Torah Portion:	Tzav – Parah
Synagogue:	Shira Chadasha (Partnership Orthodox)
Walking time from home:	25 minutes
Reason for going:	My sister and I sponsoring the kiddush
Kiddush:	Lots of variety

For the last twelve years, my sister and I have sponsored a kiddush in memory of our mother at the Shira synagogue, and I have given the sermon, partly connected to the portion of the week, and partly to our mother. What follows is the highlights of the edited speech. 

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I want to start by thanking this shule because this continues to be the place our family comes to for special occasions. Last year my niece celebrated her Bat Mitzvah here, and today we are all back again for this milestone – the 32nd Yahrzeit and the 11th drasha for our mum’s Yarzheit in 12 years.

This week is the first Shabbat after Purim. For me this is significant because I always associate Purim with my mum. Although she died just over a week after Purim – the actual Yahrzeit being this coming Monday – Purim of that year was really the last time I spoke to her. I remember it quite clearly. I was leaving a Purim party and from a payphone in those days, I called my dad who was at the hospital. I asked if I should visit, but he said that would be too difficult since there was no one to pick me up, but instead he gave the phone to my mum. Despite the recollection of the day, I have no idea what we actually spoke about, but in retrospect I realised that it was our last conversation. It was a week or two earlier that I saw her for the last time. 

On top of that, the portion of Parah, which is always appended to another Parasha as it was today, was the one I read for my Bar Mitzvah, and that year, because she was in hospital, my mum missed that too. So in a way, more than in most years, this year’s oration is more personal than usual.

It is more personal in other ways too. Because of the calendar cycle, though the date of my mum’s Yahrzeit doesn’t change, the Parasha that I talk about often does. Since the first time I did this 12 years ago, this is the fourth time Tzav has come up but the first time it has been combined with Parah. Tzav in many ways is a particularly bland portion. As I have said on previous occasions, it is ostensibly about so-called boring and esoteric concepts like sacrifices and the details around them, and about the responsibilities of the Kohen and how Moses made Aharon and his sons the priests of the nation. Even the regular Haftarah of Tzav is Jeremiah’s perspective on the Tabernacle and offerings, and thus this week’s portion doesn’t seem to have any of the juicy stuff that other parts of the Torah are known for. But maybe, bland is fine?!

It is fair to say that my mother was a quiet person. She was quiet both in the way she interacted with people and the way in which she navigated the world – very much different to most of her descendants. Her goal was to never cause too much of a fuss and to not get in people’s ways. Unfortunately that also meant that she wasn’t great at asking for help, even when she needed it – a trait that is common to many of us – and despite the love, care and both medical and psychological assistance that was around her in her final years, she died at the very young age of 44. She led a quiet life and in the end, died a quiet death, but it was on the very same day – 27 March 1992 – that Lang Hancock – the father of billionaire Gina Rinehardt – also died, and every time I see his name or her name, I think of my mum too, because his death certainly took the limelight that day.

In a sense, my mum’s life was bland, a little bit uninteresting even, if looked at from the outside, without the accolades, publicity and fame that some others achieve during their lifetimes. She did earn two degrees, had two kids, moved countries, travelled a little and had multiple careers before she got ill, but many people do these things. There was little that objectively stood out.

When talking about the bland portion of Tzav, the rabbis of old suggest that when a young child starts to learn the Torah, rather than starting at the beginning or with something iconic, they should start with Tzav, or at the very least with last week’s portion of Vayikra – the first one of the Book of Leviticus. Why? Partly because it is a nice starting off point before getting to the more juicy stuff, but mainly because the sacrifices and the Tabernacle are in a true sense what really matters. Sure, we don’t have sacrifices anymore, but the Musaf prayer that we are about to do, the concept of three daily services and many of the festivals – especially the three pilgrim ones – are all connected to the conceptual form of sacrifices, and much of the rest of Judaism is connected to the Tabernacle and its enclosures. Without these concepts, as boring as they might first appear to be, the Judaism of today would be unrecognisable.

Even more obscure and bizarre than sacrifices though, is the reading of Parah, about the purification of the red heifer, or red cow. Why is Parah always appended to another Parasha, and read on the first Shabbat after Purim? The main reason is that although strange and complicated, the concept of the red cow is really about purification, and since Purim always comes one month before Pesach, it is a reminder that now that Purim is over, we should start to think about Pesach and all the purification and cleaning that is involved in that. But more than that, I think the red cow has a deeper meaning.

Mythological history recalls that there have only ever been nine recorded cases of the red cow, and that there will only ever be one more. On top of that, everything associated with the rules around the red cow are theoretical only, because we no longer have sacrifices and no longer require the same level of ritual purification. If and when any of this is applicable and reinstated again, it will only be during the times of Moshiach.

Personally, I don’t think much about Moshiach and I suspect most of you don’t either. I also don’t really like delving into hypothetical matters that don’t seem to apply to me. But at the same time, I am not only a Kohen, but Parah was my Bar Mitzvah section, so if the idea that everything happens for a reason is to be believed, then there has to be some connection. The one I choose to draw is that although the red cow is some abstract idea that we will likely never see in our lifetimes, it is still something we can aspire to. Well not the cow itself, but the idea of something magical, mythical and special.

Did my mum live up to her potential? Who knows. But as her descendant and as someone who knows about these ideas, surely it is my duty to reach for the stars in a way she never had the chance to do. As I have mentioned before, I always try to make the most of any opportunity and I feel an almost innate call to make a difference in the world. Very soon after I spoke here last year, I travelled to Poland and then to Israel to see firsthand for myself the horrors and remnants of the Holocaust, and to see what has happened in the seventy plus years since. Never could any of us have imagined that just a few months later, our worlds would have been turned upside again by the depraved acts of deluded madmen on October 7. But here we are, almost six months on, and the Jews – just like they were seven decades ago and many times before that – are the victims yet again, and the ones who are perceived to be the cause of all evil.

I am standing here remembering the life of my mother, but this conflict, along with so many others, is producing the need for so many other people to remember the lives of their loved ones. Each with their own minds, goals and aspirations, yet each cut short in brutal fashion.

To my mind, the red cow is an aspiration for all of us to do better, and mixed with Tzav, for each of us to value the small things, the bland things, even the boring things. In my sister’s family, they got so sick of the kids saying that school was boring that they created a new word to say instead. The kids often find everything, especially at school, quite boring, but at the end of the day, their marks are great, their teachers say that they are good learners and it is clear that they are taking it in. It might seem boring at first but that is only because it is part of the cycle of life.

And so it is for the rest of us. A bland, modest, quiet life does not need to mean boring. It means making a difference in your own special way, and in a way that has an impact on others, as my mother’s life certainly did. My goal and hope for my own life is that I can continue to aspire to the red cow to make a difference in the world, but that I am grounded enough in my blandness so as not to obscure my dreams and opportunities.

This year, as we recover from Purim, prepare for Pesach and stand here on this Shabbat, I hope that all of us have the chance to think about our place in the world, to not take things too much for granted, and to make the most of every situation. Thank you.