Author: devora

Excerpted from Rabbi Shmuel Goldin’s Unlocking the Torah Text – Bamidbar, co-published by OU Press and Gefen Publishers

Context
As Parshat Pinchas opens, God details the divine reward to be bestowed upon Pinchas for his courageous defense of God’s honor during the episode of Ba’al Pe’or: “Therefore, proclaim: Behold! I give him My covenant of peace. And it shall be for him and his offspring after him a covenant of eternal priesthood, because he took vengeance for his God and he atoned for the children of Israel.”

Questions
The reward granted by God to Pinchas seems to be completely coun-terintuitive. During the episode of Ba’al Pe’or, Pinchas defended God’s honor by summarily executing an Israelite man and a Midianite woman who were engaged in an act of public desecration. Pinchas’ violent act of zealotry, while apparently warranted, could hardly be construed as a “peaceful” act. Why then does God go out of His way to specifically reward Pinchas with a divine “covenant of peace”?

In the same vein, why is ascension to the priesthood an appropriate practical reward for Pinchas? The paradigm of the priesthood is, after all, Pinchas’ grandfather Aharon, famously identified as a “lover of peace and a pursuer of peace.” Pinchas’ violent actions seem to be strange qualifications for his grandfather’s priestly mantle.

Are the “covenant of peace” and the “covenant of eternal priesthood” mentioned in the text synonymous, or does God grant this hero multiple rewards? If these rewards are separate, what is the exact nature of the “covenant of peace”?

Finally, the concrete implications of Pinchas’ priestly reward are equally unclear. Why must God bestow upon Pinchas a “covenant of eternal priesthood”? Isn’t Pinchas already a Kohen simply by dint of the fact that he is Aharon’s grandson?

Approaches

-A-
While some scholars, notably Rashi, perceive only one reward accruing to Pinchas, other authorities view the two covenants as separate pledges.

One group of commentaries, for example, including the Abravanel, interprets the divinely ordained “covenant of peace” as a concrete commitment on God’s part to ensure Pinchas’ personal safety. In the aftermath of the violent events at Ba’al Pe’or, God pledges to protect Pinchas from any retribution that might be taken against him by the powerful family and friends of his victim, Zimri.

The Sforno agrees that the “covenant of peace” granted by God to Pinchas is fundamentally a pledge of divine protection. The protection God pledges, however, is not protection from Zimri’s supporters but from death itself. Citing a series of textual and Midrashic sources indicating that Pinchas far outlives his contemporaries, the Sforno maintains that with this first covenant, God promises Pinchas the gift of personal longevity.

Moving in a completely different direction, the Netziv, Rabbi Zvi Yehuda Berlin, offers a powerfully stirring interpretation of the “covenant of peace.” This blessing, the Netziv maintains, is designed to counteract the destructive internal tendencies that Pinchas’ violent deed might have aroused:

He [God] blessed him [Pinchas] with the attribute of peace, that he should be neither quick-tempered nor easily angered. For it is only natural that the act performed by Pinchas, the slaying of a soul by his hand, would leave in his heart a powerful unrest….

Therefore, divine blessing is bestowed upon him, that he should continually experience tranquility and the attribute of peace, and that his own actions should not haunt him.

Through a divine “covenant of peace,” the Netziv claims, God ensures that Pinchas’ personal encounter with violence will not leave him permanently scarred.

Equally beautiful is the approach of Rabbi Shimshon Raphael Hirsch, who suggests that the definition of “peace” is very much in the eye of the beholder. From a Torah perspective, however, the definition is clear:

True peace of men rests on the peace of all of them with God [my italics]. He who dares to wage war with people who are against divine Goodness and Truth is…fighting for the “covenant of peace” on earth. He who, for the sake of so-called peace, quietly leaves the field to people who are really at variance with God, his love of peace is at one with the enemies of the “covenant of peace” on earth.”

Pinchas’ violent actions in defense of God’s name, Hirsch argues, are actually “peaceful acts.” As he fights to preserve God’s will, Pinchas brings the world one step closer to the “covenant of peace,” to the true state of tranquility resulting from the attainment of harmony between God and man.

-B-
Turning to the second of the two covenants mentioned in the text, the “covenant of eternal priesthood,” we are immediately confronted with the technical questions surrounding Pinchas’ status as a priest before and after the fateful events of Ba’al Pe’or.

If Pinchas is already a Kohen by dint of his identity as Aharon’s grandson, why must he now be blessed with “a covenant of eternal priesthood”?

Two basic approaches are suggested by the commentaries, both based on the early Midrashic dictum “Pinchas was not appointed as Kohen until he killed Zimri….”

Rashi maintains that Pinchas, although a descendent of Aharon, is not a Kohen at all until these events unfold. The kehuna, this scholar explains, is granted to those descendents of Aharon who are born after Aharon and his sons are themselves inaugurated into the priesthood. Because Pinchas was born before the moment of Aharon’s ascension, he can only enter the priesthood in an exceptional fashion, as a result of God’s blessing in the wake of his heroic act. A slight alternative to this approach is suggested by a group of scholars who maintain that while Aharon and his sons were originally inaugurated into the kehuna, his grandsons were not. Pinchas is, therefore, not a Kohen until God confers such status upon him following the events at Ba’al Pe’or.

Both the Ibn Ezra and the Ramban, on the other hand, interpret the “covenant of priesthood” as referring specifically to the High Priesthood. Although Pinchas is a Kohen from the outset, his heroism catapults him to a new, higher status. God now commands Moshe to publicly proclaim that the chain of High Priesthood will, in the future, emerge directly from Pinchas.

-C-
Whichever approach we accept, however, the question remains: In what way is the granting of priesthood, in any form, an appropriate reward for Pinchas’ violent actions?

A number of commentaries, including the Abravanel, answer this by suggesting that the “covenant of priesthood” is a confirmation, rather than a conferral, of Pinchas’ kehuna. Through this covenant, God allays the zealot’s fears concerning his own current status. In the aftermath of the events at Ba’al Pe’or, Pinchas is concerned that he will lose his status as a Kohen because of the law invalidating any individual guilty of murder or manslaughter from the priesthood. God, therefore, grants Pinchas the “covenant of priesthood,” reassuring him that, because his courageous actions served the greater good, his current status as a priest remains intact.

-D-
The Ktav Sofer, however, chooses an interpretive path that skillfully weaves the two covenants bestowed upon Pinchas into one cohesive whole.

God, this scholar maintains, confers priesthood upon Pinchas after the events at Ba’al Pe’or specifically because the character exhibited by Pinchas during those events recommends him to the priesthood.

As teachers of the nation, the Kohanim are required to instruct the people with unbending strength and unyielding commitment. There is to be no compromise when it comes to matters of the law and ritual. The zeal demonstrated by Pinchas in his defense of God’s name, therefore, will serve him well in his priestly role.

At the same time, however, the passion for God’s law, meant to be part of every Kohen’s psyche, must be balanced by a warmth that discourages strife and brings others close. This is the warmth of Aharon, “the lover of peace and the pursuer of peace.” God, therefore, blesses Pinchas with both a “covenant of peace” and a “covenant of eternal priesthood.”

There will be times when, as a priest, Pinchas will have to be an Aharon, and times when he will have to be a zealot. Together, the two covenants will provide Pinchas with the balance essential to his success.

Excerpted from Rabbi Shmuel Goldin’s Unlocking the Torah Text – Bamidbar, co-published by OU Press and Gefen Publishers

Context

Immediately following the death of Miriam, the nation rises in complaint against Moshe and Aharon due to a lack of water. When Moshe and Aharon turn to God at the entrance of the Sanctuary, God instructs Moshe: “Take the staff and gather together the assembly – you and Aharon, your brother – and speak to the rock before their eyes and it will give forth its waters. And you shall bring forth water from the rock and you shall give drink to the assembly and to their animals.”

Moshe takes his staff, gathers the people facing the rock and says to them, “Listen now, rebellious ones, from this rock shall we bring forth water for you?”

Raising his arm, Moshe then strikes the rock with his staff twice, and abundant water pours forth, providing for the people and for their livestock.

God turns to Moshe and Aharon and proclaims, “Because you did not believe in Me to sanctify Me in the eyes of the children of Israel, therefore you shall not bring this assembly to the land that I have given them.”

The Torah concludes this tragic event with the statement “These are mei meriva, the waters of strife, where the children of Israel contended with God, and He was sanctified through them.”

On three other occasions in the text, God explicitly identifies the events at Mei Meriva as the source of His refusal to allow Moshe and Aharon to enter the land of Canaan.

Questions

A number of years ago, on one of my synagogue’s numerous missions to Israel, we traveled to locations in Jordan, as well. Among the sites we visited was the mountain believed to be Har Nevo, the peak from which Moshe viewed the land of Canaan from afar, and upon which he died.

Like so many of us, I have long been troubled by God’s refusal to allow Moshe to enter the land of Canaan. As I stood alone, however, on that windy summit in Jordan, looking out, as once did Moshe, on a view that spans from the Dead Sea to the Galilee, I was struck as never before by the ultimate tragedy that marked Moshe’s life.

This humble, reluctant leader – pressed into service by divine command, pushed to the limit repeatedly by his backsliding flock, ever the defender of the nation before God – manages to lead his people successfully to the very border of their Promised Land. Yet, apparently because of a misstep at the scene of the waters of strife, he is denied the opportunity to enter that land himself. He leads the people to the realization of their dreams, but is denied the realization of his own.

Why does Moshe deserve this fate?

What specific sin does Moshe commit at the scene of Mei Meriva that is beyond forgiveness? And why, in addition, is Aharon punished simply for being a bystander?

In what way do the actions of these great leaders indicate a “lack of belief in God” and a “failure to sanctify Him”?

Approaches

A
Some scholars, upon careful review of the narrative, cannot find any action taken by Moshe and Aharon at Mei Meriva that merits the severe punishment they receive. Disputing the overwhelming evidence of the text, therefore, these authorities claim that the guilt of Moshe and Aharon actually emerges from other, more powerful sources.

The Abravanel, for example, maintains that Aharon’s sin lay in his involvement in the fashioning of the golden calf, while Moshe’s transgression consisted of expanding the mandate given to the spies prior to their entry into the land of Canaan. The actions of these great leaders were well-intentioned, the Abravanel argues, and yet in each case they inadvertently contributed to the national disasters that ensued. God therefore balances His responses carefully. To protect Moshe and Aharon’s reputation, He does not punish them immediately, together with those guilty of intentional rebellion. He instead waits for them to commit an intentional sin, however minor, and then punishes them for their original transgressions. When Moshe deviates from God’s commandment and strikes the rock, God seizes the opportunity to exact retribution upon these leaders for their previous, more substantial failings.

B
The vast majority of commentaries, however, find the clear testimony of the text incontrovertible. As noted above, God explicitly and repeatedly identifies the events at Mei Meriva as the source of His refusal to allow Moshe and Aharon to enter the land of Canaan.

Rashi reflects the position of these authorities when, commenting on the sentence “Because you did not believe in Me to sanctify Me in the eyes of the children of Israel, therefore you shall not bring this assembly to the land that I have given them,” he adamantly argues, “The text openly reveals that had it not been for this sin alone, they [Moshe and Aharon] would have entered the land.”

Clearly, something specific happens at Mei Meriva to seal the fate of these great leaders. The question, however, is what?

The rabbinic search for an answer gives rise to one of the most heated debates in biblical interpretation to this day.

C
Building upon an earlier Midrashic source, Rashi chooses the most obvious explanation for Moshe’s sin. Moshe is punished for his failure to obey God’s explicit commandment. Commanded by God to speak to the rock, Moshe instead strikes the rock twice. This deviation from God’s instructions, although perhaps mitigated by circumstances, diminishes the sanctification of God’s name.

Had water rushed forth as a result of Moshe’s verbal command, the people would have concluded: If this rock, which neither speaks, hears, nor requires sustenance, fulfills the word of the Lord, how much more then should we!

Because Moshe does not follow God’s commandment to the letter, the Israelites lose an opportunity to glean a lesson critical to their developing relationship with God. Moshe thus fails to sanctify God’s name and loses his right to enter the land of Canaan.

D
While agreeing with Rashi’s contention that Moshe’s failure lies in striking rather than speaking to the rock, numerous other commentaries offer alternative insights into the significance of that failure.

The Rashbam, for example, defends Moshe’s misstep as resulting from a logical misunderstanding of God’s intent. Because God specifically instructs him to “take the staff,” Moshe assumes that he is meant to strike the rock, as he had been commanded to do under similar circumstances, years earlier, at Refidim.10 Despite the inadvertent nature of Moshe’s actions, God nevertheless punishes him severely because, as the Talmud notes, “God is exacting with those nearest to Him to the point of a hair’s breadth.”

The Sforno, for his part, relates the problem raised by Moshe’s striking of the rock to the essential character of divine miracles. All supernatural events recorded in the text, this scholar claims, can be divided into three categories, in increasing order of intensity:

1. Hidden miracles, performed by God through natural means.
2. Open miracles that can occur naturally but only through powerful forces and over a long period of time.
3. Open miracles that cannot occur at all through natural means.

The full extent of God’s power, the Sforno explains, is demonstrated only through miracles from the third, highest category. Such events also attest to the worthiness of the earthly messenger through whose agency the wonder is performed.

In response to the complaints of the Israelites, God decides to demonstrate His own full power to the people and to reestablish Moshe’s credentials with them. He therefore commands Moshe specifically to perform a miracle that cannot occur through natural means: “Speak to the rock before their eyes and it will give forth its waters.”

Moshe, however, has his doubts.

Unable to believe that God would perform a miracle at the highest level on behalf of the rebellious Israelites, Moshe consciously deviates from God’s commandment and strikes the rock, splitting it in a manner that can occur through natural forces, over time. By deliberately lowering the caliber of the miracle performed at Mei Meriva, Moshe thus fails to sanctify God’s name to the fullest possible extent.

E
In his ethical work Shmoneh Prakim, the Rambam breaks from Rashi completely, choosing an entirely different interpretive path to Moshe’s sin at Mei Meriva. In the midst of a lengthy discussion encouraging a golden mean of personal conduct, the Rambam cites Moshe’s actions at the scene of Mei Meriva as proof of the dangers of immoderate behavior: “Moshe’s entire sin lay in erring on the side of anger and deviating from the mean of patience.”

This anger, the Rambam claims, is clearly evidenced in Moshe’s declaration: “Listen now, rebellious ones, from this rock shall we bring forth water for you?”

Unwarranted anger, in and of itself, is considered sinful. Moshe’s public rage at Mei Meriva, however, constitutes an even more dangerous failing in God’s eyes. Not only does Moshe set a dangerous example for the entire people, but he also potentially causes the nation to erroneously conclude that God is “enraged” by their complaints. There is, in fact, no indication in the text of such divine wrath. While God is indeed “angered” on a number of other occasions by the people’s groundless complaints, at Mei Meriva, the Israelites, suffering from thirst, are justified in their protests.

F
The Ramban strongly disagrees. In a lengthy exposition, this scholar disputes the approaches of Rashi, the Rambam and others to Moshe’s sin. Concerning Rashi’s suggestion that Moshe is punished for striking rather than speaking to the rock, the Ramban insists that God would not have commanded Moshe to “take the staff” had He not intended him to strike the rock. The Ramban also harshly rebuts the Rambam’s interpretation on a number of counts, pointing out, most fundamentally, that God never chastises Moshe for anger, and that, in fact, God Himself must have been angered by the Israelites’ bitter complaints.

The Ramban therefore quotes Rabbeinu Chananel in offering an entirely different perspective on the events at Mei Meriva. Moshe and Aharon’s failings are reflected not in the first half of the passage quoted by the Rambam, but in its second half: “Listen now, rebellious ones, from this rock shall we bring forth water for you?”

The problem is at once clear and startling. In place of stating, “Shall God bring forth water?” Moshe instead proclaims, “Shall we bring forth water?” Moshe and Aharon’s public assumption of credit for the miracle, although obviously inadvertent, cannot go unanswered. Absent a strong response from God, the nation might erroneously conclude that Moshe and Aharon had produced the water on their own, through magical powers. Such an interpretation would undermine the very tenets of belief in divine authority that these leaders themselves had worked so hard to instill in the nation.

God’s accusation, “Because you did not believe in Me to sanctify Me in the eyes of the children of Israel…,” can, the Ramban explains, be interpreted to mean: You failed to instill belief in Me in the people’s hearts. Even further, through your incautious words, you undermined My sanctity in their eyes.

The Ramban concludes his remarks concerning the events at Mei Meriva by acknowledging the limitations of rational explanation for what is “one of the great mysteries of the Torah” and by offering an additional kabbalistic interpretation for the episode, which remains outside the scope of our discussion.

G
Moving in yet another, totally different direction, the Ibn Ezra maintains that the sin of Moshe and Aharon lies in their initial undignified reaction to the people’s complaints. Instead of demonstrating confidence in God’s ability to provide for the people, these great leaders approach the Sanctuary “as fugitives,” fleeing before the nation’s threats.

Centuries later, Rabbi Joseph Albo elaborates on the Ibn Ezra’s approach by arguing that Moshe and Aharon should have directly asked God to perform a specific supernatural act in response to the people’s complaints. “The failure of a prophet to perform miracles,” Albo explains, “is liable to make people doubt the truth of the text that the Lord estab-lishes the words of his servants.”

God therefore accuses these great leaders of a “failure of belief.” In their humility, Moshe and Aharon do not trust that God will respond to their direct request for miraculous intervention.

H
Many years ago, Rabbi Harold Kanatopsky, a brilliant teacher and orator who served as rabbi of my community during my teenage years, offered a new, innovative approach to the events at Mei Meriva. So profoundly did this approach impress me that I have not only remembered it and quoted it over the years, but I have also added some thoughts of my own. I can no longer remember where Rabbi Kanatopsky’s ideas end and mine begin, but the foundation of this approach is certainly his.

To understand the events at Mei Meriva, we first must add to the puzzle.

As the Rashbam notes (see above), this is not the first time that Moshe finds himself in the circumstances presented at Mei Meriva. An almost parallel event occurs earlier in Moshe’s career. Shortly after the Exodus, at a location known as Refidim, the Israelites find themselves without water and converge in complaint against Moshe. On that occasion God distinctly commands Moshe: “And you shall strike the rock and water will issue forth from it and the people will drink.”

This seems to make our questions concerning the events at Mei Meriva even more troubling. How can Moshe be blamed, as Rashi and so many others claim, for striking the rock at Mei Meriva when that was exactly what he was told to do – with success – on a previous occasion? Even more importantly, why does God command Moshe at Refidim to strike the rock and at Mei Meriva to speak to the rock? Given the similarity between these two parallel episodes, why does God change His instructions in such seemingly arbitrary ways?

Upon consideration, there is one powerful variable between the episodes at Refidim and Mei Meriva: the Israelites themselves.

At Refidim, Moshe and Aharon are confronted by the generation of the Exodus. At Mei Meriva, forty years later, they are confronted by the wilderness generation.

As we have noted (see Korach 6, Approaches B; Points to Ponder; Chukat 2, Approaches D), the transition between these two generations marks a major paradigm shift in God’s relationship with His people. Over a forty-year period, the nation moves from the relational level of yira, fear and awe, to the level of ahava, love.

The erstwhile slaves who comprised the generation of the Exodus and Revelation were able to relate to God only on the primitive plane of fear. Shaped by their decades under the taskmaster’s whip, they responded to brute force and power. God, therefore, commanded Moshe at Refidim to speak to this generation in a language that they could understand. Strike the rock, He commanded, and let the Israelites recognize the power of their new heavenly master.

Forty years later, at Mei Meriva, a new generation has emerged that has not known slavery on an adult level. Nurtured under God’s watchful care, this generation has learned to relate to their Creator through the more mature dimension of ahava.

God therefore commands Moshe: Take the staff. Show the people that you can use it, but that you deliberately will not. Instead, speak to the rock and, in doing so, “speak” to the people. Demonstrate to them, at this critical moment, that the power of love is infinitely stronger than the power of brute force. Through love, I will provide for them now; through love, we will relate to each other across the pages of time.

Moshe, however, slips….

Confronted again by the bitter complaints of the Israelites, he flashes back to Refidim. He sees before him not the Israelites of the day, but their parents and grandparents of yesteryear. Nothing has changed, he concludes. These people still understand only the power of the staff.

And in that one fell instant, as Moshe lifts his staff to strike the rock, he fails to transition with his people from one generation to the next, from one relational level to another. This failure seals his fate. He and Aharon (who makes no move to stop his brother) will remain forever part of their generation, consigned to perish in the desert without entry into the land.

Far from a minor misstep, Moshe’s actions at Mei Meriva emerge as a fundamental failure of leadership. This greatest of leaders remains rooted in the past, unable to respond to the internal changes that have transformed his people. God’s seemingly drastic response to Moshe’s failure at Mei Meriva now becomes understandable. Sadly, Moshe’s time has come and gone. A new leader must now emerge – a leader who will be able to transition with the next generation in its march towards a glorious future.

Excerpted from Rabbi Dr. Norman Lamm’s Derashot Ledorot: A Commentary for the Ages – Numbers, co-published by OU Press and Maggid Books, and YU Press; edited by Stuart W. Halpern

Rebel and Revolutionary*

The rebellion against the leadership of Moses and Aaron is one which had tragic consequences and which left an indelible impression upon the collective Jewish memory. The Torah lists the names of those involved in the conspiracy in the desert. But who indeed were the members of this conglomeration of the displaced, the dissatisfied, and the disaffected? What motivated them, and what was their relation to each other?

Rabbi Naftali Zvi Yehuda Berlin, the Netziv, found three distinct groups in this mutiny of malcontents, and he describes them to us in his commentary HaAmek Davar. The first consists of the two hundred and fifty princes of the congregation. These community leaders were not at all malicious people. They were well-intentioned but misguided. They were great Jews, great even in their piety. That is why the Torah (Numbers 16:2) refers to them as “princes of the congregation, the elect men of the assembly, men of renown.” They were Levites who desired to be kohanim not because the priesthood offered them positions of influence and status, but because it represented an opportunity to come closer to God in the course of serving Him in the Sanctuary.

The second group consisted of two brothers from the tribe of Reuben – Dathan and Abiram. These two were known as trouble-makers even before the Exodus from Egypt. They were not at all people of ideals or convictions. They were merely power-hungry schemers – nothing more, nothing less.

The third element in this mutiny was Koraĥ himself. He was a man of great fame in Israel and yet was, in a way, the worst of all, for he tried to appear to the people a man of sincerity and genuineness, who had legitimate and selfless complaints, like the two hundred and fifty princes – but in fact he had the same base ends as Dathan and Abiram, namely, the usurpation of the authority of Moses and Aaron.

This analysis – of which we have mentioned but the bare outline – is not only an act of exegesis, but also a valid insight into character that is relevant to the human condition in general, whether in the days of Moses or our very own times.

Permit me to expand on this by referring to a recent essay by Dr. Erich Fromm, “The Revolutionary Character,” whose ideas we shall accept in part. Fromm distinguishes between two types – the rebel and the revolutionary. The rebel is one who is innocent of any ideological convictions. This individual is resentful of authority and wants to overthrow it so that he can become the authority himself. This person is dissatisfied not with the office, but with the office-holder. His goal is a naked power-grab.

The revolutionary is completely different. This person is not necessarily one who participates in revolutions; the term is used psychologically, not politically. The revolutionary is one who thinks independently. He is unimpressed by those in control and will not accept an idea just because it was pronounced by someone in authority. This individual’s mood is a critical one, not that of bland acceptance. The revolutionary will even be able to see through “common sense” when that term is used to describe what is but nonsense repeated often enough by those who are influential enough. The revolutionary is one who can transcend the parochial limits of his own society and milieu, and thus criticize both his own and any other society. The revolutionary character is one that enables a person to say “No,” and not automatically assent to authority, to the status quo, to their environment, to “conditions.”

Of course, not always is the revolutionary angelic. This person can be right or wrong, good or evil, constructive or destructive, depending upon what he says “no” to, and upon whether his criticism is valid or invalid. Simple “orneriness” is not a virtue. But at least the mood of the revolutionary character is authentic. He thinks and reacts as an individual, not a cipher, not just another sheep in the flock.

With this distinction we can, I believe, better appreciate the Netziv’s analysis of the Koraĥ episode. Dathan and Abiram were what we have called rebels. No ideals or principles or ideologies informed their treachery. They lusted for power directly and without inhibition. The two hundred and fifty princes were revolutionaries. They refused to accept without question the denial to them of the priesthood. But they misplaced their energies. Their criticism was well-intentioned but grievously misdirected. And Koraĥ played an opportunistic, political, demagogic game. He cloaked himself in piety and tried to disguise himself as a revolutionary character, like the two hundred and fifty princes. But in essence he was no different from the rebels Dathan and Abiram. He was the McCarthy of the biblical period.

Indeed, the Koraĥ-type is no stranger to our contemporary world. Far too many greedy, corrupt, and power-hungry men, from Iraq to Ghana and from Indonesia to Latin America, have taken over the reins of government without in the least benefiting their own people – and all this under the pretense of nationalism and anti-imperialism. The slogans are the slogans of revolution, but the goals are the goals of rebellion. Our age, so stormy and tempestuous – born in the French and American revolutions, sired by the industrial revolution, agonizing now in the scientific and nationalistic and civil-rights revolutions – offers great temptations to the Koraĥ-type character. As Fromm puts it, “Twentieth century political life is a cemetery containing the moral graves of people who started our as alleged revolutionaries and who turned out to be nothing more than opportunistic rebels.”

Now these three classes represent what is wrong with the protest against power and authority: the two hundred and fifty princes who were misguided revolutionaries, the avaricious rebels Dathan and Abiram, and the demagogic and deceiving Koraĥ. But the constructive, creative aspect of the revolutionary character also has a place of honor in the Jewish tradition. In fact, it is a distinguishing feature of Judaism in the world and one of the major functions of Orthodoxy within the Jewish community.

What is the prophetic tradition if not the expression of a revolutionary character? It had its genesis in Abraham – who was an iconoclast. It reached its heights in Moses who defied Pharaoh and both the military might and cultural hegemony of Egypt. Elijah was a revolutionary when he challenged Ahab, Isaiah when he thundered against the drunkards who ruled the northern kingdom of Israel, and Ezekiel when he dissented from the popular worship of Baal and Marduk. For three and a half thousand years Judaism has been out of step with the world – and has thus managed to be its repository of sanity and sanctity.

In like manner, today it is the mission of Orthodoxy to perpetuate this tradition of dissent and the revolutionary character within the Jewish community. Of course, if there are those who believe that this is the best of all possible worlds, that our American-Jewish community leaves nothing to be desired, that synagogue services must be rallies and that rabbis must be propagandists, then there is nothing more to be said. But for those whose love for Jews does not leave them blind, who are painfully aware of some of our faults and defects, there remains the problem of who will fulfill the role of the little boy who dared to proclaim that the emperor was naked. That role, I submit, is incumbent upon Orthodox Jews whose convictions force them to measure mankind and events by the criteria of Torah rather than by their own subjective tastes and shifting contemporary standards. It is we who have the obligation, painful though it be, of being the critics – constructive critics, of course, but critics nonetheless. It is part of the fate, the destiny, and the mission of the Torah Jew to say “no” when others sheepishly nod their heads in agreement, to arouse whilst others drowse in moral stupor, to irritate and goad when others seek only to pacify and tranquilize.

The founder of Chabad Hasidism, Rabbi Shneur Zalman, in his Likutei Torah, saw this idea implicit in the famous words of the prophet in the second chapter of Jeremiah (verse 2), “Thus says the Lord, I remember for you the affection of your youth, the love of your espousals, lekhtekh aĥarai bamidbar be’eretz lo zeru’a, how you went after Me in the wilderness, in a land that was not sown.” Those last three words, “be’eretz lo zeru’a,” says Rabbi Shneur Zalman, mean not only “a land not sown,” but also a land in which the word and idea and imperative “lo,” “no,” was sown! The most memorable achievement of our people was our willingness to accept a Torah and a tradition that emphasized the “no,” that enshrined the power of dissent, that glorified non-conformism with the popular and the conventional. “Eretz lo zeru’a” – the “ground” – principle of Judaism is: “lo,” “no.” There in the desert, the vast and lonely midbar, we learned to be ourselves, to forge our own souls and characters under the tutelage of God alone. There we learned to say No to the idols worshipped by the crowds; No to the ever-present threat of assimilation; No to the passions and lusts that tyrannize a man; No to the avarice which inheres in his character. There, in that “eretz lo zeru’a,” man learned to say No to the hidden fears that creep up on him in secret and threaten to paralyze his will and ruin his peace of mind; No to his grief when it turns excessive and overwhelms him; No to his worries and concerns when they give rise to despair and the kind of hopelessness that moves black clouds over his heart and his mind and his soul; No even to his perverse tendency to say “No” when there is no cause for it!

Today’s American Orthodox Jew must not forget his ancient origins in the “eretz lo zeru’a.” We must say “no” to the bankrupt Jewish secularism that surrounds us, often in clerical garb; “no” to the unreflective, obtuse, and self-disdaining tendency of certain Jewish organizations publicly to violate our most sacred tenets; “no” to Jews who dare call themselves observant or Orthodox but who perpetrate miserable, unethical business practices; “no” to renowned leaders of powerful Jewish organizations who seem to have lost every shred of self-respect. I refer, in this last instance, to the leaders of the American Jewish Committee who had an audience with the Pope in Rome to discuss Jewish-Catholic affairs just two weeks ago – on Shabbat! How horribly incongruous – leading Jews meeting with leaders of another religion on a day that they ought to be spending in the synagogue and in Sabbath rest! Can anyone blame church leaders for silently questioning whether they ought to take Jews seriously at all? Certainly we dissent. We counter pose a most vigorous “no” to this shameful exhibition of self-denigration and inferiority.

There may be those who will complain that this is a negative, unproductive attitude. But that is a shallow conclusion. For, when it issues from a commitment to Torah, every no is really a “yes.” “No” to the idol is “yes” to God. No to assimilation is “yes” to the promise of a Jewish future. “No” to Jewish self-denigration is yes to Jewish dignity and self-respect. “No” to despair and fear and hopelessness is “yes” to faith and trust in God. Our “lo zeru’a” issues from “ĥesed ne’urayikh” and “ahavat kelulotayikh,” from a relationship of love and affection. Our revolutionary character, unlike the rebellious character, seeks to correct, not abolish; to build, not to destroy. It is motivated by love, not enmity.

It is a difficult challenge which our historic tradition places on us – to be revolutionary without being rebellious, to know when to be critical and when to conform, when to dissent and when to assent, when to say “yes” and when to say “no.” But God in His goodness has given us a standard by which to judge. It is something Koraĥ and his children learned, albeit too late. For, as the Talmud (Bava Batra 74a) tells us in a most meaningful legend, when centuries later Rabba bar Bar Ĥannah put his ear to the ground where Koraĥ and his cohorts had been swallowed alive, he heard a voice that issued from the bowels of the earth. And that voice called out, “Moses is true and his Torah is true.”

That is our measure, our criterion. With that truth we shall know when to say “yes” – and when to say “no.”

---

*June 14, 1964.

Excerpted from Rabbi Shmuel Goldin’s Unlocking the Torah Text – Bamidbar, co-published by OU Press and Gefen Publishers

 

Fringe Element

Context

Parshat Shelach closes with a discussion of the mitzva of tzitzit, the commandment to place fringes on the corners of all four-cornered garments worn by men. While the majority of the tzitzit threads are to be white in color, each bundle of tzitzit is to contain at least one thread of techeilet, a shade of blue.

As mandated by the Torah, the mitzva of tzitzit is obligatory only if one happens to wear a four-cornered garment. The rabbis decree, however, that such a garment (a tallit katan, a small tallit) should be worn throughout the day in order to fulfill this mitzva continuously. The eventual institution of the tallit gadol, the large tallit, into Jewish practice, worn as a prayer shawl during the morning prayers and on other occasions, further reflects the significance of this mitzva.

The Talmud maintains that the mitzva of tzitzit is equivalent in importance to the sum of all other mitzvot combined.

Questions

What is the meaning of the mitzva of tzitzit and why do the rabbis attach such significance to its performance? What possible purpose could there be in placing fringes on our garments?

Is there any underlying philosophical significance to the white and blue threads of the tzitzit?

Why is this mitzva recorded in the text at this point, specifically in the aftermath of the tragic sin of the spies?

Approaches

A
Rabbinic discussion concerning this mitzva begins at the most basic level, as the rabbis debate the very meaning of the Hebrew term tzitzit.

Rashi offers two alternative interpretations, each of which he supports with textual evidence. The term tzitzit, he says, refers either to the fringes themselves or to their role as a visible symbol meant to “be seen” (based on the root l’hatzitz, to see).

A number of commentators, including the Rashbam, view Rashi’s two approaches not as alternatives but as complementary interpretations. The term tzitzit, they maintain, defines, at once, both the physical structure of the mitzva and its ultimate purpose.

This dual meaning of the term tzitzit, these scholars claim, is reflected in the strange textual flow surrounding the mitzva. The Torah first states: “and they shall make for themselves tzitzit on the corners of their garments,” and then continues, “and it shall be for you as tzitzit and you shall see it.” Why would the Torah find it necessary to state that the tzitzit will serve for the Israelites as tzitzit?

Applying Rashi’s two interpretations simultaneously, the Rashbam explains the flow of text as follows: “and they shall make for themselves tzitzit [fringes on the corners of their four-cornered garments]…and it shall be for you as tzitzit [visible symbols] and you shall see it and you will remember et kol mitzvot Hashem, all of the mitzvot of the Lord.”

The mitzva of tzitzit thus consists of more than making and wearing fringes on four-cornered garments. To properly fulfill this mitzva, the fringes must “be seen”; they must serve as a visible symbol, inspiring the wearer to remember the entirety of Jewish law.

A fundamental question, however, remains: the text does not clearly explain how the tzitzit are meant to work. In what way will “seeing” these fringes remind the observer of “all the mitzvot of the Lord”?

B
In one of the earliest references to the symbolism of the tzitzit, the Talmud begins to answer this question by comparing the fringes to a “seal of clay” placed upon a slave as permanent confirmation of his status.

Numerous later commentaries pick up on this theme, explaining that God commands Jewish males to wear tzitzit on their four-cornered garments as a lasting reminder of their subservience to divine will.

The Sforno thus maintains: “When you see [the tzitzit], which are as a seal placed by a master upon his servants, you will remember that you are servants to an exalted God Whose commandments you accepted through an oath and a promise. Through this you will refrain from ‘straying after your hearts.’ ”

The Ba’al Hachinuch similarly notes: “No tool in the world is more effective for the purpose of remembrance than the seal of the master fixed upon [his servants’] everyday garments…which are before [the servant’s] heart and eyes throughout the day.”

To these and other scholars, the mechanism by which the tzitzit remind their wearer of “all the mitzvot of the Lord” is straightforward and concrete. These fringes comprise the uniform of an eved Hashem, a servant of the Lord. The individual who wears this uniform throughout the day will be constantly reminded of his role in God’s service and of its incumbent responsibilities. He will thus be encouraged not to stray in the direction of sin.

Why, however, are tzitzit specifically chosen as a reminder of servitude to God? Is the selection of these fringes arbitrary, similar to a ribbon tied around an individual’s finger as a prod to memory? Or, does some physical aspect of the tzitzit recommend them for their divinely ordained purpose?

Once these questions are raised, a variety of approaches to the specific symbolism of the tzitzit are suggested by the sages, running the gamut from pshat to Midrash and from the simple to the complex.

C
An early Midrashic source quoted by Rashi, for example, views the symbolism of the tzitzit in mathematical terms. The numerical value of the word tzitzit is six hundred. By adding the eight strands and five knots found in each set of fringes to that base number, we arrive at a total of six hundred thirteen, the sum of the mitzvot contained in the Torah. In this way, the Midrash maintains, the tzitzit serve as a reminder of “all the mitzvot of the Lord.”

After attacking Rashi’s approach on a number of grounds, the Ramban argues that the symbolic message of the tzitzit is specifically contained in the thread(s) of techeilet, the blue strand(s) found in each set of fringes. The color techeilet, the Ramban states, alludes to the tachlit (purpose) of all creation. The goal of the mitzva of tzitzit is not simply to remind the observer of “all the mitzvot,” but to remind the observer of the divine attribute of kol (all), the totally inclusive nature of God.

The Ramban finds support for his approach in a well-known Talmudic observation concerning techeilet: “Why is techeilet different from all other colors? Because techeilet resembles the [color of the] sea, and the sea resembles the [color of the] heavens, and the heavens resemble the [color of God’s] throne of glory.”

Symbolism of a vastly different nature is attributed to the techeilet by Rabbi Elazar the son of Rabbi Shimon in another early Midrashic source. Noting that the root word kalla, to complete or finish, is contained in the term techeilet, this scholar argues that the blue thread of the tzitzit is designed to remind the observer of the “complete” destruction of the Egyptians through the plague of the firstborn and the closing waters of the Reed Sea. Rashi adds that the blue shade of techeilet specifically resembles the color of the heavens as they darken towards night, the appointed time of the plague of the firstborn.

Other commentaries discern practical, moral lessons reflected in the blue thread of the tzitzit. The Ba’al Akeida, for example, maintains that techeilet lies midpoint on the color spectrum between the extremes of black and white. Techeilet is, therefore, included in each set of tzitzit to reflect the desirability of a balanced life path that eschews extremes.

Entering the kabbalistic, mystical realm, the Zohar perceives in the blended colors of the tzitzit a reflection of the attributes of God. The white threads represent midat harachamim, the divine attribute of compassion. The strand(s) of techeilet, on the other hand, signify midat hadin, the divine attribute of strict justice (see Shmot: Va’eira 1, Approaches E for a discussion concerning the divine attributes).

Finally, Rabbi Joseph Soloveitchik suggests that the white threads of the tzitzit symbolically denote “clarity, rationality and that which is self-evident.” Techeilet, on the other hand, “focuses our thoughts on the grand mysteries of human experience which elude our precise understanding.”With inimitable eloquence, the Rav applies the symbolic balance created by the colors of the tzitzit to three distinct areas of human experience:

1. In the scientific realm.
In scientific inquiry, the physical sciences, i.e., physics, chemistry, biology, etc., lend themselves to mathematical precision….
It is when the focus of inquiry changes to man’s psyche and abstract verities that inexactitude and uncertainty intrude….
The universe will yield its secrets to the organized scientific pursuit. But the one thread of techeilet pertains to the spiritual realm,where man is humbled by the mystery of existence. Here he needs the guidance of revelation and the religious perceptions of the soul.

2. In our personal lives.
We have all had periods, even of an extended nature, which are rational, planned, and predictable, when we feel that we have a hold on events. At other times, however, mystery and puzzlement intervened, dislocating the pattern of our lives and frustrating all our planning….
Inexplicable events render us humbled. This is the tekhelet [techeilet] of human experience.

3. The enigma of Jewish history.
If Jewish history operated solely with white, we would not be fighting for Israel today. From the standpoint of reason and logistics, our efforts against imponderable odds are insane….
Only people sustained by tekhelet could be motivated to constitute a state after two thousand years of exile. Nations governed only by white mock us incredulously and derisively….
The garment of Jewish life will yet possess both blue and white, and our historical yearnings and sacrifices will be vindicated.

 

To the mind of the Rav, the tzitzit serve as a constant reminder of those elements of our existence that lie within man’s comprehension, as well as those that lie beyond.

Countless other approaches are suggested by the scholars as they struggle to unravel the mysteries behind the ever-present symbol of the tzitzit.

D
One final insight into the mitzva of tzitzit can be derived from an enigmatic linguistic connection between this mitzva and the tragic event with which the parsha opened.

As the curtain rose on Parshat Shelach, Moshe sent twelve spies latur et Eretz Canaan, “to explore the land of Canaan.” Now, at the end of the parsha, the Torah summarizes the purpose of the tzitzit by declaring: V’lo taturu acharei levavchem v’acharei eineichem asher atem zonim achareihem, “And you shall not explore after your heart and after your eyes after which you stray.” The Torah’s repeated use of the uncommon verb latur, to explore, seems to link the disparate themes found at the endpoints of the parsha. What, however, is the thrust of this association? What possible link can be suggested between the sin of the spies and the mitzva of tzitzit?

Perhaps the answer lies in Judaism’s overall attitude towards exploration of the physical world. For while the Torah here warns, “you shall not explore after your heart and after your eyes after which you stray,” investigation of our physical surroundings is not only generally permitted by most halachic authorities, but encouraged. No less a luminary than the Rambam maintains:

And what is the path that will lead to the fear and love [of God]? At the moment when an individual considers His wondrous and great creations and works and perceives within them His matchless and infinite wisdom, he immediately loves, praises, glorifies Him and is seized with an overwhelming desire to know His great name.

Such exploration becomes hazardous, however, when we forget the basic assumptions that are meant to guide our journey. Like the spies sent by Moshe on a legitimate mission to explore Canaan, we stumble off course in our own “explorations” when we lose sight of God’s presence in our lives and when we despair of our own self-worth.

The mitzva of tzitzit is necessary specifically because we do not close ourselves off from the outside world. As we traverse our own physical surroundings, the tzitzit serve as an ever-present reminder of our regal role as avdei Hashem, servants of the Lord.

Excerpted from Rabbi Norman Lamm’s Derashot Ledorot: A Commentary for the Ages – Numbers, co-published by OU Press, Maggid Books, and YU Press; edited by Stuart W. Halpern

Our sidra this morning introduces us, rather casually and incidentally, to one of the most important and highly celebrated virtues in the arsenal of religion – that of anivut. We read in today’s portion, “And the man Moses was the most humble (anav me’od), above all the men that were upon the face of the earth” (Numbers 12:3). Whatever may be the particular translation of the Hebrew word anav, the idea that is usually imparted is that anivut is humility, a feeling by the individual that he lacks inner worth, an appreciation that he amounts to very little. Indeed, the author of Mesilat Yesharim, one of the most renowned works on Jewish ethics in all our literature, identifies the quality of anivut with shiflut – the feeling of inner lowliness and inferiority. According to this definition, then, the Torah wants to teach each of us to see ourselves in a broader perspective, to recognize that all achievements are very trivial, attainments mere boastfulness, prestige a silly exaggeration. If Moses was an anav, if he was humble and able to deprecate himself, how much more so we lesser mortals should be humble.

However, can this be the real definition of this widely heralded quality of anivut?

We know of Moses as the adon hanevi’im, the chief of all the prophets of all times, the man who spoke with God “face to face” (Exodus 33:11). Do the words, “And the man Moses was the most humble” mean that Moses himself did not realize this? Does the anivut of Moses imply that he had a blind spot, that he failed to recognize what any school child knows? Does a Caruso** have to consider himself nothing more than a choir boy, and an Einstein merely an advanced bookkeeper, in order to qualify for anivut? In order to be an anav, must one be either untruthful or genuinely inferior?

To a very great extent, modern psychology is concerned with the problem of inferiority. Deep down, people usually have a most unflattering appraisal of themselves. Many are the problems which bring them to psychologists and psychiatrists; yet all so often the underlying issue is the lack of self-worth. Are we, therefore, to accept the Jewish ethical prescription of anivut as an invitation to acquire an inferiority complex?

In addition, the definition of anivut as self-deprecation and humility does not fit into the context of today’s sidra. The identification by the Torah of Moses as an anav is given to us as part of the story in which we learn of Aaron and Miriam, the brother and sister of Moses, speaking ill of Moses behind his back. They criticize him harshly because of some domestic conduct in his personal life. They are wrong, and they are punished by the Almighty. But what has all this to do with the humility of Moses? The substance of their criticism, namely, the domestic relations of Moses, is as unrelated to Moses’ humility as it is to his artistic talents or his leadership ability.

Furthermore, the Talmud relates an exchange that is all but meaningless if we assume that anivut means humility. The Talmud (Sota 49a) tells us that when Rabbi Judah the Prince died the quality of anivut disappeared with him. When this was stated, the famous Rabbi Joseph disagreed. He said, “How can you say that when Rabbi Judah died anivut vanished? Do you not know that I am still here?” In other words – I am an anav!

Now, if anivut really means humility, does this make sense? Can one boast of his humility and still remain humble? Is it not of the essence of humility that one should consider that he possesses this virtue in himself?

It is for these reasons, and several more, that the famous head of the Yeshiva of Volozhin, popularly known as the Netziv, offers us another definition of anivut (in his HaAmek Davar) which, I believe, is the correct one. I would say that the definition the Netziv offers means, in English, not humility, but meekness. It refers not to self-deprecation but self-restraint. It involves not an untruthful lack of appreciation of one’s self and one’s attainments, but rather a lack of arrogance and a lack of insistence upon kavod, honor. To be an anav means to recognize your true worth, but not to impose the consequences upon your friends and neighbors. It means to appreciate your own talents, neither over-emphasizing nor under-selling them, but at the same time refraining from making others aware of your splendid virtues at all times. Anivut means not to demand that people bow and scrape before you because of your talents, abilities, and achievements. Anivut means to recognize your gifts as just that – gifts granted to you by a merciful God, and which possibly you did not deserve. Anivut means not to assume that because you have more competence or greater endowments than others that you thereby become more precious an individual and human being. Anivut means a soft answer to a harsh challenge, silence in the face of abuse, graciousness when receiving honor, dignity in response to humiliation, restraint in the presence of provocation, forbearance and a quiet calm when confronted with calumny and carping criticism.

With this new definition by the Netziv, the statement of Rabbi Joseph becomes comprehensible. When he was told that with the death of Rabbi Judah the Prince there was no more meekness left in the world, he replied with remarkable candor and truthfulness: You must be mistaken, because I, too, am meek. There is no boastfulness here – simply a fact of life. Some people are meek, some are not. If a man says, “I am humble,” then obviously he is not humble; but if a man says, “I am meek,” he may very well be just that. In fact, the Talmud tells us that Rabbi Joseph was at least the equal in scholarship of his colleague, Rabba, but that when the question arose who would head the great Academy in Babylon, Rabbi Joseph deferred to Rabba. And furthermore, all the years that Rabba was chief of the Academy, Rabbi Joseph conducted himself in utter simplicity, to the point where he did all his household duties himself and did not invite any artisan or laborer, physician or barber, to come to his house. He refused to allow himself the least convenience which might make it appear as if he were usurping the dignity of the office and the station occupied by his colleague Rabba. This is, indeed, the quality of meekness – of anivut.

And this meekness was the outstanding characteristic of Moses as revealed in the context of the story related in today’s sidra. Here were Aaron and Miriam, both by all means lesser individuals than Moses, who derived so much of their own greatness from their brother, and yet they were ungrateful and captious and meddled in Moses’ personal life. A normal human being, even a very ethical one, would have responded sharply and quickly. He would have confronted them with their libelous statement, or snapped some sharp rejoinder to them, or at the very least cast upon them a glance of annoyance and irritation. But, “The man Moses was the most meek, more so than any man on the face of the earth.” Although aware of his spiritual achievements, of his role as leader of his people, even of his historical significance for all generations, Moses entertained no feelings of hurt or sensitivity, of injured kavod. There was in his character no admixture of pride, of arrogance, of harshness, of hyper-sensitivity. He had an utter lack of gall and contentiousness. He was, indeed, an anav, more so than any other individual on the face of the earth. And he was able to write those very words without self-consciousness! Hence he did not react at all to the remarks of his brother and sister. Therefore, God said that if Moses is such an anav that he does not defend himself against this offense, I will act for him!

The quality of anivut, as it has been defined by the Netziv, is thus one of the loveliest characteristics to which we can aspire. One need not nourish feelings of inferiority in order to be an anav. Indeed, the greater one is and knows one’s self to be, the greater his capacity for anivut, for meekness. It is the person who pouts arrogantly and reacts sharply and pointedly when his ego is touched who usually reveals thereby feelings of inferiority and worthlessness, of deep shiflut. The individual who feels secure and who recognizes his achievements as real can afford to be meek, to be an anav.

For it is this combination of qualities – inner greatness and outer meekness – that we learn from none other than God Himself. The Talmud (Megilla 31a) put it this way: “Wherever your find mentioned the gedula, the greatness, of God, there also you will find mentioned His anivut.” Thus, for instance, where we are told that God is mighty and awesome, immortal and transcendent, there too we learn that God is close to the widow and the orphan, the stranger and the sick, all those in distress, those overlooked, ignored and alienated from the society of the complacent. God’s anivut certainly does not mean His humility or self-deprecation! It does mean His softness, gentleness, kindliness – His meekness.

Here, then, is a teaching of Judaism which we can ill afford to do without. When we deal with husband or wife, with neighbor or friend, with children or students, with subordinates or employees – we must remember that the harsh word reveals our lack of security, and the impatient rejoinder shows up our lack of self-appreciation and self-respect. It is only when we will have achieved real gedula, true inner worth and greatness, that we shall learn that remarkable, sterling quality of anivut.

Let us leave the synagogue this morning aware of that mutual, reciprocal relationship between greatness and meekness. If we have gedula let us proceed to prove it by developing anivut. And if we doubt whether we really possess gedula then let us begin to acquire it by emulating the greatest of all mortals, Moses, and the immortal Almighty Himself, and practice anivut in all our human relations. If this anivut does not succeed at once in making us truly great, it at least will offer us the dividends of a better character, a happier life, more relaxed social relations, and the first step on the ladder of Jewish nobility of character.

Excerpted from Rabbi Norman Lamm’s Derashot Ledorot: A Commentary for the Ages – Leviticus co-published by OU Press and Maggid Books

In Praise of Impracticality*

Our sidra opens with the words, “And the Lord spoke to Moses at Mount Sinai (behar Sinai), saying…” (Leviticus 25:1). What follows this introduction is a portion that deals with the laws of shemita, the sabbatical year, when the land must lie fallow and all debts be remitted.

The Rabbis were intrigued by one word in that opening verse: the word “behar,” “on the mountain.” Why this special reference to Mount Sinai at this time? The question as they phrased it has come over into Yiddish and Hebrew as an idiomatic way of saying, “What does one thing have to do with the other?” Thus (Torat Kohanim, as quoted by Rashi): “ma inyan shemita eitzel Har Sinai?” “What connection is there between the sabbatical laws and Mount Sinai?” Were not all the laws and commandments enunciated at Mount Sinai? Why then this special mention of shemita in association with Mount Sinai?

Rashi quotes the answer provided by the Rabbis. Permit me, however, to offer an alternative answer: Although Judaism is action-geared oriented to the improvement of humanity and society; although it has a high moral quotient; although it addresses itself to the very real problems of imperfect beings and suffering society; although, in contrast to certain other religions, it is more this-worldly – nevertheless, this concern with the real and the immediate and the empirical has a limit. Not everything in Judaism has to be as practical as an American businessman’s profit-and-loss sheet or as “relevant” as the social activists and the radicals would like it to be. Judaism may not be ancient history – but neither is it journalism.

And this we see from the piquant fact that the laws of shemita were given specifically at Mount Sinai. Laws known as mitzvot hateluyot ba’aretz, commandments whose fulfillment is dependent upon the Land of Israel, were given to the people of Israel before they ever arrived in Eretz Yisrael, the Land of Israel! Agricultural laws were now given, in all their details, to a nomadic tribe without farms, without roots in the soil. Consider what the laws of shemita sounded like to our grandparents as they surrounded Mount Sinai, that baredesert mountain. They must have appeared weird, irrelevant, out of place, impertinent.

And yet, what was true of shemita at Mount Sinai is true of all the commandments at all times. They may seem hopelessly impractical, untimely, and irrelevant to the cold-eyed and hard-headed person, and yet they are the Law of the Lord, obligatory upon Jews at all times and all places.

Indeed, there is hardly anything as irrelevant as the piddling relevancy of the coldly practical person. Show me the man who sees only what is before his eyes, and I will show you a man who cannot see beyond his nose!

What does this praise of the impractical teach us?

First, it tells us simply that there are things that are of value in and of themselves, not only because they are instrumental or lead to other things. Thus, some of the commandments may restrain one’s destructiveness. Others may lead one to improve society or one’s own soul or help the disadvantaged. But some are valuable simply because they were commanded by God. No other reason is necessary.

The same is true of knowledge. There are some kinds of knowledge which may lead to invention and enhance the health of an individual and his convenience. But science is more than technology. There is also such a thing as knowledge for its own sake, knowledge acquired in order to satisfy the natural intellectual curiosity of mankind.

A week ago, Apollo 16 returned from its trip to the moon. Except for those Americans who are so benumbed by the sensational that after the first time a thing is done it becomes a dreadful bore, the exploits of the astronauts kept the world enraptured. And yet consider what a monumental irrelevance the whole project is! The government spends millions of dollars, some of the brightest men in the world donate their talents, three men risk their lives – all in order to study the structure of remote rocks so that we might formulate a theory of when the moon was created and how old it is. “So what?” one might ask. And the answer is: “So everything!”

Yes, there may be legitimate questions about the priorities in our national budget. That is not now our concern. But without a doubt, knowledge, for its own sake, must not be deprecated. The real point, to a small-minded person, sometimes appears to be beside the point.

And the same is true in Judaism. There is the study of Torah for the sake of performance of the mitzvot, or the sake of cohesion of the community, or the sake of raising the level of Jewish observance. But the highest concept of Torah study remains Torah lishma, Torah for its own sake. Here too, there may be a question of priorities in determining the subject matter of Torah. But there is no denying the ultimate and high value of Torah lishma, of study for its own sake.

It was the Jerusalem Talmud (Ĥagiga 2:1) that attributed to the most notorious heretic in Jewish history the opposition to “other-worldly study of Torah.” Elisha ben Abuya, known as Aĥer (“the other one”), is said to have stormed into a classroom, rudely interrupted the teacher, and shouted at the students: “What are you doing here? Why are you wasting your time in such irrelevant material as Torah? You, you must be a builder; you must be a carpenter; you ought to become a fisherman, and you should be a tailor. Do something useful in your lives!” The great heretic was an eminently practical man…

Of course, I do not mean to be cute by espousing impracticality and advocating irrelevance. Total irrelevance is deadening to the spirit and results in what philosophers call solipsism, the divorce from the outside world and experience and the introversion into oneself – and impracticality can become nothing but a semantic excuse for inefficiency and incompetence. What I do mean is that relevance is a good, but not the only one or even the most important one. And while practicality is necessary for the execution of ideals, dreams and visions need not be pre-restrained in the Procrustean bed of a mercantile mentality.

The second point is that sometimes the apparently remote does contain highly significant and very real dimensions, but it is our narrow vision and restricted understanding that does not allow us to expose these obscure insights. Kashrut sometimes is ridiculed in this modern age because it appears superfluous when we consider the sanitary facilities we possess. And yet, those who understand kashrut realize that it has so little to do with sanitation and has so very much to say about reverence for life – and this, in a world in which life is losing its value, in which the approval of abortions is moving into the encouragement of euthanasia. Shatnez and kilayim, the prohibitions against mixing various garments or seeds or animals, has always been held up as a paradigm of non-rational commandments, and yet today we realize how much they have to say to us about ecology and the preservation of the separate species of the universe. The Sabbath laws are meant not only to give us a day of rest, because Sunday in modern America can accomplish that as well. It does tell us that we are not the by-products of a cosmic accident, that we owe our existence to God, and must therefore curb our insufferable pride and collective arrogance.

So, these and many other such illustrations remind us of the need to search beneath the surface of Judaism for teachings that are eminently pertinent.

Third, we must be future-oriented. We must have faith that what is genuinely irrelevant now may someday become most relevant and meaningful as a result of our ability to carry on heroically despite present irrelevance and impracticality. What today seems visionary may prove indispensable to tomorrow’s very real need.

The Rabbis were fond of saying, “The words of Torah and the Sages are ‘poor’ in one place (bimkom zeh) and ‘rich’ in another (bimkom aĥer)” (Yerushalmi Rosh HaShana 3:5). By this they meant to say that sometimes the text of Torah will seem utterly narrow and superficial, teaching very little indeed. It is only when we compare it with another text, in another context, that we can appreciate how genuinely deep and insightful it really is. I would like to paraphrase that passage, switching from “makom” to “zeman” – thus: It sometimes happens that the words of Torah in one epoch may seem to be thin and insignificant; it is only later, at another time, that the same words stand revealed as possessing unspeakable richness of insight and teaching.

Take the most striking example: the hope for Jerusalem, whose fifth anniversary of liberation we celebrate later this week.

If we have the privilege to commemorate the reunion of people and city, of Israel and Jerusalem, we must acknowledge our debt to a hundred generations of Jews and Jewesses who since the year 70 have been wild dreamers, impractical idealists, possessed of visions impossible of execution; Jews who turned to Jerusalem three times a day in prayer; who when they ate bread thanked God for bread and for Jerusalem; who mentioned Jerusalem when they fasted and when they feasted; who brought little packets of dust of Jerusalem during their lifetime in order to take it along with them in their coffins on their long journey to eternity; who arose at midnight for tikun ĥatzot, to lament over Jerusalem, and at every happy occasion promised to return there.

If we live in Jerusalem today, it is because of those unsophisticated visionaries who wanted at least to die in it.

If we can visit Jerusalem this year, it is thanks to those other-worldly dreamers who sang “leshana haba’a biYerushalayim” – at least let us be there next year.

If we can happily laugh – “az yimalei seĥok pinu,” “then our mouth will be full of laughter” (Psalms 126:2) – it is in large measure the work of those who did not realize how irrelevant they were, how impossible their dreams were, and who prayed to return there, thus daring and braving and risking the derisive laughter of legions of practical people who simply “knew” that we were finished, and that Jerusalem would never become a Jewish city again.

It is only because of generations of bridegrooms who concluded every wedding by stomping on a glass, its shattering fragments recalling the ĥurban habayit (the destruction of Jerusalem), and proclaiming, “If I forget you O Jerusalem, let my right hand fail” (Psalms 137:5), that today we can defy the whole world, East and West, and say: Never again shall you separate us from Jerusalem, not Capitalists and not Communists, not Muslims and not even Christians who have lately discovered that Jerusalem is important to them.

Jerusalem Day is a tribute to this special Jewish brand of impracticality and irrelevance.

So, “ma inyan shemita eitzel Har Sinai?” – What is the association or connection between the sabbatical laws and Mount Sinai? First, it is to tell us that not everything need be relevant; second, that not everything that appears irrelevant really is; and third, that what is irrelevant today may be the most important fact of life tomorrow. This lesson too is part of the heritage of Sinai. Indeed, without it all the rest is in jeopardy. With it, all the rest will prevail too, bimheira beyameinu, speedily in our day.

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* May 6, 1972

Excerpted from Rabbi Shmuel Goldin’s Unlocking the Torah Text – Vayikra, co-published by OU Press and Gefen Publishers.

Context

Roughly midpoint in the text of the Torah, at the culmination of the series of vital interpersonal laws of Parshat Kedoshim, lies a three-word mandate considered by sages such as Hillel and Rabbi Akiva to be the foundation of all Torah law: V’ahavta l’reiacha kamocha, “And you shall love your fellow as yourself.”

Questions

How can the Torah demand the impossible? How can God insist that I should love everyone – even a passing acquaintance or, for that matter, even a stranger – as I love myself? Such a requirement seems well beyond our reach.

To go a step further, as many sages note, this demand is not only antithetical to human nature but contrary to practical halachic dictate. The Ramban points out that the very same Rabbi Akiva, who considers this commandment to be “the fundamental rule of the Torah,” elsewhere maintains: “Your life takes precedence over the life of your friend.”

Practical application of this latter mandate, the Talmud explains, indicates that if two individuals are traveling in the desert and one of them carries a flask that holds enough water for only one to survive and reach civilization, the individual who possesses the water should not share with his co-traveler. His own need to survive takes precedence over any responsibility he might have towards his fellow.

We are thus faced, the Ramban argues, with a clear halachic contradiction…

If the Torah’s commandment of V’ahavta literally means that I must “love my fellow as [I love] myself,” I should have no right to withhold life-saving sustenance from another, even at the cost of my own survival. I should be required to consider his immediate welfare as precious to me as my own!

Approaches

–A–
Rabbinic recognition of the difficulties inherent in the commandment V’ahavta l’reiacha kamocha is evidenced in a number of sources.

When, for example, a potential convert demands to be taught the entire Torah “while standing on one foot,” Hillel chooses this commandment as the foundation all of Jewish law. He does not, however, quote the text directly. Instead, he transposes the directive into the more palatable (and limited) negative: “What is hateful to you do not do to your fellow.”

Elsewhere, the rabbis find concrete application for the edict of V’ahavta in disparate areas ranging from marriage to capital punishment. Their search appears to mirror a desire to find distinct, limited spheres of law where the text’s formulation can be applied without contradicting other halachic precepts.

–B–
Can, however, the sweeping majesty of this edict, described by Rabbi Akiva as the fundamental precept of the Torah, be preserved?

Can the text be understood as written, without editorial change and without limiting its application to narrow areas of the law?

–C–
Some scholars maintain that the problems associated with the text should be addressed through a simple change of focus. The term kamocha, “as yourself,” they claim, is not an adverb defining the boundaries of commanded love (as in: love your fellow “as you love yourself”). It is, instead, an adjective delineating the basis of fellowship (as in: love your fellow “who is as yourself”). Since all men are created in the image of God, the Torah maintains, all are kamocha, “similar to you,” and all are, therefore, deserving of your love.

This approach avoids the issues raised above. The text is not commanding us to love others as we love ourselves, a commandment problematic in both behavioral and halachic terms. The Torah is instead informing us why we should love others in the first place: “Love your fellow,” who is, after all, “as yourself” – created, like you, in God’s image and, therefore, worthy of your love.

Nehama Leibowitz finds support for this approach in a similar biblical passage: “The stranger [convert] who dwells with you shall be like the native-born among you; and you shall love him kamocha, as yourself, for you were strangers in the land of Egypt.”

In this case, Leibowitz maintains, the last phrase of the commandment clearly reflects back on the meaning of the term kamocha. Effectively, the text states: You should love the stranger, for he is like you. After all, you were once strangers in the land of Egypt.

–D–
Other authorities, including the Ramban and the Chizkuni, choose another, bolder, path.

They maintain that the commonly accepted translation of the phrase “V’ahavta l’reiacha kamocha” is incorrect. Had the Torah meant to say, “Love your fellow, as yourself,” the text should have read: V’ahavta et reiacha kamocha.”

Literally, as written, the text before us translates as “Love for your fellow, as for yourself.

An overwhelmingly powerful lesson is thus transmitted by this passage, as explained by the Ramban:

Sometimes an individual may wish well for his fellow only in specific areas. He may wish him wealth but not wisdom and the like; and, even if he wishes him well in all areas – desiring that his beloved fellow attain wealth, honor, learning and wisdom – he will still not want him to achieve the same level that he, himself, achieves. He will still desire to be superior to his fellow [my italics].

The Torah, therefore, commands that the individual eradicate such selfish jealousy from his heart; that he should love [desire] well for his friend – as he would want for himself – without limits or reservations.

Through the eyes of these scholars, the Torah is not demanding the impossible – only the overwhelmingly difficult. Capping the list of interpersonal laws of Parshat Kedoshim is the one commandment that sums them all up: Truly desire for others what you desire for yourself. If you can achieve that level of love, all the other obligations between you and those around you will be easily met.

Points to Ponder

Sometimes limiting the scope can increase the burden…

By placing the commandment of V’ahavta l’reiacha kamocha within our reach, scholars such as the Ramban and the Chizkuni actually make the Torah’s demands upon us more difficult. As long as the commandment remained impossible to attain, we were “safe.” We could be proud to be part of a people whose tradition included this wonderful idea of V’ahavta l’reiacha kamocha, yet avoid its practical implications. We could repeat the words as a litany, admire their poetic majesty; but remain beyond their claim on our behavior. Who, after all, could possibly be expected to love someone as himself? Clearly, the Torah could not be talking to us.

Our escape is thwarted, however by the rereading of the text.

Truly desire for others what you desire for yourself.

This commandment is attainable, albeit with great difficulty. Conformance requires the cultivation of the purest of hearts; a soul that can truly rejoice in the success and happiness of others without the taint of jealousy. It means that a student rejected for medical school must be as happy over the admission of his friend as if he, himself, had made the grade; that a young single man or woman, actively seeking a shidduch (marital match), must rejoice wholeheartedly at the wedding of his/her friend; that an individual denied a promotion must feel gratitude for the promotion of his colleagues to that very same spot.

The challenge is far from easily met, but the potential rewards are great. If each of us cultivates a heart that truly desires for others what we desire for ourselves – without jealousy, bitterness and rancor – we will each learn to rest easy with our own life accomplishments, as well.

 

Excerpted from Rabbi Norman Lamm’s Derashot Ledorot – A Commentary for the Ages: Leviticus, co-published by OU Press, Maggid Books, and YU Press; edited by Stuart W. Halpern

God, Man, and State*

The conjunction of the two sidrot we read today, Tazria and Metzora, is remarkable. The first speaks of birth, the second of a kind of death (a leper is considered partially dead; see Nedarim 64b). Tazria describes the joyous acceptance into the fold of a new Jew by means of brit mila, circumcision, while Metzora tells of the expulsion of the leper from the community.

Yet, these two portions are read on the same Shabbat with no interruption between them. The tension between these two opposites, this dialectic between birth and death, between pleasure and plague, between rejoicing and rejecting, speaks to us about the human condition as such and the existence of the Jew specifically. Even more, this tension contains fundamental teachings of Judaism that are relevant to the problems of the State of Israel whose eighteenth birthday we shall be celebrating this Monday.

After delineating the laws of childbirth, the Torah in the first sidra gives us the laws of circumcision. The Midrash Tanhuma (Tazria 7) relates a fascinating conversation concerning this Jewish law. We are told that Turnus Rufus, a particularly vicious Roman commander during the Hadrianic persecutions in Palestine, spoke to Rabbi Akiva, the revered leader of our people. He asked Rabbi Akiva: “Which is more beautiful: the work of God or the work of man?” Rabbi Akiva answered: “The work of man.” Turnus Rufus was visibly disturbed by the answer. He continued: “Why do you circumcise your children?” Rabbi Akiva said: “My first reply serves as an answer to this question as well.” Whereupon Rabbi Akiva brought before the Roman commander stalks of wheat and loaves of good white bread. He said to the Roman: “Behold, these are the works of God, and these are the works of man. Are not the works of man more beautiful and useful?” Said the Roman to Rabbi Akiva: “But if God wants people to be circumcised why are they not born circumcised?” Rabbi Akiva replied: “God gave the mitzvot to Israel letzaref bahen, to temper or purify His people thereby.”

Here is the triumphant Roman commander, activist, arrogant, proud, and power-drunk. In an attitude of contempt, he faces the aged Jewish leader of this conquered people, a man who proclaims that the greatest principle of life is the study of Torah. What can these otherworldly mystics know about the world, about reality, about life? So he taunts the old rabbi: How come you circumcise your children? Do you not believe that man, as God’s creation, is already born perfect?

But the Roman pagan is amazed by the response: No! All of Judaism – its philosophy, its Torah, its mitzvot – is based upon the premise that God withheld perfection from His creation, that He only began the task and left it to man, His tzellem, His image, to complete. In Genesis 2:3, we are taught that God rested from creating the world “which God created to do” – and Rabbi Samson Raphael Hirsch interpreted that to mean that God created the world for man “to do.” Therefore, Rabbi Akiva shows Turnus Rufus the wheat stalks and the white breads to teach him that God has created wheat because He wants man to do something with it. It is God’s will that human beings make the created world more beautiful and more perfect. No wonder that in the Jewish view science and technology play such a positive role. No wonder that religious Jewry has contributed so mightily, throughout the ages and today as well, to the advancement of science and the control of nature.

Therefore, too, the mitzvot, and especially circumcision, were revealed to Israel to teach that people must act in order to perfect themselves and the world, and in the process, letzaref bahen, to purify themselves and fulfill all their sublime potentialities.

Indeed, Rabbi Akiva himself exemplified this great principle. He was, on the one hand, one of the saintliest spirits in all our history. The Talmud, in imaginative grasp of the truth, tells us that when Moses ascended Mount Sinai to receive the Torah and he saw the sacred soul of Rabbi Akiva, he protested to God that Akiva was more worthy to be the bearer of Torah than he, Moses, was. And yet, on the other hand, it was the same Rabbi Akiva who did not isolate himself in the academy, but became the sponsor of Bar Kokhba, the great Jewish general who led the revolution against Rome.

This, then, is what mila teaches us: “The work of flesh and blood is beautiful indeed.” The world is an uncompleted creation; man’s fate is to finish it. This is the principle of activism. The State of Israel was built by people who perceived this Jewish principle. They were the ones who refused to stand aside, outside of the stream of history, but who actively took upon themselves to rebuild Jewish statehood. Their activity was in full keeping with the Jewish tradition as taught by the law of mila. More than enough Jewish blood was spilled in the effort, and the sweat and tears invested shall never be forgotten.

Yet, this is only half the story. There is an opposite danger. If man is indeed a creator, then there is the peril that he will become intoxicated with power and self-delusions, that he will begin boasting and bragging and proclaiming bombastically, “My own power and my own strength have performed all this” (Deuteronomy 8:17). When he circumcises his child, he tends to forget that a healthy child is the gift of God. When he bakes his bread, he does not always realize that the wheat came from God’s earth. When he builds his state, he ignores the fact that without the divine promise to Abraham and divine guidance throughout the ages there would be no Jews to build the Jewish state. When he is self-completing, he tends to become, in his imagination, self-creating. He is self-finishing and thinks that he is therefore self-made; and God spare us from self-made men!

To help us avoid this dangerous delusion, we have the teachings of Metzora. Just as Tazria and mila warn us to avoid the passivism that issues from a misunderstanding of faith, so Metzora and the law of the banishing of the leper outside the camp teach us to avoid the fatal illusion that issues from faithlessness. Just as one sidra tells us to circumcise the flesh and assert our manhood, so the second tells us to circumcise the heart and serve our God.

The great medieval scholar Rabbi Elazar of Worms explains the law of Metzora and this banishment outside the camp by means of a comment on a famous verse in the Psalms (49:13), “Man abideth not in honor; he is like the beasts that perish.” Man, says Rabbi Elazar, is born naked and ignorant, without understanding and intelligence. But God puts him on his feet, grants him wisdom and insight, feeds him and clothes him and makes him great. But then man forgets and does not understand that all this glory came to him from his God. Therefore, he becomes like a beheima, a mere animal. An animal is not kept at home, but sent out to pasture; he is unfit to live in a truly human community. So a person who forgets God is a metzora, is morally sick, and must be sent outside the camp of his or her peers. The leper symbolizes the individual who acquired self-confidence at the cost of fidelity to God and therefore is reduced to the role of a beast.

Mankind, then, must be co-creator with God. Tazria teaches that we must imitate our Maker; Metzora reminds us not to impersonate our God, not to be imposters. One sidra stresses the virtue of human commission, the other – the virtue of human submission to God.

Indeed, in an insight brimming with tremendous significance, the eminent Italian-Jewish thinker Rabbi Moshe of Trani finds this second principle in the commandment of mila itself. Just as circumcision teaches that man must act, so its particular designation for the eighth day teaches that his actions must not lead to the mere amassing of power and self-importance. Rather, man must acknowledge and reach out to the Creator of all the world. The number seven, Rabbi Moshe teaches, is the symbol of nature. Seven is the number of days in the week, the unit of time which establishes the rhythm of our lives. The earth, itself agricultural, follows a seven year cycle in Judaism – that of the shemita. The number seven, therefore, stands for this world in its fullness. The number eight, however, is beyond seven – it teaches that you must transcend what seven symbolizes, you must go beyond nature and reach out for the supernatural, for God, He who creates nature. Were mila on the seventh day, then the duty of man would be to correct the imperfections of Nature, but forever to stay within it as nothing more than a clever animal. But mila was commanded for the eighth day, to teach that the purpose of all man’s activity, the purpose of his work on Nature, is to elevate himself beyond the perfection of body and mind, beyond the conquest of the world, beyond technology. When man controls his environment, he fulfills the number seven; when he controls his instincts, he reaches the number eight. His technology is symbolized by the number seven; his theology by eight. Mila on the eighth day teaches that man must not only complete himself but must grow beyond himself; he must yearn and aspire to something higher. It signifies not only mila but brit; not only a surgical cut, but the sign of the covenant, a contract with God sealed in blood. It means that if a human being will not strive to be more than human, he must become less than human, an animal: “He is like the beasts that perish” (Psalms 49:13). Then, man becomes a metzora, and like an animal, must be sent out “hutz lamahaneh,” outside the camp of human beings.

Indeed, this is the crucial problem concerning the character of the State of Israel: Is it to be the symbol of seven, or the symbol of eight? Will it be just a natural state, or something higher, something nobler? If Israel will be only natural, a state like all others, a small sliver of real estate on the shores of the Mediterranean, considered nothing more than the creation of the Hagana and Sabra ingenuity, then it has no special claim on Jewish communities throughout the world – no more than its population warrants. It has no right to messianic pretenses. Such a conception places it hutz lamahaneh, outside the purview of authentic Jewish history, an aberration. It is then in defiance of the covenant; it is the way of tuma, impurity. Only by fulfilling the symbol of eight, of loyalty to the covenant of God, of Torah, does it go the way of tahara, of purity and rebirth, of joyous fulfillment of the historic dreams and prayers and prophecies of our history.

This, then, is the real problem on this eve of the eighteenth birthday of the State of Israel: Will it be mila or brit? Surgery or covenant? Tazria or Metzora? Tahara or tuma? Striving to be more than a natural human political entity, or falling to a mere natural group which, under the impress of secular nationalism, often becomes beastly (“he is like the beasts that perish”)?

Such decisions are never made all at once. They involve long processes measured in historic time, certainly more than eighteen years. Many facts will determine the answer, and not the least of them will be the spiritual leadership in the state under the resolute stewardship of our distinguished and revered guest, His Eminence, Chief Rabbi Unterman, may he live and be well. Their enormously difficult task is to be both responsive to their fellow Israelis and responsible to our Heavenly Father. Like the kohanim in our sidra, they must confront all Jews, the perfectly pure and perilously impure. Sometimes it is their unhappy and tragic task to say to a man: “tamei,” “You are impure – you must go out!” Yet their greater and nobler task is to teach this same tamei to return, to bring Jews back into the historic community of Israel, to train all Jews in the way of the Torah’s tahara. It is by no means a simple duty; it is, in fact, unenviably difficult. Our hopes and good wishes and our prayers for divine guidance and blessings go to Chief Rabbi Unterman and his distinguished colleagues in this historic mission.

We have spoken of brit mila in relation to the State of Israel. The eighteenth birthday also has another significance – “ shemone esrei lehuppa” (Avot 5:22), the eighteenth year is traditionally the year of marriage. Let us conclude then by extending our wishes to Israel in a manner appropriate to both events. Let us all wish the State of Israel divine blessings – leTorah lehuppa ulema’asim tovim. May it be a future of Torah in which Israel will accept the divine word and turn to its Father in Heaven. May it be the time of huppa, the marriage of hearts between Israel and Jews throughout the world. And then, having returned to God and to Jews throughout the world, may Israel become the shining beacon of ma’asim tovim, of good deeds and noble living, throughout the world and for all mankind – leTorah lehuppa ulema’asim tovim, amen.

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* April 23, 1966