Parashat Be'ha'a'lot'cha, Numbers 8:1-12:16

This week’s portion, Be’ha’a’lot’cha – literally, “when you raise” (here in the unusual use of “when you raise the candles against the Menorah”) – provides us with a rare opportunity.  Ever wondered what it is like to wonder the desert for forty years? Welcome to this portion of the week. From “when they went” to “what they ate” – it is all there. Accordingly, this week’s post would be a bit different: instead of commenting on two points appearing in the text, we’ll have a quick Q&A on life in the desert.  For the readers who are interested in a less-religious commentary, I also offer a one at the margin of each answer.

Life in the Desert: Frequently Asked Questions

Q: Did they actually travel every day?

A: Not always, but generally yes.  The big principle, of course was that: “According to God the People of Israel would go, and according to God they shall make camp.” (Numbers 9:18; and again, 9:23).  At times, the divine cloud rested over camp several days, and then they would remain in that place.  But generally speaking, that cloud resided over the Mishkan in the evening, and was lifted in the morning – signaling that it would be ok to travel during the day. In some cases, they Israelites travel at night time as well. At times they walked three days straight.

Non Religious Explanation: Life in the desert is tough.  Different terrain, changing weather, and continuing issues with this enormously large traveling group (over 600,000 grown up men) require flexibility in moving arrangement. A good pattern is to move every day, and to rest during the night, but that pattern has to yield to the changing circumstances.

Q: Was there a special order of traveling?

A: Yes. First in the group was the tribe of Judah, with their military commander (Nachshon – a name and title that, until today, signals (in Hebrew) “he who dares to stand in front” of the army, and to run into battle.) Then two other tribes, with their commanders. Then the Mishkan itself. Then the tribes of Re’uven, Shimon, and Gad. Then, separately from the Mishkan, the Kahaties – those in charge of actually erecting and dismantling the Mishkan each time the People made camp.  Then the other tribes. And then, at the very end – as sweep – the tribe of Dan and its commander.

NRE: Clearly, considerations of safety and utility are well utilized here. The notion that the strongest part of the army is in the front has been a leading strategy for the Israelis since those days and until today. The strategic placement of the Mishkan – at the top of the group, but not the very top, as well as the separation between the Mishkan and its workers, all guarantee a smooth operation and quick set-up and breakdown. Great work by Moshe here.

 Q: What did they eat?

A: Despite the widely-spread myth of “Manna from Heaven,” the Israelites complained at times about the narrow selection (nothing new here, either).  This week, their complaint is especially detailed (and visual, I may add): “[And the People] cried and said:  Who would provide us with meat? We all remember the sea-food that we have eaten in Egypt for free, and the squash, the water melons, the leek, the onions, and the garlic; and now our soles are dried – there is nothing but the Manna in our eyes.” (Numbers 11:5-6).  In response, occasionally, Moshe would provide some other culinary choices, such as meat. But that, in turn, would create some issue of its own – widespread food poisoning, etc. (See Numbers 11:33-34).  

NRE: Water and food supplies are easily the hardest part of this entire operation. The great thing about the Manna was its freshness – every day the people would only get enough for the next day (except for Shabbat, when they collected for the weekend in advance). Those who dared to collect more were severely punished – sometimes by God, sometimes by a severe food poisoning. Every deviation from this strict diet had its consequences, but Moshe had to balance between his needs and the People’s complaints – so he provided them meat (and other options) every now and again, only to prove them, once again, that Manna is really from Heaven.

Q: Was Moshe the only person in charge?

A: We know, from many portions ago (Yitro, Exodus 18:18), that Moshe could not handle his judicial power obligations all on his own, so his father-in-law provided him with a structured legal system based on himself as the sole Justice of the Supreme Court (see there for details). But today, we learn that his executive powers, too, were hard to handle with a group of that size and for that duration. After pleading with God (a wonderful one, btw – check out Numbers 11:12), Moshe receives assistance in the form of 70 elderly wise men, who help him in carrying the load. Later, this number would form the basis for the famous Sanhedrin, a joint legislative-executive body of the small Jewish community in Israel. (Note that despite his hardships in the Article II and III issues – executive and judiciary departments – Moshe leaves to God (and himself, by delegation) the sole authority on legislation.)

NRE: Clearly, the model of a single leader as the only legislator, executive, and judge is unattainable; but it is interesting to note that the request for help comes from Moshe himself – not from the people (who doesn’t seem to mind) or from God (who is apparently content with channeling all three branches to one person). Empirically speaking, it seems, the separation of powers is not only a wise poly-sci choice (just ask Motesquieu and then the Founding Fathers, who read him closely), but also a necessary fact of life.

Q: What about the Occasional Catastrophe?

A: This week’s portion alone tells us the story of three emergencies/mini-catastrophes: First, a fire consumes part of the camp’s edge (Num. 11:1-3). Second, as we have seen earlier, many people die due food poisoning, following the People’s demand for meat (Num. 11:33-34). And finally, a mysterious skin disease afflicts Miriam, Moshe’s sister, perhaps in response to a bizarre derogatory comment she made against Moshe’s black-skinned wife. (Num. 12:1, 10)  All that are issues Moshe had to contend with on a daily basis, with the help of God, of course.

NRE: I believe these incidents, who were reported and then included in the text forever, are only a tip of the iceberg of what Moshe had to deal with on a daily basis. With no medical facilities (or much knowledge, for that matter), no sanitation, harsh conditions, and a people who was never used to long-term camping, those occasional catastrophes were probably a part of the people’s daily routine.  The fact that Moshe successfully brought them all to the Land of Israel is a testament to his fantastic leadership skills – not only from the religious perspective, but also – and perhaps mainly – from the pragmatic, day-to-day leadership perspective. Not for naught does this portion concludes with the following compliment:  “And the person Moshe is very humble – more than any other person on earth.” Indeed, we had a very humble leader then. I wish we had more of those today.

Shabbat Shalom.

       

Parashat Nasso, Numbers 4:21-7:89

This week’s portion, Nasso – literally, an order to count (as in “go and count the people of Israel”) – is the longest of all portions of the week. Then again, it is also a great example of the rule that quantity does not necessarily yield quality. But enough about me.

The portion’s main issue – other than the continuing them of the census and its importance, with which we dealt last week – is infidelity.  More accurately, a married woman’s infidelity and its consequences. In looking at this issue I will venture, almost for the first time in this blog, to the very muddy waters (more in a second on this choice of words) of the Torah’s view of women. I am aware how dangerous this terrain may be, yet still I would like to offer my two cents. I begin with what – thankfully – has by now become a standard criticism of the text.  I then move to suggest a surprising possible justification of the ancient practice described in this week’s portion. I conclude with some general thoughts of the text and its relation to women.

The Water of Bitterness

The ceremony of the “the water of bitterness and curse” may be viewed as a typical (and unfavorable) biblical treatment of women. To begin with, the text does not even mention, let alone discuss, a situation in which the husband – not the wife – is suspected of cheating while the wife is “fraught with jealousy.” Not here. Instead, all we have is a situation where the woman is suspected of being disloyal to her husband, to “have gone astray and broken faith” with another man (nice, creative translation by JPS here) (Numbers 5:12).  What would a husband to do in this situation?

According to this week’s portion, the husband has to go to the priest.  To the religious authority (which, coincidently, comprises of all men – then and now, more than 2,000 years later). In a description reminiscent of the later “Salem witchcraft trials” and the famous “drowning test” –if the accused woman has drowned, she was innocent, but had she lived she was guilty of witchcraft – the text goes in great detail through what the poor suspected woman has to go through:

“And the priest made the woman stand before God, making her hair undone, and then he gave unto her hands [holy water (mixed with) the soil of the Tabernacle . . . this was] … the bitter, cursing water.  And the Priest swore that woman in, and told her: If no man has slept with you, and if you have not gone sinfully astray under you man, you shall be cleared by this water of bitterness and curse . . . [but if not,] your stomach would distend and your thighs will sag . . . and the woman would say: Amen and Amen.” (The full description, which is heavily edited here, may be found in Numbers 5:16-31).

Importantly, the text provides a nice alternative to the likely physical response the woman may have to the bitter water: if her stomach would not “distend,” then the suspected woman would be cleared of all suspicion, declared as “pure,” and even be “planted a seed” (become pregnant) (Numbers 5:28). [Loyal readers of this blog may look back at the discussion we had on the first verse of Parashat Tazri’a (Levit. 12:1), where, again, our sages has shown clear preference against naming a portion “A Woman”; there, too, the verse deals with the planted seed in the woman’ womb.]  

While the text provides no data, one may only venture to guess how many poor women could actually survive the test – which their husbands, again, had no need to take under similar circumstances – and be declared “pure.” To reiterate, this ritual is not dealing with the case of well-proved infidelity cases. Rather, we are dealing here with mere suspicions, rumors, and innuendoes; all we have in fact is “the wind of jealousy” by the husbands.

When I first read this text, I was appalled. To me, it represented everything that was wrong with the Torah’s treatment of women. It reminded me of my first class of Jewish Law in my final year at the Hebrew University Law School. By then, we were no longer viewing our professors with the same awe and revere that were the staple of our first year.  So when the Instructor opened the class by announcing that the Israeli Law of Equality of Women’s Rights – a mainly declaratory, though still important, act of legislation passed by Israeli Knesset very early in the life of the Jewish State – that this Act has “violated a delicate balance struck over thousands of years by Jewish sages with regards to women’s rights” I could no longer take this. “It is quite the opposite” – I told the instructor, shortly before leaving the class for good – “The State of Israel has corrected an imbalance that lasted through thousands of years with regards to the rights of Jewish women, due mostly to sages of Jewish thought who intentionally and creatively discriminated against women.”

That was how I felt when I read the text initially.  

Later Developments – in Halacha and Within Me

In part, it seems that my sense is disgust was somewhat jutified. During the Mishna period, the “Water of Bitterness” test was abolished. (3 Mishna, Sotah, Chapter 9 mishna 9).  The reason stated to this surprising state of affair may be more telling than the act of abolition itself: “Mi’she’rabu Ha’me’na’a’fim” – when cases of infidelities became too many, there was no longer need for the test.  In other words, the deterring effect of the test was lost in the “sea” of infidelity incidences. But a careful reading of the text shows an even more interesting feature: the Mishna does not say: “Mi’she’rabu Ha’me’na’a’fot” – when the women infidelity cases became too many; but rather “when the infidelity cases [by all!] became too many” then the test was abolished. Here we have an initial recognition – very implicit, very hesitant, almost secret – in the fact that perhaps the initial test was wrong, as it applied to women alone. Perhaps not only women should have been accused of such an act. Perhaps men, too, are fallible.

But not only have our sages changed their mind. I did, too. I came to view the test in a different light. I realized that – at the time, and within that context – women required a great degree of protection from their jealous husbands.  That, sometimes, these women were in a state of clear and present danger to their very lives, just by virtue of being suspected of committing adultery. (Hmm… Is that really so different from today?) And that by providing the test – horrible as it may seem to us today – the Jewish religion has stepped forward to end this situation and to protect those women (clearly in a manner less than satisfactory, but still).  To be more specific, the notion that a priest – the prime religious authority – may absolve a woman of that cloud, in a final manner and with the blessings of God, is a huge step towards the protection of women’s right. [Moreover, as I was poring some sugar into my baby son’s bitter medicine – he is seek this week – I was thinking that maybe some thoughtful Priests pored some sugar into those bitter waters back then, to make it easier on the women.]  Again, I don’t know if any of this is true. I don’t know how many women, if any, were absolved by this test. But the very option granted by our religion to clear a woman from any unfaithful suspicion – with the authority of God, no less – should, in my mind, be looked upon favorably, even if the actual means used to effectuate this thought were inhumane by today’s standards. At least for that thought, the Torah’s text should be absolved.

Shabbat Shalom,

Doron    

    

  

Parashat Ba'Midbar, Numbers 1:1 - 4:20

This week’s portion, Ba’midbar (literally, in the desert) opens the penultimate book of the series of five known as the Books of Moses (or, in Hebrew, Torat Moshe).  It begins with an accurate time stamp – God speaks to Moses on the first day of the second month of the second year from the day they left Egypt – one year and one month, to the day, after the exodus.

And what concerns God on that day? The exact number – or “Numbers” as the English version provides (this is the title of the Book in English) – of the People of Israel.  In other words, God orders a census. And that brings me to a point I began talking about last week – that very little had changed between then and now.

The Census – Then & Now

By now you probably have heard (perhaps more than you wanted) about “Census 2010” – the mandatory counting by the federal government of the People of the United States.  To me, this latest census is strikingly similar to the first census ever taken – the one we read about this week in our Portion. Allow me to demonstrate.

           

i.                    The Number – 600,000

The total number of the people (and by “people” the text means only men over the age of 20 – see Numbers 1:3) counted in the first census was exactly 603,550 (Numbers 2:32).  This number is strikingly similar to the approximated number used a year before, on the day of the exodus, “approximately (“Ke”) 600,000 men, notwithstanding children.” (Exodus 12:37).

While this number is not identical to the 300 million or so Americans living in the U.S. today (ok, ok – it does not even remotely resemble it), it certainly is identical to the number of people who conduct the census in America today; or, in the words of the Census’ Director (not God, the current one): “A Note to my 600,000 New Colleagues.” (available at http://blogs.census.gov/2010census/ ).

ii.                  The Method

Today, just like the first Census, the actual counting is achieved through districting – allocating the entire lot into smaller and smaller lots, and having count each of those smaller lots until – in the aggregate – we reach the final number (see Numbers chapter one for an extremely detailed description). This may sound quite trivial today, but in my mind this is one of the very few things that we are doing today precisely the way they were conducted thousands of years ago (and with the same amount of success, I may add).

iii.                The Reason

Why a census? We all heard the “formal” reasons – a proper allocation of federal budget that is proportional (or number dependent) in nature, such as funds allocated to education, police, infrastructure, and, in fact, almost anything. There are myriad of other reasons cited on today’s census website (“Why It Is Important?” http://2010.census.gov/2010census/why/index.php ).  Yet part of the reason so many people try to evade the census’ pollsters (and the reason the Government today had to recruit 600,000 strong to do the job) is that they fear that counting all the people would provide the government with a lot of power – too much power – to govern over its citizens. Indeed, there’s a sense that knowledge is power, and absolutely accurate knowledge may lead to absolute power. I would not like to dwell into this weak version of conspiracy theory, (“weak,” counter intuitively, because it does have some factual basis) but I would love to leave it to you to draw the proper analogy with the ancient ultimate pollster entity – and the reason He was interested in the exact number.

The Prophecy: Hypothetical, Not Actual

From the census – a scientific, data-oriented, fact-based, empirical experiment, we are moving this week into the world of moral philosophy – the untested, hypothetical, purposively inaccurate realm of biblical prophecy.

This week’s Haphtarah – Hosea 2:1 – begins with a statement that is quite contradictory to the subject-matter of our portion: “And the number of the People of Israel has been like the grain of sand in the ocean, which cannot be measured and cannot be counted . . . [but God told them:] You are not my people.” I will not dwell here on the heavier conundrum posed by the text – why did God waited until the Jewish People has arrived at that number to break that news – but rather concentrate on a much more mundane question:  Why does the portion text take so much pains to reach an accurate number, while the “prophecy version” insists on a number that neither countable nor measurable?

The answer to this seemingly trivial question is actually quite deep, and stands at the heart of really understanding the nature of Jewish prophecy (and for that matter, all true prophets) over the generations.  And this true understanding can be summarized in the wonderful phrase – appearing originally in the Tosaphot (Yevamot 50, 71) and invoked countless times by Leibowitz – that “the prophet does not engage in prophecy but for the matters that are ought to be.” In other words, prophecy is prescriptive, not descriptive in nature; it tells us in which direction we should go, not in which direction we are actually going. Indeed, for thousands of years many of the prophecies written into the text did not come true – an evidence, for many, that they were wrong (or that the prophets who made them were charlatans). But rather than an evidence of incompetence of the prophets, those unsubstantiated prophecies may only serve as an evidence of our own incompetence – our own inability to live up to their desired ideals. And that, to a large extent, is the difference between the actual and the hypothetical.  

Shabbat Shalom,

Doron

Parsaht Be'Har-Be'Chu'ku'tai Leviticus 25:1 - 27:34

This week’s two portions – Be’har (literally, “on the mountain”), and Be’Chuku’tai (literally, “in my laws”) – mark the end of the third book, the book of Leviticus.  They contain the famous laws of “shmee’ta” – the innovative idea that every seventh year the land itself has to rest, just like we humans rest every seventh day.  They also contain other, more familiar religious laws such as the prohibition on the making of idols (Levit. 26:1), the decree to keep the Shabat (26:2), and others.  At the end of the Chapter 26, we see a dramatic concluding remark: “These are the statutes, laws, and doctrines that God provided between Himself and the Israelite People at Mount Sinai at the hand of Moshe.”  (26:46)

But other than those well-established rules, this week’s portions discuss two very interesting concepts – the notion of business cycles, and the notion of negative rewards (or sanctions) for bad behavior.  To me, both demonstrate that apparently not much has changed since the time the Torah has been written. I will disucss them in turn. 

On Business Cycles and Old Recessions

The modern theory of business cycles – the notion that markets function in predictable stages, notably four: (1) expansion; (2) crisis; (3) recession; and (iv) recovery – was only developed in the twentieth century by economists like Joseph Schumpeter.  Yet the idea that economic activity operate in waves, and that sometimes people find themselves on top and sometimes on the bottom, is as ancient as markets themselves.

This week’s portion is famous for its detail discussion of the laws of Sh’meeta, which I mentioned earlier – the careful consideration given to the ground, the main production source of the day. In a limited sense, this is also a discussion of a business cycle, though one that is self created. However, to me, the more interesting part of the portion relates to the very detailed account of what happens when people are suddenly affected by economic hardship. What happens, for example, when your relative is forced to sell a part of his land as he no longer can hold onto it; when someone had to sell his lucrative dwelling home behind the protective walls of the city (the then-Upper East Side, I presume); what happens to other dwelling homes that are sold, without a wall (insert your favorite wall-less neighborhood here); what happens when your relative lost his job; and so on and so forth. (Levit. 25:25-55)

Though the laws dealing with these situations are fascinating – providing, in essence, a model for market-created social safety net, including the (now famous) restriction on usury loans – I am more interested here in the very phenomenon of people who fell on hard economic times. More importantly, I am interested in how society -- according to Judaism -- should treat those people. This, to me, shows not only that this unfortunate phenomenon was prevalent way before the Great Depression or our current economic crisis, but that the Jewish religions saw it as a religious obligation to treat those people with dignity, honor, and hope.  The message here is simple: You better treat those people well today, because tomorrow you might be the person needing that kind of support. The debate in Washington today over the creation of a new consumer protection agency or the concept of a “private” bail-out – a direct government assistance to people in need – are but a faint echo to this comprehensive set of rules that was created more than two thousand years ago to properly deal with business cycles and their effect. Once again, we can be proud of our wise sages (or God, if you believe He is the author of the text) that identified a social issue and created a comprehensive way of dealing with it.

The “She’ma” and Sanctions for Bad Behavior

While business cycles are entirely a secular phenomenon – no God is involved in either the creation or solution of the issue (with the proviso, of course, that everything is done in His command, again for those readers who hold this view) – the next issue is anything but.

The She’ma – “She’ma Israel, Adonai Eloheinu, Adonai Echad” – is by far the most famous of Jewish texts.  It consists of two parts, as Yeshayahu Leibowitz explained in length (in English, see The Reading of Shema in Judaism, Human Values, and the Jewish State 37 (Harvard 1992)). The first part of the She’ma, which is presented as an absolute demand (or a Kantian categorical imperative), orders every Jewish person to love the Lord our God with all his heart, with all his soul, and with all his might. (And Rabbi Akiva says: “with all his soul – meaning even when they are taking away your soul (killing you) – you should still love Him.”) I would not dwell here on the beautiful issue of why the word love was chosen to portray the desired – nay, decreed(!) – relationship between the person of faith and God. I would just suggest that love is the greatest of human feelings, the strongest, the most expressive, and thus no other human emotion could be chosen for the task.

The second part of the She’ma is framed as a conditional demand (or, in Kantian terms, a conditional imperative). It begins with the words “And if you shall hear [Me],” and promises a set of rewards for those who would follow the ways of the Jewish Lord.  Leibowitz dwells here on the notion of “Lishma” and “Lo Lishma” (a faith for its own sake, which is the one mentioned in the first part, and a lesser, though much more prevalent, form of faith, to gain a reward, appearing in the second) – an issue I dealt with in previous posts. But for my purposes today, I would like to remark on what is missing from the She’ma.  The two sections (I omit, for a second, the third part of Ts’tsit) are very positive in nature. They describe no sanction, no punishment, no negative reward for not following the ways of God. 

That part is supplied by today’s portion. And in droves.

The portion of “Be’Chukutai” begins with the now-familiar text of “If you shall follow my laws, and keep my decrees . . . then I shall provide your rain in time (etc., etc.)” – much like the second part of the She’ma.  But then the text moves onto a third part that does not appear in the She’ma:

"But if you shall not listen to me, and shall not follow my decrees, and if you reject my rules and despise my laws . . . then I shall do the following onto you:" And here the text provides a parade of horribles, including plagues, losing in wars, turning to enemy slaves, having no fruits from the ground, death of domestic animals, and so on and so forth, including being forced to eat the very flesh of your own sons and daughters. (Levit. 26:29).   

To me, that shows – once again – that not much has changed since the time the text was written. Yes, it is very nice to discuss categorical imperatives – doing things because they are right in and of themselves; or even do something for anticipation of reaping the rewards – such as “if you will follow my laws, all the best will happen to you.” But human nature is such that nothing would happen unless and until meaningful sanctions are put in place. And those sanctions, to be sure, must be such that would deter someone from doing the act.  Serious, big sanctions (and in this case, perhaps even cruel and unusual sanctions). And this is the role (well) played by our portion of the week. 

I would like to leave you with the following question, however: If this section is so important, so vital, so crucial to human behavior, why was it left outside the She’ma itself? If you were sitting today in the Knesset Gdolah (a religious legislative body that doesn't exist anymore), would you reintroduce this part of the text into the She'ma?

Shabbat Shalom,

Doron