After a whole book of Levitical laws, the book of Bemidbar
seems like
more of the same, with various lists of the tribes and how they
configure themselves in the desert. Actually, the book of Bemidbar is
not about laws at all but about the effort to march into the Holy Land
as a holy people. While at first it seems that the Jews will march right
into the land, it later emerges that they are not ready. Our parasha
raises our hopes that the Jews could march right into Israel. But there
is a principle in Jewish life that there is no holiness without
preparation. The Jews needed to prepare themselves for their new
mission. Holiness is not born overnight. As we prepare for Shavuot, we
too need to prepare to receive the holy torah on Shavuot all over again.
From Rabbi Finkelstein's 1999 sermon on this Parsha:
The first 11 chapters of Numbers emphasize counting,
numbers, camps, encampments, groupings, and formations. It is not always a
real attention grabber. When I first studied it, I did not see what the
significance was. Then I gained a new perspective based on the Ramban; it
was a census for war. The troops were gathering for a battle to take over
the Land of Israel. The book of Bemidbar is about making plans to settle
Israel and about how those plans never came to fruition. It is about a
dream which was eventually frustrated by our sins and the consequences of
our sins.
On second thought, though, it doesn’t say the camps
are gathering in order to conquer Israel for in the end, they are not.
Only at the 11th chapter when Moshe speaks to Jethro does he
say they are going to the land which G-d promised. But they are not. They
are just playing. They are lining up, in formation, with no place to go.
Many commentaries place the emphasis not on war, but on
love of G-d for the people. He counts them not for military purposes but
because of his obsession with Jews. Like sheep, not going anywhere, just
beloved, he counts them. Some will sin and die. How many will be left? G-d
counts to see how many are in His beloved flock.
The greatness of the Jews is that while we always have
had dreams, we don’t always ask along the way, "Where are we going?
How will we survive in the desert?" We didn’t ask. We have to
gather the troops, do what we can, huddle around the Torah, the
Tabernacle, and march forward, and who knows? Maybe we will march to the
Promised Land. Tomorrow, maybe we will march toward a more perfect world.
Today, we say, daber el bnai yisrael viyisau- let us march forward,
step by step, to bring the world closer to perfection. If we don’t get
anywhere, at least we placed the Torah at the center of our lives. |
