Parshas Naso contains one of the most famous blessings ever uttered by man, the tri-part blessing of the priests. While this blessing is recited by the Chazzan every morning (and on some occasions, more than once a day), in Israel and among some Sephardic communities – even some in the Diaspora – the kohanim offer this blessing daily. Diaspora Ashkenazim only experience the blessing from the kohanim on rare occasions: twice on Rosh Hashanah, on Yom Kippur, 4 days of Sukkos, 4 days of Pesach and two days of Shavuos – a grand total of 13 times a year. Even twice a year during Sukkos and Pesach, hundreds, if not thousands of kohanim go to the Kosel (Western Wall) and perform the blessing for an eager nation of Israel. This past Pesach I was moved to learn that the stellar US ambassador to Israel, the Honorable David Friedman, attended the event as a scion of the original Kohen, Aharon, along with his son and grandson. You can read about that wonderful event and Ambassador Friedman’s reactions here.

 The first mention of the word Kohen in the Torah can be traced to Avraham’s interaction with Malki Tzedek (whom the Midrash identifies as Shem the son of Noach ,father of the Semites). But a Midrash seems to parallel Avraham himself to the priestly caste as well.

 The Midrash (Bamidbar Rabbah 11:4) records in the name of Rabbi Elazar:

 The Holy One Blessed is His name states that when I created my world and until now, I was inclined to bless my creations Personally as it says, (Bereshis 1:28)’Elokim blessed them (the original creature both male and female). Later (chapter 9), the Torah records that God blessed Noach and his descendants. When Avraham arrived on the scene, Hashem gave Avraham the power of the blessing; yet he did not bless it. Why not? One can understand why from the following parable. A king had an orchard and gave it to a sharecropper. In the field was a tree that produced life and a tree that produced poison. The sharecropper figured that he would just do as the king requests with his orchard. In this parable, the king is Hashem and the orchard represents the world which Avraham was empowered to bless. Avraham had two sons, one was unpious (Yishmael) and one was righteous (Yitzchak). Avraham figured if he were to bless Yitzchak, Yishmael too would request a blessing. ‘What should I do’ wondered Avrham? After all, I am flesh and blood and a mortal. I will defer to the will of the Almighty. When Avraham passed away, Hashem appeared to Yitzchak and blessed him (Bereshis 25:11) Yitzchak blessed Yaakov and Yaakov blessed the 12 tribes, his sons. From then on, Hashem told the Children of Israel that the key to blessing is in the hands of the Children of Israel through the kohanim (priests). The kohanim would henceforth administer the blessing to the Children of Israel. Hashem told Avraham that he and his offspring would be blessed (Bereshis 12:2) and here it states, thus is the way to bless Israel (Bamidbar 6:23).

 The Sfas Emes (5646/1886), citing this Midrash, noted that Avraham Avinu rose above the natural world, and by doing so, he himself became the blessing. Avraham’s ability to subjugate himself to God’s will in this way, sustained the world. The Children of Israel are those who, in the crucible of the arid wilderness, most subjugated themselves to the will of the Almighty. As such the world is blessed through the seed of Avraham. Within the Hebrew nation, it was the kohanim who sustained and provided the blessing to the Chosen nation, for they were most divorced from the physical world in that they did not receive a portion of land in Israel. In the realm of time, Shabbos provides blessing for the entire week because it too is most separate from the physicality of the work week.

I read a beautiful and deeply moving related story last week, contained in the weekly D’var Torah by Rabbi Mordechai Kamenetzky, the Rosh Yeshiva of Yeshivas Toras Chaim Bais Binyamin, the Yeshiva of South Shore, which I would like to share. [ I strongly recommend Rabbi Kamenetzky’s eloquent and inspiring Divrei Torah, which can be found in Ami Magazine and faxhomily can be sent to your email inbox.  Just TEXT FAXHOMILY to 22828 to get started!-EK]

 Just the other day, a good friend, Joe Bobker, sent me a story which he had translated from the Hagadah "Chemdat Shamayim".  I have adapted his translation.

During the Yom Tov prayers the Rabbi of a large synagogue in the United States noticed that one of the worshipers, a Holocaust survivor, left the shul before the "Birkas Kohanim". He decided to find out why.

At the beginning of the next morning's davening, the rabbi approached the fellow and invited him to the Yom Tov meal to be held in his home after the davening. But this time too, to his surprise, just before the priestly blessing - the Jew folded his Talis and left the synagogue.

The rabbi felt a sense of missed opportunity and was even a bit surprised. He thought that the yid had spurned his invitation and went home. That was not the case. When the rabbi left the shul, he saw, to his amazement the same Jew standing and waiting for at the corner of the street.

At that moment he realized that something must be hidden here. He walked up to him and blessed him with a "Gut Yom Tov" and they both walked together to the rabbi's house.

After they had eaten, and their hearts opened, the rabbi dared to ask his guest: "Why do you always make sure to leave the synagogue before the blessing of the Kohanim?"

The guest turned pale. He was clearly in a state of emotional turmoil. A few minutes later, when he calmed down, he began his story: "I'll tell you something I did not tell anyone," a chilling story:

"During the Holocaust, I was interned in Auschwitz, where 800 people lived in one barracks, sleeping 8 people crammed on a sloping wooden bench, without a toilet or shower, and eating 300 grams of dry bread a day, and sometimes soup from potato peelings.

One of the prisoners in the barracks was a special Jew who held us all together, mentally and emotionally. Everyone called him "the rabbi of the camp." He loved us all and encouraged us. Almost every day he would sit and listen to the prisoners' plight and embrace them with all his heart.

One evening, the rabbi entered the hut and said: "In two weeks it will be Pesach, we must celebrate the Passover Seder.

One of the prisoners, who served as a servant custodian in the apartment the Nazi camp commandant, approached him and offered his help. He said that during the afternoon the commander goes to sleep, and from that time he can use the oven in the kitchen to bake matzos. The rabbi was very excited and briefly explained to the Jew how to prepare the oven and bake the matzo. The servant was fearful of the dangerous idea, but in the end, he agreed. Within a few days, he returned to the barracks at night, hiding two kosher Matzos!

On Pesach night after evening lights out we all sat on the floor and began the Pesach Seder.  The rabbi read the Haggadah by heart, and we joined him. The rabbi then handed out a tiny piece of matza to each of the prisoners. Among us all was an unthinkable awakening. "Maror" was abundant all year round, "Four cups" of wine were of course absent, although we drank abundantly our cups of bitters tears!  But to our amazement, that night, we were privileged to eat matzah!  Matzah... here in Auschwitz!!

Suddenly the door of the barracks was smashed open and the vile Nazis entered, seeing the throng of Jews sitting on the floor together. In a moment we all jumped and stood by the bunks. The chief Nazi took out a pistol, grabbed the first Jew next to him, pinned the gun to his head, and shouted, "Who organized this gathering?

The Jew refused to turn over the "rabbi," and the Nazi continued to shout, "I will kill them all, one by one, until I know who is responsible for this!"

The rabbi stood in the middle of the path between the bunks opposite the Nazi, tore open his shirt, exposed his heart, and turned to the Nazi: "Here it is, my heart, I organized everything, I am guilty, kill me."

The Nazi stepped toward him, aiming his gun at the rabbi's heart, and in the final second before pulling the trigger, he stopped and began to smile diabolically. We already knew that something horribly cruel was going to happen. The Nazi began: "I will not kill you just like that, tomorrow we will gather the whole camp, we will put up a big stage, and I will tell everyone what you did, and only then will I kill you."

That's exactly what happens next day. The Nazis gathered the entire Camp and told about the "sin" of the rabbi, and pressed a gun to his forehead.  In the final seconds of his life, the rabbi raised his hand and asked for "one final request" before his execution.

"What do you want?" The Nazi sarcastically asked "Bread? Soup? Meat?"

"No," answers the Jew. "I do not want water or meat or bread or soup, I want to give something to my thousands of brothers here ... I love them, I am Kohen and I want to give them the blessing of the Kohanim."

The rabbi raised both hands, placed them in the prescribed manner, and began to recite the blessing of the Kohanim: "May the Lord bless you ... and preserve you."

The silence among the prisoners could be cut with a knife. It was an awesome and terrible sight. Thousands of Jews were bowed, lowering their eyes to the ground, and a sea of tears spilled ... It was a cry without a sound. The soil already soaked with blood was now saturated with burning, salty tears

"After the liberation from Auschwitz I went to America," the Jew finished the chilling story. I abandoned Yiddishkeit and very much wanted to assimilate, to marry someone who was not Jewish, but the image of that priestly blessing was always right before my eyes, and I just could not do it ... I married a Jewish woman and we had children. I was determined to enroll them in a non-Jewish school, but the image of that holy Jew Jew, the "Rabbi HaCohen, blessing us in Auschwitz stood before my eyes, and I simply could not do it ... I sent them to a Jewish school. "

"Do you understand why during the blessing of the Kohanim I go out?  I do not ever want to lose the memory, the image, of that priestly blessing of Auschwitz!  I never want to forget it. I want it to remain engraved in my heart forever ... I do not want to replace it with any other priestly blessing!"

If there ever was a story illustrating the Sfas Emes’ notion of becoming a blessing, Rabbi Kamenetzky shared it.

May we all – kohanim, leviim and Yisraelim – all of the Jewish people realize how blessed we are and by yearing to come close to the Almighty, we too can transform into blessings, like Avraham and this holy Jew in Auschwitz.