The parsha shiur of this past week focused on the curses that appear at the end of Devarim Chapter 27. Calling them “curses” is not entirely fair: they’re more like warnings of behaviors to avoid, as the one who violates is ארור – cursed.
The Number 12
When I first read through them, I saw Rashbam who mentioned there are 12 curses, corresponding to the 12 tribes. Then I saw Rashi, who says there are actually eleven (he considers the last one a general conclusion), corresponding to all the tribes except for Shimon.
At first deliberation my thought was, “The number 12 was chosen because it is a nice round number – just like the tribes.” Then I thought, “Perhaps each curse corresponds specifically to a tribe who was guilty of doing this exact act.”
Free Associations
The one corresponding to Reuven (do not lay with your father’s wife) was obvious from the Bilhah story – Bereshit 35:22: “While Jacob was living undisturbed in the area, Reuben went and disturbed the sleeping arrangements of Bilhah, his father's concubine. Jacob heard about it…Jacob had twelve sons.”
I thought the warning about sleeping with one’s sister would refer to Shimon, as per the midrash that he married Dinah.
בראשית רבה פ:יא - א"ר הונא אמרה ואני אנה הוליך את חרפתי עד שנשבע לה שמעון שהוא נוטלה, הה"ד ושאול בן הכנענית
In the end I found the comments of the Maskil L’David (see two snippets of his biography here and here) and the Abravanel (bio here and here), who delineated to whom the warnings refer. They have the advantage of 20-20 hindsight on Biblical history, and they interestingly take the liberty of either accusing a tribe of being guilty of the crime suggested, or using historical evidence to prove they could have been in violation of one of these sins, but chose not to. In this latter case, the hope is their tribesmen will continue following their model and will avoid losing the character trait that was so wonderfully embodied by their ancestor.
Without further ado, the hit parade with explanations for how they arrived at their conclusions.
(Click on the image to see the explanations in a readable size)
[If the image does not work, click here to see it spelled out]
Alternatively, you can try to make your own list.
This exercise is fascinating because anyone can be right. It’s all a matter of how you want to match things up, and how much knowledge you have to support the ideas you may bring to the table.
Final Lesson
The nit picking leaves us open to thinking that somehow, the things we do matter. We can find the smallest flaws or the smallest credits (or the greatest flaws and the greatest credits) from actions that seem to be completely unrelated to the specifics of our behavior we draw out of our deeds.
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