(from Meshekh Chokhma on Vayikra)
The Constant Yom Kippur
The opening of Parshat Acharei Mot outlines the Yom Kippur Temple service, culminating in the Kohein Gadol’s entering the Holy of Holies. The Torah, as the Vilna Gaon points out (based on a Midrash), does not limit this to Yom Kippur. Aharon the Kohen could enter the Holy of Holies at other times also, as long as he first went through the whole progression of atonement sacrifices.
This seems to be the simplest way of reading the paragraph at the beginning of the Parsha. At first we are told, “With this (service) Aharon should enter the holy place,” (Vayikra 16:3) and the list of sacrifices follows. Only at the end of the paragraph, twenty-six verses later, is this identified as the Yom Kippur Temple service. “This should be for you an eternal law in the seventh month . . .” (Vayikra 16:29).
Why was Aharon able to enter the Holy of Holies merely through the sacrifices, but subsequent Kohanim Gedolim, even with the sacrifices, were limited to Yom Kippur? The Meshekh Chokhma explains based on a comment of the Sforno at the end of Parshat Emor. The Sforno was bothered by why the Torah attributes the daily candle lighting and daily incense offering to Aharon even though halakhically any Kohen can do it. He answers that because the Clouds of Glory constantly hung over the Mishkan while the Jews travelled through the desert, they experienced the equivalent of a constant Yom Kippur. The height of Yom Kippur is the cloud of incense filling the Holy of Holies. But in the desert there was always a Divine Cloud over the Holy of Holies. Therefore just as on Yom Kippur the Kohen Gadol did all of the services of the day (even those not specially designated for Yom Kippur), so in the desert Aharon did all of the services, even the normal daily ones.
This is why, says the Meshekh Chokhma, Aharon was able to enter the Holy of Holies any day of the year (as long as he went through the sacrificial order) – for he was living in a state of constant Yom Kippur. The same was true, maintains the Meshekh Chokhma, for his son Elazar, who lived through the period when the Clouds of Glory hovered over the Mishkan constantly. Subsequent Kohanim Gedolim had to wait for the actual Yom Kippur to enter. Only on Yom Kippur are the Jews all in an angelic state, and fitting for the atonement and Divine Revelation that comes with the Yom Kippur service.
[prepared by Eliezer Kwass]
