Purge the Shrine

“Purge the holy place from impurity.” – Leviticus 16:16

Arriving in New York, my grandparents and great-grandparents discovered a new holiness.  American idealism supplanted Shtetl Judaism. The Mezuzah at the doorpost was the Statue of Liberty. Their new Torah was the Constitution. Election day was a sacred gathering. The geographic center of the universe was Washington, D.C., their new Jerusalem. The holy place stretched from the Lincoln Memorial to the United States Capitol. Now the shrines are defiled and impure.

Leviticus reminds us: When the people sin, the holy space becomes defiled. The sanctuary itself—be it Temple or Republic—must be purged. The Jewish texts created rituals to clear our holy places of iniquity. In Leviticus 16:16, the High Priest purged the sanctuary of Israel’s sins because the impurity caused by the people’s wrongdoing has seeped into the very center of holiness.

On January 6, 2021, mobs desecrated the U.S. Capitol, a literal shrine of American democracy. It wasn’t just a riot. The attack on the Capitol left a spiritual stain, bursting from an eruption of falsehood and rage that exposed deep moral rot. The violent breach of the Capitol was a symptom, not a cause, of the broader corruption: attacks on truth, erosion of democratic norms, and tolerance of authoritarian impulses.

The shrines of democracy are now temples of inequity. Our government’s leadership is hostile to democratic principles, defying ethical behavior, civic responsibility, and common decency.

The “shrines” became defiled not just by one individual’s sin, but by the collective failure of justice and righteousness. Today, authoritarianism, abuse of the judicial system, and attacks on democratic norms defy our holy American endeavor.

Our nation’s founding ideals were never quite reached but always remained within our grasp. Only recently we leaned into honest history, incorporating the accounts of slavery and the displacement of indigenous people on equal footing with the myth of American exceptionalism. However, within the last decade, those in power in our nation quickly turned aside truth and the rule of law.

Those who desecrate our holy halls of government mask accountability with false patriotism. We aren’t making “America great again.” The degenerative disorder into which we have settled needs to be purged, not endured.

Leviticus offers hope. It tells us that purification is possible. In our modern era, denial or acquiescence abet the impurity. Rather, we need rituals that demonstrate courage, accountability, and regard for the truth. Just as the High Priest entered the Holy of Holies with incense, confession, and sacrifice, so must we confront our own national sins: we vote and urge laws to eliminate voter suppression, we greet our neighbors and undo white supremacy, and we support leaders, especially those who act boldly yet with humility.

Not just in politics, but in our own lives we have a role through the conversations we choose to have, the sources we trust, and the courage we summon to speak out against injustice.

Purging the shrine means we refuse to allow the soul of the nation to be desecrated without response. We do not shrug at corruption or become numb to lies. We act. Because if Leviticus teaches us anything, it’s this: holiness is not static. Our work is to maintained, protect or reclaim the holy purposes of our nation.

How then, do we purge the shrines of democracy? We speak the truth and demand accountability. Most importantly, we too can take action. For example, on the local level, we can urge public education to restore civics as a requirement in the curriculum.

To apply Leviticus 16:16 to America today is to say: “We must cleanse the holy spaces so that justice and freedom may once again reign.”

Rabbi Evan J. Krame