There are matters of this world that are holy by God, and others that we can voluntarily consecrate. There is an interesting category of matters which God decrees should be holy, but also expects Man to join in this declaration.

Our Gemara on Amud Aleph discusses the mitzvah of Bechor, the first born animal that must be set aside for the Cohen and as an offering. The Gemara notes the relative uniqueness of the first born sacrifice that though it is automatically rendered holy by Hashem, there also is a mitzvah for the owner to declare it as such.  This is why the Gemara considers if a Bechor offering has a status of a neder (voluntary vow), which has halakhic ramifications. If one refers to an item in an oath that “it should be like a bechor”, is this is a valid vow? (Halachic vows must draw reference from an existing object that it vowed or declare it definitively to be prohibited by a vow.)

In any case, let us reflect on this interesting process where something is holy, but also must be declared to be holy.  Rav Soloveitchik compares this to Shabbos (see Rabbi Rosner’s Daf Hayomi Shiur), where it is holy and forbidden from work no whether we make kiddush or not, yet it is a mitzvah to mindfully sanctify Shabbos via reciting kiddush.  

At face value, the idea would seem to be one of partnership.  That is, certain matters in the world are intrinsically holy and do not need man’s participation.  Others are completely in man’s domain and he can choose or not choose to sanctify it, such as voluntary sacrificial or charitable vows.  And then there are matters that God wants us to join with Him and be partners in making it holy.

Ha’amek Davar (Shemos 13:2) notes that the process for a bechor animal hints at the human, who also has a bechor process.  The person is meant to partner with Hashem in making himself holy.  It is an expectation that you volunteer, so to speak.

When thinking about this marriage comes to mind as well.  The Gemara KIddushin (2b) tells us that the rabbis consciously encouraged the use of the word Kiddushin to connote marriages even though the scripture uses other phrases, seemingly to emphasize a process of sanctification.  Marriage is a human state that is recognized to be sacred by many cultures and religions throughout time.  The Torah idea about this may be that aside from its intrinsic and potential to be sanctified, man and woman must declare it to be sacred as well.  A marriage can be empty or holy, depending on what you make of it.  

What makes a marriage holy?  It is not merely two people acting holy, who happen to be married. That is not marriage, just two holy people who happened to share the same home.  Instead, marriage is holy as marriage when two people work together to make it holy, There are three elements to that: (1) Work (2) Holiness (3) Together.  This project must be done together in order to be successful.  Just as God asks for partnership with us to mindfully sanctify certain intrinsically holy matters, so too, to make marriage holy, we not only need God but we need each other.  (More on this tomorrow, in Psychology of the Daf Nedarim 14.)

Translations Courtesy of Sefaria, except when, sometimes, I disagree with the translation

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