וְלָבַשׁ הַכֹּהֵן מִדּוֹ בַד וּמִכְנְסֵי־בַד יִלְבַּשׁ עַל־בְּשָׂרוֹ וְהֵרִים אֶת־הַדֶּשֶׁן אֲשֶׁר תֹּאכַל הָאֵשׁ אֶת־הָעֹלָה עַל־הַמִּזְבֵּחַ וְשָׂמוֹ אֵצֶל הַמִּזְבֵּחַ׃
The priest shall dress in linen raiment, with linen breeches next to his body; and he shall take up the ashes to which the fire has reduced the burnt offering on the altar and place them beside the altar. (6:3)
This mitzvah carries two very important lessons.
Chovos Halevavos writes in the Gate of Humility Chapter 6, "When performing an act for the sake of G-d, may He be exalted, one should forget his own importance, honor, and dignity, whether he is alone or in the midst of assemblies. As Scripture says of Aharon, in spite of the high dignity of his office: 'He shall remove the ashes' – the Creator obligated him to remove the ashes daily (which is quite a menial task) to induce lowliness and remove arrogance from his heart.” The lesson here is that no one is too dignified to perform even this type of task in the service of Hashem.
To illustrate this, there was a famous Yeshiva in pre WWII Poland in the city of Kelm where the auctions of honors that customarily took place on Simchat Torah included the honors of sweeping the Yeshiva floor and taking out the trash!
The next lesson comes from Rabbeinu Bachya in his commentary on the words וְלָבַשׁ הַכֹּהֵן מִדּוֹ בַד, “The priest shall dress in linen raiment”, that tell us that the Kohein wore his priestly garments while removing the ashes. This teaches us that even for a menial task like removing ashes, Hashem commanded that the Kohen adorn himself by wearing the priestly garments. Therefore whenever a person approaches Hashem in a form of worship or in doing a mitzvah one should adorn oneself while doing it. (My understanding of this is that one should be dressed respectfully when doing a mitzvah.) This demonstrates that what is being done now is of great significance and worthy of adorning oneself for.
We tend to have our own measuring stick for what’s considered important. The greatest measure of importance is something's role in the service of Hashem even if It doesn't conform with how we measure things.
The same applies to how we measure beauty.
There is a concept in Halacha (Jewish Law) that a mitzvah should be done in a beautiful form such as a beautiful Tallit or a beautiful pair of Tefillin. This conforms with our typical perception of beauty.
When it comes to the mitzvah of taking the Etrog in our hand on Sukkot there are aspects of beauty that are actually mandatory. For instance, an Etrog that changes color is invalid because it cannot be considered הדר, beautiful, anymore.
Now there was once a town that had only one Etrog for the townspeople to use (there were times years ago when Etrogim were scarce). Due to being handled by so many hands it turned black! It appeared that the Esrog wasn’t kosher anymore. This case was brought before Rabbi Moshe Sofer, famously known as the Chasam Sofer, who ruled that the Etrog was kosher. He explained that when the Etrog turns dark on its own then it’s considered lacking beauty. But if it turns dark because it was used for a mitzvah then that’s its beauty ! We still have a beautiful etrog!
This introduces to us a new perspective on beauty. It might seem that a blackened etrog or the worn out pages of a well used Siddur have lost their luster. But truthfully those signs of usage are their beauty. Because what could be more beautiful than the signs of dedication to the will of the Almighty.
Shabbat Shalom!
Yitzchak