What does it mean to be holy?
Table for Five: Acharei Mot-Kedoshim
In partnership with the Jewish Journal of Los Angeles
Edited by Nina Litvak & Salvador Litvak, the Accidental Talmudist
“Speak to the whole Israelite community and say to them: You shall be holy, for I, the ETERNAL your God, am holy.” -Leviticus 19:2
Rabbi Gershon Schusterman
Author, Why God Why?
The Torah doesn’t engage in hyperbole. G-d can instruct us to do certain acts and refrain from doing other behaviors; that’s within our capabilities. But how can a human being be told to be G-d-like in any way, especially regarding holiness?!
Let’s understand what being holy means. The Hebrew word Kadosh, holy, literally means designated and segregated. Though a mortal cannot be as holy as G-d, he can he holy like G-d, living G-d’s kind of holiness.
G-d is sui generis, generally translated as one of a kind, a rather fitting non-descriptive description of G-d, quite apt for the Creator. The accurate translation of the Latin is of its own kind which says much more. G-d, though immanently active in His creation, is an entirely different existence.
G-d instructs the “Israelite community” to realize their uniqueness as being in the world but not of the world, destined to be a people apart. As Balaam prophesized, “It is a nation that shall dwell alone and not be reckoned among the nations.”
99.8% of the world senses this (which sadly accounts for 3,338 years of anti-Semitism). We, the Jewish people, comprise 0.2% of the world population and stand out disproportionately, for better and for worse. There is something sui generis about the Jew too. G-d is telling the Jew: I have chosen you to be to be my treasured people. That honor comes with a heavy price of responsibility and mission. Embrace it and live it, because that is who you are.
Nili Isenberg
Pressman Academy Judaics Faculty
Rabbi Samson Raphael Hirsch (1808 – 1888) observes that holiness comes from a person’s ability to use their free will to control their desires. He points out that the successive verse sets the foundation to develop this holy habit through the commandments to honor our parents and to observe the Sabbath. These are “the guides of sanctification from cradle to grave.”
Raising children in this structured environment can be challenging. We strive to balance our children’s personal initiative with the Torah framework that we know gives so much meaning to our lives. We pray that our children will come to appreciate the values promoted by our traditions. As Rav Hirsch further explains, “This mastery over self does NOT consist of neglecting, curtailing, killing, or doing away with any of one’s powers. None of the powers of man is either good or bad in itself. Rather, they are given to him for the purpose to accomplish God’s will.”
We have a tremendous responsibility in raising our children to make a “Kiddush HaShem” in the world. Many commentaries point out that this exhortation to holiness was delivered to the entire Israelite community. This emphasizes the role of the whole village in supporting this work. Or HaChaim (1696 – 1743) also notes the use of the future tense, observing that, “the ultimate realization of the ideal of holiness will forever remain in the future.” Throughout our lives we can attain higher levels of holiness with a commitment to learning and growing at every age.
Gavriel Aryeh Sanders
Spokesperson, Be A Mensch Foundation
At first glance, “holy” can sound abstract, mystical, and beyond reach. It feels like a word better suited to heaven than earth. But the Torah brings it down to ground level.
First, this command is addressed not to priests or spiritual elites, but to the entire people. Holiness is not the private domain of the unusually pious. It is the calling of a nation.
The Hebrew itself hints at something important. In kedoshim (holy), referring to us, the word is written without a vav, while God’s kadosh (holy) appears in a fuller form. God’s holiness is complete; ours is not. Ours is partial, striving, unfinished. We can’t possess holiness in its fullness, but we can move toward it. That matters because the essence of kadosh is not vague spirituality or monastic piety. It means to be set apart, designated, reserved for a higher purpose—like Passover dishes. A holy life is not life in the clouds. It is life lived differently, with boundaries, dignity, and intention.
That is why this chapter quickly turns to the most practical matters: honesty, justice, care for the poor, restraint, courage, and love of neighbor. Holiness is not escape from the world. It is the elevation of the world. It asks us to make daily life answer to a higher standard, and to let ordinary human behavior become a vessel for the Divine. To be holy is to strive for a life guided by a higher purpose in this world.
Rabbi Nicholas Losorelli
Jeffery & Allyn Levine Assistant Dean, AJU Ziegler School of Rabbinic Studies
“You shall be holy for I, the Lord your God, am holy”, a nearly impossible task, it seems, to be holy, since God is holy. How does one reach such heights that only God can reach? It’s confusing to say the least, because one could assume that it is through all of these laws that we are being given in this part of the Torah that we achieve holiness; however, given that these laws all have to do with humans living in bodies, and God has no body, and is an uncontainable omnipresence, then how can these body-bound laws be the way to the type of holiness that God possesses? It’s an almost quixotic task, and I actually think that that is the point.
As the earnest and determined Don Quixote himself sings: “To dream the impossible dream, to fight the unbeatable foe , to bear with unbearable sorrow, to run where the brave dare not go, to right the unrightable wrong, to love pure and chaste from afar, to try when your arms are too weary, to reach the unreachable star, this is my quest, to follow that star, no matter how hopeless, no matter how far..” Our quest is to be in constant pursuit of the impossible, to achieve holiness because God is holy. It’s through that earnest, and sometimes foolhardy feeling, that we meet a broken world, and make the seemingly impossible possible, and bring the kind of repair into the world that it so desperately needs.
Rabbi Shlomo Yaffe
Congregation B’nai Torah, Springfield, MA
Midrash Rabba (Vayikra 24) on this verse states: “My sanctity is above your sanctity. However, the Hebrew can be read with a different punctuation “My Sanctity as it is Above (made)FROM your Sanctity.”
The Hebrew root “Kadosh” translated Holy or Sanctity actually means “separated”. The connection is that “Sanctity in Judaism means taking the ordinary, mundane, everyday reality and elevating it thereby revealing the G-dly root of everything.
For example, Shabbat and the Festivals are called “Holy”. Each of these days has 24 hours with all the rhythms of time and nature like any other day – but we sanctify them by refraining from the everyday activities and fill those hours with connecting our bodies and souls to the G-dly. Marriage in Judaism is called Kiddushin – the couple is both separated from all others to become one holy unit transcending the ordinary life of each one as separate being, which they were hitherto.
When the Torah discusses the laws of Kashrut we invoke “Kedushah” – sanctity. There is nothing more basic to human survival than fueling the body. Yet through Kashrut, we bring G-dliness into that most physical of activities -thereby elevating ourselves and revealing the life-giving force that G-d invests in nature. Hence G-d says “My holiness above – my presence is revealed and expressed by your holiness. We reveal this and fulfill G-d’s presence by the light of the sanctity we create by allowing the G-dliness that is everywhere and in everything to permeate our lives.
With thanks to Nili Isenberg, Rabbi Gershon Schusterman, Gavriel Aryeh Sanders, Rabbi Nicholas Losorelli and Rabbi Shlomo Yaffe.
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