CCAR RESPONSA
American Reform Responsa
23. Walking Across Religious Symbols
(Vol. LXIII, 1953, pp. 153-154)
QUESTION: The entrance to the foyer of our new Temple is embellished with a mosaic outlining the seven-branched Menora and the Tablets of the Law. As one enters the Temple, he unavoidably walks across these two important symbols of Judaism. Is it proper to do so? To tear up the floor at this time would, of course, involve considerable expense.
ANSWER: In a religion such as Judaism, which has always stressed the disciplinary value of symbols and symbolic acts, reverence for the consecrated objects must of necessity play an important role.
Accordingly, when sacrifices prevailed as modes of worship, the Altar assumed a holy character and had to be kept from any form of profanation. Even the ashes on the Altar, partaking of the sanctity of the Altar itself, had to be removed “without the camp unto a clean place” (Lev. 6:4).
When the book displaced the Altar, and prayer and study became the delights of the worshiper, the written word, as embodied in the Bible and Prayerbook, rose to the place of the sacred and received reverential treatment. Scrolls and religious books, worn with use, were stored temporarily in special hiding places to await ultimate burial with due ceremony.
This reverence for religious objects, long fostered in the synagogue, has taken root in our Western civilization. Modern nations cherish their national emblems and treat them with a reverence bordering on religious piety. Shall we, who have come to view the Decalogue as the symbol of our faith, allow men to trample on it?
The expense involved in rectifying the error is as nothing compared with the sure impairment of the sense of reverence in a not-too-reverent generation.
See also:
S.B. Freehof, “Menorah Decoration in Floor,” Reform Responsa, pp. 68ff.
If needed, please consult Abbreviations used in CCAR Responsa.