The Sprinkled Blood
In Vayikra 1:5, we are told of a very interesting scenario:
"The bull shall be slaughtered before G-d; and Aaron’s sons, the priests, shall offer the blood, dashing the blood against all sides of the altar that is at the entrance of the Tent of Meeting."
The Torah specifies that "they shall sprinkle the blood on the altar on all sides". The blood is taken in the vessel and dashed against the two diagonal corners of the altar: the northeast corner and the southwest corner. It took great expertise to dash the blood properly so that when sprinkled on these two corners, the blood would reach all four walls of the altar. (Me'am Loez, Vayikra 1:5)
Why do this in such a way? How do we understand this?
As always, what is about to follow is only my opinion. With that, let's go!!
I believe each of these corners represents one of Yaakov Avinu's four wives. The two main sides from which the sprinkling is made are Leah and Rachel. The remaining two are Bilhah and Zilpah. The landing on all four corners means Hashem is making all four ladies liable for the fact that the person bringing the korban, from which the blood is taken, is a descendant of one of their sons. And the way the ladies raised their children - the twelve boys - now requires a korban, and now, years later, their descendants keep on making sins, due to the brothers' mothers bad parenting practices; bad internal home politics; competition between the wives, and hatred of the children towards Yosef, which eventually got him sold to a different country, away from the family. Sons of Leah's dislike and disrespect toward the sons of Bilhah and Zilpah, and all these bad traits were passed down to their descendants to this day.
And there was that man, bringing a sacrifice, and Cohen is sprinkling the blood, as if putting a blame on the wives of Yaakov Avinu, thus inspiring them to join together in his prayer.
When the ashes of the red heifer are sprinkled, they atone for Chavah Imenu and purify the person. But the wives of Yaakov Avinu have it much tougher.
In everyday life, we encounter all sorts of people. Some good, some not at all, but all are products of their mothers' parenting, who have instilled those traits in them.
So...welcome to the show!!
Shmuel Katanov
