TORAH SPARKS
Parashat Chukat-Balak (Outside Israel) | Balak (Israel)
July 1, 2023 | 12 Tammuz 5783
Torah (Outside Israel): Numbers 19:1-25:9
Triennial: Numbers 19:1-21:20 Haftorah: Micah 5:6-6:8
Torah (Israel): Numbers 22:2-25:9 Haftorah: Micah 5:6-6:8
The End of a Generation
Bex Stern-Rosenblatt
Parashah
Two weeks ago, in the story of the spies, we learned that the generation of Israelites who left Egypt would not survive to enter the land of Canaan. The epic journey they had made would result in freedom for their children and in death for them. As God reiterates a number of times, their corpses will fall in the wilderness rather than reaching the promised land.
By the time we stand on the Plains of Moab to listen to Moses recite Deuteronomy, that first generation seems to have died off. After all, the listeners, the audience, in Deuteronomy seems to be the second generation, the generation who will enter the land. Moses tells us in Deuteronomy 2:14 that 38 years have passed, that the whole generation, the men of war, came to an end from the midst of the camp as the LORD had sworn concerning them.
Accordingly, somewhere or some time in the Book of Numbers, there should be a record of the deaths of the first generation. We should learn that the moment has come when God s word has been fulfilled, when the last of the corpses of the first generation has fallen and we, the next generation, are ready to enter the land. It seems like a moment that should be, if not celebrated, accompanied by a bit of fanfare. At the very least, it seems like it should be mentioned. But there is no such moment. The Torah makes no mention of the point at which that transition is completed.
Some people point towards the two censuses in the Book of Numbers, the one that opens the book and the one that occurs in Numbers 26 after the Baal Peor incident. Different people are recorded in each. Therefore, the first generation must have died before the second census. But when? Did the incident of Baal Peor happen to the first or second generation? Likewise, did Balaam open his words of praise, how beautiful are your tents, oh Jacob about the first or second generation?
The one verse, Deuteronomy 2:14, points us towards a place at which it happens, saying that the last of that generation died at the time that we went from Kadesh-Barnea until we crossed the Wadi Zered. That moment occurs in our parashah, in Numbers 21. This chapter is a long list of our wilderness wanderings and it is notoriously difficult to locate these places on a map. Nonetheless, the Wadi Zered of Deuteronomy 2:14 appears. We read in verse 12, from there they journeyed onward and camped at Wadi Zered, and in verse 13, from there they journeyed onward and camped across the Arnon. Using the verse from Deuteronomy, we would believe that between verses 12 and 13, the last of the generation that left Egypt perished. There is not so much of a hint towards this seemingly monumental moment in the text. The subject does not change, the journey goes on. There is no mention of a grand statement, no as God had commanded concerning that generation for what they had done when The text merely continues.
This may be intentional. There is never a concrete point when one generation ends and the next generation begins. The idea that the second generation was separate, different, from the first is blatantly false. Their actions mirror each other. The punishment of the first generation, their death in the wilderness, was no different from the mortality of all humans, our foretold ending since the Garden of Eden. We die. Rather, the blessing for the first generation is that their people continue. Their children and their descendants will enter the land. The promise that God made to their ancestors will be fulfilled for generations to come.
The continuity of the Israelite people and the irrelevance of the passing of the generations is thrown into stark contrast with the other nations in Numbers 21. We read all that is left of the civilization of Moab in the Song of Heshbon, Woe to you, Moab, You are lost, O people of Chemosh, the remnant of an entire nation remain as just a footnote, an echo of an ancient song, recorded in our living text. We need not mention the moment of the passing of a generation of Israelites because there will never be a point at which we disappear, remaining only in song.
Bilam or Moshe?
Vered Hollander-Goldfarb
Haftarah
This is the perfect haftarah for the combination of the parashot of Hukkat and Balak, as they are read this week outside of Israel. In Parashat Hukkat we take the first steps towards ending our time in the desert. Ahead lies the transition necessary to move into a settled land with shifts in many areas of life. It is in this parashah that Moshe and Aaron are told that they will not enter the land. Miriam dies and so does Aaron, leaving Moshe to do the last miles without the team he has had since God lifted you out of Egypt (Micah 6:4) In Parashat Balak, even Moshe is missing from the story, but it is difficult not to notice the similarities between Moshe and Bilam the sorcerer. Both are masters of orators; both have the potential of changing the world through speech.
In this haftarah, Moshe, Aharon and Miriam are juxtaposed with Bilam and Balak. Moshe, Aharon and Miriam are the symbol of the good that God had bestowed upon the people. They were sent ahead to lead when God raised us out of Egypt. The prophet Michah suggests that to rise up from a situation of subjugation, house of bondage as Egypt is called, we needed individuals who were able to change the people s mentality from that of a slave to that of a free, independent, and responsible person. It took Moshe, Aharon and Miriam forty years to develop a generation that had changed sufficiently to enter the land and take care of themselves.
Among the various adversaries that the people meet along the way to independence, Balak and Bilam stand out. They do not fight with conventional warfare, they try to enlist God to curse the people of Israel. In the Tanakh a curse is a weapon, a powerful one that is treated by laws as potentially lethal. Even after being warned that the people are blessed and presumably are immune to curses, Bilam goes ahead with his mission. Perhaps he does so out of hatred, we know how blinding hate can be, or perhaps out of greed, another powerful motivator. Putting Moshe side by side with Bilam, Michah highlights the difference in choices these great orators made. While Moshe used his talents to create a people, Bilam used his powerful talents to attempt to destroy the very same people.
This haftarah is a rebuke to the people of Israel who are ungrateful despite all the good God has done for them. Ironically, when the people are faced with the angry God, they resort to sacrifices to try to appease Him. They are choosing the path of Bilam, believing that God wants gifts, that God can be brought under human spell by an offering. Michah, in the closing verse of the haftarah, tells us to return to ideas that are at the basis of the spirit of freedom: Justice, kindness, humility before God. The traits of Moshe, not Bilam.
Conjuring Candles
Ilana Kurshan
Adventures in Mishnah with My Kids
Shabbat 1:3
Last week when we made havdalah, the candle suddenly burned out just as we were reciting the blessing about the Creator of fire. We hastily lit two matches and held them together to replace the candle, which, we discovered a short while later, had not been furnished with long enough wicks; the bottom third of the candle was all wax and no wick. We were prepared to throw the candle away, but Matan the scientist in our family assured us that he could refurbish the candle by boring out a narrow hole and filling it with a match. That evening, proud of his pyrotechnic prowess, Matan read in bed by the light of our de-commissioned Havdalah candle.
When I came into his room to learn a mishnah that evening, he pleaded with me to first finish the Harry Potter chapter he was in the middle of reading. And so I obliged, reading to him about Harry s al fresco dinner with the Weasley family, during which Mrs. Weasley magically conjures candles to light the darkening garden so that everyone can finish their strawberry ice cream. See? They use candles too, Matan points out to me he is upset that I insisted that he also turn on his reading lamp because, as I told him, a havdalah candle really doesn t provide enough light for reading.
As it turned out, the mishnah we learned that night was about reading by the light of a candle, though in the times of the Mishnah, a candle was more of an oil lamp. The Mishnah (1:3) teaches that a person may not read by candlelight on Shabbat, out of a concern that he might tilt the lamp to add more oil to the wick, which is like lighting a fire on Shabbat. The Talmud (Shabbat 12b) tells a story about Rabbi Yishmael ben Elisha, who proclaimed that he could read by candlelight on Shabbat because he would make sure not to tilt the lamp. But once it happened that while he was reading, he needed more light and he unthinkingly tilted the lamp. Humbled, he declared, How great are the words of the sages, who said not to read by candlelight! Another sage adds that after realizing his error, Rabbi Yishmael ben Elisha recorded his regret and his resolution on a wax tablet: I, Ishmael ben Elisha, read and tilted a candle on Shabbat. When the Temple is rebuilt, I shall bring a sin offering.
After we finish this Mishnah, I want to keep reading by candlelight, Matan tells me. I warn him that it s dangerous what if he falls asleep with the candle still burning? I won t fall asleep, I m sure of it, he tells me, and I remind him of Rabbi Yishmael ben Elisha s overconfident self-assurance. God forbid an accident should happen, I warn him, trying not to think of Bertha Rochester in Jane Eyre. I don t want you to regret it and say, How great are the words of my mother, who said not to read by candlelight!
In the continuation of the mishnah, we learn that school children are permitted to read by candlelight on Shabbat if they are sitting and studying with their teacher, because their teacher will make sure they don t tilt the candle. The Babylonian Talmud explains that the fear instilled by their teacher will prevent them from tilting inadvertently. The Palestinian Talmud offers a different explanation: There is no concern that the students will tilt the candle because they want it to go out anyway, so that they can get a break from their studies. Matan can understand that. If I were doing my math homework by candlelight, I d be really happy if the candle went out. But if I m reading Harry Potter, then yeah, I might tilt the candle to get more light.
Before I leave Matan s bedroom that evening, I make sure to take the candle with me. "How do you know I won t conjure a candle after you leave? he asks me. I tell him that he had better not conjure a candle on Shabbat, because it would definitely be muktzeh if the candle didn t even exist before Shabbat, it would fall into the category of nolad something born or created on Shabbat which therefore could not possibly have been designated in advance for use on Shabbat before Shabbat. In any case, don t conjure any candles in your bedroom at night it s too dangerous, I warn him, taking the magic wand from his nightstand, where he s kept it ever since he began reading Harry Potter. Fortunately Matan is much better at science than at magic, but I m not taking any chances.