(D’var Torah delivered at Shabbat Sheva Brachot for Chaviva & Razi, Behaalotcha, June 3, 2023)
Until a few years ago, regardless of the time of year or the occasion, Zaidy would always speak about Naso, his Bar Mitzvah Parasha, no matter what Parasha it was, and I’m going to do the same thing. I’ll start by quoting his Dvar Torah which we all know well :
Naso (last week’s Parasha) has Birkat Cohanim: יבריך ה’ וישמריך וכו’
Zaidy then pointed out that יבריך, “may Hashem bless you”, is not enough – you can be blessed with wealth, brains, beauty, etc, and yet one day it could all disappear. This is why you also need וישמריך – we need Hashem to protect us.
(For those who don’t remember, Zaidy used to bring Bernie Madoff as an example of someone who had everything but then it all disappeared, and a bunch of us found it a very odd example, because if anyone deserved to lose it all, it’s him. But then recently I realized that that’s exactly why Zaidy used it, as opposed to an example of a good person who lost everything. Let it be Bernie Madoff.)
Anyway, that’s well and good for the first phrase of Birkat Cohanim, but there are 2 more phrases. And I’ve always felt like I don’t really understand what we’re saying and what we’re asking for, and all the usual answers didn’t sit right with me, so I went looking
The part that bothered me most was “ישא ה’ פניו אליך”. Usually, it’s translated as “forgive you”, and indeed, a lot of times, “ישא” is used next to sin, like לא תישא עליו חטא or עונו תישא “. But it felt wrong to me, why would we bring up things we did wrong when we’re getting a Bracha, why would we mention it. The rest of the Bracha is positive, and the last phrase is negative? I didn’t like it.
The other use of it is favoritism: לא ישא פנים ולא יקח שוחד – G-d doesn’t take bribes or show favoritism. That also doesn’t quite fit.
Something I know about language, having studied linguistics a bit, is that words often shift their meaning several steps from the original, but in a particular direction. “Awe” is fear, “awesome” meant frightening, “awesome” meant jaw-dropping, “awesome” means wonderful
So same here, favoritism shifted to forgiveness, but what was it before it was favoritism, when it was just “favor”?
We have an example in the Tanach: when Yosef’s brothers bring Binyamin to Egypt, and they’re all eating together, we have the following:
וישא משאת מאת פניו אלהם ותרב משאת בנימן ממשאת כלם חמש ידות
I’m going to translate that literally:
“He sent a gift from his face to them – and the gift for Binyamin was 3 times the gift of the others”
Originally, a “Mas’et” was a gift from a ruler to their subject. “from his face” – from his own plate that’s in front of him.
It’s also familiar to us from Megillat Esther – after Esther becomes queen, Achashverosh makes a party:
ויעש המלך משתה גדול לכל שריו ועבדיו את משתה אסתר והנחה למדינות עשה ויתן משאת כיד המלך
“he gave gifts as a king does”
The greater the gift, the greater the favor that the king shows to his subject.
Thus: ישא ה’ פניו אליך is the same as וישא משאת מאת פניו – we hope that Hashem treats us as favored subjects and gives us gifts , from His own plate as it were, showing favor, showing closeness, showing the depth of our relationship with Him.
So now that we know that we’re looking at gifts – favors – given from a ruler to his subjects, we can understand more about the context and framework of Birkat Cohanim
Birkat Cohanim is part of the Avodah in the Mishkan. In fact, the first time it is mentioned was back in Shmini, when the dedication of the Mishkan was drawing to a close, they did all the things they were commanded to do, Aharon and his sons brought all the sacrifices that they were supposed to bring – that is, gifts from the subject to the ruler – and then
וישא אהרן את ידו ידיו אל העם ויברכם …:
Aharon raised His hands over the people and blessed them
The subjects give gifts to the ruler, the ruler reciprocates with gifts to his subjects – in our case, it is the job of the Cohanim to request those gifts through their blessings. That’s the role that’s in Nasso, again, in the context of the Mishkan. And so it was in the Beit HaMikdash as well.
Now, here’s the interesting thing. The Mishkan is gone, the Beit HaMikdash is gone, sacrifices are gone, but we still have Birkat Cohanim in our service. How does it still work?
תפילות כנגד תמידים תיקנום
When the Beit HaMikdash was destroyed, and we lost our ability to give gifts to our Ruler, and to get blessing and gifts in return, Chazal replaced it with prayers, with the Shemoneh Esrei in particular. It still called Avoda, service, “Avoda shebaLev”
The gifts we give now are not our possessions, the lives of our cattle – but in its stead, we give the most precious commodity we have: our time and our attention, pieces of our own lives
And at the end of the Shemoneh Esrei, after we have placed our sacrifice before Him, and it has been accepted in Retzei and we have expressed our gratitude in Modim, then the Cohanim offer their blessing – requesting a Mas’et, the gifts of favor from our Ruler, a symbol of our relationship and closeness:
יברכיך ה’ וישמריך
יאר ה’ פניו אליך ויחוניך
ישא ה’ פניו אליך וישם לך שלום
But wait, you ask, it’s not the end of the Shemoneh Esrei, there’s one more blessing after it, isn’t there? And also, what if there are no Cohanim, or if you’re davening alone, what then, no blessing, no gifts?
Well, let’s look at it, let’s see how we end our Avoda SheBaLev:
שִׂים שָׁלוֹם טוֹבָה וּבְרָכָה, חֵן וָחֶסֶד וְרַחֲמִים
עָלֵינוּ וְעַל־כָּל־יִשְׂרָאֵל עַמֶּךָ
בָּרְכֵנוּ אָבִינוּ כֻּלָּנוּ כְּאֶחָד בְּאוֹר פָּנֶיךָ
כִּי בְאוֹר פָּנֶיךָ נָתַתָּ לָּנוּ ה’ אֱלֹהֵינוּ תּוֹרַת חַיִּים
וְאַהֲבַת חֶסֶד, וּצְדָקָה וּבְרָכָה וְרַחֲמִים וְחַיִּים וְשָׁלוֹם.
טוֹב בְּעֵינֶיךָ לְבָרֵךְ אֶת עַמְּךָ יִשְׂרָאֵל
בְּכָל־עֵת וּבְכָל־שָׁעָה בִּשְׁלוֹמֶךָ
Sim Shalom is a restatement of Birkat Cohanim
It’s all there:
Barcheinu Avinu B’Ohr panecha
Ke B’Ohr Panecha, natata lanu – we ask for a Mas’et, for gifts, and we even list the gifts that we request from Him – Torah, Chesed, Rachamim, Chaim, Shalom – the foundations of our relationship with Him
Each time we get up in front of Hakadosh Baruch Hu, our Creator, our master and ruler, we offer him the sacrifice, the gift, of our time, and when we’re done, we request the blessing and favors and gifts from Him to us as His servants, משאת כיד המלך
So – Razi, we are all – not just Chaviva – thrilled to finally have a Cohen in the family, to have Birkat Cohanim at our “Camp Sirote”. Saying Sim Shalom is good, but it’s not the same as having an actual direct descendent of Aharon HaCohen, tasked with continuing to develop the relationship between us and Hakadosh Baruch Hu, until such a time as we see you do it in Yerushalayim, in the Mikdash
May all the blessings that you request be granted, upon us, upon yourself, and upon Chaviva and you together
(The reference to משאת בנימין is suggested by Bechor Shor, and was pointed out to me by R’ Johnny Solomon)