The Book of Leviticus, opens with the word Vayikra, “He called,” after which the entire book is named. The book of Exodus concludes with the glory of God filling the Tabernacle on the day it was to be consecrated. Moses was standing outside the Tabernacle when God calls him.
This was not the first time that God had called to Moses using the term vayikra. When God appeared to Moses at the burning bush, the Torah relates that when Moses first saw he said: I will turn and see this great wonder, why does the bush burn and is not consumed” (Exodus 3:3). The next verse states that when God saw that Moses turned to see, He called to him from within the bush. Later at the giving of the Torah at Mount Sinai, Moses ascended to God and God called to him from the mountain (Exodus 19:3).
In all of these cases God was in a sense responding to an “awakening from below,” that is to say, an action or state of mind on the part of Moses. In the first case, Moses was standing outside of the Tabernacle that he and all of Israel had labored intensely to build as a dwelling place for God among them. Now that the time had come to consecrate the Tabernacle, Moses in a combination of existential humbleness and awe found himself on the outside. It is in this context that God calls to Moses. In the case of the burning bush God responds to Moses’ curiosity and willingness to investigate the mysterious appearance of the bush that was on fire but not consumed. Only when God sees Moses turn and approach the bush did he address him directly. In the final case of Moses ascending to Mount Sinai, again we see Moses taking the first step. This idea relates to each and every person. Although there are times when there is an “awakening from above,” even without an initial move on the side of an individual, we are taught that as much as possible we need to approach God by taking the first step.
When looking through preceding Torah portions we see the word vayikra is in fact used many times. Yet in virtually every case it is employed in the context of calling something by name. The first time and the contextual “headquarters” for this term is used after Adam and Eve ate from the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil and as a result they try to hide from God: “and God called to Adam and said to him, ‘where are you’.” God’s calling to Adam is of course not a question of where are you physically, rather a much broader existential question of: what have you done? what were you thinking? Do you really think you can hide from God? Here we see again that God is responding to the action taken by Adam but in this case a very negative action.
There is a verse in Psalms (121:5) that states that “God is your shade/shadow on your right side.” The straightforward explanation is God is always there to protect you. The Baal Shem Tov had a novel explanation. The nature of a shadow is that it responds exactly to every move of the one creating the shadow. He explains that God reacts to man exactly according to how man acts to others and to Him. This is the same dynamic in all of the above cases where God calls to man for the positive or negative dependent on man’s thought, speech and action.
An additional dimension in understanding the word vayikra is that Rashi comments that this word is an expression of endearment and is the same expression that the angels in heaven use when they call one to the other in order to praise together their Creator. It is clear that each time God calls to Moses He is inviting him to come close, to enter into a deep and intimate relationship, to be a partner with Him. Even in the case of Adam after he disobeyed God by eating from the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil, God called to him with the intent of giving him a chance to explain himself and repent for what he had done. Instead, Adam blamed his wife and Eve blamed the snake. Had they done teshuvah on the spot, God would have forgiven them and the exile from the Garden of Eden would never have occurred.
According to the Arizal, Abraham is a reincarnation of Adam. Similar to how Adam was a collective soul in that all human beings come from Adam and Eve, so too Abraham was a collective soul in that all Jews come from him and Sarah. Soon after Abraham came to Israel, the Torah relates that he built an altar and called (vayikra) in the name of God. Soon after, he was forced to leave Israel because of famine and when he returned he came to the same place where he built the altar and again called in the name of God. Rashi comments that Abraham foresaw in prophecy that in the future his children would stumble through sin in that very place and therefore he prayed for them. (That incident occurred in the time of Joshua when one of the soldiers, Achan, took booty against strict orders causing the Army to be defeated in Aye, the very place Abraham had built his alter). Others comment that “calling in the name of God” means that as soon as Abraham came to Israel he began to spread the teachings of one God.
Here we see a great rectification of Adam’s predicament in the Garden of Eden, in that it was Abraham who was calling God and not the opposite, as in all the above cases. This is in line with how Abraham in seeking to understand the dynamics of the universe came to the realization that there is but one all-inclusive unity pervading all creation. Only then did God reveal himself to Avraham.
In addition to rectifying Adam on some level, he was also beginning the process of fixing the downfall that occurred during the generation of Enosh when they began the practice of worshiping idols. This is alluded to in the verse that states that in that generation “they began to call in the name of God” (Genesis 4:26). The word for “they began” can also mean they “began to profane.” Abraham’s calling in the name of God, the one and only God, began the process of fixing the previous generations and paving the way for monotheism in the future.
When taking all of the occurrences of the word vayikra into consideration we see the dynamics of relationship between man and God, and by extension, between people as well. In a deeply paradoxical and mysterious way it becomes apparent that God, although all-knowing, infinite and beyond all comprehension, seeks a relationship with His finite, material, and somewhat flawed creation, especially human beings. The quality of the relationship depends greatly on our desire, tenacity and faith in seeking such a relationship. The more we call to God, the more God will call to us.
