(1) "Say to the priests” - After [the Torah had] warned the Israelites to become holy [19:2], it warns the priests to protect themselves from ritual impurity, given that they are dedicated to God’s service and are considered the members of G-d’s “household” on earth.

בני אהרן, “the sons of Aaron,” including minors;”

לא יטמא בעמיו, “he must not defile himself on account of any Israelite that had died, i.e. although they are all of “his people.”

הקרובה אליו, “who is related to him;” she is related to him only as long as she has not married. As soon as his sister is betrothed this relationship has ended, halachically. (Talmud tractate Yevamot folio 29)

לאמו ולאביו, to his mother or his father;” the letter ו before the word לאביו means: “or,” instead of “and.” The same applies in לבנו ולבתו, or in ולאחיו ולאחותו. In each of these words the prefix ו means “or” instead of “and. As to the question why the word ולאביו, “or to his father,” was needed to permit the son to defile himself at his father’s funeral, seeing that the relationship is of a lower level as that of the mother, [being only presumptive as we do not know for sure that he is the father, Ed.], we might have thought that on account of this the Torah would not have allowed the son the priest to defile himself at the funeral; on the other hand if the Torah had only mentioned that the son could defile himself at his father’s funeral, we would have taken for granted that if even this was allowed, attending his mother’s funeral would certainly be allowed. However, I could have argued the reverse: if I cannot defile myself on account of my father’s funeral when he had disgraced himself and lost his status as a functioning priest, I can certainly not defile myself on account of my mother’s funeral, if my mother had lost her status as legitimately married to a priest. In light of these problems, the Torah decided to mention father and mother separately. לאמו ולאביו, “to his mother or father;” when the Torah speaks of an ordinary priest, it mentions the mother before the father, whereas when speaking of the prohibition for the High Priest to defile himself for the death of his parents, it mentions first the father and then the mother. (verse 11) The logic runs as follows: if an ordinary priest may defile himself at his mother’s funeral, seeing that we are certain that she is his kin, the Torah broadens this to also include the father, though he is by no means definitely a blood relative. When speaking of the prohibition for the High Priest to attend even his closest relative’s funeral, it mentions the father first, seeing that he is not definitely a blood relative. It continues by saying that this High Priest may not defile himself even for the sake of his mother’s funeral, although we know definitely that he is her son. ולבנו ולבתו, “and on account of his son or his daughter,” (he may defile himself) if the Torah had only written about either son or daughter, why would this not have been enough to tell us that the priest may defile himself at the funeral of any of his children, G-d forbid? Not only that, but we could have reasoned that if the priest may defile himself on account of children’s death neither of whom he was obliged to honour during their lifetime, is it not logical that he has to do the same on account of his parents whom the Torah commanded him to honour and revere? Answer: if the Torah had not spelled out both son and daughter, I might have thought that for preemies who did not survive their birth, the priest would also be permitted to defile themselves; therefore the Torah spelled out that only children who qualify for the title son or daughter, are a legitimate cause for the priest to defile himself. Another reason why the Torah had to write: לבנו ולבתו, “to defile themselves on account of his son or daughter,” is that son and daughter do not have the same relationships to their respective parents. A son is obligated to perform the commandment of honouring and revering his parents throughout his life, whereas a daughter’s obligation to do this takes second place to her honouring her husband upon marriage, as is evident that while her father could invalidate certain of her vows before marriage (depending on her age) after marriage only her husband has the right to do this. Therefore, the fact that they rank equally concerning the rights of their parents to defile themselves at their funerals had to be spelled out.

ולאחיו ולאחותו, “and concerning his brother or his sister, in case either of them died; this too could not be derived from the Torah having written this concerning son and daughter. Neither brother nor sister was obligated to perform acts by which to honour the other. We could have assumed therefore that the family ties to one another was therefore weaker than the other relatives mentioned by the Torah which would have prohibited them defiling themselves at each other’s funeral. The Torah also had to make a distinction between a sister who is still a virgin, i.e. too young to have been married, and one who has left her father’s house already to live with her husband.

ולאחותו הבתולה הקרובה אליו “and in respect of a sister, a virgin, and therefore still closely bound to him by family ties; regardless of whether she is a sister through a common mother or a common father; when Rashi commented here on the sister including one who is already betrothed to a husband to be, he does not refer to some priest’s betrothed but not yet married fiancee. Similarly, when the Torah wrote about a sister who is a virgin, it is understood that she is below twelve years of age at the time of her death. Had she been married already she would have been part of her husband’s family, not that of her father. This is why the Torah used the expression לשארו, “to his family.” (verse 2).

אשר לא היתה לאיש, “who had never belonged to a man.”According to Sifra, this somewhat clumsy wording implies that if that sister had lost her virginity through a cause other than being penetrated by a man’s genital organ, she is considered as still a virgin with regard to the prohibition of her brother defiling herself at her funeral. If she lost her virginity through marital relations with her husband, he (her brother) may not do so.

לה יטמא, “he will defile herself on her account;” not only may he defile himself at her funeral, but he is commanded to do so. If he declines to do so, the court forces him to do so. The Sifra relates that a certain priest by the name of Joseph whose wife had died on the eve of Passover, and he did not want to defile himself at her funeral as then he would not be able to fulfill the commandment of eating from the paschal lamb on the night following, was forced by the sages to do so nonetheless.

לה יטמא, but he must not additionally engage in burying other people seeing that he is already ritually impure. [It is always forbidden for a priest even nowadays when all priests (and non-priests) are ritually impure, to add impurity unnecessarily to their bodies seeing that they cannot purify their bodies in the absence of the ash of the red heifer. Ed.] The Rabbis derived this from the word לה, understanding it as restrictive, i.e. he may only defile himself through her body, not through anyone else’s that happens to be nearby. He may also not defile herself through contact with her limbs, if, for instance, she had been mutilated, and only parts of her body are available for burial.

לא יטמא בעל בעמיו, “a husband (who is a priest) may not defile himself for his wife corpse (of a wife who has been forbidden to him and disqualified him for priestly duties);” if there are other people available who can do this without delay. According to the Targum, there is a letter ב missing here at the beginning of the word בעל which should be understood as if it had been written בבעל. The reference then would be to the High Priest not being allowed to bury his wife as he is the highest ranking priest. According to our author, this construction is not unique, and he cites Genesis 38,11 שבי אלמנה בית אביך, where Yehudah tells his daughter-in-law to spend the period of her widowhood in her father’s house pending his son Shelah becoming of age so that he could marry her. In other words, the word בית there should really have been: בבית, “in the house.” Our author claims that there are numerous such constructions to be found elsewhere. According to Ibn Ezra, the verse speaks of an ordinary priest not being allowed to defile himself on his wife’s body, as she is not a blood relative.

לא יקרחה קרחה בראשם, “they shall not make a bald spot on their heads.” Although the word יקרחה is spelled with the letter ה at the end, it is read as if it had been spelled with the letter ו and the vowel shuruk.

והיו קודש, “therefore they shall be holy.” This “holiness” also includes priests suffering a physical handicap which disqualifies them from performing service in the Temple.” (Sifra)

אשה זונה, “a woman who had engaged in a sexual relationship with a partner forbidden to Israelites;” (Rashi) If so, why would she on account of that be forbidden to marry an ordinary priest? We find only one single Rabbi in the Mishnah who rules that if an unmarried male Israelite had intercourse with an unmarried Israelite woman that she becomes forbidden to be married to a priest! The opinion of that Rabbi was never accepted as halachah. (Talmud, tractate Yevamot folio 61) The only woman who is known by the stigma zonah, as a harlot, is the one who had had sexual relations with someone disqualified as a priest, as Rashi himself pointed out in his commentary on Ketuvot, foIio 30.ו

חללה, “a woman who has been profaned;” the letter ו at the beginning of this word means “or,” and substitutes for או. The same applies to the letter ו in ואשה גרושה, “or a woman who had been divorced;”

גרושה מאישה, “divorced from her husband;” and not someone who is not her husband. According to Rabbi Elazar ben Matya, this must be understood as distinct from someone no longer her husband, as he had abandoned her and emigrated overseas and has not been heard from. In the meantime this woman had remarried, and after a while her first husband turns up and claims her as his wife. Our verse comes to tell us that she can return to her former husband although in the meantime she had received a divorce decree from her second husband, and in the event that her first husband is a priest, she has not lost her status as being legally a priest’s wife. All this the sages derived from the otherwise superfluous words: “from her husband,” as who else could have divorced her? In the scenario just described her “marriage” to her second husband would not have been recognised as a marriage, hence her “divorce” from the second “husband,” was not a divorce at all.

קדוש יהיה לך, “he will be holy as far as you are concerned;” here too the adjective “holy” also applies to physically handicapped priests. (Sifra)

את אביה, “she profanes her father,” seeing that being a priest he is holy. (legally) and she also causes her father to become belittled in the eyes of his friends who know that he failed miserably in the way he raised his daughter, her guilt is therefore twofold. This is why the Torah decreed the harsher mode of execution by having molten lead poured down her throat.

היא מחללת, the word היא is spelled with the letter .י

באש תשרף, “she will be burned by fire” (as explained.). Only she has to suffer this harsher mode of execution, not her partner. Her partner dies by the sword. (decapitation)

את ראשו לא יפרע ובגדיו לו יפרום , “he must not let hishair grow wild, nor must he rend his garments” (as a means of showing the world that he is in mourning). He must not neglect his dignified appearance, even when in mourning.

ועל כל נפשות מת לא יבא, “he shall not go to make contact with any corpse.” This is a warning to the High Priest not to be in the same covered airspace with any corpse. Seeing that this could have been derived already from the previous verse, it is clear that here the Torah includes ordinary priests in this legislation also. The linkage known as g’zeyrah shava, is established by the word יבא which is used here in connection with the High Priest, followed by the unnecessary

ולאביו ולאמו לא יטמא “he must not defile himself on the bodies of either his father or his mother.” This was included in the previous part of the verse that was all inclusive, by the words: כל נפשות מת, “any dead bodies.” By repeating it, apparently, the sages learn that if a corpse is abandoned and has no one to arrange for his burial, the High Priest is commanded to defile himself on his account. (Sifra)

אלמנה וגרושה, “a widow or divorced woman;” seeing that the High Priest is not allowed to marry a widow, is it not obvious that he may not marry a divorced woman? Why did the Torah have to spell this out for us? Answer: I might have thought that seeing a widow is permitted for the ordinary priest to marry, a divorcee who is also forbidden to an ordinary priest and who is certainly forbidden to the High Priest, that if the High Priest had contravened this law, the son from such a union is not only no priest but has the status of a mamzer, someone who is not allowed to marry a Jewish woman. By phrasing it as it does, the Torah limited the fallout from such a contravention to demoting the issue to be like an ordinary Israelite, not a priest. Or, if the Torah had written only that the High Priest must not marry a divorced woman, I would have thought that the son of a marriage between a High priest and a divorced woman would indeed not be a priest, whereas the son of a union between a High Priest and a widow would be considered as a normal priest; therefore the Torah has to state that the consequences are more serious than we would have thought. In short, the unnecessary word גרושה is interpreted as lenient, whereas the unnecessary word אלמנה is interpreted as additional severity. (Sifra)

וחללה זנה, “or a profaned woman or a harlot;“ the missing letter ו in the word זונה is comparable to the missing letter ו in Chabakuk 3,11, “their habitation” in the word זבלה which should have been זבולה, “its respective habitation (orbit)” or as in Deuteronomy 32,42: וכפר אדמתו עמו, where the ו is missing at the beginning, so that it will be understood: “and His people.”

את אלה לא יקח, “these (who have been mentioned) he must not marry.” (publicly, in a ceremony of a wedding)

כי אם בתולה מעמיו, “but he must marry a virgin of his own people.” If she is not a virgin he would have transgressed a positive commandment. (The transgression is not punishable by lashes. If you were to ask what is different here from the commandment that the Passover lamb must only be eaten broiled on the fire, not boiled or steamed, where the sages interpreted this not as a positive commandment but as a negative commandment (Talmud tractate Pessachim folio 41) and they decreed that someone not doing so would receive lashes on account of having transgressed two negative commandments, one for having eaten it raw, the other for not having eaten it broiled? Here too the commandment of marrying a virgin is a positive commandment? Answer: the words: כי אם בתולה, “only a virgin,” refer to the part of the verse that began with the words, and refer to what follows; whereas in the verse speaking of how to eat the Passover lamb, the words כי אם צלי אש, refer to what had already happened, something which is not followed by another positive commandment, i.e. יקח אשה.

ולא יחלל זרעו, “so that he will not profane his seed,” by marrying these profaned people secretly.”

איש מזרעך לדורותם, “any of your descendants (afflicted with a physical deformity;)” Rabbi Elazar ben Azaryah uses the wording of this verse to rule that a minor,son of a priest is unfit to perform service in the Temple, even if he is physically perfect. As to the question of from what age such a minor is qualified to perform service in the Temple, he rules that when he has grown 2 pubic hairs since this demonstrates that he is sufficiently developed physically. In spite of this ruling, his colleagues, the adult priests do not admit him to perform such service until he has reached the age of 20 years. [They imply that spiritual maturity is required also. Ed.] (Sifra)

אשר יהיה בו מום, “who is afflicted with a physical blemish;” after the Torah had made an overall statement regarding the holiness of the priests, it begins to list blemishes which will disqualify individual priests from performing service in the Temple. (Ibn Ezra)

'כי כל איש וגו, “for any man who is afflicted with a blemish” the Torah lists the reason that such priests may not perform service in the Temple as being that seeing that they represent the whole Jewish community, it would not seem appropriate that this community dispatches blemished people as their representatives at the Court of the King of Kings. (B’chor shor)

אשר בו מום, “even if he had been born with the physical abnormality;”

חרם, an expression similar to חרם or שבירה, “disgraceful, something to be avoided.” (Ibn Ezra)

שרוע, asymmetrical, too long or too short. Compare Isaiah, 28,20, השתרע.

גבן, “hunchback;”דק, “a dwarf;”

תבלול, “malformed eyes.”

מרוח, “psoriasis"

מקדשי הקדשים, ומן הקדשים, “both of the most holy and the holy.”(he may eat) This poses the question of why we have to be told that he may eat of the ‘holy,” seeing that the Torah had already permitted him to eat from “the most holy?” Answer: if the Torah had only written that he may eat of the קדשי הקדשים, I might have thought that what is meant by this is only the קדשים, “the holy things of a lower level of holiness.” The logic behind such a thought would have been that these קדשים, “holy” things, could be consumed also outside the sacred precincts of the Temple which are also permitted to be eaten by non priests. (Example: Passover lamb) In order to prevent such a misunderstanding, the Torah added the extra words.

אך אל הפרכת ואל המזבה, “but to the dividing curtain inside the Sanctuary, and to the altar he must not come near.” (on account of his blemish); if the Torah had only quoted the example of the dividing curtain I might have thought that seeing that the dividing curtain is inside the Sanctuary, the blemished person could also not approach the golden altar whereas it would be all right to approach the copper altar outside the Sanctuary. On the other hand, if the Torah had only forbidden the blemished priest to approach the altar, I would have thought that the reason is because the sacrificial animals are slaughtered in it. Seeing that the dividing curtain did not have anything to do with the actual slaughtering of the offering, I might have thought that even a blemished priest could approach it; in order to prevent such faulty reasoning on our part the Torah added a few words.

כי אני ה' מקדשם, “for I the Lord, sanctify them.” The Torah is speaking about sanctifying the dividing curtain and the altar, and that is why a priest with a blemish is not fit to approach them. (B’chor shor)

ואל כל בני ישראל, “as well as to all the Children of Israel.” They are warned not to entrust their offerings to priests who are afflicted with blemishes.