Our sages felt that the passages describing the sacrificial system of Israel were to be interpreted as a source of ethical imperatives for the Jew. The verses were seen as filled with moral guidance for the way in which the Jew was to conduct his or her life. The most obscure passages of the sacrificial system were read as gems of spiritual light. Thus, the Torah in its entirety became the living waters of Judaism.

Parashat Tsav teaches that the burnt offering and the sin offering were to be offered on the same altar. Yaakov ben Yitzhak Ashkenazi derived from this that there should be no knowledge of who has sinned in thought and who in deed. The sages were painfully aware of how shame and embarrassment may affect an individual. They remind us that we are not allowed to hold on to the past as a grudge against an individual who has reformed his or her behavior. They teach us that public embarrassment of an individual is the moral equivalent of murder as the embarrassed individual turns beet red. The sages compared this to the drawing of blood. Pirkei Avot, the Ethics of the Fathers states succinctly, "Judge every person in a positive light." The humanitarian ethic of rabbinic Judaism was derived from the details of the sacrificial system.

Rabbi Levi interpreted the word, "olah", the burnt offering, to be etymologically related to "alah", the boastful person. Like the burnt offering, fire would consumer the boastful individual. Judaism\s has always upheld modesty as a supreme virtue. Moses is known as the most modest of all human beings. He does not challenge the insults hurled out him by his own brother, Aaron, and his sister, Miriam. He is ecstatically happy when Eldad and Meidad begin to prophecy in the camp of Israel independently. When Joshua views the actions of Eldad and Meidad as a threat to the authority of Moses, Moses responds, "Would that all of Israel were prophets?" The beautiful midrash of the death of Moses asserts that Moses would rather die than have a pang of jealousy for the leadership of Joshua. Modesty is seen as the greatest of virtues; pride as sinful. The Book of Proverbs states it succinctly, "Let a stranger praise you and not your own mouth." Self-aggrandizement is seen as the sin of the Tower of Babel and the sin of Sodom. The people of Babel feel that they may challenge G-d by erecting a tower in the sky. The people of Sodom feel that their wealth permits them to be cruel to the stranger. The mortal sin of the sons of Aaron, Nadav and Avihu is associated with excessive pride as well. The two sons feel themselves to be superior to the leadership of Moses and Aaron. The two sons choose to remain celibate because they feel they are too good for any of the women of Israel. The fire of excessive pride ultimately engulfs the two sons of Aaron and they perish.

The Torah mentions the four sacrifices in the following order: burnt offering, meal offering, sin offering, guilt offering, and peace offering. Rabbi Meir noted that the peace offering was mentioned last to teach the greatness of shalom, of peace. The ethics of peacemaking occupy a special place in rabbinic thought. Our rabbis, like all of us, note the tension between the significance of peace and the need to confront evil and injustice. Our sages express the tension through the personalities of Aaron and Moses. Aaron is the peacemaker, willing to sacrifice the ideal of monotheism to appease the Israelites with the Golden Calf. Moses, the absolutist, will never compromise and would rather engage in violent conflict than surrender his convictions. Peace is one of the greatest of the rabbinic values but the sages were not blind to the realities of conflict. They interpreted our beloved prayer, "Oseh Shalom Bimromav", the only place of absolute peace is the heavens. Someday, G-d's peace will dwell among us and all Israel. Our sages noted that the Hebrew word for "heaven" is "shamayim', which they interpreted as an amalgamation of "esh" and "mayim", fire and water. The only place where fire and water may co-exist in harmony is in the heavens. Like our sages, we too, esteem the value of shalom. Yet, we know that the vision of the world of shalom is in the future.

The verses and chapters of Leviticus, ironically, have given rise to the most beautiful of rabbinic interpretations. Leviticus is the first book of Torah taught to the child. It is the book of innocence, comparable to the innocence of the young student off to his or her first study. Let us cherish the middle book of Torah, placed in the very heart of our sacred texts. Leviticus is in many ways the heart of Torah, the beating, pulsating source of the spiritual genius of Judaism.