Rabbi Daniel Siegel

The Scream

How could or should one react in the face of the inscrutable, the unacceptable.

In seeking to serve God, in the Mishkan (Tabernacle), the priests Nadav and Avihu are struck down before the Lord.

Our parashah, Shemini, is as terse about their father’s reaction as it is about his sons’ deaths-וידום/VaYidom Aharon.

וידום/VaYidom, describing the bereft father, has two opposing meanings.

Aharon (Aaron) was struck dumb, rendered speechless. Utter silence alone bespeaks the depth of his sorrow. The word /דומםdomem sharing the same root letters of וידום/VaYidom denotes lifeless matter. In his sons’ deaths, Aaron is devoid of life.

וידום/VaYidom might also mean to wail and lament. Confronting the unbearable, Aharon could not, would not, contain his anguish and pain.

Lament or silence, Aharon is confounded in a world of utter desolation.

All of Israel, Moshe tells his brother, Aharon, will mourn the deaths of his sons. But, we are left wondering if this father will ever find life and God again.

Eliyahu (Elijah), in despair, calls out to God:

It is enough. Now, O Lord, take my life… And, behold, the Lord passed by, and a great and strong wind rent the mountains, and broke in pieces the rocks before the Lord; but the Lord was not in the wind; and after the wind an earthquake; but the Lord was not in the earthquake; and after the earthquake a fire,

but the Lord was not in the fire; and after the fire a still (דממה/demamah) small voice.