Pastor's Comments for September
Over the course of the next 7 months, our monthly newsletter will include information on 7 different “occupations” of Jewish religious leaders, past and present (& maybe even future!). This information was originally published in “Israel My Glory,” September/October 2001. I trust we who love the Jews will find this information enlightening.
~ Pastor John
Jewish Culture & Customs
“So, What Exactly Is That?”
~ by Steve Herzig
Meeting new people is a regular part of my job. Usually it takes just a short time before I find myself asking the inevitable question, “What do you do?” Sometimes (not often, I hope), the answer leaves me with a rather glazed look. Oh, I hear it all right. But my clueless stare into space is a dead giveaway; I don’t have the faintest idea what that particular occupation really is. Then I ask sheepishly, “So, what exactly is that?”
For many people outside the Jewish experience, such words as kohayn, chazzan, rabbi, rebbe, fav, tzaddik, shammas, and gabbai can produce a similar stare into space. Maybe some of you are familiar with the terms; but you still wonder, “What exactly is that?” Here are the answers to your question.
What Is a Kohayn?
A kohayn was a priest in the days of the Jewish Temple in Jerusalem. To understand the term requires a trip into the genealogy of Israel. Jacob, whose name later became Israel, had 12 sons. From them emerged the 12 tribes of Israel. The Levites are descendants of Jacob’s son Levin. The Bible describes them as servants around the Holy Temple. Aaron and Moses were Levites. God chose Aaron to perform special duties as the nation of Israel’s first high priest. Only his descendants are called kohanim (plural of kohayn).
When the second Temple was destroyed in A.D. 70, the sacrificial system ended. The genealogical records, which had been kept in the Temple, also were destroyed, making it impossible today to prove any Jewish person’s tribal origin. So the title of kohayn has been passed down orally from one generation to another. A father assumes he is a kohayn because his father told him so, as did his father before him, so on and so forth.
Recent studies in the new field of population research have made several interesting claims. Scientists say the &-chromosome passes virtually unchanged from father to son, Rabbi Yaakov Kleiman states: “The rare mutations—which are changes in the non-coding portion of its DNA—can serve as markers. Studies have shown a very high genetic affinity among present day Cohanim, indicating that they do have a common paternal ancestor estimated to have lived some 3,000 years ago.”
Although this research is still in the early stages, it is conceivable that, in the future, people will attempt to identify kohanim with a simple blood test. For those Jewish people awaiting the building of a third Temple, this research would be most welcome. Today, individuals thought to be kohanim carry the honor and responsibility of being the first to be summoned to read from the Torah in synagogue worship.
(Next month we will look at “Chazzan”)
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