Not long after the horrific Oct. 7 massacre of Israelis, the spokesman for Hamas announced that the motive behind the attack was the arrival of five red heifers in Israel and the imminent construction of the third Jewish Temple on the Temple Mount in Jerusalem. In a frank interview with Israel365 News, Rabbi Azariah Ariel, the head of the Temple Institute’s Red Heifer Project, refutes that claim, explaining its blatant inaccuracies, and stating the obvious: “Hamas does not need reasons to kill Jews; It only needs excuses.”
Rabbi Ariel inherited his interest in the Temple from his father, Rabbi Yisrael Ariel who founded the Temple Institute about 40 years ago.
“My father lived in Jerusalem before the establishment of the state,” Rabbi Azariah said. “After that, he also had the privilege of participating in the Six-Day War in the liberation of Jerusalem and the Temple Mount. He was one of the first IDF soldiers to reach the Western Wall and the Temple Mount.”
“Several years later, the idea came to him to establish the Temple Institute and work towards establishing the Temple in Jerusalem in our time, and in a practical manner.”
After many years of research and work, the Temple Institute is close to implementing an essential element: the Red Heifer. If they are successful, implementing the red heifer ritual will not only have implications for the Temple service but will also help Jews observe other commandments more completely.
Rabbi Azariah Ariel has been working to reinstate the Biblical commandment of the Red Heifer. About two and a half years ago, he oversaw the transport of five suitable cows from Texas to Israel. In an interview with Israel365, Rabbi Ariel addressed the possibility of the mitzvah returning and what it means (or does not mean) for the world.
Rabbi Ariel has compiled an authoritative book based on his studies of the past two decades. Respected rabbis are currently reviewing his research.
“Anyone who talks about the Red Heifer without referring to the original sources simply does not not know what he’s talking about,” Rabbi Ariel said. “He can talk about the red heifer, he can talk about cows all day. But if it’s not based on the sources or does not reference accepted scholars, he’s not talking about anything.”
The commandment of the red heifer is described by the sages as the most inexplicable of any in the Torah. Yet lacking a red heifer has left all of Israel ritually impure and unable to properly perform many other commandments. The Temple Institute in Jerusalem has tasked Rabbi Ariel with supervising the effort to reestablish this essential Torah commandment. As such, Rabbi Ariel is precise in his description of the commandment including its present-day implications.
“The Torah commands us to perform the mitzvah (Torah commandment) in order to be in a ritually pure condition,” Rabbi Ariel explained to Israel365 News. “This is necessary for us to engage in anything that is holy or sanctified. It is important to understand that impurity is not any type of physical dirt or something. For most ritual impurities, bathing in a mikveh (ritual bath) is sufficient. The highest level of impurity comes from contact with the dead and to purify this condition, the ashes of the red heifer are required. This condition comes not only from contact with the dead. But to be under the same roof as a dead body also brings about this severe level of ritual impurity. This can typically happen if a person is inside a hospital in which a dead body is present. In such cases, the ashes of the red heifer are the only method for becoming ritually pure. Lacking the ashes of the red heifer, this condition remains forever.”
The physical requirements for a red heifer are simple yet precise. This has led to an intense search for an exceedingly rare candidate.
“We know that there have been nine red heifers throughout history, the first having been prepared in the times of Moses and Elazar, the son of Aaron,” Ariel explained. “A red heifer is a female cow that is completely red, with no more than one non-red hair on its entire body. In the language of the Bible, red is not exclusively what we know today as red. It also includes brown and other similar shades of red. This excludes black. All of the hairs on its body must be the same color.”
“The animal must also be two years and one month old,” Rabbi Ariel explained. “There can be no blemish, no holes in the ear. Until that point, it is considered a calf and not a cow. At that point, the cow can be slaughtered and prepared.”
Though reinstating the Temple service in its entirety is dependent on the return of the red heifer ritual, the ashes of the red heifer are prepared outside of the Temple.
“This is not a sacrifice per se so it is burned in an area outside of the Temple, on the Mount of Olives. The ashes are collected. A tiny bit of the ashes are mixed with spring water and can be sprinkled on people in order to purify them.”
“The main reason to recreate the red heifer is that it’s one of the 613 mitzvot in the Torah. One of them happens to be the red heifer ceremony,” Rabbi Ariel explained. “We do not do the ritual of the red heifer so that the Messiah will come so that God will do something like this or like that. He doesn’t work for us. God commanded us to prepare the red heifer, and that is what we do.”
“The messiah is something separate. It is written in the Torah so we know it will come.”
Rabbi Ariel explained that having the Red Heifer does not activate the requirement to build the Third Temple.
“Regarding the issue of entering the temple mount or building the Temple, these do not depend on the red heifer,” he said. “It is possible to enter the temple mount now, even without the red heifer. Even without the red heifer, it is possible to bring public time-bound sacrifices in a state of impurity.”
“Of course, with the help of the red heifer, there will be more possibilities, but that is in due time.”
“What is more relevant right now is that following the observance of the mitzvah of the red heifer, we will be able to perform other mitzvahs that are not necessarily performed on the Temple Mount. Even the red heifer is not prepared on the temple mount. It is made in another place on the Mount of Olives, facing where the Temples stood.”
Rabbi Ariel explained that all of the elements must be perfectly prepared before the burning of the Red Heifer on the Temple Mount could be carried out.
“The calves must be checked periodically,” he explained. “They were perfectly red when they were born and when they arrived, but this can change with time,” he said. “Non-red hairs can suddenly appear and they can also disappear over time.”
“The second requirement is to have a kosher Kohen, a Jewish man who has descended from Aaron the priest, and who has not been made ritually impure by proximity to a dead body, “Rabbi Ariel explained. “He has to be pure in order to perform the ritual and prepare the ashes. For example, he cannot be born in a hospital. We have a few priests like that.”
“We’re looking for priests who have been careful in this matter of meaning distanced from dead bodies from cemeteries and from hospitals. They have to have a clear family tradition that they are descended from priests. There are actually many, many men like this. He also has to be at an age where he can slaughter the cow at least 15 years old and he hasn’t been in a hospital until that time.”
“The third requirement is we have to prepare the place on the Mount of Olives that is precisely in front of the place of the temple. There are some differing opinions and some practical and halachic questions about this. As you know, there are currently many graves on the Mount of Olives. You have to find some pathway in and out that is pure. We need to build some special construction that allows access without the transference of impurity.”
“There is a description of a structure like this in the second temple: a bridge from the temple mount to the Mount of Olives that had spaces preserved against impurity.”
Rabbi Ariel was asked to respond to the Hamas claim that they attacked because of the Red Heifers and their claim that this signaled the imminent construction of the Third Temple.
“First of all, the temple is a gift of peace to the world, a house of prayer for all nations,” Rabbi Ariel said. It is not a weapon of war or an excuse to go to war. They say they’re attacking us because we have the Red heifer.”
He explained that this excuse by Hamas was an attempt by them to justify their horrible actions and is so illogical that warning against the construction of the Temple was an excuse that would only be accepted by people who already hated the Jews and the Bible.
“The truth is that Hamas does not need reasons to kill Jews. They only need excuses in order to make feed a story to the other nations. And the only people who accept these excuses already want Hamas to murder Jews. Building the temple does not depend on the Red Heifers. Entering the Holy of Holies will be forbidden even after the red heifer is prepared. The issue of the Temple Mount is almost irrelevant now.”
