This past week’s Parsha, Badmidar, isn’t really my jam; I tend to gravitate more naturally toward the narrative-based chapters contained in Bereishit and Shemot over the intricately detailed portion of Bamidbar that we just heard; I prefer my Torah spoon-fed to me through colorful stories of fratricide, floods, and famine.
So, at first glance, I found Bamidbar to be anything but a page-turner.
In pasuk bet, Hashem instructs Moshe:
This is in reference to men over the age of twenty who are fit to bear arms.
The ensuing verses of Bamidbar function almost like a Hollywood call-sheet, with a census of the cast and crew of B’nai Yisrael, along with a detailed prescription of their various roles in the transportation of the Mishkan. We even get a detailed listing of where everybody parks their trailers on set.
Like I said, not much of a page-turner. I left my first reading of Bamidbar understanding how Bnai Yisrael erected a tent-society that rivals Burning Man by virtue of its sheer scale, but I was still left wondering: what relevant lessons does the parsha have to impart about the story and human condition of our people?
And so, I looked backward. How did we, the Jewish people, find ourselves here, in Midbar Sinai, בְּאֶחָד֩ לַחֹ֨דֶשׁ הַשֵּׁנִ֜י בַּשָּׁנָ֣ה הַשֵּׁנִ֗ית לְצֵאתָ֛ם מֵאֶ֥רֶץ מִצְרַ֖יִם/on the first day of the second month, in the second year since yetziyat mitzrayim?
What I discovered is that the human drama of Parshat Bamidbar is subtextual, and its narrative secrets can only be unearthed through an examination of chronology and instances of repetition that harken back to the events of Sefer Shemot. So, let’s travel back in time about 10 months to Parshat Yitro.
B’nei Yisrael have arrived at Midbar Sinai, where Moshe ascends to the top of the mountain to receive the Torah from G-d, who directly delivers the Ten commandments to B’nai Yisrael, the first two being:
אָֽנֹכִ֖י֙ יְהֹוָ֣ה אֱלֹהֶ֑֔יךָ אֲשֶׁ֧ר הוֹצֵאתִ֛יךָ מֵאֶ֥רֶץ מִצְרַ֖יִם מִבֵּ֣֥ית עֲבָדִ֑͏ֽים׃
לֹֽ֣א־יִהְיֶ֥͏ֽה־לְךָ֛֩ אֱלֹהִ֥֨ים אֲחֵרִ֖֜ים עַל־פָּנָֽ͏ַ֗י׃
When Moshe concludes reading the sefer Ha’brit, B’nai Yisrael famously proclaim…“naaseh v’nishma/we will do and we will listen.”
Wonderful! We are out of the woods of Egypt. B’nai Yisrael are now a nation with a code of laws. We are legit. Now it’s time to literally put our money where our mouth is, in Parshat Terumah, where B’nai Yisrael contribute donations to the building of the Mishkan, a sanctuary for the Presence of G-d to dwell amongst them. And we get all the instructions about how to go about getting the Mishkan together in Terumah and in the following parsha, Tetzaveh, and then we get to Ki Tisa which begins in a very similar fashion to our Parsha this week…with what?
Hashem commanding Moshe to commence A CENSUS!
For a short time after this, Hashem offers more details of the Anointing of the Mishkan—we are almost there, folks! We are a people, we’ve got a set of laws, and now at the precipice of closing the deal with G-d, by giving G-d’s presence a place to dwell among us…and then
WE BEEF IT!
The event that follows is the Chet Ha-Egel, the sin of the Golden Calf. Moshe has been gone for so long up on Har Sinai that B’nai Yisrael have a crisis of faith and build an idol. When Moshe descends from the mountain, to find the very people he led to freedom, desecrating the very laws inscribed on the tablets he carries in his hands, he shatters them in rage (at least according to the p’shat).
And he doesn’t stop there. Moshe instructs the tribe of Levi,
עִבְר֨וּ וָשׁ֜וּבוּ מִשַּׁ֤עַר לָשַׁ֙עַר֙ בַּֽמַּחֲנֶ֔ה וְהִרְג֧וּ אִֽישׁ־אֶת־אָחִ֛יו וְאִ֥ישׁ אֶת־רֵעֵ֖הוּ וְאִ֥ישׁ אֶת־קְרֹבֽוֹ׃
“Go back and forth from gate to gate throughout the camp, and slay sibling, neighbor, and kin.”
They went on to kill three thousand of our own people that day.
So these are the events that lead us to where we meet our heroes in last week’s Parsha, in Midbar Sinai, almost a year since they arrived there. And what a year it’s been…
Finally found the human drama I’ve been looking for. And I didn’t even mention the part where Aharon’s sons die.
So now that I have all this crucial context, I’d imagine that, at this point in their journey, Bnai Yisrael are finding themselves in a state of serious whiplash. What was meant to be a victorious exodus and consecration of their relationship with their Divine redeemer has devolved into an unmitigated disaster.
This is taking place in a fragile time for B’nai Yisrael — the very infancy of nationhood. The nearly year-long period spent at Sinai is one of trial and error. We cannot seem to get anything right the first time; for starters, we broke the first two commandments within moments of receiving them.
This census at the beginning of Bamidbar and emergence of Israelite civilization as demonstrated by the organization of their encampment, tribe by tribe, represents a second chance—though not one that ignores the preceding events that necessitated it. Much like the hand-carved second set of tablets that Moshe brought down from Har Sinai, the encampment of B’nai Yisrael around the Mishkan serves as a searing reminder of their past errors; where once the first-born from every tribe were destined to serve in the Mishkan, only the Leviim remain to carry out the Avodah.
In this camp of B’nai Yisrael, each tribe flies their own flag, yet they pitch their tents recognizing that they all exist to sanctify the loftier, unifying force of the Divine, as represented by the Mishkan at the center of their camp. And, just as was the case during the Chet Ha-Egel, G-d’s presence is protected by the Leviim, who encircle the Mishkan as protectors of the Sanctity of the Divine on the blood-soaked ground of Midbar Sinai, where they executed their own people not so long ago. Ibn Ezra posits that the Leviim’s placement around the Mishkan was for the express purpose “that no one from the congregation of Israel should draw close to the tabernacle and die.” The Leviim go from being the executioners of their own people to the protectors of their lives.
At Matan Torah, we became a nation, but with the establishment of the camp in this week’s Parsha, B’nei Yisrael begin to build their neighborhood, their community. There’s the old joke that every member of a Jewish community has the shul they go to and the shul they don’t go to—the implication being that the establishment of every community is in itself an invitation for conflict. But what I find so fascinating about Parshat Bamidbar is that the conditions of the community it prescribes are entirely PRECEDED by conflict. Its urban planning is symbolically designed around the conflict that came before it, and on the ground where it took place.
Perhaps this census we see at the start of our parsha is the first step toward CONCENSUS.
Every single tribe was party to the Chet Ha-Egel…even the Leviim, in their role as those who carried out the punishment for it; yet, in this camp, they all stand together as one community, they all answer to a calling higher than their past earthly squabbles, and they are all worthy of practicing the moral code set forth by the Torah.
There is, in B’nai Yisrael’s camp, with its many flags flown, a recognition in what Rabbi Jonathan Sacks referred to as the dignity of difference. However, difference is secondary to the ultimate purpose of our people’s inaugural neighborhood. Whether lesbian, gay, bisexual, trans, or any other color of the rainbow; be us ally or uncomfortable—our differences in orientation, be they sexual, political, religious or otherwise, pale when put up against the ultimate thing that unites us: our status as common creations of the Divine.
בְּאֶחָד֩ לַחֹ֨דֶשׁ הַשֵּׁנִ֜י בַּשָּׁנָ֣ה הַשֵּׁנִ֗ית לְצֵאתָ֛ם מֵאֶ֥רֶץ מִצְרַ֖יִם
On the first day of the second month, in the second year since yetziyat mitzrayim…
Biblically, the second month refers to the month of Iyar; all of the events of Parshat Bamidbar took place in the month we just saw come to a close.. This past Shabbat, we blessed the new month of Sivan, ushering in the third regel of Shavuot, which we will begin to celebrate this Thursday night. Together, we are going to celebrate Matan Torah, on this holiday that gives us a second chance, just as B’nai Yisrael got in Midbar Sinai, to accept the Torah just a little bit better than we did the last time, and in doing so, build a better neighborhood for all of us. May our celebration of the upcoming holiday of Shavuot be one that brings us closer to one another, and in doing so, closer to the Divine.
-Mendel Weintraub, Program Director