THE PRIESTS IN JUDAISM

 

Rabbi Rifat Sonsino, Ph.D

Many religions today have priests. For example, the Catholic Church, the Greek Orthodox Church, the Anglicans, some Lutherans and Hindus are served by ordained priests. Islam has no sacerdotal priests. In Judaism, we had priests but not anymore. 

The biblical history of the priesthood is complicated. As Lawrence Boadt, a Biblical scholar, puts it, “the actual history of the priesthood (in the Hebrew Bible) is murky and leaves many problems yet to be solved” (1). So, the best that we can do is to draw a few general lines as we reconstruct the history of the priesthood in ancient Israel. 

Roland de Vaux, a French Bible scholar, who studied the social structures of the ancient Hebrews (2), points out that in the early periods of the Jewish history, there was not an organized priestly class. In fact, during the days of the Judges, 12^th-10^th centuries BCE, different individuals functioned as priests. For example, the prophet Samuel was one of them (I Sam. 2:18).  Similarly, Micah the Ephraimite, appointed his own son as priest (Judg.17: 5). Even king David’s children were working as priests (II Sam. 8;18). During the monarchy, especially during the reign of Josiah (640-609 BCE) and on, in the Book of Deuteronomy that was redacted around that time, a new group of people emerged as priests in the only temple that existed in the country, namely in Jerusalem.  They were the Levitical priests (ha-kohanim ha-leviyim), the presumed descendants of the tribe of Levi (Deut. 10:8) who offered the appropriate sacrifices on the altar and took care of the needs of the sanctuary. After the destruction of the First temple by the Babylonians in 586 BCE, and especially after the return of the exiles back to Israel, during the second temple, a new group appears to have gotten the upper hand as the main priests of the Jerusalem temple, and they were the Aaronides, the presumed descendants of Aaron, the brother of Moses. The prophet Ezekiel, ca.  593-571, makes this distinction clear (44:10ff). From then on, the Aaronides became the main priests and the Levites were denigrated to becoming their helpers , as it is made clear in the Book of Numbers (3: 5-10), the redaction of which most likely followed the time of Ezekiel. The title of Kohen was hereditary and went from father to son. A Kohen was not allowed to marry a divorcee, a prostitute or a widow. They were not permitted to have any contact with dead bodies. They were also not allowed to drink wine or strong drinks. The Aaronides held their function until the destruction of the second temple of Jerusalem by the Romans in 70 CE. After that the priesthood ceased to exist. 

During the Rabbinic period that followed, and even now in the present times, at Orthodox or Conservative synagogues, the priests, namely the descendants of the Aaronides and the Levites assumed a ceremonial role in the synagogues and in the Jewish religious life. For example, someone who claims to be a Kohen (now going by the name of Kohen, Kahn  or even Katz, for Kohen Tzedek, a righteous Kohen),  gets the honor of ascending the pulpit for the reading of the first portion of the Torah, and a Levi takes the second. Similarly, a Kohen is invited to come up to the pulpit to bless the congregation, covering his head with a prayer shawl. In cases  where a redemption of the first born (namely, a pidyon haben) is done, it is usually a Kohen who does the redeeming for a sum of money. Also, a Kohen is not allowed to attend a funeral at a cemetery. Outside of these, for all practical purposes, the priesthood has ceased to exist in Jewish life today. 

Reform Judaism, ever since the Pittsburgh platform of 1885, has eliminated all teachings regarding the “priestly purity” and consequently has abolished all distinctions among Jews. The role of the Kohen or Levi is now non existent in Reform Jewish practice. Today, we believe, that every Jew has the same obligations and responsibilities vis-a vis the Jewish community at large.

 

Notes:

Lawrence Boadt, Reading the Old Testament. Paulist Press, 1984, 278.

R. de VauX, Les Institutions de l’Ancient Testament. Les Editions du Cerf,   1967, 217ff.

OUR SEDER WITH SPAIN AND PORTUGAL

Rabbi Rifat Sonsino, Ph.D

During Passover, it is traditional for Jews to hold a Seder (meaning ‘the order’), a ceremonial meal, on the first and traditionally on the second night of the holyday, to commemorate the Exodus from Egypt in biblical times. A special text, created by the Rabbis of old called Haggadah (“the telling [of the story]) is used before and after the meal.

The Seder is a family affair and is often held at home, even though some synagogues offer “congregational Seders.” The rabbinic text used during the Seder is called, Haggadah (namely, “The telling”), and recalls the past when “we were slaves in the Land of Egypt.” Then, according to the Bible, led by Moses, Jews escaped Egypt and arrived into the Sinai desert.  This year, because of Covid, the pattern changed drastically. Few people dared to leave their home to gather with other family members in order to celebrate freedom. So, many Jews resorted to zoom Seders, connecting with family and friends online.

This year, my wife and I had a dilemma. How will we hold the Seder? The Willows, where we live in Westborough, did not offer one. Most of the residents here are not-Jewish and, besides, they still do not encourage large gathering of people. We, therefore, decided to have one on the second night with our daughter, Debbi and our grandchildren, Avi and Talya, in their home in Milford, MA, about 15 minutes away from our apartment.  (Our son lives in California). But, what to do the first night? I thought, why not connect with our friends in Spain? In the past, on many occasions, Ines and I travelled to Barcelona during the summer, and I helped BetShalom, a small but vibrant Reform congregation, with some rabbinic work. This year, because of the virus, they were planning to hold a congregational Seder by zoom.

So, on the first night of Passover, March 27, 2021, we connected with Barcelona at 2 pm Boston time, and were happy to see that even our friends from Madrid, Spain as well as others from Portugal, had joined the Seder online at 7 pm, local time. In fact, the cantor who led the singing, David Alhadef, was from Portugal. We read the Haggadah, placed on computer screen, in Spanish and Portuguese, and sang all the traditional songs in Hebrew. Various people took turn in reading different passages and responsive readings. Even I chanted the “Ha Lanhma Anya” (“this bread of affliction”), almost at the start of the Seder, using a melody that I remembered from my childhood back in Turkey. At the end of the Seder, the group in Madrid held a congregational meal and the rest of us retreated to our own family dinners.

The entire experience, I felt, was surreal. I said to myself: Here we are a group of Jews, who are spread all over the world, connecting with each other for the celebration of a holiday that, at best, has dubious historical basis, but one that has been recalled through oral tradition from generation to generation for centuries. We are still reading and chanting the texts that have been part of our tradition for a very long time. So, year after year, when Jews get together in their homes or congregations, to tell the story of their ancestors’ liberation from bondage in Egypt, sometime around the 13^th century BCE, we can relive their experiences and prepare ourselves to face unknown challenges , like the Israelites apparently did when, according to legend, after leaving Egypt, they somehow crossed the desert to receive the Decalogue at the foot of Mt. Sinai as their constitutional chart. Then, they went on their way to establish themselves as a nation in the land of Israel for many years to come.

This year, through the miracle of technology, zoom made it possible for all Jews to enlarge the circle of families by connecting them online wherever they are, making our world even smaller but intimate. Now that Covid is about to end, we shall remember this interlude and build on it as we confront new challenges as individuals, families and nations.