[Avodah] Kohen Gadol

[T613K at aol.com]

From: Cantor Wolberg _cantorwolberg at cox.net_ (mailto:cantorwolberg at cox.net) 

>> R'  Micha wrote:  It seems to me self evident, a huge statement about   
the relative importance of chessed.

And not to allow him [to  mourn] for his own immediate family IS chessed?
Also, if he comes upon a  meis, he could demonstrate his chessed by  
summoning another  person.
Sorry, that answer is not self evident.
The only answer I could  accept is that it is a chok.  It certainly  
isn't rational in my  way of thinking and IMHO. <<

 
 
 
>>>>>
I think RMB's words about the relative  importance of "chessed" needs 
emendation -- the Torah is speaking about the  importance of a particular /kind/ 
of chessed, namely chessed shel emes, rather  than generic chessed of all 
types.  
 
The kohen gadol's relatives will be buried properly by other members  of 
Klal Yisrael whether or not he personally takes care of their burial.  A  mes 
mitzva by definition is a person who will not be buried at all if the KG  
doesn't do it himself.  The Torah is telling us that it is more important  
that a Jew be buried than that the KG avoid becoming tamei.  Why is that  "not 
rational"?  Many halachos have to do with what has priority over what,  
e.g., for what mitzvos do you have to leave off learning Torah and go do the  
mitzva.  Such orderings of priority are neither rational nor not-rational  -- 
the Torah just tells us what is important in Hashem's eyes.
 
We see from the story of the Harugei Betar that it is extremely  important 
for Jews to be brought to burial.  The chessed in the case of the  mes 
mitzva is that a person is brought to kevurah who would otherwise rot in a  
field, unburied.
 
It is a denigration of the tzelem Elokim to leave a body lying outside  
somewhere, unburied.  It is also a hardship for the neshama of that person,  
which feels great distress if the body is not buried.
 
The halacha about a KG burying a mes mitzva is mainly  hypothetical.  In 
the normal course of events, a great man like a Kohen  Gadol would never go 
anywhere without an escort of at least two men (IIANM that  is the halacha 
concerning great men, that they must always be  accompanied).  Thus he would 
never be all alone, somewhere outside of a  city, to encounter an untended 
corpse.  
 
The only possible time this halacha  of mes mitzva would even  apply would 
be in a time that was distinctly NOT normal -- maybe a time of  churban, of 
war, persecution, fleeing, running, hiding.  In wartime you  hear of such 
stories, a corpse in a field somewhere and no one to bury the  person.    
 
It would be an extremely unusual circumstance where this would  happen, 
that a kohen gadol would be all alone and would come across a corpse  somewhere 
away from a city, away from any other people.  Most likely it  never 
happened, ever in history (like the ben sorrer umoreh), and the halacha is  
actually a lesson to the rest of us about the great importance of making sure  
that a Jew is never left unburied, even in extreme circumstances, if there is  
any possible way to bury him.
 
 


--Toby  Katz
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