True Sacrifice

by Rabbi Simon Jacobson
Does serving G-d mean that you have to sacrifice your life? To become a conformist? To obliterate your personality?
In the third book of the Bible, Vayikra (Leviticus), we learn the quintessential approach to how each of us can and should serve G-d. We enter the bloody world of the great altar in the Holy Temple where the Jewish people brought animal sacrifices to Jerusalem to atone for their sins. What possible connection could this slaughter of ox and sheep have to do with establishing a fulfilling relationship with G-d?
The classical Torah commentator Ramban, tells us that when a person had to bring a korban (animal sacrifice), "a person had to envision that what was happening to the animal should have been happening to him or her." Since it is we who need to be cleansed of our wrongdoings - a cleansing of our blood, our flesh, and our fat - G-d in His great mercy gave us an alternative: we could replace ourselves with an animal that would endure this process in our stead.
The Torah is not a lesson in ancient history; its every word is eternal and relevant to each of us every day. In a Temple-less world, we need to look a little deeper to discover the relationship of these sacrifices to our contemporary lives.
There are two forces within each of us: a force that desires material pleasures and a force that yearns for G-dliness. Simply put, our search for purpose, for meaning, for serving G-d, are at constant odds with "the animal" in us: the part of us that would rather indulge our selfish passions than contribute to a higher cause. The centrality of the animal offerings in the Temple reflects the essence of our Divine purpose: To submit the animal within us to G-d.
Now, when we read how a person brought a sacrifice upon the altar we find a curious twist of words. Instead of saying, "When one of you will bring an offering," the literal translation is, "When a person will bring an offering of you." The "of you" tells us that by bringing an animal to the altar, we are actually bringing to the altar the animal in us.
Offering yourself, the animal in you, to G-d is the cornerstone of all Judaism, but how is this accomplished? Do you crush the animal passion and pleasure in you and live a somber life of deprivation and misery?
The answer lies in the derivation of the word korban. While korban is often translated as "sacrifice," the actual word comes from the root word "kiruv," meaning "to draw close."
We make ourselves a korban by "bringing close" the pure essence of the animal in us to G-d. We don't annihilate it, we don't squash it, we use it to help us approach Divinity, to transcend our limits and get closer to the quintessential purpose for which we were created. An animal cannot behave in any way other than how G-d created it. Bulls are aggressive, sheep are slothfully self-indulgent, and goats are stubborn.
But the animal in us has a choice. We can be an obnoxious "bully," or we can channel our passions toward an assertive love for G-d. We can indulge in our sheep-like lust for pleasure, or we can get pleasure in helping others and living a meaningful life.
At the heart of every force in our lives, even the ones that manifest negative expression, lies a kernel that can be directed to a constructive and G-dly cause. What we do "sacrifice" is the object of our desires, the immature or narrow attitudes we assume, our ignorance and our blind spots - so that our essential natures can emerge, just as you sacrifice the weeds to allow the flowers to surface.
You shouldn't give up your G-d-given talents and behaviours; you should bring them closer to their purer state. When you become a korban, you have the opportunity to transform every aspect of yourself, to become the greatest person you can be; a person who no longer walks among the beasts, but hand in hand with G-d.
The story of the korban in Vayikra teaches us that serving G-d is not about self-annihilation but about self-actualization.