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Introduction
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We start the fourth book of the Torah, which will cover the bulk of the time in the wilderness. B'midbar -- also related to the word for speaking and even things (d-b-r). So a possible translation of the first pasuk (verse) could be: "And God spoke to Moshe in the talkings of Sinai in the tent of (season, holiday, feast, meeting, time, habits, committees), at the beginning of the second month of the second year since the exit for the tight places, saying:" The tent could even be called the tent of prophecy, of warnings.
WOW -- there is definitely a clue here that there are hidden meaning throughout this book, at least if we read carefully. And this Parsha is powerful in that area. It would be easy to read this Parsha and say, "Oh, this is abut dividing responsibilities and who does what as they camp in the wilderness and prepare to do battle with....." and that would be one reading -- the surface one, to be sure.
And yet there is a little snippet of key information here -- and I am not sure that Moshe and Aharon and his sons really got it, either. Even they were still human and made mistakes. (See below to see what I might have seen)
And that makes me wonder -- how many times do we miss the little key that later, if we saw it, heard it, recognized it, would make such a difference. But our lives are so busy that we miss more than we see -- and sometimes we see more than IS there, because we are also so busy. Moshe and Aharon were busy, too. They had a people to tend to, new rituals to learn and teach and new laws to implement and explain and, and, and. Even in the wilderness, in all the talking, life is so busy, so hectic.
And the more we 'advance' the more it stays the same. I always learned in school the "nature abhors a vacuum" and I could understand that -- as soon as I cleared out a drawer or the top of my desk, nature abhorred that vacuum and filled that empty space.... and so it is with our lives.
If we have a few 'empty' moments, we fill it with distractions, opiates that keep us from thinking, really thinking. It might be the beautiful flowers, the wonderful movie, that recipe that Mom used to cook, that screwdriver that shouldn't be on the counter, the junk mail that comes every day. "But I look at the flowers to appreciate God," I hear you say -- and that might be true -- and it might not be.
What determines what is 'work' and what is distraction -- I think it is two things -- what we do and how we do it. Are we fully present? Are we learning? It is beautiful to take in the majesty of Nature, the colors, the sounds, the smells. But are we riding on a wave of 'stuff' (endorphins) or are we getting closer to the One, to the Mystery of it all? Some times, when I stand outside in my yard first thing in the morning (I take my dogs outside every morning, so I stand under the open sky amid the plants in my yard -- rain, snow, dark or light), I try to take in everything and acknowledge it -- some times I fall short. The rains are a pain, I'm cold, there's a lot to do today, whatever. Other days, I am able to work on myself through it. Some times, on those days, I bow deeply and come up with my arms stretching as wide as they can and just breathe. Sometimes I just stand there, breathing. Feeling each breath, starting, in, held and out.
Bowing didn't used to come easy to me. "Jews don't bow" some say -- and that is only half of the sentence -- it is "Jews don't bow in worship to anyone BUT the One" -- and we do bow to Him. The word Barukh -- the start of every blessing -- is about bowing. The shoresh, the root, b-r-ch, carries all of this: knee, elbow, to bless, to greet, to congratulate, in softness, in tenderness, in gentleness, pool, pond, cistern, lagoon, gift, present -- and more. This is the power of Hebrew -- the imagery, the subtlety, the shades and intertwining.
This is the basis behind the words: "As we Bless the Source of Life, so we are Blessed." If we can truly bow to the One, giving up our own ego and control, then, as we bow fully and fully present, the pool of tenderness and enveloping softness will be there, below our knees and we will be able to take up the gift of the water and lift it up above us that it may sprinkle and flow over us.
When I experience these moments it always amazes me -- it doesn't matter that yesterday was a bad day and that I didn't get to this place -- I am welcome whenever I allow myself to go there. I have never felt punished that I didn't do it the day before, regardless of the reason. I am always amazed that the joy I feel when I do 'let myself go there' is, in fact, not just my joy, but Her joy also, inviting me and enveloping me.
And then, if I stay completely quiet for just a moment, without the clatter of my everyday life and worries and ego, I may just hear the words that hold the keys.
Candy Lobb
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1. Parsha details: Num 1:1-4:20 ( tri 3:14-4:20 ) [ Haftorah Hosea 2:1-22 ]
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2. Questions and a few observations
Summary: Naming of the Chiefs of each tribe and the number of able-bodied men in each tribe. Tasks of the Levites. Positions of the tribes as they camp around the tabernacle and teams of armies (4 sets of three tribes) and their captains. Placing Aharon and his sons over the Levites and the counting of Levites as redemption of the first-born sons of the rest of Yisra'el, their responsibilities and placements of their camps. The duties of Aharon and his sons when things are to be moved and the warning about the K'hatim.
Wow, what a warning. (Num 4:18-20) So simply stated that not much is said about it, and yet it is screaming with information. Every once in a while, there are a few words of Torah that are so powerful, so deep, that I am amazed we don't just read the few pasukim and sh'ma, listen, really listen. This is such a shiyur, a lesson.
Let's look at it in detail. Below is Soncino's translation. Fox's translation explains that 20 talks about the dismantling of the Holy Shrine.
"18. Do not cut off the tribe of the families of the Kohathites from among the Levites;
19. But thus do to them, that they may live, and not die, when they approach the most holy things; Aaron and his sons shall go in, and appoint them each to his service and to his burden;
20. But they shall not go in to see when the holy things are covered, lest they die."
Even read this way, there is something to raise questions here. Who are the K'hatim? Well, K'hat was a son of Levi, the second of four children named (3 boys and 1 girl). He had four sons, the first of whom was Amram and the second was Yitz'har (father of Korakh -- whom we will meet in much greater detail). Amram had three recorded children, Aharon, Miryam and Moshe. Are the curtains starting to part?
So let's dig a bit farther -- names are very important in Torah. K-H-T is the root for dull, sodden. So we might read this pasuk as "Don't you kheret the clan, the dull, sodden families, from the tribe of Levi." (We'll talk about kheret in a moment).
If we look at the next pasuk, it might be translated as "And this you will do with them, and they will live and not die when they approach the Holy of Holies: Aharon and his sons will come in with them and give them, man by man, their work, their load." That fits with the idea that Aharon's cousins may not totally 'get' the picture.... or maybe there is more here...
The next pasuk is: "And they shall not come in to see [at all] when the holy things are dismantled and die." Take a moment and let some of these concepts meander in your mind for a while. What's going on here?
Family dynamics? Probably. Group politics? Also probably. Also one of those things that tell a lot about the nature of what Torah talks about. This is the kind of detail that would either by deleted or expounded on if somebody wrote the details of this account later in history (read Parsha Korakh (Num 16:1) to see why). But it is just a little 'blurb' inserted here almost casually. A detail remembered, but not heeded.
Ahhhhhhh. So let's turn to 'kheret' for a moment. This word can have various readings, from a premature death, to making a covenant, to bringing down or undermining. (Hebrew is wonderful for layers of meaning)
And Torah places the responsibility on Aharon and his sons. And Torah talks about the rebellion of Korakh later, but it does not tie it back here. Perhaps the lesson is more for us, than for the ancient times.
How many times do we say "Hindsight is 20-20", meaning if we had only paid attention to some little (or big) details early on,..... Is this the case here? Perhaps.
The Levi'im assist the Cohanim, that's much of what this Parsha is about. The Levi'im do not fight in battle, they take care of the Tent and its parts. The Levi'im will not inherit land, they will be taken care of as they assist the Cohanim. In fact, in this Parsha, they are 'given' to Aharon and his sons. For many of them, this was probably a great arrangement. Not a bad job, if you will. However, the closer to Aharon one is by family, the more one might also feel like an 'also ran' (Why were YOU picked...).
The work of a Cohen is one that takes extreme presence of mind. They are dealing with potentially very dangerous things and not being fully present and careful and precise already cost two of Aharon's sons their lives. And family often fails to see the whole picture. They see our failings and our shortcomings, our profaneness. And sometimes they are jealous of good things that happen.
Perhaps the K'hatim are not dull and sodden, but clever and ambitious or even just fascinated with the working of the Holy things? Perhaps, if they saw the dismantling they would see something that would encourage them to go where they shouldn't. Or perhaps they would see a moment or two when Aharon and his sons were not 'fully present' and thought "Gee, this Priest thing is easy -- I could do it". Well, I am not sure what they would see, but I get the message that they shouldn't have been allowed into the area alone and certainly not where they could see pieces-parts.
Perhaps their 'dullness' was an inability to keep focused on the task and they might be tempted to tinker here or there. In any event, Aharon and his sons were to keep a watchful eye on them and deal with them one by one. Perhaps that is also a key. They were individuals with individual needs, who needed to be acknowledged as individuals, not as a lump. Perhaps if Aharon and his sons worked closely with them they would have seen the trouble of a dozen more chapters before it erupted.
But this was a busy time of organizing camps and armies and details. It is easy to forget the little things when you are so busy. Perhaps family problems might be lessened if we paid attention iysh-iysh, one by one or individually, making sure each one is sure what they are to do and what we expect of them. And perhaps we need to guard the Holy things, lest we allow them to appear profane as we dismantle them?
Torah leaves the ultimate lesson to us in her silence, in her white space.
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3. Some Observations
Perhaps there is another lesson here as well. This Parsha reads very well and is relatively 'closed' -- not many separated sections. The three pasukim that I talked about above form the maftir, the last part of the Parsha (the part traditionally read by the Bar or Bat Mitzvah or the one who has the honor of reading the Haftorah). And so it carries some extra weight.
This Parsha is about establishing order and organizing things and people. That is a necessary function, to be sure. And yet, future grief and strife will come from those close to Aharon and Moshe. When the rebellion actually surfaces before Moshe, he will "fall on his face". We get the feeling that he will be surprised by it.
And yet the warnings is here.
The priesthood and the leadership of Yisra'el costs Moshe and Aharon dearly. Aharon has already lost two sons and must maintain placid leadership in spite of this. Moshe has a wife and two sons, but we hear very little about them. Again, the white space speaks. Was Moshe simply not showing favoritism to his family? Or was he so involved in the day-to-day running of his office that there wasn't much room for family? Powerful parents sometimes overshadow their children -- is that what we see here?
Perhaps Moshe and Aharon are so occupied with the camp arrangement and the organizing of the armies and who is in charge of the thousands and who does what that they missed the warning to do things iysh-iysh, with personal attention and one by one.
And again, this is the wonderful thing about Torah -- it shows us that even Moshe is not perfect. And so we can learn from his mistakes and oversights -- if we chose to.
An email I received yesterday comes to mind. It said: "Learn from the mistakes of others. You won't live long enough to make all of them yourself." another part of it said: "Keep looking around. There's always something you've missed."
And so, I am sure there are many more lessons in this Parsha -- even though we might think it applied only to a time in the wilderness. But then, we all create our own wildernesses.
I am also fascinated that the word for wilderness is related to the word for word, speak, things. Are we creating a wilderness in this age of so much information? ("data, data everywhere, but not a thought to think?) Are we getting lost in information overload and in getting files in order and putting people or things in charge of things that we miss the individual?
Perhaps some quiet meditation will allow things to percolate to the surface so that we don't miss the warnings of our own rebellions when we might have been able to do something about it. Once again, balance is a key. Even the clusters of beautiful lilacs in my back yard are the collections of individual flowers -- the rose is a collection of individual petals. And if any of those petals get crushed, the whole rose suffers.
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4. Purifying Contraction
This week's Parsha is about Purifying Contraction. One needs to pull back from running everything so that others may blossom. Control is one of our most destructive forces, both to ourselves and to others. This Parsha is about knowing what is reasonable and necessary and what is overdoing it. Even when we 'delegate', we may be 'controlling' and, in the long run, that will not work.
So if we purify our contraction, that is the pulling back, the letting go of things that allow others to contribute to the whole, to feel connected and needed. One might read the warning as implying we need to control the efforts of others -- but that would be the opposite, I believe, of what Torah is saying. Torah doesn't say "Aharon, watch that they do what they are supposed to" -- it says "give each one his work, his responsibility -- and then let him do it."
So leading is about letting others develop and not over-controlling.
Another way to look at this is that the more I restrain myself, the more I allow others to develop and assert their own individuality. And in that way, I can purify my own contraction. I can lead by helping others grow through their own actions, each one according to his needs and abilities.
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5. Exercises
1. Iysh Iysh: Individually, one by one, one-on-one, one-to-one. Think of individuals. Recognize them. See the contribution. Picture the cluster of flowers without the individual flowers. Every one is precious to the One. Repeat the process for ten people, a minyan. Ten individuals, each one truly unique and precious. 8,600 K'hatim, each one truly unique and precious, one by one.
2. Camping around the Mishkan: Envision the Tent of Meeting. Levi'im form the first set of camps around it. To the East are Aharon and Moshe and their sons. To the south are K'hat, Moshe and Aharon's next closest family. To the west are Gershon's family, the first born son of Levi. To the north is Merari's family, Levi's youngest son. Beyond Moshe and Aharon are Judah. To his right are the Issachar and to his left Zebulun. Beyond K'hat is Reuben (watch this group). To Reuben's right is Shim'on and to his left is Gad. Beyond Gershon is Ephrayim. To Ephrayim's right is Manasheh and to his left is Benjamin (All Rachel's descendents). Beyond Merari is Dan. To Dan's right is Asher and to his left is Naftali. Tens of thousands in each camp. Look up the blessings of the sons (Gen 49) -- who makes up neighbors?
3. Levi'im for Me: God takes the Levi'im for Him in place of the first born of the rest of Yisra'el. The total number of Levi'im males is almost equal to just the first-born males of the rest of Yisrael. Levi is the smallest tribe. What would it have felt like to go from the smallest tribe in the group to 'being given' to Aharon and his sons (for God) with responsibility for the Tent of Meeting and everything that entailed. What did this duty entail? What tasks would the Levi'im perform when they were camped?
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6. We prepare for Shavu'ot
Just a few more short days -- the mountain is in sight. The Sages taught that we are all present, every year as we receive Torah again.
Perhaps it is notable that Yisra'el was not organized into the various camps until the second year in the wilderness. They just came together at the base of the mountain to see the voice, to comprehend it fully.
The offering for Shavu'ot is bread, rich with khameytz, the effort of our hands. First fruits. Harvest of the wheat. So is this about ego? Only in that it is offered up. At Pesakh we eliminated khameytz, (yeast, ego) for the week. Then we entered the period of the counting of the omer -- the intense soul work of spending 49 days, a week of weeks, examining and reflecting about various aspects of Self. And now we are gathering at the base of the mountain to hear with our own eyes (see the voice) the teachings that guide our lives, whether we hear them or not. For even in refuting them or ignoring them, we are interacting with them and we choose whether to use that energy for our good and the good of those around us or not. And we choose whether to blind ourselves with ourselves or not.
And so we gather at the base without the flags and standards of our outer lives and we look up the mountain. What do you see?
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ADS:Kallah in Chicago: http://www.aleph.org/kallah%20html/kalindex.html July 2001
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There are many traditional interpretations of the parsha that I neither talk about nor mention. That is done from a position of space. I trust that the average reader is either familiar with these or can find many of them easily in other commentaries readily available.
Thanks for reading this. If I have offended you, please forgive me -- that was not my intention. If you found some joy or happiness in reading this, thank you for allowing me to be a part. If you found a reason to think about something more deeply - kol hakavod and thank you!
And to the people giving me feedback thank you so much! I enjoy all of it. (Including the typos) You have made this weekly practice wonderful.
b'v'rakha,
Candy
(c) 2001 Candy Lobb All rights reserved
