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# Leviticus, I Hardly Knew Ya!
- URL: https://www.lifeisasacredtext.com/leviticus-i-hardly-knew-ya/
- Published: 2023-08-21T10:19:57.000Z
- Updated: 2024-01-17T03:19:44.000Z
- Description: Saying baaaaaaaaaahhh baaaaaaaaaahhh to the Torah's middle book
- Author: Rabbi Danya Ruttenberg
- Tags: Newsletter, #Migrated-1705099970463, #Import 2024-01-12 22:53

![black short coat medium dog with blue and black leash](https://images.unsplash.com/photo-1607372322888-cf5d31ba525d?crop=entropy&cs=tinysrgb&fit=max&fm=jpg&ixid=M3wzMDAzMzh8MHwxfHNlYXJjaHwzNXx8Z29hdHxlbnwwfHx8fDE2OTE3ODg0Nzd8MA&ixlib=rb-4.0.3&q=80&w=1080)

![white horse on green grass during daytime](https://images.unsplash.com/photo-1594586924162-1473f0a21418?crop=entropy&cs=tinysrgb&fit=max&fm=jpg&ixid=M3wzMDAzMzh8MHwxfHNlYXJjaHw1OHx8Z29hdHxlbnwwfHx8fDE2OTE3ODg0ODJ8MA&ixlib=rb-4.0.3&q=80&w=1080)

![black ram on green grass field during daytime](https://images.unsplash.com/photo-1596559612981-1784ee9baaf5?crop=entropy&cs=tinysrgb&fit=max&fm=jpg&ixid=M3wzMDAzMzh8MHwxfHNlYXJjaHwxNjl8fGdvYXR8ZW58MHx8fHwxNjkxNzg4NjU1fDA&ixlib=rb-4.0.3&q=80&w=1080)

Can you believe it? We have passed through the Gate of the Goats.

We began by investigating the ways in which the Torah is a 🥪 [**sandwich**](https://www.lifeisasacredtext.com/feeling-levitical/)**🥪** and Leviticus is in the middle for a reason. We did an overview of the 🐐 [**sacrificial system**](https://www.lifeisasacredtext.com/korbon-101/) **🐐,**  considered the ways in which civil disobedience—giving the State control of your body—is and is not a [**substitutionary**](https://www.lifeisasacredtext.com/substitutionary/) act, and how 💕 [**acts of love are,**](https://www.lifeisasacredtext.com/drawing-close/) and are not, korbanot/offerings.

As we looked at the anointing/ordination of priests, we looked at the [**history of messianism**](https://www.lifeisasacredtext.com/anointed/), at the High Priest’s groovy💎 **d**[**ivination** ](https://www.lifeisasacredtext.com/perfect-light/)**💎** tools**,** and I make the argument that behind the tragedy of Nadav and Avihu could be a story of the[ ](https://www.lifeisasacredtext.com/bowls-of-blood-and-strange-fire/)[**toxic mentorship**](https://www.lifeisasacredtext.com/bowls-of-blood-and-strange-fire/)—the same one that happens all too often today.

Our look at kosher laws occupy a heavy [**porg/vampire-themed territory,**](https://www.lifeisasacredtext.com/the-jedi-zohar-thirsty-jewish-vampires/) **🧛‍♀️** I talked about how 🦠 [**illness is**](https://www.lifeisasacredtext.com/illness-as-metaphor/) and[ ](https://www.lifeisasacredtext.com/illness-is-not-a-metaphor/)[**is not a metaphor,**](https://www.lifeisasacredtext.com/illness-is-not-a-metaphor/) **🦠** and much later Rabbi Dr. Julia Watts Belser showed us a [**new way for thinking about bodies and blemishes and disability justice.**](https://www.lifeisasacredtext.com/guest-post-staring-down-ableism/)

We talked about what[ ](https://www.lifeisasacredtext.com/contracting-the-hebrew-jeebies/)[***tumah*** ](https://www.lifeisasacredtext.com/contracting-the-hebrew-jeebies/)[**and**](https://www.lifeisasacredtext.com/contracting-the-hebrew-jeebies/)[ ***taharah***](https://www.lifeisasacredtext.com/contracting-the-hebrew-jeebies/) (“everyday states and elevated states”) are, about the very complex development of [***niddah***](https://www.lifeisasacredtext.com/immersive-experience/) (“menstrual stuff”) laws, as well as getting a sneak peek at’s work in progress on [**Queer Niddah**](https://www.lifeisasacredtext.com/queer-niddah/)(just subscribe to already). We also saw proof of the Torah’s narrative genius in its organization viz the Yom Kippur ritual, and [**why it demands integration**](https://www.lifeisasacredtext.com/bringing-our-full-selves/)[ ](https://www.lifeisasacredtext.com/bringing-our-full-selves/)of the High Priest, as well as the whole business about the Goat to Azazel, aka [**Appeasing Puppy Satan.**](https://www.lifeisasacredtext.com/like-a-goat-outta-hell/)[ ](https://www.lifeisasacredtext.com/like-a-goat-outta-hell/)🐶😈

We talked about how that whole “male shall not lie with male as with female” verse 🏳️‍🌈[**probably doesn’t mean the homophobic things it’s used to mean**](https://www.lifeisasacredtext.com/god-loves-gays/)**,** and[ ](https://www.lifeisasacredtext.com/big-dyke-energy/)[**how Maimonides and 90’s lez pop use the same tropes about women’s same-sex activity**](https://www.lifeisasacredtext.com/big-dyke-energy/)[ ](https://www.lifeisasacredtext.com/big-dyke-energy/)🏳️‍🌈 (and why) (and also some reflections on the reason “dyke” never stuck).

Then we got into the [**“H” section of Leviticus,**](https://www.lifeisasacredtext.com/the-idea-of-the-holy/) and talked about the concept of the holy, looked at ✊ [**labor justice**](https://www.lifeisasacredtext.com/the-bible-commands-solidarity-forever/)[ ](https://www.lifeisasacredtext.com/the-bible-commands-solidarity-forever/)in the tradition and 🛏️ [**Jewish sexual ethics**](https://www.lifeisasacredtext.com/some-notes-jewish-sexual-ethics/)**,🛏️** the “great mitzvah” of [**redeeming captives and the cash bail system**](https://www.lifeisasacredtext.com/as-if-spilling-blood/).

And then we got to Leviticus 19\. In some ways, 🎯[**the point of everything.**](https://www.lifeisasacredtext.com/the-point-of-it-all/)**🎯** It undergirds the [**radical theology of Mr. Rogers,**](https://www.lifeisasacredtext.com/the-radical-theology-of-mr-rogers/) it teaches us how and why we [**demand accountability**](https://www.lifeisasacredtext.com/rebuke-and-accountability/)[ ](https://www.lifeisasacredtext.com/rebuke-and-accountability/)from one another, and teaches us that we must [**love im/migrants as citizens**](https://www.lifeisasacredtext.com/loving-the-immigrant-as-a-citizen/)**. 💞💞💞**

**👁️** [**We complicated old thinking about an “eye for an eye”**](https://www.lifeisasacredtext.com/eye-for-an-eye/) 👁️ and embraced rabbinic “textual activism,” and looked at how the Torah does 💰 💰 [**systemic economic justice.**](https://www.lifeisasacredtext.com/resetting-the-board/) 💰💰

And along the way there were some other things, like [**a text study of the Southern Baptist Convention’s resolutions on abortion**](https://www.lifeisasacredtext.com/abortion-bans-are-a-violation-of/)**,** an overview of [**how Jews read text,**](https://www.lifeisasacredtext.com/jews-for-exegesis/) 🗡️ [**Judith’s sword-wielding, head-chopping**](https://www.lifeisasacredtext.com/beware-of-confident-women-with-swords/) 🗡️ story, something on 🕎 [**Hanukah and adult faith**](https://www.lifeisasacredtext.com/hanukah-and-adult-faith/), a**🍷** [**history of Purim Torah (uh, sacred text satire)**](https://www.lifeisasacredtext.com/purim-torah-a-history-plus-a-jewish/) **🍷,** a [**feminist theory of leavening/chametz**](https://www.lifeisasacredtext.com/clearing-out-how/) **🍞,** leadership lessons from the [**prophet Miriam**](https://www.lifeisasacredtext.com/the-song-of-miriam/)**,🚰** the [**surprisingly relatable**](https://www.lifeisasacredtext.com/love-and-longing-in-elephantine/) letters of biblical-era Jews, we got Kendra Watkins Saperstein’s brilliant [**Reading the Torah Towards Liberation**](https://www.lifeisasacredtext.com/guest-post-reading-the-torah-towards/)**,** we looked at the [**sexual violence of Lamentations**](https://www.lifeisasacredtext.com/so-much-to-mourn/) and [**mourned Shuhada' Sadaqat (nee Sinéad O’Connor)**](https://www.lifeisasacredtext.com/never-get-old/)

### And some highlights from the Subscriber House of Study:

- [**Time travel Torah!**](https://lifeisasacredtext.substack.com/p/time-travel-torah/comments) **⏱️**
- Some [**personal photo/ musical backstory**](https://lifeisasacredtext.substack.com/p/backstory-into-the-gorgon/commentshttps://lifeisasacredtext.substack.com/p/backstory-into-the-gorgon/comments) to bring you deeper into a chunk of Surprised By God
- Closing in on the [**origins of the Hanukah oil miracle**](https://lifeisasacredtext.substack.com/p/oil-miracles-and-textual-puzzles/comments) story 🪔
- [**Star Wars theology (for May the Fourth, natch)**](https://lifeisasacredtext.substack.com/p/jedi-torah-redux/comments)
- [**Why keep kosher (and: Do mizvot always need a reason??)**](https://lifeisasacredtext.substack.com/p/do-mitzvot-always-have-a-why/comments)
- [**Doing Judaism in spaaaace**](https://lifeisasacredtext.substack.com/p/intergalactic-torah/comments) **🚀🚀🚀**
- [**Emma Goldman on the criminal justice system**](https://lifeisasacredtext.substack.com/p/why-do-they-not-deter-emma-goldmans/comments)
- The [**incredibly messy process of writing the** ](https://www.lifeisasacredtext.com/sprouting-booksshaping-books/)[***Surprised By God***](https://www.lifeisasacredtext.com/sprouting-booksshaping-books/)[ **book proposal**](https://www.lifeisasacredtext.com/sprouting-booksshaping-books/)[ ](https://www.lifeisasacredtext.com/sprouting-booksshaping-books/)[**as a case stud**](https://www.lifeisasacredtext.com/sprouting-booksshaping-books/)**y** for shaping nonfiction book projects
- [**Niggunin— gorgeous Jewish wordless music**](https://lifeisasacredtext.substack.com/p/wordless-prayer)**/prayer 🎶🎶🎶**

[tell friends for a free subscription!!!](https://www.lifeisasacredtext.com/leaderboard/)

The goats are very proud of you for making it so far.

Next stop: Numbers/Bamidbar, but a few delightful diversions for a few weeks, first.

![black and white goat on brown soil during daytime](https://images.unsplash.com/photo-1610477294602-a532050416cb?crop=entropy&cs=tinysrgb&fit=max&fm=jpg&ixid=M3wzMDAzMzh8MHwxfHNlYXJjaHwyMjl8fGdvYXR8ZW58MHx8fHwxNjkyMDI0NDU2fDA&ixlib=rb-4.0.3&q=80&w=1080)