Parashat Kedoshim - Third Aliyah

After detailed instruction on the laws of sacrifices, purity, and holiness, the Torah takes us, in one of the most impressive and heart-touching aliyot, to a wide field of everyday life. There are no laws of the Sanctuary or of impurity here, but life itself: what is permitted and forbidden to engrave on the body, how to relate to the elderly, how to plant a tree and how many years to wait before eating its fruit.

The Law of Orlah

At the center of the aliyah stands the law of “orlah”. When a person plants a tree in the Land of Israel, in the first three years its fruit is “arelim lo ye’akhel” (uncircumcised, it shall not be eaten, verse 23), forbidden to eat. In the fourth year the fruit is “kodesh hilulim” (a holy thing for praise-giving, verse 24), holy to Hashem. Only in the fifth year is it permitted to eat the fruit of the tree, and thus, through waiting and restraint, the person merits a special blessing: “lehosif lakhem tevu’ato” (to add to you its produce, verse 25).

The Torah illuminates here an important principle: even in the world of matter, there is a time for the holy, there are boundaries, there is patience. This is education for restraint and for fear of Heaven, also in the natural realm.

Body, Divination, and Awe

Immediately afterward come mitzvot between a person and his body and his fellow: the prohibition of eating upon the blood (which commentators interpret as barbaric behavior, and at times as ways of idolatry), the prohibition of divination and sorcery, laws against attempts to control the future in a magical way.

After them, an explicit command against bodily injuries: not to round off the corners of the head and the beard, not to cut into the flesh, not to write tattoos. And above all: “Ani Adonai” (I am Hashem, verse 28), as if to say: your body is not private property, but a gift from God, and one must relate to it with awe of holiness.

Respect for the Elderly

Toward the end of the aliyah appears one of the most beautiful and moving mitzvot in the Torah: “Mipnei seivah takum vehadarta pnei zaken” (You shall rise before a hoary head and honor the face of the elder, verse 32).

The Torah obligates us to show respect not only to wisdom but also to years. To rise before old age, this is not only manners, but recognition of the holiness of the journey a person has gone through.

And why? “Veyareta me’eloheikha ani Adonai” (And you shall fear your God, I am Hashem, verse 32). Even if no one sees whether you truly honored that elder who passed by you, the Holy One sees.

An Insight for Life

Precisely in an era when speed, immediacy, and changing appearance are leading values, the Torah teaches us the value of restraint, waiting, and respect for what is not temporary: old age, a tree, the human body, the holiness of time and life. There is great beauty in knowing that for everything there is a time, and that life need not be built only according to what one wants now.