Pesikta de-Rav Kahana

A collection of aggadic midrash, Pesikta de-Rav Kahana consists of more than thirty homilies on the scriptural readings for special Sabbaths and feast days. Although some of its material comes from as early as the fifth century CE, the more well-developed proems reflect a later stage of development in the seventh century. The fourth pesikta contains homilies for the Sabbath of the Heifer, the Sabbath on which Numbers 19 is read. This reading is concerned with the ritual preparation of purification water from the ashes of the red heifer, used to remove corpse impurity. The ritual of the red heifer is introduced in Numbers 19:2 as a statute (ḥok) of the Torah, a term understood by the rabbis as signaling a nonrational decree (see “Sifra”). According to Pesikta de-Rav Kahana 4:1, the law of the red heifer is one of four divine actions or commandments that defy logic. Their nonrationality is proclaimed and interpreted as the very mark and sign of their divinity. The rabbis were aware that their embrace of the nonrational nature of some of the laws was controversial. Pesikta de-Rav Kahana 4:7 presents a dialogue between R. Yoḥanan ben Zakkai and a non-Jew who is puzzled by the seemingly nonrational ritual of purification from corpse impurity. R. Yoḥanan explains the ritual in logical terms acceptable to his rationally inclined interlocutor. But to his students, who are equally puzzled by the nonrational character of a divinely ordained law, he acknowledges that the purification ritual is a brute command, a statute that must be obeyed.