The Mitzvah of Parah Adumah is looked upon as the classic chok, that is, a mitzvah whose reason we cannot understand. However, there is a very intriguing comment in the Midrash which states that it is only beyond our understanding in this world. However, in future times, the reason for this mitzvah will be revealed to us. From a certain point of view, this idea makes the Parah Adumah even more puzzling. If its reason would be completely and fundamentally beyond human understanding, then that would be that. However, now that we discover that the reason will become revealed to us in the future, apparently it is something we can understand. Why, then, can it not be revealed to us already in this world?
Wherein Lies the Chok?
To answer this question, we need to examine what we mean when we say that the Parah Adumah is a chok – a mitzvah beyond our understanding. While we tend to look upon the totality of Parah Adumah as a chok, the Gemara interestingly identifies one specific aspect of the mitzvah which is responsible for its chok designation, namely, that it generates two opposite and counter-intuitive effects:
- On the one hand, the impure person upon whom the water with the Parah Adumah ashes is sprinkled becomes pure.
- At the same time, any pure Kohen who encounters the water becomes impure.
The Gemara states that it was regarding this contradictory effect of the Parah Adumah that Shlomo Hamelech exclaimed: “אָמַרְ תִּי אֶחְכָמָה וְהִּיא רְ חוֹקָה מִּמֶנִּי – I thought I would be wise, but it is beyond me.” This, then, is the aspect of the Mitzvah that currently remains elusive, yet it will be revealed in the future. What does all this mean?
A Chok in the Torah for the Chukim of Life
A very beautiful and profound explanation of this matter is presented by Rav Yosef Zvi Salant.
Hashem gave the Torah to the Jewish people, not only as a source of instruction for how to lead their lives, but also as a source of strength with which to do so. In this vein, the Midrash explains that the verse “ה' עֹז לְעַמוֹ יִּתֵּן – Hashem will give strength to His people” refers to the Torah. Yet life itself, in the current imperfect state of the world, is often baffling, mystifying and confounding, with the most vexing question of all being the righteous who sometimes experience suffering in this world and the wicked who so often seem to prosper.
It is a question whose full answer cannot be fathomed within our current frame of life. Yet in the absence of the answer, we need the fortitude to persevere in the presence of the question.
Parsha Analysis – Will We Ever Know the Reason for Parah Adumah, Continued
Our faith in and faithfulness toward Hashem in all of life’s confusing situations comes from the mitzvos known as chukim, whose reason likewise are unknown to us. At the center of this category of mitzvah is the Parah Adumah which likewise contains a contradiction, whereby the impure becomes pure and the pure becomes impure. This mirrors those situations when life itself seems to act in a contradictory way – purifying and rewarding the impure while generating impurity and hardship for the pure. This idea is expressed in the verse in Tehillim, by David Hamelech, who himself experienced many hardships, often in hiding from those who sought to kill him: Your statutes (chukim) were a song for me, in the place of my sojournings.
The sojournings to which David refers were all the places where he needed to find refuge from his opposers and enemies. At those times, with so much of his life containing adversity and hardship, the chukim of the Torah were his song, and from them he drew strength in engaging with the chukim of life.
Statutes and Decrees
Indeed, perhaps the relationship between these two types of “statutes” can be seen in the Sages’ formulation regarding the chukim: “I have established statutes, I have issued decrees. You do not have permission to question them.” What is behind the double expression, “statutes... decrees” with regards to the chukim? Are these not one and the same?
Rather, Hashem is informing the Jewish people that He has established unfathomable statutes (chukim) in the Torah, paralleling the equally unfathomable decrees (gezeiros) He has issued to the world as we know it – for it is the former that gives strength regarding the latter. Indeed, this idea may give us insight into an intriguing comment of the Midrash which links the terms used to describe the Parah Adumah with the exiles of the Jewish people: Heifer – this is Egypt; Red – this is Babylon; Completely – this is Persia. Who has no blemish – this is Greece. Who has never carried a yoke – this is Rome.
Nowhere is life more inexplicable and unpredictable than when the Jewish people are in exile. Their evil oppressors appear to be enjoying boundless success while they themselves endure hardship. It is for these exiles especially that Parah Adumah is given as a chok.
We can now understand why although the reason for Parah Adumah cannot currently be made known to us, it in the future it will be revealed. When the Jewish people are finally redeemed and the world achieves its rectified stated, not only will the confounding “decrees” of life no longer occur, we will even be able to understand in retrospect how all the experiences of the exile were for our ultimate benefit. In this state, with no chukim in life, there will be none necessary in the Torah. May the transfer of this Mitzvah from chok to mishpat occur speedily in our days!
You can get more of Rabbi Bernstein’s Parsha insights by visiting journeysintorah.com. Rav Bernstein’s work can also be found in book form with the Mosaica Press release of his Sefer, Dimensions in Chumash.
