Q&A: Study Sources for Understanding the Concept of Holiness
Study Sources for Understanding the Concept of Holiness
Question
The concept of holiness in Judaism seems vague to me, and I’m not really able to understand it very well. It comes up in quite a few contexts—for example, the Divine Presence in the Holy of Holies, the holiness of certain objects, and in general holiness that exists in a particular physical place or at a particular time. I don’t really have any idea what this means beyond a faint intuitive notion.
I know this is a big topic, and even so, does the Rabbi have any recommended sources through which one can begin learning about this subject, so that these things will become clearer to me?
Answer
I don’t think the topic is all that big, and I think even less that there is material to read that will help you with it. As I understand it, holiness is divine presence, and where there is a closer and more pronounced presence, the holiness is greater (see the Mishnah of the ten degrees of holiness in tractate Kelim). That can be in some time and/or place, or in some object. That’s all.
Discussion on Answer
I don’t understand what isn’t clear. Do you understand God? Is He situated in space? At least not like a physical object. It is commonly thought that He affects reality. And there are objects, places, and times in which He affects it more / is closer. That’s all. What’s the problem with that? What is there here to delve into?
How is that influence on reality expressed? About the Ark of the Covenant, you can say there is a mystical influence, and there it’s clear. But with a Torah scroll, tefillin, the holiday of Passover, or things like that, it seems that the influence is expressed only in a greater number of laws. If so, are “having many laws about something” and “divine presence” identical concepts?
As I understand it, the laws are a result of the state of holiness, not its very definition.
If something signifies God in the world, then it is holy—whether it is tefillin and mezuzot, in which God’s name is written, or a place consecrated to His worship, like the Temple and synagogues, or even the Jewish people themselves.
Berkovits devotes discussion to the topic in his book, in the chapter on holiness, from a different angle.
There’s the book The Holiness of Spring by Rabbi Lichtenstein.
If you’re interested in the concept of holiness in general, there’s a book by Rudolf Otto called The Idea of the Holy.
If you’re interested, there’s an interesting lecture by Prof. Moshe Halbertal on YouTube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T7rTXFHBbgY&ab_channel=%D7%91%D7%99%D7%AA%D7%9C%D7%90%D7%9E%D7%A0%D7%95%D7%AA%D7%99%D7%A9%D7%A8%D7%90%D7%9C%D7%99%D7%AA
And our master the Rabbi Michael Abraham also has, incidentally, a series of lectures on the topic of holiness.
I don’t understand what it means that there is divine presence in a certain place or at a certain time, or what it means that it is closer or more pronounced. Is God physically located in space? Is He matter? Is He a ghost? In one place are there 3 units of volume of God and in another place 4 units of volume of Him?
If the statement about the Mishnah in Kelim is that this itself is the meaning of divine presence—that is, divine presence = the laws about which impure people are forbidden to stand in that area—then I understand. But it seems to me that this is not the intention; rather, because there is more divine presence in that area, halakhic ramifications follow from that. So in practice, even after looking at the Mishnah, I still don’t really understand what divine presence means.