Holiness is a continual process – enjoy the journey!
“Our Father in heaven, hallowed be your Name.” (Matthew 6:9)
Parashat Emor is a practical account of how to hallow God’s Name within a variety of contexts. Leviticus 22:32 states: “You shall not profane my holy Name, but it shall be hallowed among the people of Israel; I am the LORD who sanctifies you.” So, the core of the theme developed in this portion is how to hallow the Divine Name in a profane world?
First, responsibility comes with the role to which we have been called; therefore, our actions, our clothing, and our relationships must have boundaries (Leviticus 21-24)…the greater our responsibility, the greater the level of discipline and holiness required.
The original priesthood was conceived as a gift to the people; the cohen had the choice to develop a purpose above their personal ego and, above all, the privilege of living in close communion with God. They would teach others how to approach the Divine through service. Today, some people might view this role as a great burden because we live in a world that craves freedom, lacks structure and institutions, and lacks purpose.
Second, our role speaks to us about the sanctity of our offerings. In principle, offerings are voluntary, and in this spirit, when we wish to draw closer to God, we seek to give our very best. However, God foresees that at some point, the sanctity of the offerings could be lost, and that human beings could end up offering not their best, but what is flawed.
I like the idea that it reinforces the need for the priest to be in a state of purity to serve. Why? On the offeror’s side, they had to bring something worthy; on the priest’s side, they had to act as the filter and discern whether the intention and what is being offered are appropriate to be presented before God. If a priest lacks self-control, wouldn’t he be susceptible to bribery, to receiving or offering something improper? Malachi 1:7-8 says, “You offer unclean food on my altar, and yet you say, ‘How have we defiled you?’ By saying, ‘The table of God is contemptible.’ When you offer a blind animal in sacrifice, is this not evil? And when you offer a lame or sick animal, is this not evil?” In conclusion, it is not only what we give that matters, but “how we give it.”
Third, it indicates that we must also sanctify or set aside our time, as it develops a sacred calendar for the year beginning with Shabbat, Pesach, the Omer, Shavuot, Yom Teruah, Yom Kippur, and Sukkot. I see it this way: Shabbat represents holiness lived continuously; Pesach, by liberating ourselves; the Omer, by growing through life’s processes; Shavuot, by receiving purpose; Yom Teruah, by awakening and reorienting ourselves; Yom Kippur, by correcting ourselves; and Sukkot, by learning to trust in our fragility. That is, all the time, which is why I love the context of David’s apparent madness expressed in Psalms 34: “I will bless the LORD at all times; His praise shall continually be in my mouth.” When we understand that time belongs to God, not to us, we can say, as Moses did in Psalm 90:12: “Teach us the number of our days, that we may gain a heart of wisdom.”
Fourth, holiness requires continuity, constancy, as we read in Leviticus 24:2, “to have the lamps burn continually (ner tamid),” and in verse 24:3, “Aaron shall order it to burn continually, from evening until morning, before God. This shall be a statute forever in your generations.” Verse 4 says: “He shall order the lamps upon the pure Menorah before God continually.”
Then verse 8 speaks of presenting baked bread: “Every Sabbath, a priest must set it before God, where it will remain continually, as an offering from the Israelites in the form of an everlasting covenant.” In short, the light is constant, and the bread is renewed weekly, symbolizing spiritual continuity. The light represents wisdom and that which guides us, giving us clarity, understanding, and direction in life. The bread represents that which provides us with basic sustenance for life, the fruit of human labour. Bread doesn’t appear like an avocado, for which you wait to grow and ripen before picking from the tree. Bread requires a process: sowing, harvesting, grinding, kneading, and baking. In other words, it represents the transformation of the world through human effort. In this sense, presenting the loaves to God isn’t for Him to eat (we read that the bread is for man, for Aaron and his sons), but rather what we present to God is our life through our effort. In short, it’s not enough to know (i.e. light); we need sustenance (i.e. bread). It’s not enough to merely survive (bread); we need direction (light). The light requires daily perseverance, and the bread must be renewed.
Fifth, holiness in what we utter with our mouths. In Leviticus 24:10 -16, a story unfolds that interrupts the narrative. It speaks of the son of an Egyptian man and an Israelite woman named Shelomit bat Divri, from the tribe of Dan. According to a BBC article, it is a myth that women speak on average 20,000 words a day while men speak only 7,000. A study indicates that in Mexico and the United States, men speak 15,669 words, versus 16,125 for women. That is, although women speak slightly more on average, we are almost equal. So, I ask myself, how many of my 15,000 daily words sanctify the Divine Name, and how many profane it?
God reinforces the idea of taking responsibility for my words and my actions. The text indicates that the young man pronounces the Name, but then curses; in other words, he used the Divine Name to curse. Today, we have the concept of freedom of expression, freedom to speak and transmit ideas, from good to devastating. We see how expressions of hatred toward President Trump led to his attempted murder. We see how freedom of expression incited the murder of Charlie Kirk and is provoking violent antisemitism around the world.
Why? Because freedom of expression does not regulate the message. In this section, we learn that messages should be regulated, not censored. What is the difference? The young man was not censored in the strict sense of uttering idle words; he was regulated for having said what he said. That is, the regulation of responsibility for what he says and its impact on society should be applied. If we analyze the young man, his Israeli mother gave him his spiritual identity (his inner self), but his Egyptian father represented oppression and force (his outer self). In other words, he was a young man with a dual, fractured identity.
According to the Midrashim, he was fighting for his place; according to the Torah, the future inheritance was reserved for the descendants of Israel (Numbers 26, 27 and 34). Therefore, his request was denied because he had an Egyptian father, causing a rift in his behaviour. From this wound came blasphemy; that is, the young man wanted to obtain something through violence, not by seeking due process or properly presenting his case of “apparent injustice”, with respect and honour. Later, we will read in Leviticus 36:2 about the case of four women, the daughters of Zelophehad, who could not inherit their land because they were women. However, they did seek due process and won their case. Both cases broke the norms and were unjust, but the intention in both was to distinguish themselves and speak with conviction.
Today, we create realities through our words, words that shatter systems and affect millions of lives. We can consciously or unconsciously profane the Divine Name by using God’s name to justify the unjustifiable. This is called Chilul Hashem (cursing God’s name). There are clear examples of people being manipulated in God’s name to commit abuse (spiritual, psychological, physical, or sexual); inciting hatred or violence by saying that “God wills it “; justifying deceiving, stealing, or acting unethically while representing “God.”
God wants us to perform Kiddush Hashem (literally Blessing the Name) or the sanctification of His Name, which means acting with justice, integrity, compassion, and kindness. And this is how the final phase of our parashah connects to the principle of just retribution for our errors (an eye for an eye). We must continually ask ourselves: Does this word or action increase human dignity and responsibility… or does it concentrate on power and justify doing harm? Leviticus 24:15 demonstrates that bearing the burden of guilt is a personal matter, and verse 16 shows that cursing by using the Divine Name crosses the line from the personal sphere and harms society.
Sanctifying is not merely being set apart; in Genesis, God separated light from darkness, the waters above from the waters below, and the sun from the moon. Separating and differentiating are the initial parts of sanctifying. Taking something, separating it from common use, and aligning it with a higher purpose — this is sanctifying. Without limits, separation, and differentiation, we would return to emptiness, to chaos.
And this is what Emor is about. Emor teaches us that defined frameworks, which bring limits and differentiation, create an environment that allows life to flourish, and a blessed life at that. Any action that breaks away from this framework will result in chaos. That is why the world is the way it is right now.
Returning to the words of Rabbi Yeshua: “Hallowed be Your name…” is not a passive declaration uttered daily by millions of people worldwide; it is a petition and a commitment: “May your Name be treated as holy (distinct, exalted) in the world.” God is Holy – Kadosh. Every Shabbat we sing Kadosh, Kadosh, Kadosh, i.e., three times Holy or Holiest. It is about us, as human beings, recognizing and treating God as such, giving Him His rightful place, position, and honour within the framework He designed to generate abundant life.
My prayer for this Shabbat is that we may live lives that sanctify the Divine Name daily, in our work, in our families, and in our surroundings, not desecrate it.
Shabbat Shalom
Mauricio Quintero