He discovered that it had been burned up: Moses’ and Aaron’s reasonings with regard to the difference between the special sacrifices of the day and those that would be offered up on a regular basis reflect their respective visions of humanity’s relationship with God. As we saw above, Moses’ life was devoted to transmitting God’s Torah to the people, whereas Aaron’s life was devoted to elevating the people to the Torah. If we imagine the relationship between God and the Jewish people as a marriage, it is Moses who escorts the Heavenly Groom to the canopy and Aaron who escorts the earthly bride.
The Torah is objective and unchanging truth, whereas human beings are subjective and constantly changing. Therefore, Moses sees the Torah’s truth as being uniformly applicable in all situations, in contradistinction to Aaron, who realizes that each situation must be assessed individually in order to know how to apply the Torah’s immutable truth effectively. Aaron sees that an ad hoc sacrifice is different than a permanent one, that God’s truth can be reflected differently on different levels.
In our own lives, we must evince both Moses’ and Aaron’s perspectives. For ourselves, we must aspire to be like Moses, devoted to the Torah’s truth absolutely and unchangingly. But when dealing with others, we must take into account their moods and inclinations, and draw them to the Torah with forgiving love, as did Aaron.
