Drash – Shemini

Rabbi Nicole Roberts

Senior Rabbi North Shore Temple Emanuel

Aaron’s response to the sudden death of his two sons in this week’s parasha, Shemini, is troubling: Vayidom Aharon—“And Aaron was silent.”[i]  Also disturbing are the circumstances of their death: the sons die lifnei Adonai—“before God.”  That is, their lives are taken at the altar, in plain sight of God who, presumably, could have saved them. Two sons’ deaths, two silent responses, two mysteries.

In his piercing commentary on Aaron’s silence, Holocaust survivor, author, and activist Elie Wiesel, z”l, wrote (in French): “A father, whatever be his role, whatever be his public functions, cannot, must not, accept calmly, in faith and resignation, the sudden death of his two sons!” Wiesel continues, “Is there for a man or woman a greater misfortune than to bury his children?  This is against nature…”[ii]  In his role as High Priest, Aaron fails to stand up to the God he serves and cry out for justice, cry out for explanation, or simply cry in pain.  So, in his unnatural silence, Wiesel sees complicity, i.e., with the God who ought to have stopped the tragedy.  To Wiesel, silence here—both Aaron’s and God’s—reflects an indifference—the sort that he denounced in his other writings: “The opposite of love is not hate but indifference,” and “unless we raise our voice in protest” against the death of children, we bear some responsibility.[iii]

Is it really possible that Aaron was such an inhuman father, and God such an inhumane God? Or is this all just a big, tragic misunderstanding?

There is, of course, no way to know.  But there are other ways of reading the story.  We might take a closer look, for instance, of the half verse of Torah in between the sons’ death and Aaron’s silence, when Moses is quick to offer up an explanation for their death, saying to his brother, Aaron, “This is what God meant when saying ‘Through my close ones, I will be sanctified, and in front of all the people I will be glorified.’”[iv]  Perhaps Moses was trying to offer comfort, reassuring Aaron that his sons were close to God, or that their death somehow was not in vain, and that Aaron still served a worthy God. But sometimes a moment doesn’t call for explanation, justification, or one’s own understanding of purpose. Sometimes a moment doesn’t call for theologising.  Sometimes a moment just calls for silence. Not abandonment, which the bereaved already feels in abundance, but silent presence.

Moses stayed present, but he did not stay silent.  His words revealed a callousness to Aaron’s untenable position.  Aaron’s life’s work was to serve the God who had just stood by as his children died, in the place they ought to have been safe—their sanctuary.  Aaron’s role was to attest to all the people that this God he served was worthy of worship, sacrifice, and glory.  But these social expectations would have only added to the agony Aaron felt upon seeing his sons reduced to ashes.  After Moses’ half verse of words, perhaps Aaron wondered if he could continue living in a world that demanded so much of him. Perhaps he wondered how his own brother—his sons’ own kin—could come to God’s defence, or be so insensitive.  Perhaps he was not able to even think clearly enough to wonder anything, so he retreated in silent confusion.

Sometimes the world around us is not the one we thought we lived in.  Sometimes our life’s purpose is not what we thought it was.  Sometimes the people we turn to for comfort offer something much less welcome.  Such upheavals contribute to the swirl of emotion that follows any significant loss.  In such a cyclone, one in the eye of the storm can only be silent.  Not complicit, not indifferent, not responsible just needing a quiet place to retreat and grieve all that has been lost.

Wiesel has every reason to question God’s silence. But maybe Wiesel gets Aaron wrong, pegging him as inhuman.  Aaron’s silence in the eye of the storm may, instead, reveal his very humanity.

  i] Lev. 10:3b

[ii] Wiesel, Celebration prophetique: Portraits et legendes (translation mine)

[iii]https://www.nytimes.com/1986/01/05/opinion/welcoming-1986.html

[iv] Lev. 10:3a