For most of the year, the kohanim and levi’im lived in their designated cities throughout the Land. When their family’s turn to serve in the Temple arrived, they would go up to Jerusalem. The main Temple service and the offering of the sacrifices were entrusted to the kohanim, while the levi’im assisted them in two ways: guarding the Temple gates and accompanying the public sacrifices with song and music. To that end, the levi’im formed choirs and musical ensembles.
When the kohanim and levi’im were in the Temple, the kohanim were sustained by the portions of sacrificial meat designated for them, as well as by the menaḥot and bikurim. The levi’im, by contrast, were sustained from the produce of ma’aser sheni that Jews brought up to Jerusalem, as it says: “You shall eat there before the Lord your God and rejoice, you and your household. And do not abandon the Levite within your gates, for he has no portion or inheritance with you” (Devarim 14:26–27). They also shared in the meat of the shelamim offerings and ma’aser behema that the people brought, as it says: “Before the Lord your God you shall eat it, in the place that the Lord your God will choose – you, your son, your daughter, your male servant, your maidservant, and the Levite within your gates – and you shall rejoice before the Lord your God in all your endeavors. Guard yourself, lest you abandon the Levite all your days upon your land” (ibid. 12:18–19).
For most of the year, when they lived at home, the kohanim were sustained by terumot, and the levi’im by ma’aser rishon. The Torah commands the levi’im to separate terumat ma’aser from the ma’asrot they receive and give it to the kohen, thereby strengthening the bond between levi’im and kohanim.
A basic difference between kohanim and levi’im shapes their daily lives. Teruma is sacred and may be eaten only in purity, whereas the ma’aser given to a levi is non-sacred produce and may be eaten even in impurity. Kohanim and their families must therefore guard themselves from impurity at all times. Levi’im, like other Jews, need to be pure when they go up to the Temple, but during the rest of the year they do not have to live with that same constant vigilance.
Since the role of the kohanim is to extend the sanctity of the Temple throughout the Land, they must live with a higher degree of separation and purity. From within that atmosphere, they teach Torah to Israel. The levi’im, by contrast, come into closer contact with the people and, presumably, are therefore more involved in teaching and educating children. Since the levi’im do not need to guard themselves constantly from impurity, they can, when necessary, work in other occupations.
The kohanim, by contrast, receive many gifts. Some come through their service in the Temple, allowing them to remain in Jerusalem for longer periods. They also receive important gifts throughout the Land that have no sanctity attached to them, such as the foreleg, cheeks, and stomach from every slaughtered animal. These gifts help sustain the kohanim when they are impure and cannot partake of teruma. For example, a kohen may become impure when one of his close relatives dies. Women have days of impurity, men may become zavim, and one who has marital relations or experiences a seminal emission may not eat teruma until he immerses and the day ends.
In any case, relative to their numbers in the early days of the nation, the kohanim received far more gifts than the levi’im. It seems that this led the kohanim to increase in numbers at a faster rate than the levi’im. Perhaps this was the Torah’s intention: to strengthen the priesthood, whose way of life inclined more toward piety and purity, in comparison with the levi’im. By the beginning of the Second Temple period, the kohanim who returned to the Land already numbered ten times as many as the levi’im.[4]
[4]. The Levi’im, Their Inheritance, and Their Livelihood: From the days of Moshe Rabbeinu, each tribe’s officers were appointed from among its own members. Later, in the days of Yehoshafat, officers were appointed specifically from the tribe of Levi, as it says: “And the Levitical officers are before you” (2 Divrei Hayamim 19:11). This was part of Yehoshafat’s broader effort to strengthen the people in the service of God, in the observance of the mitzvot, and in the appointment of judges throughout his cities. Ya’avetz explains that after Yerovam ben Nevat split the Kingdom of Israel away from the Kingdom of Yehuda and led its people into idolatry, many levi’im left his territory and moved to the Kingdom of Yehuda. In order to provide them with a livelihood, Yehoshafat – who began to reign thirty-nine years after Yerovam’s death – appointed them as officers. By the Second Temple period, however, most officers once again came from the non-levi tribes, as explained in Yevamot 86b.
The special status of the tribe of Levi was shaped by two events. The first was when Shimon and Levi killed the men of Shekhem. In response, Yaakov Avinu said of them in his final testament: “Shimon and Levi are brothers; weapons of violence are their trade. Let my soul not enter their council; let my honor not join their assembly, for in their anger they killed a man, and in their will they uprooted an ox. Cursed is their anger, for it is fierce, and their wrath, for it is harsh. I will divide them in Yaakov and scatter them in Israel” (Bereishit 49:5–7). This is why they did not receive a territorial inheritance in the Land. There is also a view that they were punished in this way because they were the main initiators of the sale of Yosef (Rashi to Bereishit 49:5).
The second event was their standing with Moshe Rabbeinu against those who sinned with the Golden Calf (Shemot 32:29). Through this, they merited being set apart for God, as it says: “The Lord spoke to Moshe, saying: Take the Levites from among the Children of Israel and purify them… You shall separate the Levites from among the Children of Israel, and the Levites shall be Mine” (Bamidbar 8:5–6, 14; see the entire chapter, and Devarim 10:8). Instead of receiving an inheritance in the Land, God became their inheritance, as it says: “There shall not be for the Levitical kohanim, the entire tribe of Levi, any portion or inheritance with Israel; the fire offerings of the Lord and His inheritance shall they eat. He shall have no inheritance among his brothers; the Lord is his inheritance, as He spoke to him” (Devarim 18:1–2). Similarly, it says: “To the descendants of Levi, I hereby give every tithe in Israel as an inheritance, in exchange for their service, the service that they perform, the service of the Tent of Meeting… For the tithe of the Children of Israel, which they separate to the Lord as teruma, I have given to the Levites as an inheritance. Therefore I said to them: Among the Children of Israel they shall not inherit an inheritance” (Bamidbar 18:21–24).
It may be said that their zealotry contains both danger and greatness. When misdirected, it can become destructive; when directed toward God with dedication and self-sacrifice, it becomes a great virtue, as when the tribe of Levi stood against those who sinned with the Golden Calf: “Moshe stood at the gate of the camp and said: Whoever is for the Lord, come to me. And all the descendants of Levi gathered to him” (Shemot 32:26). Yet in order to keep their zealotry within holiness, they were not given an inheritance in the Land. Instead, the Torah mandated that they be sustained by the gifts of Israel and devote themselves to teaching Torah to Israel. In this way, they would remain bound to Israel in love and would not turn excessive zeal against sinners, so long as those sinners were not destroying Israel’s vineyard. In later generations, the Ḥashmona’im, who were kohanim, indeed raised the banner of revolt against the Greeks, who had issued decrees of religious persecution against Israel. Through them, the Jewish people continued to keep God’s Torah and mitzvot.
The difference between kohanim and levi’im and its practical ramifications should be emphasized. At first, the kohanim were very few compared to the levi’im – less than ten percent of their number – yet they received gifts of far greater value. In addition to receiving a tithe of the tithe given to the levi’im, the kohanim also received many other gifts, twenty-four in all, including the firstborn animal; the foreleg, cheeks, and stomach of every slaughtered animal; ḥalla; reishit ha-gez; and others. Even though teruma and bikurim have no fixed measure by Torah law, the Sages ordained that about two percent be given for each, presumably after the kohanim had multiplied. Thus, while the kohanim were required to live in purity, as explained in sections 6–7, their livelihood was relatively comfortable. The levi’im, by contrast, were not required to live in purity and could work in other professions, but since they had no inheritance in the Land, their livelihood was strained.
It appears, then, that the many gifts given to the kohanim allowed their numbers to grow more rapidly over the generations than those of the levi’im, until, eventually, the kohanim became more numerous. Perhaps this was the Torah’s intention: to strengthen the priesthood. This may also be seen from Bamidbar 31, where the kohanim received ten percent of what the levi’im received from the spoils of Midian, even though the levi’im numbered about 22,000 while the kohanim consisted only of the families of Aharon’s sons. A similar pattern appears in the cities they received in the Land: thirteen cities were given to the kohanim, as opposed to thirty-five given to the levi’im, as explained in Yehoshua 21:19, 39.
The kabbalists explain that the root of the kohanim is in the attribute of ḥesed, while the root of the levi’im is in the attribute of din, whose influence must be kept within bounds (Zohar 3:121a, 151b; Pardes Rimmonim 23:12). Perhaps this is why the service of the levi’im involves poverty and self-sacrifice: it serves to temper the attribute of judgment. Yet when they engage in Torah with devotion and sacrifice, they attain the highest level, the crown of Torah. Indeed, Moshe Rabbeinu, the greatest of Israel, was a levi, as was Shmuel, the greatest prophet after him. Both lived with exceptional restraint and separation: Moshe is called “the man of God,” and Shmuel is the model of one who did not wish to benefit from this world, as explained in Berakhot 10b. Their spiritual level, at its root, is lofty and hidden. Their task is to reveal it to the world, and from there the root of blessing flows. Yet because their level is hidden, they themselves do not receive that blessing in abundance.
