Parshat Tzav
by Rabbi Avi Billet
Having given all the instructions for the Kohanim, in Chapter 8 we see Moshe being given precise instructions to set the stage for Inauguration Day.
In one of the most immediate cause and effect episodes in the Torah, Moshe is told to gather the people at the Ohel Moed (Gathering Tent, the Mishkan) in 8:3, and in 8:4, “the community was assembled at the entrance of the Ohel Moed.”
Was the entire community really there to watch Moshe vest his brother and nephews in their priestly vestments (8:6-13)?
Ibn Ezra says the “entire community” refers to the “leaders of the tribes and the elders.” That would be a little over 80 people. The Rosh is of the view that 600,000 people were able to gather in a relatively small space to witness this momentous occasion. And the point, explains Chizkuni (based on the Midrash), is that everyone should learn to conduct themselves in a holy manner with respect to and when relating to the priests.
In support of Ibn Ezra, the Torah Temimah reminds us of the passage in Sanhedrin 2a that a High Priest can only be appointed by the Sanhedrin of 71. And that the term used to describe the community, “Eidah” certainly refers to a Sanhedrin which passes judgments. Thus while leadership must be present, the entire nation need not bother with coming to watch the dressing ceremonies.
Rabbenu Bachaye describes the gathering in 8:4 as a “miraculous occurrence” and he gives a number of examples where the population that gathered defied all logical explanations, because their reality entered the realm of the supernatural. One example is the 22,000 chariots of angels that were present at Revelation at the bottom of Sinai. Where did they all fit? Other examples include: that when all of Israel crossed the Jordan to enter the land, they walked between the poles of the Ark; during the time of Resurrection when all the good people through the history of the world will return the living, there will be enough room for everyone.
On a purely rational basis, it is hard to understand some of these passages, and even more difficult to explain the physics. Surely, as a believer, I can accept that something did happen or can happen in the future, but it is hard to visualize, even if I believe its possibility is real.
I think looking at this passage from the vantage point of Purim, which was celebrated on Thursday, we can appreciate how truly miraculous events just defy explanation.
We are all familiar with the efficiency of the Nazi killing machine. Yet despite its organization, and the sheer numbers of how at their height, they could be murdering over 10,000 people a day, it still took them over 5 years to kill 6 millions Jews, and they were, thank God, unable to complete their diabolical plans of the destruction of world Jewry.
And Haman, their spiritual ancestor, was hoping to achieve the same goal in one day? How could he even think such a task was possible.
It would seem that owing to his beliefs in his powers, honor, and supernatural abilities, he felt that his lottery showed that his goal was divinely ordained. And he believed that his charm and his charisma would gather enough volunteers and haters to get to every Jew in Achashveirosh’s kingdom in one day.
But the real world doesn’t work like that. In Shushan alone, Esther needed to ask for another day for the Jews to confront their enemies. On the 13th of Adar, 500 Shushanites died, and on the 14th of Adar 300 more Shushanites died in the skirmishes. Relatively small numbers, it would seem.
And therein lies the difference between the plans of the man and the works of God. Man can only achieve what is humanly possible. God – using man, when He wants it to be such – can achieve things that go beyond reason and viable explanation.
Will there be peace in the Land of Israel? Will the Arabs stop hating the Jewish people? Will anti-Semitism ever end? Will the Messiah come – when so many Jews in the world do not live a life of Torah, do not observe the Sabbath, and in some cases, don’t even know what it means to be a Jew, or that they are even Jewish? In the realm of human achievement and possibility, all of these are far-fetched possibilities. But in the realm of God, they are attainable.
Of course from Ibn Ezra’s and the Torah Temimah’s perspective, there was a respectable but manageable-size crowd at the dressing-ceremony. But the other view is not to be discounted. And it is the person of faith who learns from what happened at the inauguration of the Mishkan, when 600,000 people fit in to a small space, that when God wills it, the seemingly impossible becomes as simple as filling the universe with billions of billions of stars and having none of them touch each other.
Showing posts with label jewish people. Show all posts
Showing posts with label jewish people. Show all posts
Monday, March 21, 2016
Friday, September 18, 2015
A Gathering To Unite - If Only...
Parshat Vayelekh
by Rabbi Avi Billet
Shabbos Shuva is named for the first word in the Haftorah, but it also refers to the fact that the Shabbos falls between Rosh Hashana and Yom Kippur, at a time when our people are experiencing the “Aseret Y’mei Teshuvah” – the Ten Days Of Repentance.
How do we repent? What needs to be done. I suppose the classic answers have been talked about – not saying Lashon hora, treating each other nicely, and of course, making amends with God over our misdeeds.
Devarim 31:10-13 contains what the Sefer Hachinukh lists as commandment number 612, the mitzvah of “Hak’hel.” This commandment is fulfilled every seven years at the end of a shmittah year, as all of the Jewish people gather in Jerusalem during the holiday of Sukkot to hear portions of the Torah read aloud. While this Biblical commandment is time dependent, the category from which women are generally exempt from obligation, this is one of the exceptions to the rule (the others are Shabbat and eating matzah on Pesach – see Kiddushin 34a-b) (there are many time-dependent Rabbinic commandments to which women are bound).
Collectively the entire nation would hear the king read different portions, altogether over half, of the book of Devarim.
Surely this spectacle was memorable, with the king at the center and trumpets sounding. The Torah was heralded between the king and the high priest and the members of the “Knesset” (not Israel’s modern day parliament), and the king would recite seven blessings praising God, the Jewish people, and the relationship they shared, before he actually read the Torah.
A once in seven years experience is certainly a source of inspiration. Ask anyone who has been to the Siyum Hashas. But even such inspiration often falls short of lasting through to the next gathering of the masses, if it even lasts one month.
Hak’hel was never the same as the tri-annual “aliyah l’regel” of the holidays. Not everyone went every holiday, and not everyone could afford to make the trip so often. But once every seven years gives people enough time to budget and to plan, to make sure they are there to fulfill this great mitzvah.
How could the event of Hak’hel serve as the inspiration it is meant to be if it only takes place once every seven years?
It would seem every seven years Jews are meant to have a unifying moment. We go to our homes, to our communities, to our own lives and we tend to lose sight of the greater picture of the Jewish community, what we collectively share and value and do to enhance our lives. Hak’hel serves as a reminder for this.
The hak’hel moment is meant to inspire other experiences, to inspire a lifestyle, to inspire a regimen of continued education and learning that reflects all the spiritual grandeur invoked in the heartfelt reading of the Jewish king on that day in the Beit Hamikdash on the holiday of Sukkot. Hak’hel should be the climax, not the initiation. We should be living an ongoing life of inspiration which reaches its pinnacle moment when we gather after an extended period of separation.
This year has its own rules for the use of Etrogim that come out of Israel, owing to the completion of the recent Shmittah (Sabbatical) year. Hakhel’s seven year cycle was related to Shmittah, so we have a deeper connection than usual this year to this special mitzvah.
But in the absence of the Beit Hamikdash, we do not experience Hak’hel. So what can it mean for us today?
The answer is quite simple. Hak’hel is a gathering most symbolic of the unity of the Jewish people. It is a time when the Jewish people were reminded that “there is more that unites you than divides you.”
This message is particularly poignant at this moment in history. I have had a number of political debates with religious Jews over the Iran deal. It seems to be a done deal, and we hope for the best.
But I have a very difficult time understanding how Jews who advance all the talking points of the proponents of the deal think they know what’s best for Israel’s security, and are critical of Israel’s prime minister for looking out for the security needs of his country, in a very hostile and dysfunctional Middle East.
Even US politicians who support the deal say Iran can’t be trusted. And Israel is much closer to Iran geographically than the United States is to Iran.
I don’t know if sins in political moves require teshuva. And truth be told, it is hard to make a judgment call of who is right or wrong, especially when people have very strong opinions that will not be swayed.
But the Jewish people need to be united, because, as the old saying goes, “United we stand” while “divided” – as we surely have been over these political dealings – “we fall.”
If only we could create a real hak-hel, we’d see how much we have in common. If only.
by Rabbi Avi Billet
Shabbos Shuva is named for the first word in the Haftorah, but it also refers to the fact that the Shabbos falls between Rosh Hashana and Yom Kippur, at a time when our people are experiencing the “Aseret Y’mei Teshuvah” – the Ten Days Of Repentance.
How do we repent? What needs to be done. I suppose the classic answers have been talked about – not saying Lashon hora, treating each other nicely, and of course, making amends with God over our misdeeds.
Devarim 31:10-13 contains what the Sefer Hachinukh lists as commandment number 612, the mitzvah of “Hak’hel.” This commandment is fulfilled every seven years at the end of a shmittah year, as all of the Jewish people gather in Jerusalem during the holiday of Sukkot to hear portions of the Torah read aloud. While this Biblical commandment is time dependent, the category from which women are generally exempt from obligation, this is one of the exceptions to the rule (the others are Shabbat and eating matzah on Pesach – see Kiddushin 34a-b) (there are many time-dependent Rabbinic commandments to which women are bound).
Collectively the entire nation would hear the king read different portions, altogether over half, of the book of Devarim.
Surely this spectacle was memorable, with the king at the center and trumpets sounding. The Torah was heralded between the king and the high priest and the members of the “Knesset” (not Israel’s modern day parliament), and the king would recite seven blessings praising God, the Jewish people, and the relationship they shared, before he actually read the Torah.
A once in seven years experience is certainly a source of inspiration. Ask anyone who has been to the Siyum Hashas. But even such inspiration often falls short of lasting through to the next gathering of the masses, if it even lasts one month.
Hak’hel was never the same as the tri-annual “aliyah l’regel” of the holidays. Not everyone went every holiday, and not everyone could afford to make the trip so often. But once every seven years gives people enough time to budget and to plan, to make sure they are there to fulfill this great mitzvah.
How could the event of Hak’hel serve as the inspiration it is meant to be if it only takes place once every seven years?
It would seem every seven years Jews are meant to have a unifying moment. We go to our homes, to our communities, to our own lives and we tend to lose sight of the greater picture of the Jewish community, what we collectively share and value and do to enhance our lives. Hak’hel serves as a reminder for this.
The hak’hel moment is meant to inspire other experiences, to inspire a lifestyle, to inspire a regimen of continued education and learning that reflects all the spiritual grandeur invoked in the heartfelt reading of the Jewish king on that day in the Beit Hamikdash on the holiday of Sukkot. Hak’hel should be the climax, not the initiation. We should be living an ongoing life of inspiration which reaches its pinnacle moment when we gather after an extended period of separation.
This year has its own rules for the use of Etrogim that come out of Israel, owing to the completion of the recent Shmittah (Sabbatical) year. Hakhel’s seven year cycle was related to Shmittah, so we have a deeper connection than usual this year to this special mitzvah.
But in the absence of the Beit Hamikdash, we do not experience Hak’hel. So what can it mean for us today?
The answer is quite simple. Hak’hel is a gathering most symbolic of the unity of the Jewish people. It is a time when the Jewish people were reminded that “there is more that unites you than divides you.”
This message is particularly poignant at this moment in history. I have had a number of political debates with religious Jews over the Iran deal. It seems to be a done deal, and we hope for the best.
But I have a very difficult time understanding how Jews who advance all the talking points of the proponents of the deal think they know what’s best for Israel’s security, and are critical of Israel’s prime minister for looking out for the security needs of his country, in a very hostile and dysfunctional Middle East.
Even US politicians who support the deal say Iran can’t be trusted. And Israel is much closer to Iran geographically than the United States is to Iran.
I don’t know if sins in political moves require teshuva. And truth be told, it is hard to make a judgment call of who is right or wrong, especially when people have very strong opinions that will not be swayed.
But the Jewish people need to be united, because, as the old saying goes, “United we stand” while “divided” – as we surely have been over these political dealings – “we fall.”
If only we could create a real hak-hel, we’d see how much we have in common. If only.
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