Parashat Naso 5786, 2026: "On Birkat Kohanim"

 
Rabbi David Etengoff
 
ה' יעזור וירחם על אחינו כל בני ישראל בארץ ישראל ובכל חלקי הארץ
 
Birkat Kohanim is one of the most powerful tefilot we encounter during the Yom Tovim. Young children mischievously hide under their father’s tallit while listening to the stirring melody and words of the kohanim. Adults, perhaps, imagine they hear echoes of the bracha being recited in the Beit HaMikdash. One thing is clear, something wonderful is happening. In some way, hearing these holy words uttered in true devotion and pure intention, transport us to a higher spiritual plane and bring us closer to Hashem.
 
What is the role of the kohanim in this remarkable process? Are they active parties, that is, do they bless us, or are they spiritual conduits through which the blessing flows from the Almighty to His nation? Rashi (1040-1105) suggests that the kohanim bless us. As such, in his gloss on Sefer Bamidbar 6:27, he explains the words “v’ani avarachem” (and I will bless them) by stating: “l’yisrael v’askim im hakohanim” (“I will bless them—the Jewish people—and I will agree with the kohanim”). The Siftei Chachamim (Rabbi Shabbetai Bass, 1641-1718) elucidates Rashi’s gloss in this manner: “One should not explain that Hashem will bless them on His own, [for] if that were to be true, what value would Birkat Kohanim have since Hashem, Himself, would [subsequently] bless them?” In short, Rav Bass suggests that Rashi maintains that the kohanim directly bestow their bracha upon us.
 
The Rambam (1135-1204), however, takes the opposite approach regarding the role of the kohanim in Birkat Kohanim:

Do not wonder: “What good will come from the blessing of this simple person?” for the reception of the blessings is not dependent on the priests, but on the Holy One, blessed be He, as [Numbers 6:27] states: “And they shall set My name upon the children of Israel, and I shall bless them.” The priests perform the mitzvah with which they were commanded, and God, in His mercy, will bless Israel as He desires. (Mishneh Torah, Hilchot Tefilah and Birkat Kohanim, 15:7, translation, Rabbi Eliyahu Touger)
 
In sum, the Rambam maintains:

1. Birkat Kohanim is exclusively the province of Hashem and does not emanate from the kohanim: “for the reception of the blessings is not dependent on the priests, but on the Holy One, blessed be He.”
2. The kohanim, at Hashem’s command, are mere viaducts through which Hashem’s bracha flows. It is Hashem who: “in His mercy, will bless Israel as He desires.”

 
Approximately 700 years later, Rabbeinu Shimshon Raphael Hirsch (1808-1888) interprets the role of the kohanim in Birkat Kohanim in these words:
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According to this, our priests in pronouncing the blessing, are a completely passive instrument. Only in reply to the summons of the congregation and only in the blessing dictated to them by the representative of the congregation do they pronounce it. So that in truth it is the congregation which has the blessing prescribed by God pronounced over itself through their mouths. (Isaac Levy translation, second edition, London, 1964, page 100, underlining my own)
 
Herein, Rav Hirsch channels the Rambam’s analysis, and asserts that the kohanim should be viewed as mere conduits through which the congregation receives its blessing. As such, the role of the kohanim is reduced to an almost mechanical function whereby they give voice to the hopes and desires of the congregation in the commanded and prescribed formulaic fashion.
 
Regardless as to which approach we follow, may we be zocheh to witness the complete fulfillment of birkat kohanim in our lives, our family’s lives, and the lives of all of Klal Yisrael. V’chane yihi ratzon.
 
Shabbat Shalom
 
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