I have just returned from a few days away in Germany. It was good, and it was needed. The truth is, Pesach – as joyful and rich as it is – carries with it a weight that few of us acknowledge aloud. It is one of the most intense, demanding seasons in the year of a rabbi, and this year, I could not find the pause I usually give myself after it.
And you know what? I felt it. Deeply.
There comes a point when even the sweetest duties can start to scorch. When the fire meant to keep us warm begins to burn the edges of our spirit.
Acharei Mot, the portion we read this Shabbat, returns to the story of Aaron’s two sons, Nadav and Avihu. They were priests. Devoted, passionate, faithful. They entered the sanctuary with their firepans and their incense, longing to draw close to God. And yet, they died.
Why?
Not because they rebelled. Not because they rejected holiness.
They came too close. They were consumed by the very fire they carried.
It is an old and painful truth: sometimes love, untampered, can destroy. Sometimes duty, unchecked, can overwhelm. Even service to God must have boundaries, or it risks becoming a sacrifice God never asked for. The Torah teaches us again and again the wisdom of limits. Shabbat itself is a boundary: six days you shall labour, and on the seventh, you shall rest. The High Priest, in the ritual of Yom Kippur, was commanded to draw near to God – but only once a year, and only after long, careful preparation.
Even Moses, for all his closeness, was told: “You shall see My back, but My face shall not be seen.”
Holiness, it seems, requires not only passion but distance. Not only yearning but patience.
It is so easy to forget this. There is always one more task to do, one more visit to make, one more responsibility to shoulder. We tell ourselves we are needed. We tell ourselves it is good. And it is good. But it is not good if it costs us the sacred flame within.
There is a midrash that teaches: “The priests were not allowed to enter the Sanctuary barefoot.” Even the holiest ones needed a layer of protection between themselves and the ground of awe. Maybe today, we need to hear that teaching again.
Maybe the courage to search for holiness includes the courage to rest. Maybe stepping back, breathing deeply, is itself a kind of prayer. A way of saying: “I am not the fire. I am not the sacrifice. I am a vessel, and vessels need filling.”
Shabbat Shalom.
