Mishnah Yoma Chapter 2 Mishnah 3 Pt. 1

We started a brand new Mishnah today but we are still deep in the world of “lotteries.” This time we learned about the second lottery, for whom the “winner” gets to perform the ritual slaughter of the sacrificial offering, sprinkle its blood for purification, and clear the ashes of the innermost altar. It feels hard to imagine that these would be roles that one might want to “win”. From the previous Mishnah, we learned that some of the priests were ]willing to break legs (and even stab!) other priests in order to receive certain honors. Hence the lottery system was developed. As an equalizer? A remedy for injustice?

Y’all quickly noted that this lottery system doesn’t really remedy any of the problems existing in the Temple, especially the ableism of the cultic priesthood. It was also noted that it is unclear in the text if it was mandatory for the priests to participate in these lotteries or voluntary. So could this mean that, to add insult to injury, the lottery system may be taking away some of the agency of the priests? It’s not looking much brighter in this Mishnah than the one that came before.

I found myself struck with the disconnect between the values of the world of the Temple and those of the rabbis—for the priests, it seems, the greatest value was to be as close to G!D as possible, hence in this latest lottery we learn of the role of cleaning the ashes of the innermost altar. The word “innermost” / “פנימי” / “penimi” comes from the root פני or פנים meaning faces. In the Torah, it was imagined that one came the closest to “facing” G!D directly when in the innermost chambers of the Tabernacle / משכן / Mishkan. For the rabbis, I’m not sure their ultimate goal was to be as close to “facing” G!D as possible, which may be a bit of a blasphemous thing to say. (And please disagree with me, friend! You can find my fairy hours here!) I think their goal was to be able to encounter, to come face-to-face with the Divine in the world: to discover it, uncover it, and where they couldn’t make sense of it, create magical and ritual systems to trigger it into awareness and being. The rabbis recreate these memories of a system long gone, I believe, not to idealize them, but to invoke in us a longing for the sacred in every task. I know my world would feel a lot more holy if I treated it as the Temple that it could be. Okay, way to go Mishnah (and all of you!) for getting me to think (and feel) just a little more deeply. Can’t wait to learn with y’all again soon!