This week’s parsha, Parshas Shemini, contains one of the most unsettling narratives in the Torah: The death of Aaron’s sons. The parsha describes the activities of the inauguration of the Mishkan on the eighth day after its completion. In the middle of the long inauguration service, Aaron’s sons, “Nadav and Abihu each took his fire pan, put fire in it, and laid incense on it; and they offered before Hashem foreign fire, which had not been enjoined upon them.” (Vayikara 10:1). Their motivation is examined and discussed by the sages and throughout the commentaries of all ages. There are those who condemn them for levity or intoxication, and there are those who focus on their misplaced inspiration. Whatever the reason for their bringing an offering that had not been required, the result was the same: “And fire came forth from Hashem and consumed them; thus they died before Hashem”(10:2).

It is obvious why this story is upsetting. Aaron’s sons died - publicly, dramatically, and in the middle of the most auspicious ceremony Klal Yisrael had endeavored upon. Even more discomforting for many people is the fact that Aaron and his two remaining sons could not stop the inauguration and absorb their shock. They had to go forward and complete the inauguration before reacting to the loss of their immediate family members, which is odd in itself because in Jewish tradition the death of an immediate relative puts one in a state of limbo until the burial of the body as soon as possible. 

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As humans, as survivors, as the ones who are left behind after a death, we have a hard time seeing the positive for the neshama. We are focussed on what we have lost. Protecting life is the ultimate goal - the primary instinct is, afterall, the survival instinct - because only in life can our neshama grow and flourish. The more our neshama can grow here in Olam Hazeh, the more it will be able to receive the Divine presence in Olam HaBah, and so we focus on the potential of life without, usually, remembering that death also frees the neshama from its battle, or better competition, with the goof, with one’s physical needs and desires. 

When reading parashas Shemini, our immediate reaction is based on our mindset of death as a complete negative. Perhaps, however, from the words that tell us that Nadav and Abihu died before Hashem we are reminded that death is the doorway to a higher plane of existence (when we are ready, ad mesh v’esrim for each of you who reads this!)

Wishing you all a good Shabbas.