Chukath: the Hidden World

Chukath: the Hidden World

 I chose that title because the synonyms are too charged: the Occult, The Mysterious.  But there are elements of these charged ideas in this weeks parsha.  

The parsha opens with the Red Hefer, the production of the purifying substance, the chemiical that  removes the stigma of death from those who have been in contact, or under the same roof, with death. The  parsha details a process of preparation and administration of this wondrous lotion, but we are never too lost in the details to recognize the underlying problem: our opposition to the Divine capital punishment that awaits us all, and all whom we love.  It is the mystery of transience, the ultimate question of justice, the question of meaning and existence  and the soul. 

The parsha starts out by purifying us from these questions.  There is a way to handle the problem: ritual, concentration on the formalism.

In the middle of the parsha we have the epidemic of fatal serpent bites and the cure: viewing the copper snake on the staff, the Caduceus.  This does not look like our modern medicine.  Is it  become magic?  This is another challenge to our understanding of the world. It was a challenge even  in the reign of Hezekiah.  He destroyed the object  and, later,  the Rabbis approved.  

The incomprehensible has many meanings. For the vast majority of people, Einstein's theory of general relativity is out of reach...but there are groups of people who, given enough training and teaching, would come to understand.  Relativity is a non intuitive perspective  on reality: light, gravity, time. There are many  conflicts between a deeper reality and what our senses tell us so strongly. Decisions based upon Big Data  involve denial of understanding how a process works...and those blind decisions are most often true.

Our tradition challenges our world view.  That is the only way to keep our view strong and honest.  If we know that the truth is blocked, we know to look around the obstacle