Zachor Sermon: Mitzvot of Memory – and Aharon HaKohen

Zachor and Tetzaveh

Mitzvot of Memory – and Aharon HaKohen

Parshas Zachor literally means the section of memory. Its name comes from the first word of the segment – זכור את אשר עשה לך עמלק – Remember that which Amalek did to you. But the message of זכור is much bigger and much greater than just remembering what Amalek did. 

While it is summarized in today’s Maftir, the story is the last 9 Pesukim in Parshas B’Shalach. It will be our Torah reading Purim morning. It concerns Amalek attacking a fledgling nation, just recently having experienced the Exodus, the Splitting of the Sea, and being recipients of Manna from heaven. Amalek took advantage of a weak point in the story of Bnei Yisrael, their fights with Moshe concerning water in Rephidim, and aimed to further weaken Bnei Yisrael at a time when Bnei Yisrael felt God had taken them out of Egypt to have them die in the wilderness. Amalek came… to remind them that abandoning their Father in Heaven was a recipe for disaster. 

The Siddur you are holding contains in it a list of six remembrances we are to recall often. While their commonality is that we are instructed to remember, there are different ways to break it down – some such as the Exodus and Sinai are what God Did. Shabbos is also something God did – and we are instructed to sanctify it. Perhaps we can include what God did to Miriam, even though it was a response to something she did. 

The last two are negative things done by people. We did the Golden Calf. And Amelek attacked the Bnei Yisrael. 

In a different way of categorizing, I’d like to offer a new look at a commonality concerning today’s memory of Amalek and the remembrance regarding Miriam. 

In a way – the remembrance regarding Miriam is a little cryptic. Miriam makes essentially 4 appearances in the Torah, three of those in the Torah’s post Exodus narrative. Her first appearance is when she watched baby Moshe in the basket, which according to our tradition was to see through the fulfillment of her prophesy that her parents should have another child. But post the Exodus, we have: 1. Leading the women in song after the splitting of the sea. 2. When she engages in a conversation with Aharon about Moshe and Moshe’s כשית wife, and she is stricken with Tzara’as, and the people wait for her before resuming travel, and 3. When she dies and there is no water.

 But the Pasuk says Remember what God did to Miriam, בדרך בצאתכם ממצרים. So it likely has nothing to do with the dancing, even though that was literally when they were just having left Egypt. And it likely has nothing to do with God having taken her life, which is presumed to be in the 40th year (though the Torah is unclear on that), certainly not “on the road as they left Egypt.” 

So what DID God do to Miriam? If this is about Tzara’as due to Lashon Hora, why not simply say “Remember what God did to Moshe at the Burning Bush?” 

The Chasam Sofer hints to the idea that what God did – למרים – which means FOR Miriam was HE caused the Bnei Yisrael to wait for her. Which was payback for her waiting for Moshe as a baby in the basket. I don’t want to go until the whole analysis, but suffice it to say, there is a view that Miriam had tzara’as for a very short time. She got it. God took it away. And the 7 day waiting period was the same waiting period anyone with tzara’as would undergo after the Kohen declares them Tzara’as-free. 

In that paragraph, Chasam Sofer writes that God did not judge her favorably over her comments, even though she wasn’t trying to be mean, and was speaking to one brother out of concern for her other brother. How many of us might engage in such a conversation – genuinely out of concern? 

Let us recall, for example, that Aharon was not punished in that conversation at all. In the next paragraph, Chasam Sofer links remembering what God did to Miriam and what Amalek did, noting the common theme of God’s Chesed. For Miriam – in causing everyone to wait for her for a week. And with Amalek: in weakening them, even though they were referred to by Bilaam as ראשית גוים . Though Israel was עיף ויגע, different ways of describing exhaustion, Amalek was pushed back. 

And then Chasam Sofer doubles down on Miriam – noting that the Pasuk doesn’t say to remember what Miriam did (i.e. she spoke Lashon Hora), but to remember what God did, which ultimately was Chesed. Contrast that to the Pasuk telling us to remember what Amalek did – he notes that when it comes to the wicked, we blame the wicked for their deeds, and when it comes to the righteous, which is of course how we view Miriam, we look at her in a positive light, noting the Chesed God did for her, since she did not have evil intent, even if she erred in engaging in that conversation. 

We now have a clear connection between the Zechirah of Miriam and the Zechirah of Amalek, which happen to be less than a chapter away from each other in the Torah as well. So this is a message about memory. Remembering bad behavior and learning from it what NOT to do (Amalek), and remembering good behavior (Miriam’s general presentation) and how it is rewarded.

Amalek’s reputation is tainted forever in our eyes. We look at Amalek in every way as the embodiment of 

1. Evil 

2. Distraction from our own goals 

3. Yetzer Hara 

4. The ultimate enemy against the Bnei Yisrael, both physically and spiritually 

And in a nutshell that is what we remember when we remember Amalek. Amalek can gain no ground, and is not allowed to have a negative influence on us spiritually, and must be stopped when they rear their ugly head in the physical realm, if not completely eradicated and annihilated. 

We heard a presentation a few Shabboses ago by Rabbi Shmuel Bergman of Ft. Lee as to whether Israel’s current enemy is Amalek – whether genealogically, ideologically, theologically, etc. So I will not rehash that now. But I think we can learn from the Miriam memory – that there is a different possibility than the most obvious understanding – that there are other ways to look at what Amalek did. 

My favorite insight I shared here many years ago… is this. זכור את אשר עשה לך עמלק. It doesn’t say what עמלק did לכם in plural, but לך, in the singular. Amalek UNITED YOU AS ONE. The attack caused everyone to drop whatever else was going on and to see that our common enemy makes us into a people who are fighting for our very survival. And our survival is contingent on our letting any and all fights we may have become bygones. 

Rabbenu Bachaye says regarding Miriam’s Lashon Hora ordeal: ויש לנו ללמד בזה ק"ו לגודל העונש שיש למספרי לשון הרע, אם מרים הצדקת הנביאה שלא דברה אלא באחיה, והיתה גדולה ממנו וגדלה אותו ומסרה נפשה עליו בענין היאור, ודברה שלא בפניו, נעשה עונש גדול על דבור כזה ולא הועילו לה כל זכיותיה מן העונש, וגם הדבור שדברה לא היה לשון הרע ממש אלא שעשאתו שוה לשאר הנביאים, ק"ו לשאר בני אדם שמספרין לשון הרע ממש על הגדולים מהם ובפניהם שיתביישו, שענשם כפל ומכופל. 

And since they are related – because as noted Amalek is the wedge that drives our own people apart – it’s an important message to remember now. You know the line: “Everyone always talks about the weather, but no one ever does anything about it.” The same is true for Lashon Hora. And we really need to do something about it. Because it is Amalek in our hearts. 

Let us shift gears for a moment to look at the parsha, and then we’ll tie the different thoughts together. 

There are two items in the vestments of the Kohanim in the Parsha which are referred to as Zikaron. They are the stones that sat atop the Kohen Gadol’s shoulders, as part of the Ephod, and the stones on the breastplate. Chapter 28, verse 12 and 29, respectively. Both of them are listed as a burden that Aharon has to carry, one on his shoulders, and one on his heart. And, in case not clear, both sets of stones had the names of the tribes of Israel engraved or embossed in them in some form. So Aharon is carrying the nation of Israel on his shoulders and on his heart as the ultimate Zikaron. 

The message should be clear, and it must resonate. Aharon, the man, not the general position of Kohen Gadol, is the one who is tasked with carrying this burden. Aharon, who is famously known in our tradition as being a lover and pursuer of peace between spouses, between neighbors, between former friends, is the one tasked with carrying the Zikaron – these stones that have the names of Bnei Yisrael on them – on his shoulders and on his heart. He carries the memory of what it takes for them to be united. 

Is there an Aharon today? Not one that we can point to, identify, and say “He’s the one that’s going to do this.” Which means that every one of us needs to carry a little bit of Aharon in us. Each of us has to carry the burden on our shoulders and on our hearts of being the peacemaker. Each of us has to represent the most important memory. And that is that just as the Bnei Yisrael are united on the stones of the shoulder straps and on the stones of the Choshen, the bnei Yisrael must have unity.

Amalek attacked the stragglers, people who seemed to not be part of the group, people who seemed to have no defenders, those lagging behind, the presumed forgotten. But when they were attacked, a sleeping lion was awakened. And Amalek was repelled. And Bnei Yisrael marched triumphantly to Har Sinai – having inspired Yisro, and having put themselves in a position of being ready to receive the Torah. Just as they were in the singular against Amalek, they were in the singular in their encampment around Sinai – ויחן שם ישראל נגד ההר – like one man with one heart. 

Who is the one man, who has the one heart, with the capacity of loving all of Am Yisrael? Aharon. 

Who was with Miriam in her conversation and went unscathed? Aharon. 

Who may have been with Miriam when she watched baby Moshe? Chizkuni and Baal Haturim say that when the daughter of Pharaoh opened the basket והנה נער בוכה, that the נער, not the ילד, which is how the baby had been described, but a נער was crying. And who was that נער? It was Aharon, who also wanted to see what would happen with his baby brother. 

Aharon is the carrier of memory. He is the ultimate uniter. On a Shabbos when we don’t hear Moshe’s name, we hear Aharon’s name many many times. Because he is the antidote to the spiritual attack and the physical attack of Amalek, and the one who, more than anyone, emerges sinless and blameless as he heroically stands for truth, love and peace among our people. 

May his model of carrying the burden of memory on the shoulder and on the heart serve as an inspiration to us – because Lashon Hora divides us, and Amalek divides us – those are message of remembering Miriam and Amalek. 

But Aharon stands strong and brings all of us together. May we each be an Aharon, and like the Kohen Gadol, inspire the greatest service of God we can imagine while promoting our care for one another.