This week’s Torah reading explains, at some length, the laws of different animal sacrifices (Korbanot) that the Jews could bring in the mishkan (the traveling sanctuary) or later in the Bais HaMikdash (Holy Temple). Rabbi Pinchas Peli, in an essay in his book Torah Today: A Renewed Encounter with Scripture, points out that the Hebrew text at the beginning of the reading may be translated as: “if any person bring of yourselves a sacrifice onto the Lord …” (Leviticus 1:2). He relates that various commentators interpret this clause to mean that an animal brought for a sacrifice must rightfully belong to the person bringing it and the owner must see this animal as something of value. In other words, the sacrifice has to be “of yourselves.”
Then he tells the following parable to illuminate the message: A wealthy man leaves three rare gifts to each of his three sons upon his death. The first son receives a set of binoculars than can see any place in the world. The second son receives a magic carpet, which can quickly carry passengers to any place on the planet. And the third son receives an apple that, when eaten, will fulfill any wish. One day the first son, using the binoculars, discovers a far off country where a king is agonizing over his daughter’s life threatening illness. The king issues a proclamation that anyone who can cure his daughter will be granted the right to marry her and will later become king. The first son tells his brothers, who all get on the magic carpet and fly off to the kingdom. Once there, the third son gives the princess the apple with the wish that she recover and magically she is cured.
The king is of course delighted. But then each of the sons claims the right to marry the princess – the first son because only through his use of the binoculars did they learn of the princess’s grave condition, the second son because his magic carpet got them all there in time, and the third son because his apple actually cured the princess. The King thinks over the matter and determines that one son is the most fitting choice.
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