Last week's Torah portion, Hukat, opens with discussion of the Parah Adumah, the Red Heifer, used ritually to reverse the impurity imposed by touching a dead body. The parashah continues on to discuss the death of the prophetess Miriam, the loss of the water supply for the Hebrew people, and the death of Miriam's brother, Aaron. Aaron is mourned for 30 days in the wilderness. All of this reminds us, indeed instructs us, of the mysterious power inherent in the life force.
Encountering both life and death, and the transition between the two, we are awestruck, like a bolt of lightning electrifying and transforming our lives.
We ignore this force at our peril. Traditionally we celebrate births and commemorate deaths with ceremonies. When Israel ignores Miriam's death, tradition tells us they are punished in the wilderness with the loss of water. But I think the punishment of ignoring the power in life and death penetrates to a deeper, spiritual place. We attempt to avoid its profundity, but at our peril. For it is the confrontation with the life force that makes us most fully human. Therefore we should embrace it.
People speak of looking into someone's eyes and seeing their soul. We encapsulate our physical selves in skin and our emotional selves in psychological escapes. Tearing away the emotional barriers and "I-Thou"ing another soul vitalizes and grounds our existence. The exchange injects meaning into otherwise time-bound, secular moments -- without the holy to give those moments dimension and meaning. This is the reason socializing on social media is so dangerous to society. The encounter is too literal. There is no opportunity for soulful encounter, in a society already spiritually impoverished.
Israel is not merely traveling to a Promised Land. Their divine embrace gives them direction and potential meaning. But the fulfillment of God's intent for them, as for us, comes in the inter-workings of God's creatures as we labor together to mutually fulfill God's plan. That eye to eye, soul to soul, awesome exchange of selves infuses the divine into the momentary. The ordinary is transformed into eternality. The mortal experiences the eternal. The Red Heifer laws mark the internal awe that drives us to examine the mystery of the life force, using it more effectively to transform mere existence into holiness.
