Behar – Bechukosai – how these 2 parshiyos seamlessly connect

This week we have a double פרשה, which would naturally seem like two separate פרשיות that get grouped together due to discrepancies between how many פרשיות there are in the Torah and how many weeks there are in the year. But I think these פרשיות can really be viewed as one long story.

Behar deals with יובל and all the laws that affect the land and human sales because of יובל, and פרשת בחוקותי opens with a set of ברכות if we listen to Hashem and a long set of curses if we don’t. then we have the laws of ערכין, the value of each person/object should their value be consecrated.

Is it a coincidence that the first פסוק in פרשת בהר says וידבר יהוה אל משה בהר סיני לאמר, and then after the תוכחה it says אלה החקים והמשפטים והתורות אשר נתן יהוה בינו ובין בני ישראל בהר סיני ביד משה, almost like a reminder that we are now wrapping up what we began with at the beginning of פרשת בהר. And then, almost like a prologue, after the laws of ערכין, the last פסוק in בחוקותי says אלה המצות אשר צוה יהוה את משה אל בני ישראל בהר סיני.

I think that these two פרשיות are not arbitrarily placed together simply due to calendrical placement, I think they are once long story that teaches us what really happened on הר סיני and how we are meant to translate that into our daily lives.

The גמרא in Shabbos has a discussion which date of the month the Torah was given, but everyone agrees the Torah was given on Shabbos. To understand מתן תורה is to understand Shabbos and vice versa. This world is generally for doing and moving, while Shabbos and learning Torah are the opposite of that, they are not result driven, rather the journey is the point, the means is the end.

שמיטה is a Shabbos for the land. But does the land need to rest? The פסוק seems to say that it is a שבת הארץ לכם, the land is resting for our benefit, we are meant to gain something from a year of rest. A year of contemplation, while land owners sit back and watch their family members, their workers, strangers, poor people and animals tramp all over their fields and eat all their food. The scene makes you wonder whose food it really is. And I think that’s the point. שמיטה is meant to remind us that the land we live on is not ours, it belongs to God. And יובל is the culmination of a sevenfold cycle of שמיטה, where the message of שמיטה gets amplified. You thought having other people eat the produce of your field was bad? Wait till you see this! That field that you bought a few years ago, that isn’t yours anymore. The land reverts to its default setting and original division of property. Slaves go free and land is returned, all messages to hit home that we are not in power over our possessions. Hashem is the Owner of this world and we are simply dwelling with Him.

And paradoxically when you realize that the land belongs to Hashem, then you receive the ברכה of the pasuk וישבתם על הארץ לבטח. And the פסוק then tells us that this will be followed by גאולה תתנו לארץ, redemption will always happen on the land. All we must do is know what the end of the פרשה says, כי לי הארץ and כי עבדי הם, כי גרים ותושבים אתם עמדי. The land belongs to Hashem, we are only “visiting” on God’s turf and we are His slaves and only His slaves.

At הר סיני, all the people wanted to go up to the mountain, they all wanted to see, feel, and encounter their Creator. But Hashem says, it can’t work like that, to encounter Me in such a natural state is to die, but wait until you hear the shofar, and then you can come up. Wait until you share your fields with the public and realize that they are not your fields and you will see Me. When you are down in the world working your field and focusing on the message that the land truly belongs to Hashem, when you can see Hashem not only on a lofty mountain but also in middle of the mundane world, then you have experienced climbing הר סיני. Since הר סיני was not meant to be a one-time experience, it is supposed to be renewed daily, and we are meant to see God daily in every physical aspect of our lives.

We then transition into פרשת בחוקותי, where we hear about all the blessings that we will receive if we listen to Hashem. But sadly, the world is not perfect, and people are often led astray, and what happens when the Jewish people sin? Then, because of Hashem’s love for us and because we once stood at הר סיני, we will never be destroyed, but the consequences to our actions will come, and they will only intensify if we don’t realize that Hashem is the Master of the world. And here we have the contrast of the wonderful concept of גאולה תתנו לארץ turning into ואם את משפטי תגעל נפשכם, if you make My laws disgusting to yourselves. The ethereal “א” is transformed into the courser more guttural “ע”, and the meaning takes a 180-degree turn.

But because we have הר סיני in our past we will never be destroyed, and that is why the תוכחה ends אלה החקים והמשפטים והתורות אשר נתן יהוה בינו ובין בני ישראל בהר סיני ביד משה, almost as if to be the second bookend to the beginning of פרשת בהר. And the message is that we lived at הר סיני and are locked in a relationship with Hashem, if we fight it and live a courser life then we will have תגעל, but if we live with Hashem and realize that He owns the land that we live on then we will have גאולה.

But there is one more message that these two פרשיות need to give us. We shouldn’t leave off ספר ויקרא with the תוכחה echoing in our ears, so we have the פרשה of ערכין, the laws that deal with a person donating his or her value to Hashem. And this value has nothing to do with financial status, physical capabilities or mental prowess. The only factor deciding an ערך is a person’s gender and age. I think this value is meant to give a sense of intrinsic value that sets us all on an equal plane. Each person, a newborn, a toddler, middle aged, old person, all have an intrinsic value. And the only thing that affects that value is age, which is something that we are all consistently working on every second of our lives. And at the end of this section we hear, אלה המצות אשר צוה יהוה את משה אל בני ישראל בהר סיני. A mitzva is a connection, the word צו means to connect and this knowledge and intrinsic value is our eternal connection to Hashem. And with that message we close ספר ויקרא and journey into מתן תורה and ספר במדבר where we will further delve into the importance and power of each individual person.