Aharon's Way: Blessing Through Love and Self-Sacrifice

1“Speak to Aharon and to his sons, saying: So shall you bless …”¹ The Midrash asks why Aharon is named here on his own. Why does the verse not say “Speak to the Kohanim,” [as it says elsewhere, “Say to the Kohanim”]?² It answers that since everything this passage describes is done by Aharon, the Torah included Aharon and his sons in the command, “for this is the rule: whenever the act is done by the Kohanim, the command is addressed to the Kohanim.” So far the Midrash.³ But we still need to understand why the command had to name Aharon in particular. Would it not have been enough to say “to the Kohanim,” since Aharon was one of them?

2A little further on, the verse says, “They shall place My Name upon Bnei Yisrael, and I will bless them.”⁴ Notice the wording: if Hashem Himself blesses Israel, why is the Priestly Blessing needed at all?

3On the verse “So shall you bless,” the Midrash says: “From where did Israel earn the Priestly Blessing? From Avraham, as it says, ‘Koh, so, shall your offspring be.’ ‘So shall you bless’: from Yitzchak, as it says, ‘I and the lad will go yonder, ad koh’; therefore the Omnipresent said, ‘So shall you bless Bnei Yisrael.’ From Yaakov, as it says, ‘So shall you say to the House of Yaakov,’ and corresponding to it, ‘So shall you bless Bnei Yisrael.’”⁵ We need to explain the connection: how did Israel earn the Priestly Blessing in the merit of “I and the lad will go yonder,” the words Avraham said on his way to the Akeidah, the binding of Yitzchak?

4The commentators have asked what a blessing does.⁶ We find in the Torah that the Avos and the prophets gave blessings, and the same question applies to the blessings of tzaddikim. Whichever way we look at it, there is a difficulty. If a person's deeds make him worthy of the blessing, why does he need it? And if, Heaven forbid, he is not worthy of it, what good will the blessing do? Their answer is that the tzaddik's task is to make the person a vessel fit to receive the blessing. He guides him to walk in the way of Torah and of awe, and then blessing and success come to him from Heaven of themselves. This is what the one who blesses accomplishes with his blessing: he sets the person on the right path and makes him fit to be “a vessel that holds blessing.”⁷

5This was the foundation of Aharon the Kohen's avodah and of his mission. For the task of Aharon and his sons, the Kohanim, was the one the verse describes: “For the lips of the Kohen guard knowledge, and they seek Torah from his mouth.”⁸ They taught the people to know Hashem and His Torah, and that is how Aharon the Kohen conducted himself. The early Midrash Tanna Devei Eliyahu relates: “Aharon knew of himself … and he would go around to all the doorways of Israel. Whoever did not know how to recite Krias Shema … And whoever did not know how to enter into the heart of the Torah, he would teach.”⁹

6We find that tzaddikim draw Israel close to avodas Hashem, the service of Hashem, in two ways. One is the way of Moshe Rabbeinu, who sat in his tent outside the camp, and whoever sought Hashem would go out to him.¹⁰ He did not go around after Bnei Yisrael to draw them in and bring them close; he drew close only those who came to him on their own. Moshe Rabbeinu had another practice as well: he rebuked Bnei Yisrael, taught them knowledge and showed them what they must do, using harsh words. So we find him telling them, “You have been rebellious …,”¹¹ and the verse likewise says, “Say to Bnei Yisrael: You are a stiff-necked people.”¹²

7The second way is the way of Aharon the Kohen, who was “loving peace and pursuing peace, loving people and drawing them close to the Torah.”¹³ He drew people close to the Torah through his love for them, going after them and winning them over with gentle words, and in this way he brought them close to Hashem.

8This is what the Priestly Blessing that Aharon and his sons were commanded to give is about. Their main task was to fulfill the verse we cited, “For the lips of the Kohen guard knowledge, and they seek Torah from his mouth.” That is why it is written, “They shall place My Name”: it falls to them to place the Name of Hashem upon Bnei Yisrael. The Kohanim are to remind them that they are the children of Yisrael Sava, “Grandfather Yisrael,” Yaakov Avinu, as in the verse “May my name be called upon them, and the name of my fathers.”¹⁴ They are to give them the strength to walk in their fathers' ways, in the spirit of the words of Tanna Devei Eliyahu, “When will my deeds reach the deeds of my fathers, Avraham, Yitzchak and Yaakov?”¹⁵ And they are to awaken in them the knowledge that Bnei Yisrael are the people in whom Hashem glories, as the verse says, “Yisrael, in whom I glory.”¹⁶ All of this was done with love. The Kohanim brought blessing, mercy and kindness down upon Bnei Yisrael, and through this they drew them in and brought them close to Torah and to avodas Hashem.

9That is why the blessing the Kohanim recite beforehand was worded “and commanded us to bless His people Israel with love.” The Maharatz Chayes, in his glosses on the Gemara, asks in the name of the Be'er Sheva: where do we find that the mitzvah to bless must be done “with love”?¹⁷ In light of what we have explained, the answer is clear. The whole purpose of the Priestly Blessing is to fulfill “They shall place My Name” through love: to draw Bnei Yisrael to avodas Hashem by bringing blessing and mercy down upon them. So every Kohen must mention this foundation in his blessing, “to bless His people Israel with love,” to remind himself of the path of avodah that is right for him: the way of Aharon the Kohen, who pursued peace, loved people and drew them close to the Torah.

10This lets us understand why, in the Priestly Blessing, the verse had to address the command to Aharon the Kohen by name. As we have explained, these blessings can be earned through the power of Aharon's own middah, his character trait of love.

11aThis is what Chazal meant to explain in the Midrash with their question, “From where did Israel earn the Priestly Blessing?” That is, from where did Israel gain the capacity to rise and draw close to Hashem even by this path of mercy and kindness? Their answer is that it comes through Israel's middah of mesirus nefesh, the readiness to give one's life. For Chazal said that because the earlier generations gave up their lives, they were privileged to attain lofty levels, miracles and mercy.¹⁸ We also find that mesirus nefesh keeps the mitzvos firm in Israel's hands, as Chazal said: “Every mitzvah for which Israel gave itself over to death at a time of government decree, such as idolatry and circumcision, is still held firmly in its hands. And every mitzvah …”¹⁹

11bIn light of what we have said, these two effects of mesirus nefesh are bound up together. Through his mesirus nefesh Aharon was privileged to bring down miracles and mercy, and through this he passed on to Bnei Yisrael the middah of mesirus nefesh in keeping the mitzvos, by which the Torah and the mitzvos endured in their hands. The mesirus nefesh in Aharon himself was bound to have its effect on the hearts of Bnei Yisrael, so that they would be stirred and the mitzvos would endure among them, even beyond the way of nature.

12The middah of mesirus nefesh came to Israel through the power of Avraham Avinu, for he was the first to risk his life for faith in Hashem. That is what Chazal meant by asking, “From where did Israel earn the Priestly Blessing?”: that is, from where did Israel come to the level of mesirus nefesh? The answer is “From Avraham,” the first to give his life over for Hashem's sake, who in this way opened the door for all generations. Above all it came through his mesirus nefesh when he went to bind his son Yitzchak. Then, more than at any other time, he rooted the power of his mesirus nefesh in his descendants after him, to the end of all generations. As the Midrash relates, when Avraham and Yitzchak were on their way to the Akeidah, the Satan turned himself into a great river before them. “At once Avraham went down into the water, and it reached his knees … When he reached the middle of the river, the water reached his neck. At that moment Avraham lifted his eyes to Heaven and said before Him: Master of the World, ‘the waters have come up to the soul.’”²⁰

13This is the meaning of the Midrash's words that because of “I and the lad will go yonder, ad koh,” the Omnipresent said, “So shall you bless Bnei Yisrael.” Through his mesirus nefesh at the Akeidah, Avraham rooted the power of mesirus nefesh in the generations to come and handed it down to them, so that they could keep the Torah and the mitzvos. With this power Bnei Yisrael received the Torah, as the verse says, “So shall you say to the House of Yaakov.”²¹ As Chazal said, “He held the mountain over them like an upturned barrel.”²² That is, Bnei Yisrael took it upon themselves to keep the Torah with mesirus nefesh, serving Hashem even in times of darkness and concealment, as if under compulsion. This fits the saying of Chazal we cited about the mitzvos for which Israel gave itself over to death: through mesirus nefesh the Torah endures in Israel's hands.

14In our own generation we see plainly that the way to succeed in keeping the Torah is to follow the way of Aharon the Kohen, that is, only the path of mercy and kindness. Yet along with this we must also have the power of mesirus nefesh, for with that power we will be able to raise our children to Torah and mitzvos.

15May Hashem help us always to be privileged to receive kindness. May we see fulfilled in us what my holy ancestor wrote in the sefer Toldos Adam²³ on the words “May Hashem bless you and guard you”:²⁴ “May He bless you” with wealth, “and guard you” from harm, meaning that the wealth itself should do no harm, for the test of wealth is a great test. And may we soon be privileged to greet Moshiach. Amen.