How Is “Kedusha” (Holiness) Conceptualized in Judaism? Essay Example

In Judaism, holiness (kedushah) is a biblical word for holiness in Hebrew. “Kedushah,” means “separate and unique.” Whatever its appearance, holiness is a metaphysical quality that our souls can sense. According to the holy scriptures, Judaism’s main objective is to imbue the physical with holiness. This essay will explain the foundation of holiness as a way of life before demonstrating how the Israelites achieve, nurture, and relate to holiness. Finally, I will demonstrate they employ the Torah as a manual for holiness, both as a characteristic of the Deity and as a standard for human endeavor.

Leviticus 20:26 sums up the idea of holiness in the Jewish way of life: “You shall be holy to Me, for I, the Lord, am holy, and I have separated you from other peoples to be Mine.” The Torah warns that breaking those restrictions will result in exile: “You shall faithfully observe all My laws and regulations, lest the land to which I bring you to settle spit you out” as it did Israel’s forefathers there. The laws that distinguish the Israelite people from surrounding nations are meant to preserve their distinctiveness, and the Torah warns that breaking those restrictions will result in exile (Neriah 200-201). So proper conduct would bring about and preserve Israel’s sanctity.

Since such behavior was considered to be “not in the heavens,” attainable without superhuman effort, the difference between a holy life and a profane living was not unbridgeable nor permanent. According to the Bible, Israel and all other peoples will live in a world that is completely sanctified. Despite the separatist inclination in the language of the Bible’s depiction of holiness, how holiness was given to persons, things, places, and eras was markedly similar to that of other ancient civilizations. Through ritual, prayer, official proclamation, and abstaining from particular “abominations,” holiness is bestowed and upheld.

In his book Worship and Ethics, the (aptly called) 20th-century rabbinic scholar Max Kadushin tried to explain holiness in the framework of rabbinic thought. His theory held that there were fundamentally two types of holiness for the rabbis: hierarchical and nonhierarchical. Holiness classified according to individuals, places, days, and things was called hierarchical holiness (Kadushin 99). As its name suggests, the ability to declare that one thing in each category is more holy than another distinguishes this hierarchy of holiness.

Conversely, nonhierarchical holiness is only attained via “intentional personal behavior” and is closely related to morality, Jewish law compliance, and deeds of loving-kindness. While a vessel employed in the Temple service can be considered to have some degree of holiness due to its function in carrying out necessary rites, only humans are genuinely needed to be holy (famously in Leviticus 19:2) (Marx 66). This instruction is a mandate to conduct in such a way as to be regarded as holy rather than a request to emulate the sacred vessel somehow. Thus, this form of nonhierarchical holiness can be attained by abiding by the commandments, acting in a way that emulates God’s loving compassion, or avoiding the spiritually impure (most notably, murder, adultery, and idolatry).

We may better comprehend what the rabbis meant by the term kedushah if we are aware of the contrast between hierarchical (ritual) and nonhierarchical (moral) holiness. However, separating the ceremonial from the moral carries the risk of considering the two completely unconnected. While there are significant differences between the two, Kadushin quickly points out that there is also a significant overlap because the act that bestows hierarchical holiness on an item is a mitzvah, raising the nonhierarchical holiness of the mitzvah-performer (Kadushin 201). After all, to get back to the example of our Mishnah from the Megillah, prayer is an obligation that draws the person praying closer to God and elevates them to a higher level of holiness, even if it only makes the city square holy.

The idea of holiness held by the ancient rabbis was unquestionably distinct from the holiness held by the Bible. While retaining a biblical understanding of cultic purity and impurity, the rabbis related it to a theology of mitzvot, imitating God, and refraining from morally offensive behavior. By doing this, they granted people the ability to sanctify God’s name in the world and do the mitzvah of kiddush Hashem, which is the ability to make oneself holy.

In conclusion, is achieving holiness a question of upholding the law’s requirements or going above and beyond them, maybe to the point of being a rare saintly individual? On this issue, medieval Jewish scholars took a range of opinions. Some people only need to refrain from engaging in illegal activity. Others see Jewish law’s (halakhah) mandates and prohibitions as a set of enforced minimum standards for decency, within which one may misbehave or, by choosing to conduct correctly, become a holy person (Berman and Zarsky 451). Others, however, advocate living an austere life of devotion to God as the path to becoming “holy.” Jewish philosophers of today have produced Jewish interpretations of the term “holiness,” in part informed by intellectual, literary, and anthropological investigations of religion.

Works cited

Berman, Nadav S., and Tal Z. Zarsky. “What Is the Juxtaposition between Silicon Valley and Mount Sinai? Covenantal Principles and the Conceptualization of Platform-User Relations.” Journal of Law and Religion 37.3 (2022): 446-477.

Kadushin, Max. Worship and Ethics: A Study in Rabbinic Judaism. Global Academic Publishing, 2001.

Marx, Dalia. “The missing temple: The status of the temple in Jewish culture following its destruction.” European Judaism 46.2 (2013): 61-78.

Neriah, Mosheh Zevi. “THE STATE OF ISRAEL AND THE HALAKHAH.” Tradition: A Journal of Orthodox Jewish Thought 1.2 (1959): 200-208.