Parashat Emor

This week's Parsha is Emor, literally 'Speak'. Moshe is commanded to speak to the Cohanim and to explain to them their special responsibilities. They were to be fastidious about maintaining their  levels of purity and commitment to holiness.

The parsha then goes on to address not only the priests and their sons  but all the Children of Israel. There seems to be a redundancy in the  text where we are told to obey G'd's commandments and to sanctify His name and not to desecrate His name. Such a repetition would indicate the importance of the admonition and, indeed, the concepts of 'Kiddush Hashem' and 'Chillul Hashem', sanctifying and desecrating G'd's name respectively, have become cornerstones of Judaism.

If we behave in a way that brings credit on Jews and Judaism, then we  are said to be sanctifying G'd's name; if we behave in an immoral way, allowing others to think badly about Jews and Judaism; we are said to be desecrating His name. Sometimes resisting the immoral and refusing to participate in sinful behaviour may even require us to sacrifice our lives. That is why all victims of the Shoa are described as having died for 'Kiddush Hashem' - their lives were sacrificed as we resisted the evil attempts of the Nazi regime to wipe Jewish existence off the earth.

At times when good people fail to stand up against what is clearly wrong, Judaism may be the last bastion of resistance to evil. For that reason, the most evil regimes have often targeted the Jews as their natural enemies.