Sh'lach L'cha

Numbers 13:1−15:41

Sticks And Stoned

The person who gathered wood on Shabbat in Parashat Shlah violated the atmosphere of tranquility, essential to experiencing the full spirituality of Shabbat.

By Rabbi Avraham Fischer

After the tragic incident of the scouts (Meraglim), as a consequence of which the generation of the Exodus is sentenced to live out the rest of its existence in the wilderness, we learn of the Mekoshesh, the one who collected wood on the Shabbat day:

"And the Children of Israel were in the desert, and they found a man who collected wood on the Shabbat day.

And those who found him collecting wood bought him [close] to Moshe and to Aharon and to all the congregation. And they placed him in the jail, because it was not explained what should be done to him" (Numbers 15:32-34).

Rashi, quoting the Talmud (Sanhedrin 41a), says that the Mekoshesh was warned by witnesses, yet he ignored them and continued collecting wood. Although it was known that a Shabbat desecrator is sentenced to death, thus far the manner of execution had not been taught. Hashem instructs them to stone him, and the sentence is carried out.

Many details of this incident are shrouded in mystery:

When did this occur? Rashi, based on the Sifri, says that it was during the second Shabbat in the wilderness. Ramban (Nachmanides) claims, according to the simple meaning of the text, it happened after the incident of the scouts.

Who was the Mekoshesh? Rabbi Akiva identifies him as Tzelofechad (Rashi, B'midbar 27:3). Rabbi Yehudah ben Betera insists that we are not meant to know who he is.

What was his sin? The Talmud (Shabbat 96b) quotes a three-way dispute regarding the precise melakha (category of work) that he violated: 1) plucking, which is a sub-category of harvesting; 2) heaping, a sub-category of making sheaves; 3) carrying four-cubits' distance in a public domain.

What were his intentions? A straightforward reading suggests that his wood-collecting was an act of rebellion against Shabbat. But some midrashim (including the Targum Yonatan) insist that the Mekoshesh acted l'shem shamayim (for the sake of heaven), in noble self-sacrifice, to show the Jewish people that the Shabbat must be observed.

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B'haalot'cha

Numbers 8:1−12:16

How The Trouble Began

The Israelites' troubles, and indeed our own troubles, begin when we turn away from God.

By Rabbi Avraham Fischer 

In the aftermath of a national calamity, we try to reconstruct the events that led to the tragedy.

We try to locate the turning point, in the belief that there was a precise moment at which, had we been aware, we might have prevented the catastrophe.

To be sure, the Children of Israel were sentenced to die in the desert because of the sin of the scouts (Meraglim), as we will read in Parshat Shlah Lekha. However, the first signs of dissolution emerge in B'ha'alotkha.

The verses, “And it was, when the ark set forward, that Moshe said, ‘Rise up, Hashem, and let Your enemies be scattered, and let them that hate You flee before You.’ And when it rested, he said, ‘Return Hashem to the myriads and thousands of Israel.’” are set off with two inverted letters--n'oon to mark the end of the idyllic condition described at the beginning of the book of Bamidbar (ch. 1-10)--the order, purposefulness and unity--and the onset of deterioration:

And the people were as complainers of evil in the ears of Hashem, and Hashem heard and His anger was kindled; and a fire of Hashem burned within them and it consumed at the edge of the camp (11:1).

These are the troubles that culminated in the sin of the Scouts.

Actually, the Rabbis say (Shabbat 116a) that verses 10:35-36 are set off "to separate the earlier calamity from the later calamity," suggesting that the first signs of trouble were evident even before the people's grumbling. The Torah wants to avoid mentioning too many accusations against them in succession, hence the separation. The first hint of dissonance, the Sages claim, is in:

And they journeyed from the mountain of Hashem a distance of three days, with the Ark of the Covenant of Hashem traveling before them a distance of three days, to search out a resting place for them (10:33).

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Naso

Numbers 4:21−7:89

The Service Of Song

The duty of the Levites to accompany the Tabernacle service with music and song reminds us to serve God with joy.

By Rabbi Avraham Fischer 

The G-d-centric, Torah-centric, Mishkan (Tabernacle)-centric Israelite camp described in the opening section of the Book of B'midbar [Numbers] is ordered, sanctified and serene.

A census of the population is taken. The tribe of Levi is counted separately, and their holy tasks in the Mishkan are assigned:

All those that were numbered, whom Moshe and Aharon and the princes of Israel counted of the Levites according to their families and according to their fathers’ houses; from thirty years old and upward, until fifty years old, all those who come to perform service to a service (avodat avodah) and the service of carrying in the Tent of Meeting. Their accounts were 8,580. According to the word of Hashem through Moshe did he appoint them, each one to his service and to his burden, and those that were numbered constituted that which Hashem had commanded Moshe (Bamidbar 4:46-49).

Two Categories of Service The Levites’ duties fall into two distinct categories of service. The service of carrying is obviously the transporting of the parts of the Mishkan from place to place in the desert, a responsibility that would become superfluous once the people would enter the land of Israel. But, what is service to a service (avodat avodah)?

This is not the first time such a dichotomy has been employed by the Torah. Verse 24 speaks of the service of the families of the Gershon-division of the tribe of Levi: to serve (la’avod) and to carry (l’masah).

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B'midbar

Numbers 1:1−4:20

Questioning Chronology

The lack of chronological order in Parashat B'midbar allows expressions of God's love for Israel to precede the trials and tribulations of desert wandering.
It is surprising that the sometimes tumultuous book of B'midbar commences with such a prosaic passage as the taking of a census:

And Hashem spoke to Moshe in the wilderness of Sinai, in the Tent of Meeting, on the first day of the second month, in the second year of their coming out from the land of Egypt, saying: Take a census of all the congregation of the Children of Israel by their families, by their fathers' houses, with the number of names, every male by their head count (B'midbar 1:1-2).

Censuses, here and later (chapter 26), give this book its Rabbinic name Pekudim (accounts), and its English name (based on the Septuagint), Numbers.

Nevertheless, when we look ahead to what will transpire in this book--the conflicts, the rebellions, the instabilities and the crushing disappointments--we are struck by the uncharacteristic placidity of its opening section, discussing the census and the careful ordering of the encampments.

It is particularly hard to understand why B'midbar opens this way when we consider that it could have been otherwise. A close reading reveals that the Torah changes conventional chronology in order to start with the census. Rashi, Ibn-Ezra, (12th-century Spain) and Ramban (Nachmanides) agree that, at the beginning of the Israelites' second year in the wilderness, the seven days of ordaining the Kohanim (priests) (Vayikra, chapter 8) and the 12 days of dedication of the altar (B'midbar, chapter 7) all precede the census.

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