Summary of the Parasha

The parasha opens with: “Kedoshim tihyu ki kadosh Ani”, “You shall be holy, for I am holy”. God then lists a series of commandments that form the “code of holiness”: some already known, others new.

Among them: keeping Shabbat and honoring parents, warnings against idolatry, tzedakah (leaving the corner of the field and the gleanings for the poor and the stranger), honesty in business and paying wages the same day, impartial justice, the duty to rebuke one’s neighbor gently, the prohibition of revenge and of bearing a grudge, the prohibition of Sha’atnez (wool and linen mixed), of tattoos, of shaving the corners of the beard, and of turning to divination. The Torah asks us to love the stranger and the convert, to rise before the sage and the elder, and above all: “Love your neighbor as yourself”.

Summary of the Haftara

“Hatishpot Otam” (“Will you judge them?”)
Text in Ezekiel 20:2–20 for Sephardim, 22:1–19 for Ashkenazim

In the Sephardi reading, the elders of Israel come to consult the prophet and beg God to spare Jerusalem, but their request is refused. God recalls the people’s past sins, in Egypt and then in the desert, especially against Shabbat. As in the parasha, He asks Israel to sanctify itself, not to become impure, and to keep His laws and His Shabbatot, and He recalls that He gave them a land “flowing with milk and honey”.

In the Ashkenazi reading, Ezekiel accuses Jerusalem, “the city of blood”, of its sins, and compares it to metals mixed with dross that must pass through the fire.

Parasha-Haftara Connection

The parasha calls Israel to holiness; the haftara shows what becomes of a people that forgets it, but also recalls why God chose them: to keep His laws and sanctify Shabbat, the sign between Him and Israel.