Kedoshim: outstanding

Kedoshim: outstanding

When I was a boy, maybe 13, I was recruited by my friends from Yeshiva Rabbi David Leibowitz to join  a cult. Our mission: bring Jewish youth to (our brand of) [Yeshivish] Orthodoxy.  We attended training sessions with a Rabbi.  Our core text was Rejoice O Youth by  Avigdor Miller, a book that explained how science and logic made The Faith the only possible choice. 

Part of the indoctrination into the party was  discussing the  third verse of our parsha, Kedoshim: 

אִ֣ישׁ אִמּ֤וֹ וְאָבִיו֙ תִּירָ֔אוּ וְאֶת־שַׁבְּתֹתַ֖יתִּשְׁמֹ֑רוּ
Ye shall fear every man his mother, and his father, and ye shall keep My sabbaths:

The interpretation was  that one should,indeed, respect parents, but only if that does not interfere with serving Gd.

The parsha is aptly named: Holy Ones. A series of laws are presented and, from time to time, we are told to be Holy. Most of the laws in the parsha demand  ordinary decency: Do mot steal, do not cheat, honor your parents, etc.  But  holiness  is something beyond  the mundane.

Consider the  קָ, the frist letter in kadosh, Holy. It is  one of the longest letters, it is as if an ordinary letter, a Raish, had something sticking out of it.  It has an exceptional appearance. That is an aspect of a holy person or group.  Doing the ordinary is a pre-requisite to the exceptional.

Honoring your parents is the expected, fearing Gd is the exceptional. Combining both is holy.