A1 Perhaps there is a safety angle to the purification/decontamination of the Levites? If this wasn't done, would this somehow lead to the collapse of the Israelites? #ParshaChat
Replies
A1: We've seen warnings elsewhere about the critical importance of not contaminating the sanctuary, so that seems very plausible to me. #ParshaChat
jun 14, 2025, 7:36 pm • 1 0 • view
A1: I also think this makes the most sense if we read it not as God punishing people for breaking rules, but as there literally being things that have to be done correctly in order to contain dangerous divine energy so it doesn't break out and hurt them. #ParshaChat
jun 14, 2025, 7:36 pm • 2 1 • view
Sending care and caution to #ParshaChat while I crash today. Sorry, all - I can’t focus
jun 14, 2025, 7:39 pm • 5 0 • view
oh, i understand, take care. #ParshaChat
jun 14, 2025, 7:51 pm • 2 0 • view
Thank you. I didn’t even type that right! I was trying to say I couldn’t focus my eyes. Lol
jun 17, 2025, 2:41 pm • 1 0 • view
That makes God less vindictive or arbitrary, but also less in control of God's self. I wonder about why we would worship someone who poses such a danger to people who supposedly have a partnership with God. #ParshaChat
jun 14, 2025, 7:43 pm • 1 0 • view
I think anything powerful is dangerous, TBH. #ParshaChat
jun 14, 2025, 7:43 pm • 1 0 • view
Pushing the thought a little further: yes, potentially dangerous--as you are to your own child, as a parent--but your child can count on you not to hurt it. Why can't we count on God that way? #ParshaChat
jun 14, 2025, 7:45 pm • 2 0 • view
The argument @rutiregan.bsky.social is making is that these harms are a function of the divine nature, not volition. Getting too close to the divine nature is extremely dangerous, it's not a *choice* G-d makes, it's because the difference between divinity & mortal flesh. #ParshaChat
jun 14, 2025, 8:00 pm • 1 0 • view
I've been thinking a lot in recent months about sacrifice-worship, Temple-worship, & other things we call "worship". This Parsha is all abt setting up worship via sacrifices & other offerings (grains, incense, etc): fundamentally transactional. #ParshaChat
jun 14, 2025, 8:06 pm • 1 0 • view
2500 yrs ago, this was the normal way to relate to deities, everyone did it! & no-one expected deities not to be dangerous. But. If in the Kingdom of Judah (& maybe Israel?) temple worship was being centralized, into a few temples, & then just one ... #ParshaChat
jun 14, 2025, 8:26 pm • 1 0 • view
that meant that most people -- *almost everybody* -- was no longer able to perform sacrificial worship. I don't think priests would have given up performing sacrifices outside Jerusalem if it still paid off, people don't do that. #ParshaChat
jun 14, 2025, 8:26 pm • 1 0 • view
I now wonder if regular people had turned to a different kind of worship, a less directly transactional one-- one summarized in Isaiah 1:11:20. One which has the shape of what we think of as Diaspora Judaism, centuries before the Diaspora. #ParshaChat
jun 14, 2025, 8:26 pm • 1 0 • view
I feel like... some approaches to "worship" are just too much pressure, and possibly too much pressure for God as well. #ParshaChat
jun 14, 2025, 8:07 pm • 1 0 • view
Would love to hear more of how you're thinking about this. #ParshaChat
jun 14, 2025, 8:11 pm • 1 0 • view
Yes — I think that within the Torah's narrative, God is not depicted as having the power to change that. I think one way we could interpret this is that safe proximity to people requires a LOT of intense concentration and that maintaining that perfectly all the time isn't possible. #ParshaChat
jun 14, 2025, 8:03 pm • 0 0 • view
I feel like there are ways in which children can count on parents not to hurt them, and ways in which they can't. Keeping children safe is *hard*, and it's very easy to make a mistake. #ParshaChat
jun 14, 2025, 7:53 pm • 0 0 • view
But I suppose you could argue that this is why we no longer have those kinds of sanctuaries and intense physical proximity to God — maybe it turns out that it's just inherently unsafe and that there are better approaches? #ParshaChat
jun 14, 2025, 7:54 pm • 0 0 • view
And now I'm thinking about how, in both hospitals I've given birth in, parents are routinely given the advice that if you're feeling overwhelmed and upset past a certain point, the safest thing to do is put your baby in their crib and walk away until you've calmed down. #ParshaChat
jun 14, 2025, 7:58 pm • 2 0 • view
And how there's *all kinds* of safety advice for parents and for other caregivers that assumes that everyone needs multiple layers of safety and that just deciding to be a good person isn't enough. And... #ParshaChat
jun 14, 2025, 8:02 pm • 0 0 • view
There's something that seems compelling to me about the possibility that God also needs multiple layers of safety and that there's an ongoing process of figuring out what they are. #ParshaChat
jun 14, 2025, 8:02 pm • 0 0 • view