D’var Torah: Tzav 2026/5786 צו

Dr. Jonah Hassenfeld, Director of Learning and Teaching, Schechter Parent

This week’s parsha opens with the word tzav: "command." We are most familiar with this root from the word mitzvah. Although we often translate it as “good deed,” mitzvah should really be translated as “commandment.” 

When you think about it, the idea of being commanded is quite different from the idea of a good deed. We do good deeds because we want to. The impulse comes from inside us. We fulfill commands because we have to. They are imposed from outside of us. 

We live in a culture that celebrates freedom above all else. And we define freedom as getting to do what you want, as the absence of constraints. The idea of being commanded, of limiting our freedom, doesn’t sit quite right. 

“Why should anyone tell me what to do?” we ask. Commands, especially ones that don’t make sense to us, feel like burdens or impositions to be shed. This feeling is especially salient in Parshat Tzav, which includes the highest number of mitzvot relating to the temple service of any Parsha. We read a seemingly endless list of commandments which we no longer fulfill.  

But I think that Parshat Tzav offers us the opportunity to think of commandment in a different way. Not as holding us down, but by providing us with enough structure to grow and find meaning.  

Consider a talented violinist. She must follow the instructions of the conductor, read the notes on the score in front of her. She needs to listen carefully to what she is playing to ensure that it blends seamlessly with the notes of her colleagues. She is constrained and commanded in all kinds of ways. Would it really make sense to describe her as less free because of those constraints? It is precisely the structures of command and obligation to her fellow orchestra members that make music possible. Without it, there’s only noise.

However much we deny it, we live embedded in a web of commitments and obligations. We owe things to our spouses, children and friends. If we truly lived lives of perfect choice, keeping every option open, would we really be more free? It is the commands we …, the obligations we fulfill that give our life meaning.=

Tzav,  the commandment,  is not a cage that holds us back. It is more like a trellis: something to grow against, to give shape and direction to what might otherwise sprawl without purpose. The command, however we understand it, is not a constraint on freedom. It is freedom's precondition.