.

Let us each find our own zevach todah—but let us also continue our work to perfect our world.