1 of God, as separate, apart, and so sacred, holy:
a. exalted on theophanic throne Isaiah 6:3 (3 t. in verse), Psalm 22:4 heavenly throne Isaiah 57:15; in victory Isaiah 5:16; 1 Samuel 2:2; Psalm 99:3 ("" נוֺרָא), Psalm 99:5; Psalm 99:9; וְנוֺרָא ׳ק שְׁמוֺ Psalm 111:9.
b. separate from human infirmity, impurity, and sin: Joshua 24:19 (E), 1 Samuel 6:20; Habakkuk 1:12; קדושׁ אני ׳כ Leviticus 11:44,45; Leviticus 19:2; Leviticus 20:26; Leviticus 21:8 (H); קדושׁ בְּקִרְבְּךָ Hosea 11:9; בישׂראל ׳ק Ezekiel 39:7.
c. קְדוֺשׁ יִשְׂרָאֵל = divine name (originating from trisagion, Isaiah 6:3) Isaiah 1:4; Isaiah 5:19,24; Isaiah 10:20; Isaiah 12:6; Isaiah 17:7; Isaiah 29:19; Isaiah 30:11,12,15; Isaiah 31:1; Is :2; Isaiah 41:14,16,20; Isaiah 43:3,14; Isaiah 45:11; Isaiah 47:4; Isaiah 48:17; Isaiah 49:7; Isaiah 54:5; Isaiah 55:5; Isaiah 60:9,14 elsewhere only 2 Kings 19:22 = Isaiah 37:23; Jeremiah 50:29; Jeremiah 51:5; Psalm 71:22; Psalm 78:41; Psalm 89:19; יעקב ׳ק Isaiah 29:23, קְדוֺשׁוֺ Isaiah 10:17; Isaiah 49:7, קְדוֺשְׁכֶם Isaiah 43:15; קָדוֺשׁ Isaiah 40:25; Habakkuk 3:3; Job 6:10, plural intensive שׁים (ו) קד Hosea 12:1; Proverbs 9:10; Proverbs 30:3.
2. a. of place, sacred, holy, chambers of priests Ezekiel 42:13, camp of Israel Deuteronomy 23:15, + מָרוֺם of heaven Isaiah 57:15 (but of ׳י Du Ry, and [reading ׳בְּק as holy, ב essent.] Klo Che Marti); in following (often defective) pointing dubious, read probably קֹדֶשׁ
Brown Driver Briggs
https://biblehub.com/hebrew/6918.htm
Related to Ugar. qdsh (= sanctuary), Phoen. קדש (= holy), מקדש (= sanctuary, holy place), Aram.-Syr. קַדֵּשׁ (= he hallowed, sanctified, consecrated), Palm. קדש (= to sanctify, consecrate), Arab. qadusa (= was holy, was pure), quaddasa (= he hallowed, sanctified, consecrated; he went to Jerusalem), quds (= purity, holiness), al-quds (= Jerusalem; lit.: ‘the holy place’), Akka. quddushu (= to cleanse, to hallow, sanctify,), Aram.–Syr. קְדָשָׁא (= ear or nose ring; orig. ‘holy thing’). The orig. meaning of this base prob. was ‘to separate’.
https://www.balashon.com/2022/04/kodesh-and-kadosh.html
.....every enlightened person knows that words indicating spiritual, intellectual concepts that are not perceptible to the senses are all transferred terms that originally indicated tangible things. S.D. Luzzatto (commentary to Ex. 15:11)
Samuel David Luzzatto (Hebrew: שמואל דוד לוצאטו, Italian pronunciation: [ˈsaːmwel ˈdaːvid lutˈtsatto]; 22 August 1800 – 30 September 1865), also known by the Hebrew acronym Shadal (שד״ל), was an Italian-Austrian Jewish scholar, poet, and a member of the Wissenschaft des Judentums movement. Wikipedia https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Samuel_David_Luzzatto
- suggestion that it derived from a root K-D that meant “to cut.” (Although no such root survived in the Tanach, there is evidence for it in other Semitic languages.)
- Other scholars suggest that K-D-Sh is related to Ch-D-Sh with a meaning “splendid, pure.”
- In Akkadian too, the root is sometimes related to the idea of making something ritually clean. There is also evidence from Tanach for a “purify” meaning.See 2 Sam. 11:4.
- Other scholars believe that K-D-Sh is related to Ch-D-Sh with the meaning “new.”
- The phrase “pen tikdash” appears at Deut. 22:9. A rabbinic interpretation of this phrase interprets it as “pen tukad esh,” lest it [become liable to] be burned in a fire. (See Kiddushin 56b, Chullin 115a.) In this veiw, the root K-D-Sh is a combination of two words and originally meant “burned in a fire.”
Meaning of Kadosh and Kedusha, Essay on the book A Theology of Holiness, by Alec Goldstein.
https://jewishlink.news/what-is-the-meaning-of-kadosh-and-kedusha/
Separation and Union -- Poles of Holiness, Rabbi Dr Stephen Geller
On the one hand, true holiness is viewed as deriving from the vigilant maintenance of differences, represented by separations: of Israel from the nations, of illicit from licit relations, of the human from the divine, and of permitted from forbidden foods. This is a narrow, guarded, negative, and even gloomy view of holiness, as befits a text that begins with a reminder of the deaths of Nadab and Abihu, who also crossed over the legitimate boundaries of the cult by offering “strange fire” to God in Lev. 10:1.
But countering this narrowness is the focus in Leviticus 16 on atonement, literally “at-one-ment” (in English—the Hebrew kapparah has a different origin and association), i.e., the reconciliation of humanity with God. This represents a religious aspiration to join and cohere, not separate. The idea appears in a different form in the most famous injunctions in Kedoshim, to “love your neighbor as yourself” (19:18) and “love the stranger as yourself” (19:34). What is implied is an empathetic merging with others, an internalization of their needs and feelings. The thrust seems to be a demand for outward separation but inner sympathy, even union, in the emotion of love.
In effect, this represents a complementary theological dichotomy of difference and similarity. Difference alone leads to brittle and sterile isolation—from God and from other peoples. Similarity alone leads to untrammeled merging and, ultimately, the elimination of any recognizable meaning. Similarity and difference are the poles of covenant itself, a uniting of God with Israel, which involves the unique separation of the people from other nations. Yet the covenant is also a pact of love, of the demand that Israel respond to God by loving the deity—and also, Leviticus adds, by loving each other.
Dear Torah on Kedoshi/Acharei Mot
https://www.jtsa.edu/torah/separation-and-union-the-poles-of-holiness/?fbclid=IwAR1_bmwsphZ09MtNVmbYs7_Xl1cS1jLQ-SwOwBLwQpyf3vyqiwO5kyYdw5I
Hevrutah:
- Read the passage below by the Ishbizer.
- Does this passage make sense to you? How so? How not?
- Do you relate to the sense that God is "constantly present" and "waiting"?
- If we did, as the Ishbizer instructs, imagine the God is always present, and were open to that possibility, how might that impact our lives?
Mordechai Yosef Leiner of Izbica (מרדכי יוסף ליינר) known as "the Ishbitzer" (Yiddish: איזשביצע, איזביצע Izhbitze, Izbitse, Ishbitze) (1801-1854[1]) was a rabbinic Hasidic thinker and founder of the Izhbitza-Radzyn dynasty of Hasidic Judaism. He is best known for his work Mei Hashiloach.
The Ishbitzer Rebbe (the Mei Shiloach) says that to ‘Be Holy’ is to — “Be always devoted and ready for the moment when the reality of G-d peers through ordinary reality and enlightens your vision with a higher light. Imagine that Hashem is constantly present, ready, and waiting to give the moment of light to you to save you from ordinary negativity. Stand right there and wait and hope that your vision be enlightened. You don’t have to be already holy. But be ready for the moment of holiness to uplift you. Be in process , it may occur at any moment. It is experiential and intermittent. It suffuses ordinary reality when the moment is right, and you are focused.”
God is separate from the world and transcends it, but God is not withdrawn from it. Israel must in imitating God by being a holy nation similarly not withdraw from the the world, but rather radiate a positive influence on it through every aspect of Jewish living.
Martin Buber, Bechirat Yisrael
קָדוֹשׁ
קָדֹשׁ: to be cut off, separated, to be/become pure, sacred, holy (Jastrow Dictionary)
This "separated" quality is probably the basic meaning of the Hebrew word kadosh. Much like the English word "distinguished," which can mean both "separate" and "special," kadosh begins by meaning "separate" and ends by meaning "special" or "sacred," "holy," "elevated" (Neil Gilman, Sacred Fragments, p.229)
(א) לא תלך רכיל. אֲנִי אוֹמֵר עַל שֵׁם שֶׁכָּל מְשַׁלְּחֵי מְדָנִים וּמְסַפְּרֵי לָשׁוֹן הָרַע הוֹלְכִים בְּבָתֵּי רֵעֵיהֶם לְרַגֵּל מַה יִּרְאוּ רָע, אוֹ מַה יִּשְׁמְעוּ רָע, לְסַפֵּר בַּשּׁוּק, נִקְרָאִים הוֹלְכֵי רָכִיל — הוֹלְכֵי רְגִילָה..... (ב) לא תעמד על דם רעך. לִרְאוֹת בְּמִיתָתוֹ וְאַתָּה יָכוֹל לְהַצִּילוֹ, כְּגוֹן טוֹבֵעַ בַּנָּהָר וְחַיָּה אוֹ לִיסְטִים בָּאִים עָלָיו (סנהדרין ע"ג):
(1) לא תלך רכיל THOU SHALT NOT GO ABOUT AS A TALE BEARER — I say that because all those who sow discord between people and all who speak slander go into their friends' houses in order to spy out what evil they can see there, or what evil they can hear there so that they may tell it in the streets —they are called הולכי רכיל which it the same as הולכי רגילה, "people who go about spying"; which implies, "he spied me out with subtly in order to speak evil about me to my lord״ (and thus וירגל comes to mean "to slander”)...... (2) לא תעמד על דם רעך NEITHER SHALT THOU STAND AGAINST THE BLOOD OF THY FELLOW — witnessing his death, you being able to rescue him: if, for instance, he is drowning in the river or if a wild beast or a robber is attacking him (Sifra, Kedoshim, Chapter 4 8; Sanhedrin 73a).
(1) And the heaven and the earth were finished, and all the host of them. (2) And on the seventh day God finished His work which He had made; and He rested on the seventh day from all His work which He had made. (3) And God blessed the seventh day, and hallowed it; because that in it He stopped from all His work which God in creating had made.
(טז) וַיִּיקַ֣ץ יַעֲקֹב֮ מִשְּׁנָתוֹ֒ וַיֹּ֕אמֶר אָכֵן֙ יֵ֣שׁ יי בַּמָּק֖וֹם הַזֶּ֑ה וְאָנֹכִ֖י לֹ֥א יָדָֽעְתִּי׃ (יז) וַיִּירָא֙ וַיֹּאמַ֔ר מַה־נּוֹרָ֖א הַמָּק֣וֹם הַזֶּ֑ה אֵ֣ין זֶ֗ה כִּ֚י אִם־בֵּ֣ית אֱלֹהִ֔ים וְזֶ֖ה שַׁ֥עַר הַשָּׁמָֽיִם׃
(16) And Jacob awaked out of his sleep, and he said: ‘Surely the YHWH is in this place; and I knew it not.’ (17) And he was afraid, and said: ‘How full of awe is this place! this is none other than the house of God, and this is the gate of heaven.’
A Taste of the Future
Kedoshim tehiyu is said in the future tense – “you will be sacred” – even though the truth is that we already are sacred. I think this is because entering a zone where everyone knows they are sacred, entering such a consciousness, is indeed a thing of the future, an evolving messianic consciousness that is not yet here, that we only get a taste of in this current world. Working toward this vision of the Torah, letting go of our lenses of self and other devaluation and cultivating inside ourselves a heart that loves unequivocally, is the work for which we were born, moving us ever closer towards that other world (olam haba) that is, with our participation, ever “coming.”
From Less than to Overflowing with Love
By Dr. Rachel Anisfeld
https://rachelanisfeld.com/2023/04/27/essay-from-less-than-to-overflowing-with-love-parashat-acharei-mot-kedoshim/