Parshat Masei 5768: The Last Commandment.

This is the last portion of the book of Numbers. In this week’s portion we start with a summary of all the places the Israelites visited during the journey. God then gives Moses the boundaries of the territory of Israel. Moses appoints representatives for each tribe to receive the lots. Levi, who has no land, is given forty eight cities, of which six are cities for refuge in the case of accidental homicide. The procedures for the case of accidental homicide and the legal procedure for homicide cases are enumerated. Finally, the tribe of Manasseh has an objection to the ruling made for some of their own tribe, the five daughters of Zelophehad.

3. And if they are married to any of the sons of the other tribes of the people of Israel, then shall their inheritance be taken from the inheritance of our fathers, and shall be given to the inheritance of the tribe where they are received; so shall it be taken from the lot of our inheritance. 4. And when the jubilee of the people of Israel shall be, then shall their inheritance be given to the inheritance of the tribe where they are received; so shall their inheritance be taken away from the inheritance of the tribe of our fathers. [Num 36:3-4]

The daughters had made an objection earlier that as their father died before having sons, and the inheritance chain was through sons, then the daughters would lose the inheritance of their father. The resolution was to allow in the case of a father who had no sons but did have daughters to let the daughters inherit. The elders of Gilead, relatives of the Daughters have brought this objection because such a system presents the problem of diluting the family and tribal holdings.

The resolution to this objection is rather simple:

5. And Moses commanded the people of Israel according to the word of the Lord, saying, the tribe of the sons of Joseph has said well… 8. So every daughter, who possesses an inheritance in any tribe of the people of Israel, shall be the wife to one of the family of the tribe of her father, that the people of Israel may enjoy every one the inheritance of his fathers. 9. Neither shall the inheritance move from one tribe to another tribe; but every one of the tribes of the people of Israel shall keep himself to his own inheritance.

With this commandment and the daughters of Zelophehad’s compliance with this mitzvah, we end the book of Numbers with a concluding statement.

13. These are the commandments and the judgments, which the Lord commanded by the hand of Moses to the people of Israel in the plains of Moab by the Jordan near Jericho.[Numbers 36:13]

Thus the commandment for daughter who inherit to marry within their tribe is the last commandment. This last commandment in the book of Number is remarkable in many ways. It contains a rather curious expression Moses commanded the people of Israel according to the word of the Lord.

Part of the curiosity is the rare forms of commanding used here, and only in this sequence in this verse. Moses, not God, first of all is doing the commanding. He is doing this commanding by the word of the lord, which is literally by the mouth of the Lord.

By the Mouth of the Lord is rare except for the book of Numbers. In Hebrew it is usually part of the expression al pi Hashem b’yad Moshe. Literally it means by the mouth of the Lord by the hand of Moses. It’s literal connotation is the dictation of the Torah, God spoke and Moses used his hands to write it down. It may also mean God gave a commandment and Moses executed it. One such use is the counting of the tribes at the beginning of the journey, but there it is often accompanied by another phrase: as God commanded. But in the last commandment, it’s not God doing the commanding, but Moses. One way of understanding this is a comment by the Talmudic sages:

Our Rabbis have taught…‘By the hand of Moses’ refers to the Gemara. I might include also the Mishnah; therefore it reads ‘that ye may teach’. [K'rithoth 13b]

By the hand of Moses means the Oral law, but a very specific one. The classic statement of the oral law is found in the Perkei Avot:

Moses received the Torah at Sinai and transmitted it to Joshua, Joshua to the elders, and the elders to the prophets, and the prophets to the men of the Great Assembly. [Avot 1:1]

According to tradition, this was an oral transmission of the stuff that explained the details of the written Torah. After the destruction of the Temple, it was compiled into the book we refer to as the Mishnah. A work expanding on the Mishnah with both new rulings to reflect new living patterns, explanations for the rules of the Mishnah, and a lot of stories for illustrative purposes became known in Aramaic as the Gemara. The Gemara along with the Mishnah is the work we refer to today as the Talmud.

This was not the first time Moses commanded something. Back in Exodus we read:

4. And all the wise men, that did all the work of the sanctuary, came every man from his work which they made; 5. And they spoke to Moses, saying, The people bring much more than enough for the service of the work, which the Lord commanded to make. 6. And Moses gave commandment, and they caused it to be proclaimed throughout the camp, saying, Let neither man nor woman do any more work for the offering of the sanctuary. So the people were restrained from bringing. [Exodus 36:4-6]

Moses stops the donations of materials to the Mishkan. He evaluated the situation by himself and came to a ruling. The stopping of the Mishkan donations and the last commandment, though backed by the word of God, was a judgment of Moses, not the direct commandment of God. It was Gemara: human and not divine derived rules to live by.

The last commandment was also the result of an objection to an objection. It could have been just as easy to blindly obey the original rule. But neither the daughters nor the elders of Gilead did. They saw a legitimate problem in the commandments, and brought it up for discussion. One solution led to another problem, and then that problem has to be resolved. This became the pattern of rabbinic thought. Once again look at the rhetoric used in the rabbinic statement:

Our Rabbis have taught…‘By the hand of Moses’ refers to the Gemara. I might include also the Mishnah, therefore it reads ‘that ye may teach’. [K'rithoth 13b]

The rabbis qualify themselves due to a possible objection that “by the hand of Moses” includes both parts of the Talmud, Mishnah and Gemara. They state that a proof text qualifies this and excludes the Mishnah. This passage is actually part of a bigger argument about whether one should study teach, or make rulings in the Law while intoxicated, and as such was part of a much bigger objection and question. That was part of a bigger objection itself and so on.

The last commandment was not as significant in its content but in its process. It is the idea behind rabbinic thinking: everything you need to know is in the Torah, yet some things are not written down. There will be times where things contradict or cause problems with the text. It is our duty as to question them, take from the ancestral sources and resolve the problem. Such thinking expands the texts and reveals new ideas which can be added to the body of thought. It is that thinking more than anything else that has kept the Jewish people alive to the present day.

For the book of B’midbar we have been looking at the text in terms of internal change from being in a place of slavery to getting to some personal goal or accomplishment in ourselves, we looked at the resistance that can occur to such goals and in the last few parshiot, how we need to prepare for the Promised Land. Some comments to me describe this process as a transformation from child to adult, which I find very wise and true. The last thing we need to learn is that the world is not static, but dynamic. Things change and our rules and boundaries will need to change with them. Moses and the miracles of God in the wilderness, what we might call parental support and protection, are not coming with us. We have to think on our feet like adults. We need to understand a process to make such changes. The last commandment, the last oral one, in B’midbar does exactly that. Things will change and there will exceptions and exceptions to exceptions. When necessary, change them in the spirit of the texts that came before you.

We do not enter the Promised Land in the Torah nor in the book of Numbers. We are lead to the banks and have a short crossing over yet to do. The land has yet to be fought for, as we will learn in Joshua, and starting with Judges all the way through the rest of the prophets, there is always a fight against idolatry among the people. The last commandment may be fighting Idolatry too or more accurately, Idle-atry. Part of the problem of Idolatry is one does not have the chance to grow and change, as all is in the hands of a capricious god. There is no incentive or even concept to do so. Progress is an alien concept to the pagan. Learning is meaningless. Learning’s use to create something new to adapt to changing conditions is meaningless too because nothing changes in their world view. But we must learn, as the law must be derived from the precedents of our ancestors, our true inheritance. It should not be derived from not our own emotional whims nor the emotional and manipulative arguments of outsiders.

We have come to the end of the journey, only to find that it never ends, just starts new chapters, and new books. Now we have the tools to take on those adventures.

Parshat Matot 5768: Boundaries

Last week we talked about one need for boundaries, but left a question unanswered: what are boundaries? We now have some ways of looking at that question. We start with the rules concerning a woman making vows and who and when they can be annulled. The attack on the Midianites is set up and executed, though not with the results Moses expected. This brings up issues of how to divide the spoils of war, and how to deal with female war orphans. In the third part, the tribes of Gad and Rueben want to settle east of the Jordan and not cross, which brings up new issues.

We read at the beginning of the Perkei Avot:

Moses received the [oral] Torah at Sinai and transmitted it to Joshua, Joshua to the elders, and the elders to the prophets, and the prophets to the men of the great assembly. The latter used to say three things: Be patient in [the administration of] justice, rear many disciples and make a fence round the Torah. [M. Avot 1:1]

This is the classic statement of the Oral Torah, the laws spoken between the lines of the written Torah. But the key to such a transmission and use is the curious phrase “make a fence around the Torah.” What does a fence, a boundary do? At its most basic, it keeps something in or something out. We have examples in this week’s portion of the basic use of a fence or a boundary. As part of their land deal, the tribes of Gad and Reuben propose

And they came near to him, and said, We will build sheepfolds here for our cattle, and cities for our little ones; [Num. 32:16]

Sheepfolds are fences to keep sheep in. Walled cities are walls to keep wives and children safe from outside forces. Of course they do not have one function at a time. A fence does both simultaneously. The sheep may be kept penned in but they are also safer from wolves and bears. The walled city may keep invaders out, but it also keeps little ones from wandering around. When we talk about a fence around Torah we talk of it often in this simple sense. It is a protective barrier for a mitzvah. The mitzvah prohibiting boiling a kid in its mother’s milk can through a series of fences creates a halakah mandating separate dishes and utensils, one for milk and one for meat and poultry for example. Since we are not sure what the original mitzvah truly means, we put a series of protective measure in place to make sure we do not transgress it even accidentally.

Yet fences are physical. Often territories are not marked by fences but by flags and banners. Indeed the name of our portion matot is such a boundary. The word means staff or stick, denoting the staff or stick or standard that each tribe used to identify itself, hence its meaning here of tribes. Many times boundaries are set not by a physical barrier, but by a grouping of attributes in one place. These are indentified by some symbol, like a flag or staff or standard. Each tribe is marked by their staff and the tribe groups around that staff. Go to any major tourist destination and you will see such things today. Tour groups or field trips will gather around a flag, sign, tour guide, or teacher in order to keep together. Sometimes the tribe will share some visual component for the entire group to find such as a badge or t-shirt. Having the visual attribute keeps the group together

Sometimes the boundaries don’t even have that. We can have a hard time telling where one boundary ends and another begins. To make things worse, no tribe has completely identical people, everyone has some attribute different. For example imagine two people we’ll call AC and AB. They a share a common trait “A” and thus are the tribe of A. But AB does something B. Is this act good, bad, or indifferent for AC? The answer is not clear, but that is a question addressed in this portion.

The portion begins with the annulment of vows made by women. Vows made in the name of God are hard and fast we are told. However there is a set of exemptions. If a father hears that a daughter in his home has made a vow, then he can annul it only on the first day he hears of the vow. If he delays, the vow stands. If the girl vows in her fathers house and then gets married, her new husband only on the first day of hearing of the vow may also annul what her father did not. In a similar case, if a wife vows a vow, her husband may annul it on the first day he hears of it. Otherwise, the vow stands. For widows and divorcees, no one can annul the vow.

Some vows do not affect other’s boundaries and some do. A vow not to eat cheeseburgers for six months crosses no boundaries. One kind of vow which becomes problematic is a vow not to derive benefit from another person for a period of time. One particular benefit which comes from women is the gestation of children. As the daughters of Zelophehad made clear in last week’s portion, children become the mechanism for inheritance. If a woman vows not to go near men, then we have a problem, since this affects the inheritance chain. Without any children, a man’s inheritance goes to distant relatives. Secondly, the potential for a girl to get married and have children is strongly inhibited by such a vow, since she has less value to suitors than a woman willing to have children. Thus she becomes a permanent financial burden on her father and family. Such a vow by a female dependent on her husband or father violates communal and familial boundaries. If a man vows not to go near women, he is merely spiting himself in terms of the inheritance system.

Said another way, we have a girl called AB. AB’s father, AC finds out that AB has vowed to abstain from something that might get her married and give AC grandchildren. AC is obligated to care for AB until such time as she is married. AC is thus stuck providing for AB his entire life. If AB had a brother, he would be stuck too. If she had no brothers, she does inherit her father’s inheritance, but on her death it goes to an uncle, breaking the chain and increasing the uncle’s inheritance. AC’s property and boundaries are violated by AB here. He thus has a chance to annul her vow in order to correct for this boundary violation. But he has a short window to do so in order to minimally violate AB’s boundaries and personal space. If he fails to do so, there is still a possibility for annulment. AF, a potential husband, might marry AB anyway, and on the day he learns of the vows annuls them as her husband, bringing his boundaries of inheritance back into alignment.

This can get increasingly complicated, and whole tractates of the Talmud deal with cases of how this all applies. But at the core is one person breaking someone else's boundaries to the latter’s detriment. Indeed we even use such a word for sinning. Transgressions are when we break a boundary of God’s making. The Midianites were worse than that: they did not just break boundaries of others, but they enticed transgression, to spread boundary breaking like a virus. That was why God told Moses to avenge the people against the Midianites. They have caused people to transgress once, and were likely to do it again.

Knowing where the boundaries are is different for different people. Moses, as we’ve mentioned before had an all-or-nothing thinking. When he said to attack Midian, he meant killing everyone. But the actual troops on the mission thought along different boundaries. Their boundaries were based on the census that counted them: you weren’t a real person unless you were a male of military age. So they didn’t kill the women and children. Moses, as the text tells us, freaks out

14. And Moses was angry with the officers of the army, with the captains over thousands, and captains over hundreds, who came from the battle. 15. And Moses said to them, Have you kept all the women alive? 16. Behold, these caused the people of Israel, through the counsel of Balaam, to commit trespass against the Lord in the matter of Peor, and there was a plague among the congregation of the Lord.[31:14-16]

The agent of transgression that Moses most wanted to destroy in the Midianites was left alive, all because boundaries were not clearly communicated. This can cause conflicts for us. One person’s boundary is not necessarily another’s. If we do not communicate and agree on boundaries, problems ensue.

There are plenty of stories of boundaries and boundary violation in the story of the attack on Midian and its aftermath. Yet the last third of the portion is one I want to focus on next. Reuben and Gad come to Moses with a request about physical boundaries:

4. The country which the Lord struck before the congregation of Israel is a land for cattle, and your servants have cattle; 5. Therefore, said they, if we have found grace in your sight, let this land be given to your servants for a possession, and bring us not over the Jordan:[32:4-5]

This can be taken two different ways, and again two different views of boundaries come out of it. First there is Moses’ view, that these two tribes are lazy and cowardly. They do not want to do what is good for the rest of the tribes. They set their boundaries in what they already have, the lands conquered in the last few months. Gad and Reuben might see differently. That the land starts on the west side of the Jordan is a boundary that Moses assumes. They break that boundary to include more land, to the east of the Jordan. Yet they understand Moses’ boundary issues as well. So they come up with their solution of both settling west of the Jordan and all the military age men remain as part of the military contingent of the people in entering the land.

This suggests the most difficult types of boundaries: ones imposed on us. Sometimes we are told that there are things we can and can’t do. Sometimes we come to that conclusion ourselves. Like the walled city or the sheep pen, those boundaries keep us limited. Sometimes they are completely valid boundaries and limits. I’m color blind for example and that disability makes it impossible for me to discern certain shades. Trying to figure out what are flesh tones from a box of crayons or pastels is near impossible for me. Since second grade, I’ve had a self imposed boundary that I am not an artist. That boundary however is an illusion. Limitations do not always equal boundaries. I only need look up from this keyboard to a wall covered with my own watercolors, or click a link to my on-line gallery to remember that. Limitations may mean there will need to be some adaptations, but those boundaries can be crossed, and we can become better people for it.

I was once painfully shy. I’ve found as I’ve become less shy that most of my shyness was due to boundaries set up long ago. Some of them made sense at the time, but the boundaries remained outside of their usefulness. Many people live in fortresses built on false assumptions. I think it is not coincidental that we hear mention once again of Caleb and Joshua in Moses’ response to Reuben and Gad. According to the Sages, Caleb did not just spy out the land; he decided while there that he wanted Hebron and the surrounding area. He did not say “we can’t enter because the boundaries are too great” but he said “we surely can, (and I’ve already picked out where I’m going to live.)” When the land is distributed, he does get Hebron because he changed his boundaries.

There are boundaries that are agreed on. There are boundaries that are imposed. There are boundaries that are crossed and there are boundaries that isolate. There are boundaries that are clear and understandable and boundaries that are blurred and misunderstood. The art of living in the Promised Land is knowing when a boundary is each of these things and how one is supposed to deal with them. It is the art of relationship, relationship with ourselves and relationship with others, and even our relationship with God. Setting boundaries can protect use and make us grow. Setting the wrong boundaries can hurt, isolate and stifle us. Being in the Promised Land is not a static endgame, but a new stage of living. Living in the land requires understanding boundaries, but it also requires something else found at the very end of the journey in the wilderness.

Next week, to finish the journey, we’ll see why that last commandment is so critically important.

Parshat Hukkat 5768: Success Begins with Endings

In the book of Numbers, translated literally from the Hebrew B’midbar as In the Wilderness, we’ve watched a journey from Sinai to the Promised Land of Israel. I’ve spent this round of Shlomo’s Drash looking at this book as though the people are not individuals, but a collective, one that makes up our own mind and soul. The Promised Land in that view is this thing called success. For the story of B’midbar, success is a bunch of whiny slaves entering an abundant land where they are free from slavery, one where they can worship God. We began that trip by the simple act of looking up so we can see in front of us and show our commitment to getting to the Promised Land.

Yet as we’ve seen, there has been resistance. Getting to the Promised Land is not easy, because it requires change. Resistance takes many forms, from our friends and family wanting us to be our old selves, to intense cravings. We’ve seen fear, lack of confidence and rebellious self-sabotage slow down the journey. The cry of resistance has been the same each time: let us go back to Egypt, let us go back to the way things used to be. Each time, our seemingly comfortable old selves wants to go back even though it is oppressive slavery. The only way forward was elimination of the resistance. In the biblical text often this has been symbolized by the death of individuals like Korach, Dathan and Abiram. Some have been by attrition. The forty years in the wilderness was such elimination.

This week, things really begin to change. Spanning the forty years in the wilderness, we start with the ordinances regarding the red heifer. Miriam dies and then the water disappears, which causes the people to complain. Moses is instructed to speak to a rock and water will come out, but he yells at the people and strikes the rock instead. For that, he will not enter the Promised Land. The Israelites are on the move, when very politely asking for permission to cross the land of Edom. They are told very rudely if they do, they will be attacked. So they start going the long way. After this, God tells Aaron to ascend mount Hor, where he dies and Eleazar his son becomes High priest. Then a Canaanite king attacks and takes hostages. The Israelite response is to raze the city involved to the ground. Then after more grumbling about all this moving around, there's a plague of snakes. Yet the next time they look for water, the leaders, not Moses digs the well. When they get to the land of the Amorites, they once again politely request of King Sihon to cross the land, promising to keep on the king's road and not damage anything. Deuteronomy tells us Moses even opened the door for a hefty profit by offering compensation for any food set at whatever price the Amorites want. Sihon, not understanding the concept of "tourist rates,” decides to attack the wandering tribes. That turns out to be a big mistake. Sihon and his people are totally annihilated by Israelite troops, and all of the Amorite land taken. Sihon's neighbor, King Og of Bashan attacks without any provocation, only to meet the same fate as Sihon.

Hukkat presents us with a transition. We still hear grumbling. First after the death of Miriam over water, and then in the middle of all the movement north once again concerning food. Both times we hear the same chorus about Egypt, yet these two times there are missing elements: nobody is proposing to go back to Egypt. Things are different. In this portion, we also read of Israelite chieftains who dig their own well, and an Israelite army who barely blinks and destroys whole nations, a far cry from the whimpering spies of Shlach Lecha. By the end of Hukkat, this is a far different people than the beginning of our story of B’midbar. Success is within reach, and the first signs of such success has begun.

At the same time, we lose three major characters before we get to the Promised Land. Both Miriam and Aaron die in the wilderness, and Moses is told he isn’t going to make it in either. Many commentators have asked why these three had to die before the Promised Land. One answer extends the literal answer: Moses messed up at the well of Meribah. Just after Miriam’s death the water disappears. The people once again complain:

3. And the people quarreled with Moses, and spoke, saying, Would God that we had died when our brothers died before the Lord! 4. And why have you brought up the congregation of the Lord into this wilderness, that we and our cattle should die there? 5. And why have you made us come out of Egypt, to bring us in to this evil place? This is no place of seed, or of figs, or of vines, or of pomegranates; nor is there any water to drink. [Numbers 20]

Moses and Aaron get instructions from God on how to handle this. Moses, with his staff in hand, is to speak to a rock and water will flow out of it. But all doesn’t go according to plan:

10. And Moses and Aaron gathered the congregation together before the rock, and he said to them, Hear now, you rebels; must we fetch you water out of this rock? 11. And Moses lifted up his hand, and with his rod he struck the rock twice; and the water came out abundantly, and the congregation drank, and their beasts also. 12. And the Lord spoke to Moses and Aaron, Because you did not believe me to sanctify me in the eyes of the people of Israel, therefore you shall not bring this congregation into the land which I have given them.[Numbers 20]

Moses not following directions is the direct cause of his and Aaron’s never crossing the Jordan. This is not the first time water came out of a rock. Shortly after leaving Egypt there was a similar incident:

3. And the people thirsted there for water; and the people murmured against Moses, and said, Why have you brought us up out of Egypt, to kill us and our children and our cattle with thirst? 4. And Moses cried to the Lord, saying, What shall I do to this people? They are almost ready to stone me. 5. And the Lord said to Moses, Go on before the people, and take with you of the elders of Israel; and your rod, with which you struck the river, take in your hand, and go. 6. Behold, I will stand before you there upon the rock in Horeb; and you shall strike the rock, and water shall come out of it, that the people may drink. And Moses did so in the sight of the elders of Israel. [Exodus 17]

What Moses did in the book of Numbers was follow forty year old directions, not the latest set. Note the people’s rhetoric seemingly remains the same about dying in the wilderness, but in Exodus they are on the edge of rebellion, and do not believe in either God or Moses. In Numbers, years later, there is a significant change. While they talk of Egypt they also talk of wanting their fate to be dying before the Lord, not returning to Egypt. While in Exodus there was no belief, there is belief here. They murmur against Moses in Exodus, yet they quarrel directly with him in Numbers.

What we are seeing here is indeed growth on the part of the people. There is no talk of Egypt as a land of milk and honey, like Dathan and Abiram did. The people’s complaining that there are no Vines figs or pomegranates is not a reference to Egypt, but instead to Israel. Numbers 13:23 tells us that grapevines figs and pomegranates were what the spies brought back to the camp. Deuteronomy 8:8 mentions the same three in terms of the Promised Land as well. No longer is their complaint that they want to go back to Egypt, but instead, their complaint is “When are we going to get there?”

If they are growing, why did they mention Egypt at all? For the same reason Moses struck the rock. Over time we get used to doing things one way, we have an internal script to follow. In a positive sense such scripts saves us time from having to think out a reaction. But in the negative it can also be inappropriate to the situation. We can get stuck in the script. It’s a lot like the boy who continues to breastfeed from his mother even when he’s thirteen years old. Not only is that inappropriate, it’s perverse. Both the provider and the receiver of the milk got stuck in one type of behavior, and never realized it really needed change. While that example is extreme, people in relationships, be they parents and children or husbands and wives, often fall into patterns of knowing how to push buttons to get certain automatic behaviors. The people knew how to push Moses’ buttons. If you want something, mention Egypt and Moses goes into action. What they forgot was the entirety of the script. Egypt was always mentioned when a resistance was breaking out in the camp, and Moses or God would have to stamp it out. Even when it wasn’t a real rebellion, Moses’ script thought it was, so he did the same thing the last time such a thing happened, striking the rock, and not speaking to it.

If you’ve ever been in the Negev, or in Transjordan you know it is not milk that is the stuff of life, but water. Water is preciously rare in the world the people wandered in. In my recent trip to Israel and Jordan I learned how the Nabatean empire, with its capital in Petra, became massively wealthy by monopolizing all the wells in the area, thus forcing traders to stop there, buy water supplies and trade with others, all at a hefty tax profit for the Nabateans. You can’t survive without water, the same way an infant can’t survive without milk.

Most rabbinic opinion describes Miriam, Moses and Aaron as support systems for the people:

Three good leaders had arisen for Israel, namely. Moses, Aaron and Miriam, and for their sake three good things were conferred [upon Israel], namely, the Well, the Pillar of Cloud and the Manna; the Well, for the merit of Miriam; the Pillar of Cloud for the merit of Aaron; the Manna for the merit of Moses. When Miriam died the well disappeared, as it is said, And Miriam died there, and immediately follows [the verse], And there was no water for the congregation; [Ta’anit 9a, cf. Numbers Rabbah I:2]

In the wilderness, the providing of water to the people was due to the merit of Miriam. Even in her name is the word for water: MYM. When she died the water stopped according to the Sages. The reason the verses about each are so close is that her death stopped the miraculous providing of water. Conversely, as long as she was alive the water would flow. Thinking in those terms we begin to see that Hukkat is a weaning. When the people enter than land they will have to get their own food and water, they can no longer depend on a well of Miriam for water or Moses’ Manna for food. To do so even before the journey is done holds them back from their full potential as does a pre-teen who only drinks from his mother’s breast. The support system that got them to success on the East bank of the Jordan now must make way for new support systems when they cross that river.

Moses, Aaron, and Miriam represent the support system that got the people through the wilderness to the banks of the land. As they proceeded towards the land, their usefulness actually wanes. It may even be a form of resistance itself. The scripts that were run at the beginning of the journey don’t work now, even tripping one up. God prohibiting Moses from entering the land was because Moses could not change to fit a new role within the land. He was still reacting to rebellions, even when it may be a legitimate complaint of dehydration. Like Miriam’s death, the people needed to be weaned from Manna as well as water. Manna fell on Moses’ merit, and as long as he was alive it would have fallen. As long there was free food around, no one would have worked the fertile land to cultivate all those figs, grapes and pomegranates.

Changing the support system is never easy. Often our support systems, both internal and external are beloved parts of our lives. Externally it may be parents, family and friends. Internally, it may be scripts so successful, we can’t believe they’ve stopped working. Yet, it must change for continued growth.

In B’midbar, it is not an easy transition. But it happens. We see that success in each of the military engagements, how the strength of the people increases. After Miriam dies and the incident with water, they plan to cross into Edomite territory. Unlike previous engagements, they do not cower or get defeated. They stand their ground until they are outnumbered, then politely and quietly walk around Edom. After Aaron dies and another support system is replaced with Eleazar, Arad the Canaanite attacks and takes hostages, only to be wiped from the face of the earth. After digging their own wells for the first time, they encounter Sihon, and have the exact setup as Edom. This time however the outcome is very different – Sihon’s nation of Amorites is wiped out. Og of Bashan attacks, only to also lose his life, people and land. As the people have to depend on themselves more, their success grows – and they move closer to the final destination of the Promised Land.

Early indicators of success can still be problematic. Next week, with Midian and Moab, we’ll look at what hazards there are when you finally figure out how successful you can be.

Korah 5768: Rebellion and Purpose

This week we have the story of the Korah rebellion and its aftermath. Korah, Dathan and Abiram, along with 250 of the leading figures in the community rebel against Moses and Aaron, and want to be included as priests. Moses tries to dissuade them, but is unsuccessful. In a contest the next morning, the rebels light incense in their censers, to determine who is chosen by God. Korah, Dathan and Abiram and their families are swallowed up by the earth, literally going straight to hell, and the 250 men are burned alive by a fire from God. The people murmur against this and a plague ensues. To settle the matter of leadership once and for all, another contest is performed. This time the leaders of each tribe place their staff in the Mishkan and leave them overnight. In the morning, Aaron’s staff buds and blooms with almonds. Yet, there are still murmurs.

This week we hit one of the biggest hurdles in getting to the Promised Land, the internal rebellion. In the Torah this is represented by Korah and the related rebellions. We’re all familiar with the concept in our own lives, a sense of self destruction of the path. One day you are on the top of the word, successful and ready to have your dream come true. The next you do one very stupid thing and the world come crashing down. One feels like Korah’s final fate. The ground under your feet opens ups and you fall straight to Sheol. We’ve seen it happen all too often to people in view of the media both in the political and entertainment realms. Then there are the times it has happened to us as well. It’s happened to me numerous times to be sure

As outside observers of such events, we always think “why was he so stupid?” The self-destructive behavior seems to make no sense. After the event on many an occasion when I’ve done something that stupid, I’ve noticed how much I think the same about my own behavior. This is our inner Korah, the rebel who refuses for us to grow. The Korah within us might start as one other form of resistance such as a craving, yet gathers together other thoughts, as Korah gathers around him all other others in his conspiracy.

To understand how Korah affects we must first look at what he was really after, and why that was so destructive in the text. Most of this portion is about who is and isn’t a priest. Korah’s original rhetoric is:

And they gathered themselves together against Moses and against Aaron, and said to them, You take too much upon you, seeing all the congregation are holy, every one of them, and the Lord is among them. Why then do you lift up yourselves above the congregation of the Lord? [Numbers 16:]

But Moses replies personally to Korah:

Does it seem but a small thing to you, that the God of Israel has separated you from the congregation of Israel, to bring you near to himself to do the service of the tabernacle of the Lord, and to stand before the congregation to minister to them? And he has brought you near to him, and all your brothers the sons of Levi with you; and do you also seek the priesthood? [Numbers 16 9-10]

The thing that Korah wants seems democratic if we were talking about people. All the people should be priests Korah seems to say. But if we think in terms of the journey or getting to a goal, then things are a bit different. It’s a lot like 600,000 backseat drivers and no front seat driver – one would never get to the destination. As we already know, many want to turn back and go back to being slaves in Egypt. From last week, some want to haphazardly go into the land. There is no organization to this mess because there is no singular vision to unite so many people – except Moses and Aaron.

The rebellions and murmurings effectively end after the contest of the rods. Once it is clear Aaron’s rod was selected, and then the people no longer conspire against him. Aaron’s singular authority as a priest is made clear. We cannot go in a million directions at once to get to our goal – we must plan one particular route. Anything else leads to paralysis.

The resistance that is Korah is there are visions of what we want, and visions of what we are used to. Often one causes problems for the other. In the text once again we see that with Dathan’s and Abiram’s charge against Moses referring to Egypt:

13. Is it a small thing that you have brought us out of a land that flows with milk and honey, to kill us in the wilderness, that you also make yourself a prince over us? 14. Moreover you have not brought us into a land that flows with milk and honey, or given us inheritance of fields and vineyards. Will you take out the eyes of these men? We will not come up.[Numbers 16:13-14]

This time Egypt is so inflated as to be indistinguishable from the Promised Land, both are described as a land of milk and honey. That old vision of ourselves as being in a good place, no matter how horrible it really was, gets in the way. We get so used to it, we can’t think any other way. When there is a chance for us to get something really good, we go out of our way to make sure we keep the old way, and like Dathan and Abiram and many of the people think of the path to change, traveling through the wilderness, as a fatal mistake.

The fourteen year old computer geek I once was is not the guy I am today. That guy I was last week who was always upbeat, Said Hello to every conference attendee, and try to lift the spirit of everyone he met is a far cry from the kid cowering behind his Apple ][. Yet there is always something in me that tries to pull back to that time. Friday, as I tried to get this piece written I noticed that – a lot. It did in fact sabotage me enough that I did not finish this piece until Sunday. My inner Korah, that servant of my Yetzer ha ra, tried to derail me after a very successful, though busy week.

Even eliminating this self-sabotage can cause resistance. In the text the people begin to murmur:

But on the next day all the congregation of the people of Israel murmured against Moses and against Aaron, saying, You have killed the people of the Lord.[Numbers 17]

Of course this is a ludicrous charge. Moses goes out of his way to tell the people it’s not him doing this, but God, and because these people are not as holy as they claim. Indeed all the people were witnesses to an event only a few months before that was identical to the death of the co-conspirators in the rebellion: the death of Nadav and Abihu, Aaron’s sons. At that point, no one claimed Moses or Aaron killed any body.

Memory is a curious thing. To remove the self destructive parts of ourselves we must remove memory. But such removals remove part of ourselves, and we feel guilty about such removal because we are no longer who we used to be. We do not read it in the text, but had God not started a plague then, the people very likely would have grabbed shovels and would have started to dig for Korah. Such guilt often brings back the self destruction.

Before they have a chance, God starts a plague, one that Moses and Aaron stop in a very ironic way:

11. And Moses said to Aaron, Take a censer, and put fire in it from the altar, and put on incense, and go quickly to the congregation, and make an atonement for them; for anger has come out from the Lord; the plague has begun. 12. And Aaron took as Moses commanded, and ran into the midst of the congregation; and, behold, the plague had begun among the people; and he put on incense, and made an atonement for the people. 13. And he stood between the dead and the living; and the plague was stopped.[Numbers 17:11-13]

The same incense that killed Aaron’s sons and killed the 250 co-conspirators saves the day. It’s not the incense offering that is bad, but its use and who uses it. Memories and mental constructs can be for our benefit or our destruction. Sometimes they are for both, and some memories were okay for our protection in the past, but are in the way in getting to our future. A three year old might find the world a big scary place. When he’s thirteen or even twenty two, He needs to get beyond that construct; otherwise he will be painfully shy. On the other hand, memories can prevent us from getting into true hazards, such as someone who really does want to hurt us. Memories, like incense is all in how it is used.

Yet what makes the difference and what really calms the people down the most is the proof that there is one dominant vision of how to live. Aaron’s staff growing almonds is the evidence of a dominant position, one picked by God. We too need to find our singular vision of what our promised land should look like, and make it so strong that resistance is not just destroyed but so overpowered by that vision the distractions and resistance is drowned out. Rebellions are silenced because they can never get as loud as the way we know is right. They are still there, of course. While my inner rebellions and resistance didn’t bother me while I was at my meetings last week, when I slowed down on Friday they exploited the pause. Even after the contest of the rods, there are still murmurings, but no longer are there revolts.

Sometimes the stuff that was once our most powerful allies on the journey might become new resistance when we reach our goal. Next week we’ll look at what happens when we really do start to become successful.

Parshat Shlach Lecha 5768: The Killer vs. Y-C-L

As I’ve mentioned before, this is a special portion to me since it is my bar mitzvah portion. It would not surprise me that my ongoing writing here comes from trying to make up for something: I never gave a bar mitzvah speech. Why I didn’t have a speech goes to the heart of this week’s Torah portion. Something happened in the desert that effectively killed 600,000 people before they stepped foot into the Land of Israel. That something has been driving all of the resistance I mentioned in the portion from last week. It probably will also drive the resistance we will see next week in the Korah rebellion.
We actually begin the portion on a happy note, the people are on the border, ready to cross into the land and end their journey. God tell Moses:

1. And the Lord spoke to Moses, saying, 2. Send men, that they may spy the land of Canaan, which I give to the people of Israel; of every tribe of their fathers shall you send a man, every one a leader among them. [Numbers 13:1-2]

Twelve chieftains are picked to enter the land and report back on the conditions there:

18. And see the land, what it is; and the people who live in it, whether they are strong or weak, few or many; 19. And what the land is that they live in, whether it is good or bad; and what cities they are that they live in, whether in tents, or in fortresses; 20. And what the land is, whether it is fat or lean, whether there is wood in it, or not. And be you of good courage, and bring of the fruit of the land. Now the time was the time of the first ripe grapes. [Numbers 13:18-20]

Forty days later, the twelve spies return to the camp bearing a grape cluster so big it needed two people to carry it. Their report begins on a sweet note, but quickly turns sour:

And they told him, and said, We came to the land where you sent us, and surely it flows with milk and honey; and this is its fruit. 28. Nevertheless the people, who live in the land, are strong, and the cities are walled, and very great; and moreover we saw the children of Anak there. 29. The Amalekites live in the land of the Negev; and the Hittites, and the Jebusites, and the Amorites, live in the mountains; and the Canaanites live by the sea, and by the side of the Jordan…

There is one lone voice, crying over this din of a horrible report:

And Caleb quieted the people before Moses, and said, Let us go up at once, and possess it; for we are well able to overcome it.[Numbers 13:30]

Yet the other Spies retort:

We are not able to go up against the people; for they are stronger than we. 32. And they brought up an evil report of the land which they had spied to the people of Israel, saying, The land, through which we have gone to spy, is a land that eats up its inhabitants; and all the people that we saw in it are men of a great stature. 33. And there we saw the Nefilim, the sons of Anak, who come from the Nefilim; and we were in our own sight as grasshoppers, and so were we in their sight.[13:31-33]

The English translation of Caleb’s response does not show the power of what he said in Hebrew. For we are well able to overcome it is in Hebrew ki yachol nuchal lah. In the two verbs in this sentence the root is Y-Ch-L. This verb has an interesting usage in Hebrew as it really is a verb which acts like an adverb, modifying another verb. Usually, it means to be able to and requires another verb to have any meaning. For example, the other Spies retort to Caleb, lo nuchal la’alot meaning we are not able to go up. Yet in Caleb’s phrase there is no infinitive to modify the verb. To make thing more curious, is the use of the infinitive absolute, which strengthens the verb. Infinitive absolutes have the meaning of surely, or without a doubt. So this is a long chain of adverbial expressions meaning “can.” And while earlier in the verse Caleb mentions to ascend into the land, here it is missing. Caleb does not mean just that they can go into the land, but that they can do anything. More than that, he’s completely certain of it, expecting a good outcome.
Caleb was not the only one who thought that, Joshua did too.

6. And Joshua the son of Nun, and Caleb the son of Jephunneh, which were of those who spied the land, tore their clothes; 7. And they spoke to all the company of the people of Israel, saying, The land, which we passed through to spy, is an exceedingly good land. 8. If the Lord delights in us, then he will bring us into this land, and give it to us; a land which flows with milk and honey. [Numbers 14:6-8]

Not only did these two men have confidence in their abilities, they also expected only one outcome if they kept their faith in God. Unfortunately, no one else did, and they began to pelt these two with stones. God then intercedes and plans to destroy the people. In a way he does so slowly: they are condemned to wander the desert for forty years, enough time for the entire generation to die off.
At a bat mitzvah last weekend, I re-iterated the theme I am giving this go-around in the reading of B’midbar. The question was asked in discussion: why is God so vengeful, killing so many people? Maybe one answer to that is that we should not look at this as individuals but the Israelites as a collective, the characters within different parts of a collective soul. The story of B’midbar is a story of those voices in our heads that keep us from our promised lands. They are the resistance in our lives. Our higher self in this scenario is what the text calls God. God is not killing people but instead removing the resistance in reaching the Promised Land. Remember, after the report of the spies the people said Let us choose a chief, and let us return to Egypt. [Numbers 14:4] Their point over and over again is to go back to the way things were, even if they were horrible. Such thoughts must be eliminated, and that is what is happening in the story of the wilderness.
I thought about that when my 3-year old nephew was moving around some small kid-size beach chairs lately. He wanted to stack them on top of one another, and as often is the case, instead of stacking them, he began to whine two words: “I can’t.” over and over again. Being three years old he had a valid point, but how often do we keep that three year old whine within us, even when we are 40? In Hebrew, the spies whine of lo nuchal, “we can’t” dooms them, just as Caleb’s yachol nuchal, we surely can allows him and Joshua to enter the Promised Land. The greatest monster of all, the killer of 600,000 people is two simple words “I can’t.”
When I was thirteen, I said those words many times. I was painfully shy. “I can’t go up to the grocery counter and buy something” “I can’t ask someone for something” “I can’t go up in front of others and talk.” The boy in the powder blue three-piece suit and messy hair would rather not have a bar mitzvah speech than speak in front of maybe twenty five or thirty other people as his very small bar mitzvah. Since he was so shy he had no friends, indeed he was so shy it was easy for others to hurt him for fun and throw him to the bottom of pre-teen social pecking orders, and so he hid. He became the completely isolated 14 year old computer geek I talked of last week. In other circumstances, maybe the isolation would have spiraled down to my own complete destruction. There were two stubborn dogs who wouldn’t allow that, who kept telling me I could accomplish great things if I only put my mind to it. My own internal Caleb and Joshua are always at it.
They were at it last Friday morning too. Once again this is posting late, indeed I’m writing this first somewhere over Kansas Friday morning, and then in a Tucson Starbuck’s. I have for the last three years been presenting at my national professional society. This year I’m not presenting once, but presenting three times, and moderating several more. For someone who couldn’t bear to be in front of four congregants and some family, to get up in front of hundreds is quite ironic, and I have to give my Caleb and Joshua a pat on the back for getting me here. But there was a moment this morning in the airport where I felt afraid. And like some junkyard dog (Caleb means dog in Hebrew by the way) Caleb was there beating the fear down. He was jumping on it and tearing it to shreds with the teeth of a rabid animal. The fear disappeared. I was ready for this trip even if I’m not as prepared as I’d like. Caleb is sure that I walk in to the sessions I’m presenting, including the one on public speaking, knowing the consequences can only be good.
I once said “I can’t” to being any good at art. A lot of people have. But most kids don’t flunk art in elementary school, or even ridiculed by the teacher for his work. Besides the usual “I can’t,” I also have some slight disabilities, including color blindness which makes art harder for me. But it did not stop me, as I was reminded by an art teacher of mine who thought I should go for my MFA. I’m still learning art, but I know I can do art, even when the results are not what I exactly wanted.
Once you say “I can’t,” It’s hard to take it back. We see this with the Israelites, who being told they are to die in the wilderness over forty years go ahead and try to ascend anyway.
44. But they presumed to go up to the hill top; nevertheless the ark of the covenant of the Lord, and Moses, departed not from the camp. 45. Then the Amalekites came down, and the Canaanites who lived in that hill, and defeated them, and pursued them, even to Hormah. [Numbers 14:44]
Amalekites are the notorious cowards of the Bible. They only attack anyone who cannot fight back. This is an indicator of the kind of people who tried to ascend. Once the people said “I can’t” they never really believed they could. They were the weak that the Amalekites picked off easily. Their weakness was in God not being with them – they still did not believe they could ascend to the land, so they fought half-heartedly. Whether it is loving God or perusing your goal of your personal promised land, there is only one way to do so: with all your heart, soul and might. When they do not do this, they set themselves up for a failure.
With all the successes I’ve had, there are also failures, and most of them come down to this lingering “I can’t.” Much of the resistance in keeping on a diet is this lingering “I can’t.” The cravings are bred from a self image that we can’t be successful with maintaining weight. For me, I cannot get it into my head that I could actually date, there are always doubts that I could find a partner. The shy kid I once was is still lingering there; my old identity from my teen years of the lowest on the social order still restrains me from being as sure of myself in dating as I am while speaking to hundreds. Even my inner Caleb fails to control these nagging thoughts. Some destroy themselves, but some are more insidious. They create rebellions inside.
Next portion we’ll see that rebellion come to a head by a very bald head.

Parshat B’haalotecha 5768: Resistance

Last week the theme was change, but what happens when you do change?

If you read much of the self-help literature out there high self esteem and a commitment to change should magically change your life. If all you need is to have high self esteem and be committed to your goals, then you too can be rich, successful and keep to a healthy diet. This week in the Torah, we run into several situations which point to why most people’s experiences are very different than this. They are the stories which point to resistance to change. Probably the incident most known from this portion shows us one kind of resistance.

1. And Miriam and Aaron spoke against Moses because of the Kushite woman whom he had married; for he had married a Kushite woman. 2. And they said, Has the Lord indeed spoken only by Moses? Has he not spoken also by us? And the Lord heard it. [Numbers 12]

Miriam’s slander and leprosy is as an issue of Moses ignoring his wife by the Sages. Yet most don’t understand the reason for Moses to stay away from his wife. According to the Talmud, this was one of “Three things that Moses did of his own understanding, and the Holy One, blessed be He, gave His approval”. [Shabbat 87a] Moses made up mitzvot without God’s permission, yet God approved. Many are familiar with the story of the revelation at Sinai, when all the people heard God. There is some preparation before hand:

15. And he said to the people, Be ready by the third day; do not come near a woman. 16. And it came to pass on the third day in the morning, that there were thunders and lightnings, and a thick cloud upon the mount, and the sound of a shofar exceedingly loud; so that all the people who were in the camp trembled. [Exodus 19:15-16]

After Sinai, Moses reasoned that he might have to speak to God in this manner at any time. God notes in rebuking Aaron and Miriam that Moses kept the level of prophecy he had at Sinai:

6. And he said, Hear now my words; If there is a prophet among you, I the Lord will make myself known to him in a vision, and will speak to him in a dream. 7. Not so with my servant Moses, for he is the trusted one in all my house. 8. With him I speak mouth to mouth, manifestly, and not in dark speech; and he behold the form of the Lord. Why then were you not afraid to speak against my servant Moses? [Numbers 12:6-8]

After Sinai, only Moses is granted the direct revelation that everyone experienced that day. Miriam and Aaron are not granted this. Moses thought he had to maintain the level of preparation all the people did before the Revelation at Sinai at all times. In order to do so he continually avoided his wife. [Shabbat 87a] His avoidance did not sit well with Miriam and Aaron, who believed that the marital obligations of Moses towards his wife were critical, and thus their words against him.

Moses changed on Sinai, and became a unique person who had a unique mission. The expectations of the normal Israelite did not apply to him, but the expectations of family who knew him before Sinai was the same. Miriam didn’t understand the difference in Moses, and so expecting him to be the same Moses she knew since his birth, criticized her little brother. One immense source of resistance to personal change comes from our family, friends, and those we are closely associated with. With change in ourselves there is a required change in those around us, who may not want that change. They might be comfortable with the way things are, or are afraid of how that change might change them. But most times, one does not even see the change in the person changing and continues to treat that person just like they always did. Miriam still sees her little brother, not the only man in history who talks to God face to face, or the only man until the destruction of the temple to author halakah. When Moses doesn’t act like her little brother, she gets upset.

All we hear is about Moses in response to Miriam’s criticisms “Now the man Moses was very humble, more than any other men which were upon the face of the earth.” [Numbers 12:3] We do not hear a response, because he didn’t know what to say. He loves his siblings but doesn’t want to hurt them, and anything he could say would do so, and indeed break into argument. Like many people in this situation, he may fear he will lose support from his family in what he is trying to do. Moses, however, has the intercession of God. Generally that doesn’t happen, and instead we are in a bad spot, unable to respond to the criticism of our changing for the better, because it seemingly makes things worse for those close to us, and subsequently for us. We can hope for understanding, but that may not be there. The only response for many, so as to not to have an ugly situation with those they love is to buckle under, and not change. The risk of losing what one already has outweighs the reward if one does change. Such people never make it to their personal promised land so they don’t hurt those who don’t want them to undertake the journey, and so those people do not abandon them. Yet, the best we can do is getting them away from us, just as Miriam spends time away from Moses with her bout of Leprosy.

Such is external resistance, often slowing things down. Yet there is another resistance that can be truly fatal to one’s personal journey across the wilderness. That is the internal resistance to change. We read about such resistance in the cravings of the people for something other than their diet of manna.

4. And the mixed multitude that was among them had a strong craving; and the people of Israel also wept again, and said, Who shall give us meat to eat? 5. We remember the fish, which we ate in Egypt for nothing; the cucumbers, and the melons, and the leeks, and the onions, and the garlic; 6. But now our soul is dried away; there is nothing at all, beside this manna, before our eyes. [Numbers 11:4-6]

As the Torah points out, they shouldn’t be complaining

7. Now the manna was as coriander seed, and its color as the color of bdellium. 8. And the people went about, and gathered it, and ground it in mills, or beat it in a mortar, and baked it in pans, and made cakes of it; and the taste of it was like the taste of fresh oil. 9. And when the dew fell upon the camp in the night, the manna fell upon it. [Numbers 11:7-9]

Manna was the food granted the last time the people complained about not having anything to eat after crossing the Red Sea. This time as well, these people's request is granted but at a high cost:

31. And there went forth a wind from the Lord, and brought quails from the sea, and let them fall by the camp, about a day’s journey on this side, and about a day’s journey on the other side, around the camp, and as it were two cubits high upon the face of the earth. 32. And the people stood up all that day, and all that night, and all the next day, and they gathered the quails; he who least gathered gathered ten homers; and they spread them all abroad for themselves around the camp. 33. And while the meat was yet between their teeth, before it was chewed, the anger of the Lord was kindled against the people, and the Lord struck the people with a very great plague. 34. And he called the name of that place Kibroth-Hattaavah; because there they buried the people who had the craving. [Numbers 11:31-33]

To give into your internal resistance is death to the whole venture. Of all the things to use as a way of describing internal resistance, nothing is better than food. This week, when I got on the scale for the first time in a month, I read a number I was not pleased with: 206. That same scale read 194 last year at this time, and 191 the year before. What happened? The answer is simple. I gave into cravings. Be it a hot fudge brownie sundae, sweet potato chips, or virtually anything I’d eat at McDonald’s, what I eat got the best of me. Resistance to my healthy diet is everywhere.

Cravings will do it to you almost any time. Playing with my e-mail while I’m supposed to be doing something else is another craving that gets me. All of it is resistance to what really matters. But unlike the external resistance of others this is more insidious – it is the yetzer ha-ra, our evil inclination. As the rabbis note when it entices, it is as frail as a spider web, but with time it becomes as strong as cart ropes [Sukkah 52a]. One ice cream sundae two years ago leads to me continually breaking my diet. “This is the last one” is a common reply from the Yetzer Ha-ra when we see something we crave.

Craving does something else too. Cravings increase the value of what we are craving beyond its real value. Note how slaves who probably never got such foods wax nostalgically about the abundant foods of Egypt. One would think by their description, slaves ate like they were at the midnight buffet of a cruise ship all the time, never having to pay the bill. Of course this was illusion. What was truly incredible food stuff, manna, was ignored for this illusion. When we have resistance, we do the same things. With a diet, it’s how delicious that candy bar will be. Yet after eating it, I’m not satisfied. Just one square of that chocolate bar won’t show up on my diet, but how often does eating one square become eating the whole bar, or two or three bars, because there was no satisfaction in just the one square?

Like Miriam remembering a pre-Sinai Moses, the resistance is anchored in the past, to what we once had “We remember the fish, which we ate in Egypt for nothing.” The people cry, “Now our soul is dried away; there is nothing at all” Keeping the present the same as the past is what resistance is all about. What is ahead is bad, according to the yetzer ha-ra, what you already have is good and comfortable, don’t go about changing it. For example my yetzer ha-ra continually comments “I’m familiar and comfortable with being alone and independent, why would I want to mess that up with a relationship?” “Loneliness I might compliant about but can handle. I can’t handle break-ups, betrayals or having someone else running my life” It continues inside of me, stressing the bad parts of growing. Like the manna, It ignores or even denigrates the good. It does not think of the bitterness, and tight places of my personal Egypt, my personal slavery.

The most important lesson of all from the Story in Numbers 11 is that the people who gave into their cravings die instantly. This is not a salmonella outbreak taking a few days to kill – they choke on their food because they give into their cravings so much they do not even chew it, nor look at what they are eating, and thus it kills them. We may not die instantly but our lives can be as one who is dead from giving into resistance, both internal and external. Giving into my own resistance will leave me for dead. I would be a fourteen year old computer geek who truly had no life, isolated from everything and everyone but his Apple II, as obsolete and meaningless as that antique computer. I would be that until the day of my physical death from clogged arteries or some such diet related condition. There is only one way towards life, and that is to change and improve. We cannot go back into slavery nor can we stay still in the wilderness. We can only move forward. We must fight the internal and the external resistance, though it is far from easy. It already has a strong grip on us. But to survive and get to our promised lands, it is a battle we must win.

There is one more type of resistance to take into account. It is the most insidious and the most dangerous. In the story of B’midbar, the wilderness, it kills all 600,000 Israelites but two. It fuels all other resistance, and mutates into even more dangerous forms. In next week’s portion we’ll talk about this danger of all dangers.

Naso 5768: Lifting the Head.

This week we have the census continued from last week, then laws seemingly regarding the detection of adultery. We then learn of the oath of the Nazir, and the physical and dietary requirements such a person must endure. We end with sacrifices in the Mishkan and the Kohanic blessing:

24. May the Lord bless you, and keep you;
25. May the Lord make his face shine upon you, and be gracious to you;
26. May the Lord lift up his countenance upon you, and give you peace. [Numbers 6:24-26]

We begin with:

22. Take also a census of the sons of Gershon, throughout the houses of their fathers, by their families; [Numbers 4:22]

The word for census in Hebrew gives our portion its name. Naso in Hebrew means to lift or carry. The phrase used to mean takes a census is naso et rosh, Literally lift the head of. There is more to this head count than meets the eye. The rabbis noticed this phrase naso et rosh, occurring both at the beginning of our portion (4:22) and a few verses before in 4:2 was different that the rest of the counts in the book of Numbers:

LIFT UP THE HEAD OFS THE SONS OF KOHATH (IV, 2). It does not say Number (pekod) but LIFT UP THE HEAD OF, an expression denoting ‘elevation’. When they were numbered for the purpose of being put in charge of the work of the Sanctuary they received thereby Promotion [Numbers Rabbah IV:12]

To lift the head up is to promote according to this midrash. While the rabbis are discussing why the Levite clans of Kohath and Gershon are promoted and no one else is, I find deeper meaning than that. When walking on any street in any town note how many people look down. Most people do and for good reason. One might need to watch their step from uneven surfaces, cracks or holes in the sidewalk, and anything left by dog owners who were out walking their pet, or to be more specific, anything the pet left. Yet looking down also indicates something else: submission and obedience.

When one looks down it means that the person looking down has less value than other people. All too often this is the end result of a simple nonverbal gesture, an affirmation of one’s own inferiority by looking down too much. In contrast to this, one needs only to look up. To look up, indeed to look into someone’s eye is paradoxically a source of incredible power and an incredible signal of equality. Such a paradox is resolved in that a person who has power over themselves does not need to play the game of who has more power. Such a person wants to be on a strong, equal connection with another person.

In such a context, the Kohanic blessing has incredible meaning. In two different expressions, God faces us as equals. Interestingly, the ancient sage Shammai said something similar to the second blessing that God should shine upon you. Shammai believed we should receive everyone with a bright beautiful face [M. Avot 1:15]. I’ve always thought that meant a smile. One might go as interpreting the anthropomorphism that “God shines his face on you” means God smiles. The Kohanic blessing does not just bless us as equals but does so with a smile.

If God is in the heavens, then God cannot lift his head. Instead God “lifting his face” towards us to greets us as a neighbor and an equal. One interpretation in the Midrash notes this:

Another exposition is that THE LORD LIFT UP HIS COUNTENANCE, etc., means that He will turn His face towards you; for it is not the same thing for a man to greet his neighbor while looking him in the face as to greet him with his head turned to one side;[Numbers R. XI:7]

When a man and his neighbor both lift their heads towards each other there is connection: so too with a person and with God, or with Israel and with God. But such a connection requires habit and requires discipline. Much of this portion deals with the issue of commitment. Towards the end of the portion we have the sacrifices given by each of the tribes. But in the middle we have two curious customs.

The first is the bitter waters rite. In the case where a woman is accused of adultery with no evidence, essentially she is to drink a combination of dirt from the floor of the Mishkan, water and ink. If her belly and thighs swell she is guilty of adultery, if not, she is innocent. The second is the case of the Nazir, someone who dedicates themselves to God for a period of time. Such a person, as part of such an arrangement, must not drink or eat anything made from grapes, cut their hair, nor go anywhere near a dead person. If they go near a dead person accidentally they must wash, cut all their hair and start all over. In the Talmud, Nazir, the tractate about the Nazir is followed by Sotah, the tractate concerning the bitter waters rite. The rabbis start the discussion in Tractate Nazir, with the concept that these two are part of a string of tractates related to commitment, starting with Ketubim and ending with Sotah [Sotah 2a].

The bitter waters rite seems to be rather sexist, only concerned with the adultery of a woman, but I don’t read this literally. In prophetic literature and in the writings, Israel is the woman of the relationship. Such imagery even occurs in Deuteronomy

And the Lord said to Moses, Behold, you shall sleep with your fathers; and this people will rise, and play the harlot after the gods of the strangers of the land, where they go to be among them, and will forsake me, and break my covenant which I have made with them.[Deut 31:16]

When Israel breaks the covenant, she is called a harlot and adulteress. How the faithful city has become a harlot! cries Isaiah concerning Jerusalem [1:21]. The bitter waters is exile as Isaiah describes strong drink shall be bitter to those who drink it [Is 24:9]. Israel must commit to God, and no one else. To stray from that commitment is to partake of the bitter waters rite, not something fatal, but something potentially embarrassing and uncomfortable. Such is true of exile as well. It does not kill Israel, but it does embarrass and brings discomfort to the connection.

While Parshat Naso does not read like story, I think it is an important part of story. Before the journey to the Promised Land begins there is a need to do two things. The first is to look up and forward to be in connection with God and with the goal; the second is to commit to the journey, even if it is uncomfortable or requires sacrifice or discipline. The Israelites need to do the sacrifices in this chapter, and commit to the goal. For one to remove all grape products from their diet and not cut their hair is a commitment. Neither might follow the social norm and the Nazir might suffer for it in daily life, but to do so is to commit to something bigger.

On our personal journey towards our personal promised lands, our first two steps are to raise our heads high and to commit to the journey. Neither is easy. Commitment requires a day-in and day out consistency. It is not something one does sometimes, or does recreationally. Not eating or drinking any grape product nor cutting one’s hair are examples. Daily sacrifices which morphed into daily prayer is another. Lois Jacobs once defined mitzvot into three types: those which we understand because of their practicality, those we don’t and those that are abhorrent. The class of those we don’t understand are functionally signs of commitment.

Yet for commitment to work to its fullest we must do something else first. We must raise our heads, and promote ourselves. If we do not believe we can do the commitment or if we believe we will fail, then we will fail. In two weeks, in Parshat Shelach Lecha, we’ll see this thinking in action. We must move beyond the submission of the slave with his head facing down, to the place of the free, proud to hold our heads high. This might be the greatest challenge of the journey. It’s too easy to fall into old patterns of submission. God does not want a timid, submissive concubine, but a confident, committed wife. In order to be fully human and holy beings, we too need to be both confident committed people.

Many have noted the Irony of Shammai’s statement in the Perkei Avot I quoted earlier. In full it reads:

Shammai used to say: Make your [study of the] Torah [a matter of] established [regularity] speak little, but do much; and receive all men with a beautiful shining face. [Avot I: 15]

Many know the story of Shammai and his rival Hillel. When a series of strangers asks stupid questions of Shammai, he chases away each of the three questioners with a yardstick, seemingly breaking his own statement. Hillel, on the other hand, answered the questions at the questioner’s level. Two of Hillel’s statements in the Perkei Avot are also significant:

Hillel used to say: be one of the disciples of Aaron, loving peace and pursuing peace, one who loves [one's fellow] creatures and brings them close to the Torah. [I: 12]

Brachot 34b in the name of Abbahu Comments on Isaiah 57:19 Peace, peace for him who is far off and for him who is near, says the Lord; and I will heal him. Abbahu believes those far off are those who are the biggest transgressors. To bring them close to Torah is holier than to bring one already there. This is the difference between Hillel and Shammai. While Shammai greeted friendly, he lost his patience with those who were far from Torah. Hillel on the other hand did not just have patience, but that such patience would bring close those who would otherwise not get close. He lifted the heads of those who didn’t even know they needed lifting.

Hillel also had one other well quoted statement as well.

He [also] used to say:
If I am not for myself, who is for me?
But if I am only for my own self, what am I?
If not now, when? [I: 14]

The phrase “self-esteem” is bandied around a lot today. Hillel would not have liked it, he probably would have preferred the term Value. It’s not that you need to increase your value alone, to raise your own head, but that you also increase the value of everyone around you. Shammai did not have the patience to increase those of low value. Hillel questioned what kind of person he was if he did not bring those who were far to be close, if he did not help others increase their value. Indeed, his own value increases even more by increasing the value of others.

This is something that cannot be procrastinated according to Hillel. It must be done, and it must be done now. In a sense it too is a commitment, one feeding all the other commitments. It is therefore interesting that the heads of the Kohahtites are lifted up first in the census. Among the Kohahtites are Aaron and his sons, who will give the priestly benediction to the people. In order to raise the heads of other people, God orders Moses to raise the heads of the Kohanim first who then learn a blessing to raise everyone else’s head by wishing them that God will raise his face towards them with a smile.

After my downer of column last week, I thought a lot about Hillel’s line “if not now, when?” Over Shabbat I thought a lot about them, and came to a few decisions, ones I had begun to hint at in my last column. My head has been looking down for months. As one colleague noted this is probably a function of my finishing Grad school. Another is that the Perkei Avot honors scholars, the world of 21^st century America doesn’t. Since January, society has effectively told me “over my dead body will you be a Jewish scholar.” I realized over Shabbat to believe such a thing was to lower my head. So I made a conscious decision to raise my head instead. During the week I made a conscious effort to pick up the heads of as many people as I could, and the results were astounding. When one gives value, it almost always comes back with interest. It was poignant moment this week when one morning when I was getting ready for the day, Jack Gabriel’s version of the Kohanic blessing came over my iPod. I cried listening to the words of this blessing to the tune of the Beatles Let it Be, knowing how true that blessing is not just for God but for the Image of God, Humanity.

So let’s lift our heads and let it be. Cayn Yehi Ratzon.

Parshat Balak 5767: The Peor Outbreak

Numbers 22:2-25:9

In this portion, King Balak of Moab watches all of his neighbors go down to defeat militarily at the hands of the Israelites. He sends envoys to the greatest magician in the area, Balaam, to curse the advancing Israelites. After a series of adventures, Balaam meets up with Balak, and sets up the curse. Three times in a row, the curse ends up as a blessing, the most famous now known as the prayer “ma tovu” and Balak is furious. But Balaam comes up with a plan for biological warfare. At the very end of this section, we read:

Israel stayed in Shittim, and the people began to commit harlotry with the daughters of Moab. They called the people to the sacrifices of their gods; so the people ate, and bowed down to their gods. Then Israel attached himself to Baal-Peor; and the anger of the Lord was kindled against Israel. [Numbers 25:1-3]

A plague ensues, killing 24,000 people, more than any other plague. The plague ends in a bizarre manner:

And, behold, one of the people of Israel came and brought to his brothers a Midianite woman in the sight of Moses, and in the sight of all the congregation of the people of Israel, who were weeping before the door of the Tent of Meeting. When Pinhas, the son of Eleazar, the son of Aaron the priest, saw it, he rose up from among the congregation, and took a javelin in his hand;

He went after the man of Israel into the tent, and thrust both of them through, the man of Israel, and the woman through her belly. So the plague ceased from the people of Israel. [Numbers 25-6:8]

I’m obsessed about this plague. Actually I’m intrigued by what the rabbis did with it. There are two clues in the text that explain how they come to their conclusions. The first is the name of the pagan god, Baal Peor. Baal in Hebrew means master or lord, and the common beginning of a number of such pagan god-names. So in Hebrew for example Zebuv means flies. Thus the Baal Zebuv (Beelzebub in Greek) of II Kings 1 can be translated the lord of the flies. Breaking the word Peor into syllables we have Peh meaning opening and Ohr meaning skin. Thus Baal Peor is lord of the skin orifices.

The second is a phrase in the text the people ate, and bowed down to their gods [Numbers 25:3] The Rabbis believed that there was significance to this sequence, best explained in the following story:

Rab Judah said in Rab's name: A gentile woman once fell sick. She vowed, “If I recover, I will go and serve every idol in the world.” She recovered, and proceeded to serve all idols. On reaching Peor, she asked its priests, “How is this worshipped?” They replied, “People eat beets, drink strong drink, and then uncover themselves before it. She replied, I would rather fall sick again than serve an idol in such a manner.” [Sanh. 64a]

As an Environmental Health professional I see this as an outbreak from fecal sources. When one eats and sacrifices in a room full of sewage bad things are going to happen.

Last week I began a speech at my professional association’s conference with the Peor incident. In Hebrew there is no word for enforcement, the modern word actually is a word for oppression. The point of my speech was good EH people modify the behavior of others instead of enforcing behavior. Health inspectors need to be more story tellers and less cops.

While attending sessions at the National Environmental Health Association (NEHA) Education Conference and talking to many people between sessions, I kept getting a sinking feeling. Environmental Health Professionals, what some people call health inspectors or sanitarians get a bum rap. We either get ignored or blamed for not doing the right thing. Yet we are rarely given the resources to do our job properly in the first place. From government regulators to industry auditors, the story was the same. Environmental heath is the under funded orphan of public health.

We are often confused with environmental protection. Environmental protection might be described as protecting the planet from environmental contaminants. On the other hand environmental heath is protecting people from biological and chemical contaminants in the environment.

Environmental Health is a prevention, investigation and education activity, and thus its benefit is difficult to see. If done well, nothing happens. It thus becomes the last thing to be funded either in industry or in government.

Yet this is not the frame of mind in Biblical thinking. Prevention, from the fence on the roof to the fence around Torah is deeply rooted in biblical tradition. One example given not long after the Baal Peor incident is this one:

You shall have a place also outside the camp, where you shall go out to it; You shall have a spade among your weapons; and it shall be when you will ease yourself outside, you shall dig with it, and shall turn back and cover your excrement;[Deut 23:13-14]

It is a matter of environmental heath to keep fecal matter away from public areas and to dispose of it properly. It’s a commandment to dispose of sewage properly.

The lead character in the biblical environmental health story is the Priest, which throughout both Leviticus and Numbers we hear of the number of health related issues the priest was responsible for. Yet the priest who was responsible was not the High Priest, but the vice priest. The High Priest, in order to do his sacrificial duties, could not be involved with public health. Too many situations required quarantine and decontamination procedures which would make him unfit for performing sacrifice. Instead it was the second in command who did these things.

The man who stops the plague of Baal Peor is none other than the vice priest, Pinhas. He stops it by killing just one Israelite having sex with a Midianite in the Mishkan. In doing so he changes the minds of everyone who was seduced into Baal Peor worship. The seduction had reached the point of addiction according to the rabbis. By changing people attitudes he saves everyone. In my mind Pinhas is the first Environmental Health official, the first good Sanitarian.

While I don’t condone throwing javelins through health regulation offenders, Pinhas begins a model which we find throughout the tradition. Balaam in this section is involved with magic and in many places in the Torah we find prohibitions against magic. Yet, there is one kind that the Talmud condones: Magic that keeps people healthy. Such practices can be curative, but even more important is preventative magic. Pinchas in killing one person broke Balaam’s spell of seduction. Exposure to the pathogens hovering around Baal Peor’s temple stopped, and contamination waned. It was miraculous, but it also was good science through prevention and behavioral science. Following the ideal of building a fence around Torah, the Rabbis did the same thing for human beings, noting preventative practices. Describing many of the microorganisms of today as demons they instituted many policies that still stand the test of time. For example, they advised against spending time in swamps or sewers, advocated washing hands before eating, and prohibited eating food which has sat out too long or under a bed.

When I wonder about environmental health I go back to the ancient sources, and see that it has always been there. It may have been demons instead of microorganisms back then, but the world still had EH in some form or another. We in EH have been protecting the population since the Exodus from Egypt, and I truly hope we will do so till the end of time.

Parshat Korach 5767: Too Rational to Live

Numbers 16:1-18:32

This week we have the story of the Korach rebellion and its aftermath. Korach, Dathan and Abiram, along with 250 of the leading figures in the community rebel against Moses and Aaron, and want to be included as priests.

3. And they gathered themselves together against Moses and against Aaron, and said to them, You take too much upon you, seeing all the congregation are holy, every one of them, and the Lord is among them. Why then do you lift up yourselves above the congregation of the Lord? 4. And when Moses heard it, he fell upon his face; [Numbers 16:1-4]

Moses tries to dissuade them, but is unsuccessful. In a contest the next morning, the rebels light incense in their censers, to determine who is chosen by God. Korach, Dathan and Abiram are swallowed up by the earth, literally going straight to hell, and the 250 men are burned alive by a fire from God.

Something bothers me about this story. Korach is too rational to live.

Korach is making a good rational argument. Before the revelation on Mount Sinai, God told Moses to tell the people you shall be to me a kingdom of priests, and a holy nation [Exodus 19:6]. God also states I will dwell among the children of Israel, and will be their God [Exodus 29:45]. If this is true, argues Korach, then they should all have the duties of the priesthood, not an elite. Nice rational argument, yet it leads to the death of the conspirators. Korach was too rational, and did not see the irrational, which was just as important.

For a little over a year I’ve been on a strange journey which has taken me to some rather unexpected places. It started with a sex scandal involving someone I knew. At the time I wondered how such a thing could happen.

I’ve done a lot of research since then. I’ve studied seduction, pick up artists, and social psychology. I learned a few magic tricks. I’ve read dozens of marketing books and books on influencing people’s decisions. While they all have their own themes and ideas there’s one thing that I find true of all of these books and workshops I’ve experienced in the last year. Man is not completely rational. Ironically, one of the most irrational things humans do is believe they are rational. Pick up artists, con men, salesmen and politicians all exploit this. I’ve learned the more we think ourselves rational the more submissive to mind control we become.

There is more to life than rational. But it would be a mistake to believe that we are totally irrational either. Completely emotional, experiential situations can be just as dangerous. Reading case studies about the mass suicide of members of the People’s Temple in Guyana or cult indoctrination strategies, I realize how far people will go to irrationally follow the lead of another.

In one story that has become one of my favorites in the Talmud, the two sides of this in Jewish thought become clear.

R. Abbahu and R. Hiyya b. Abba once came to a place; R. Abbahu expounded Aggada and R. Hiyya b. Abba expounded legal lore. All the people left R. Hiyya b. Abba and went to hear R. Abbahu, so that the former was upset. [R. Abbahu] said to him: ‘I will give you a parable. To what is the matter like? To two men, one of whom was selling precious stones and the other various kinds of small ware. To whom will the people hurry? Is it not to the seller of various kinds of small ware?’ [Sotah 40a]

In Jewish thought we have two ways of thinking. One is Agada, the story. The other is law, Halacha. R. Abbahu compares these to ceramic jars and diamonds. Abraham Joshua Heschel in God in Search of Man describes them differently:

Halacha represents the strength to shape one's life according to a fixed pattern; it is a form-giving force. Agada is the expression of man's ceaseless striving which often defies all limitations. Halacha is the rationalization and schematization of living; it defines, speci­fies, sets measure and limit, placing life into an exact system. Agada deals with man's ineffable relations to God, to other men, and to the world. Halacha deals with details, with each commandment separately; agada with the whole of life, with the totality of re­ligious life. Halacha deals with the law; agada with the meaning of the law. Halacha deals with subjects that can be expressed literally; agada introduces us to a realm which lies beyond the range of ex­pression. Halacha teaches us how to perform common acts; agada tells us how to participate in the eternal drama. Halacha gives us knowledge; agada gives us aspiration. (336)

Yet neither is sufficient by itself. “Halacha without agada is dead, agada without halacha is wild.” Heschel writes. They are not mutually exclusive, but instead a polarity. Neither dominates and within one is the seed of the other. It is a blending and balance of the two which is optimal.

Everything has it place. Rationality may let us look at an issue with diamond clarity. But rationality does not allow us to be in awe of the world around us, to ask new questions, only derive answers from old answers. It is not rational to say WOW! Proverbs 9:10 describes the polarity: The Awe of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom; and the knowledge of holy matters is understanding. Understanding may be rational knowledge, but wisdom comes from the irrational, from what Heschel calls it radical amazement: being able to say WOW!

Neither Korach nor any of his party could say WOW! When exposed to the ultimate WOW! Korach and the rest could not withstand such an event, and died. Trying to define and categorize that which cannot be defined leads to confusion. It is something quantifiable logic cannot handle. To those who try to quantify, they fail, and might even lose their mind and life.

There were three survivors of the Korach rebellion however. They do the opposite of Korach: They get irrational. In Numbers 26:11 we will read but the Sons of Korach did not die. They were musicians. Their lyrics we still have preserved in the book of Psalms.

As the deer longs for water streams,
So does my soul long for you, O God.

My soul thirsts for God, for the living God;
When shall I come and appear before God?

My tears have been my bread day and night,
While they continually say to me, Where is your God?

When I remember these things, I pour out my soul;
How I went with the multitude,
leading them in procession to the house of God,
With the voice of joy and praise,
A crowd keeping the festival.

Why are you cast down, O my soul?
Why are you disquieted within me?
Hope in God;
For I shall again praise him
for the help of his countenance. [Ps 42:2-6]

This is not rational thinking but emotional longing, it is not logical and objective but personal and subjective. Most of the songs of Korach’s sons are in a similar vein, often about the longing of the soul to cleave to God. Yet they also wrote

My mouth shall speak of wisdom;
And the meditation of my heart shall be understanding.

I will incline my ear to a parable;
I will open my riddle to the lyre. [49:4-5]

They understood the polarity, that wisdom and understanding are related to story and song. We move seamlessly from one to the other. There is knowledge and law, there is story and ethics. Both are necessary, both are needed by the other. We live interdependent lives, a tapestry of all things. Our lives are full when we remember that. When we forget this, as did Korach and his rebellion, we are headed for disaster.