Few books in Tanakh came as close to being suppressed as the book of Yechezkel. The Talmud records, in more than one place (Shabbat 13b; Menachot 45a; Chagiga 13a), that the Sages considered removing it from public circulation altogether because of apparent contradictions between Yechezkel’s prophecies and the commandments of the Torah. What saved the book was the extraordinary effort of a single scholar: Chananya ben Chizkiya, who sat alone in his attic, working through the difficulties by lamplight – three hundred jugs of oil, the Gemara tells us – before he was done. This week’s haftara, which we read from Ezekiel chapter 45, sits at the center of that controversy.

The difficulties are concrete. Yechezkel announces sacrificial offerings that do not appear anywhere in the Torah: a special offering on the first of Nisan (v. 18), another on the seventh of Nisan (v. 20), and additional offerings for Pesach (v. 23) and Sukkot (v. 25). These are not minor adjustments; they look, on the surface, like a prophet amending the laws of the Torah outright. That the Sages were alarmed is understandable. And yet the question Chananya ben Chizkiya grappled with in that attic echoes in every generation: How far can our sacred traditions evolve, and in what........

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