Being with people – K’doshim
The opening words of K’doshim ensure that a capacity audience will hear the message: “Speak to the whole congregation of the Children of Israel and say to them, ‘You shall be holy, for I, the Lord your God, am holy’.”
It seems the Almighty was worried that unless the whole people were present when holiness was spelled out, some would gain the impression that holiness was for a spiritual elite and not for everybody.
Some religious systems have that concept. But not Judaism.
The Torah does not require separation from the ordinary events and experiences of life in order to rise to the level of sanctity. Judaism never had much time for hermits. On the contrary; the Kotzker Rebbe teaches that only as part of the community can a person be a kadosh.
Which explains why the command about being holy is followed by laws about respecting your parents, loving your neighbour, providing for the poor and disadvantaged, not putting a stumbling block before the blind. and other day to day duties.
To be holy when, enwrapped in a tallit and enraptured with the presence of God, the rest of the world does not exist, is spiritually exhilarating.
But in some ways it is even harder to be holy when you are with ordinary people who tease the last ounce of patience and tolerance out of you, when those you try to love act unlovably, when there is dishonesty, selfishness and corruption all around you and you find it unbelievably hard to maintain your moral standards.
Being holy in the synagogue is sometimes easier, but holiness also requires being holy in the street.
Being holy when only you and God are there is all very well, but the real task of holiness is not in an ivory tower but in the midst of the community.
