If I had been asked to write my final column some two years ago, I probably would have been thrilled to have checked the calendar and noticed the concurrence of our administration's final issue with parshas Kedoshim. The normative of kedoshim tehiyu, and the underlying theme of understanding the quest for kedusha, about which I had been taught in so many different contexts, was what this year was supposed to be about. It seems to correspond exactly with my conception of bridging the realm of journalism with the seemingly inconsistent rubric of halacha.

If I had been asked to write my final column just eight months ago, I probably would have been somewhat less excited about the specter of writing about kedusha and its relation to the newspaper front. Indeed, my conception of newspapers had not changed much, and my understanding of kedusha had if anything been enhanced. What had altered, however, was the ease with which the interface between the two could be manifested and expressed. I recall having been approached a couple of days after we had published our first edition of The Commentator by an inquisitive Yeshiva student who asked me to elaborate, using concrete specifics, on what I had meant in describing the integration of journalism with halacha. I restated the theoretical framework that I had constructed as the basis for my outlook, in which I remained confident, but could do little more when it came to outlining specific examples of events that were or were not affected by this methodology. And indeed, the prototypical examples with which the Torah opens in describing the notion of kedusha seem to depict situations where such examples would be unmistakable - areas of halacha that are strictly regulated and clearly defined. Fearing one's parents. Keeping the detailed laws governing the day of shabbos. And running a college newspaper… Not exactly the next member of the list.

But, regardless of the ambiguity that characterized the practical manifestation of our framework, we chalked it up to lack of experience and continued our work, hoping to be able to identify by year's end the elusive specifics that would characterize the relationship that kedusha and journalism sustained, all the time realizing that the waters were certainly murkier than I had originally anticipated. Time and experience, I thought, would fill that void, and everything would work out according to plan.

Well, it was just a couple of hours ago that I realized that I would be writing my final column on the week of parshas Kedoshim, and, as I would have hoped, am pretty enthusiastic about the crossroads of this with parshas Kedoshim. Strikingly, however, it is not because it affords me the opportunity of expressing the fruition of the preconceived picture I had hoped to clarify. To the contrary, the source of my enthusiasm ironically revolves around an unforeseen realization that an excursion into the realm of kedusha forces one to make.

A reexamination of the thematic scheme of the parsha, coupled with a real understanding of the theoretical things that I spoke about at the beginning of the year, revealed an entirely new direction that would characterize the interface.

First, the reexamination. The Torah presents us with the challenge of "kedoshim tihiyu" and frames a series of particular commandments between the bookend refrain "ani Hashem elokeichem" - I am Hashem Your G-d. Chazal pick up on the structural clue and point out that the refrain is used to delineate certain commandments that cannot, via human observation, be completely determined to have been observed or violated. And so, the Torah tells us that even so, the ultimate judge - G-d - will be making such a determination.

While the idea seems quite nice, and quite relevant to a number of instances where the phrase is employed, it is perhaps more important to reapply the notion to the two opening examples in our parsha, where it surprisingly seems that evidence of my compliance would be relatively attainable and the explanation of chazal would be inaccurate. The first occurrence describes one's obligation to fear his parents. This mandate seems to be completely reflectable in reality by observing a person's behavior. So why the refrain?

It is not until this year that the answer became clear. Admittedly, we can indeed observe a person's behavior when his parent enters a room and observe whether the child stands up in honor of his parent. We can observe isolated incidents that seem to evidence the degree to which the normative is being obeyed. But this is only a human way of speculating - post facto - about inner feeling of an individual that might very well differ from the results of this ad hoc assessment.

This point has actually come up several times this year. When the administration, for instance, allowed Andrew Leibowitz to resign, it was asked about squandering a unique opportunity to show students that a clear student voice is acted upon. We used this principle to explain how some seemingly minor actions could alter the fate of others ad infinitum. And so, that seems to be the gap that is filled in the case a number of these commandments with the refrain pointing to G-d. Your compliance can be estimated, but not determined with a degree of certainty, barring G-d doing so.

But, in truth, this parsha takes us a step further. There seems to be evidence of something that G-d indeed notices at all other times - in unexceptional circumstances. It just happens to be too difficult for human perception to discern.

Using this as a basis to reassess the global theme of the parsha, a new definition of kedusha emerges. There does exist the handful of times that we overtly decide to not print a story, or to address a set of events differently because of the mindset that the halachic perspective has generated. But, just as in the case of fearing one's parent, there is more to pick up on if one were to look closely. The daily routine that our staff followed as a result of our striving for the goal of integration became part of our definition of journalism, but more importantly of our approach toward attaining kedusha. The everyday routine manifestations become masked and easily overlooked; but when analyzed with the keen eye, from story list generation to publishing date, became increasingly obvious. Decisions at each of these critical stages all reflect an intangible attitude that stems precisely from what the Torah asks us to target in its directive of "kidoshim tihiyu."

And so, it is this realization that was most important when looking back upon the year and looking forward toward appointing a new staff. The memorable moments of the past ten months we will always remember, but it is the daily routine that we established, the contagious approach that we subconsciously adopted, that we think will be most memorable and effective to us. As the paper is transferred to two new editors, I can rest assured that the implicit attitude that the parsha has forced me to discover in a retrospective of the year, reveals an attitude that will permeate the time barrier and the Commentator office for years to come.