Making sense of the sedra: Acharei Mot-Kedoshim

After returning from the Apollo 11 Moon Landing, Buzz Aldrin was celebrated around the world. He had walked on the moon – an experience so extraordinary it was hard for anyone else to even comprehend. For a time, he spoke about the overwhelming sense of awe and perspective he felt looking back at Earth from space.

But not long after, he found himself struggling with something very ordinary: adjusting to daily life back home. The grocery store, conversations, routines – it all felt strangely small compared to what he had just experienced.

What helped him wasn’t chasing that same ‘high’ again, but learning how to bring meaning into normal life. He began focusing on small, grounded actions – helping others, speaking honestly about his struggles, and rebuilding a sense of purpose in everyday routines.

The most important realisation wasn’t what he experienced on the moon – it was what he did after.

Because even the highest moments don’t define a person. What matters is how those moments reshape the way you live when you come back home.

“Aharon shall bring his sin offering bull and atone for himself and for his household” (Vayikra 16:6).

Our Sages (Yoma 2a) state that the Kohen Gadol’s “household” refers to his wife. On the one hand the Kohen Gadol needed to be married on Yom Kippur – to the extent that according to one opinion a “back-up” wife is designated lest his current wife die – but on the other hand he had to be separated from his wife for seven days prior to Yom Kippur to prevent any accidental exposure to impurity. Why was the Kohen Gadol’s marriage status so pivotal if in any event he was sequestered from his wife?

Furthermore, the Rambam (Hilchot Avodat Yom HaKippurim 4:2) codifies as halacha, and not mere practical order of events, that upon completion of Yom Kippur the Kohen Gadol would return home. How do we understand the contrast between the Kohen Gadol dressed in his holy garments in the holiest of locations on the holiest of days, only to immediately thereafter return home to his wife, household and regular mundane needs?

The Lubavitcher Rebbe explains that even though the Kohen Gadol attains sublime holiness on Yom Kippur, the goal of the sanctity attained is not to stay in this state of retirement from the world – remaining “holy” and separate – but to make use of that exalted holiness within the framework of the material world. His separation from his wife and physicality is a short-term aberration and not the daily norm. The halacha of him returning “home” emphasises that the lofty elevation achieved must be channelled to become a way of life for him and his household throughout the entire year!

This, says the Chatam Sofer, is why the mitzvah to “Be Holy” (Vayikra 19:1-2) was given in the presence of “the entire congregation”, to highlight that true sanctity is realised not via isolation but rather through integration and association with others and the world!