Korach: New Audio Shiur

Recorded this afternoon at Gerber & Co.

The Changing of the Guard: Understanding the Aftermath of Korach's Rebellion

After Korach's failed coup, the Torah introduces an interesting new Mitzvah: Guarding the Mishkan. Why must the Kohanim guard the Mishkan? Is this just an honor guard or is there more to it? And why is this the response to Korach's rebellion?  Find out the answers to these questions - and more - in this shiur. Just click the link above.

Out of Egypt: Lot, Michah & the Ten Lost Tribes

This is the final installation of a three-part series on the Biblical roots of Jewish assimilation in exile - and the long-term consequences thereof. Begin the series here. 

In the previous post we cited the Talmudic tradition that the Jews brought "Michah's Idol" with them across the Red Sea (Sanhedrin 103b). Who was Michah?

The Book of Judges tells the story. Generations after the Exodus, a man named Michah established a pagan temple in Northern Israel after his mother commissioned a silversmith to forge an idol (Shoftim 17:1-5). Although Michah's idol obviously did not literally cross the Red Sea, nonetheless, the Vilna Gaon believes that the Talmud is referring to this very same idol. When the Talmud says that Michah's idol crossed the sea, it means the pagan theology of Egypt crossed the sea. And many years later, this imported Egyptian paganism found expression in Michah's idol. 

This, says the Vilna Gaon, is what Moshe was referring to when he questioned the nation just before they entered Israel. 

"You know how we lived in the Land of Egypt and how we passed through the midst of the nations that you crossed. You saw their disgusting things, their idols of wood, stone, silver and gold that they had. Perhaps there is a man, a woman, a family or a tribe amongst you whose heart is turning away from Hashem our God today to go and serve the gods of those nations? Perhaps there is amongst you a root growing gall and wormwood?"  (Devarim 29:15-17) 

Moshe's concerns were well-founded. A poisonous root was growing among the Jews - the idolatry of Michah (Aderes Eliyahu ad loc.).

The temple founded around Michah's idol was located in the territory of the tribe of Dan and it stood there for centuries. It was a pagan house of worship until גלות הארץ, "the exile of the land" (Shoftim 18:30), when the Assyrian king Sancheriv invaded Northern Israel and exiled the Ten Tribes (Rashi ad loc.). 

The implication is clear. The exile and ultimate disappearance of the Ten Lost Tribes was due to paganism. But not just any paganism. This paganism was foreign and ancient. The Jews picked it up during their long stay in Egypt and then they transported it from Egypt to Israel. "Michah's Idol crossed the Sea." Unwilling to cleanse themselves of Egyptian culture, the Jewish return to Israel was flawed from the get-go, and the seeds of a future exile were planted even before they returned to their homeland.

All of this tragic history was foreshadowed by the character of Lot. Like Yaakov and his sons, Lot was forced by famine to leave Israel and move to Egypt. As we saw in part-one, Lot was seduced there by Egyptian materialism and he carried his new-found desires back with him to Israel. His longing for the Egyptian lifestyle draws him to Sodom and ultimately proves to be his undoing. Despite Avraham's best efforts to save his nephew, Lot is lost forever. Such was the cost of Lot's visit to Egypt and such was the cost of the Ten Tribes' visit to Egypt. This gives us a new appreciation for the prophets' comparison of the Jews to the people of Sodom (cf. Yeshaya 1:9-10; Yechezkel 16:48-49).

This parallel between Lot and the Ten Tribes is all the more compelling in light of the fact that Lot was in the running to be one of the forefathers of the Chosen Nation. It wasn't just Lot's shepherds who thought so (cf. Rashi to 13:7). Lot's descendants, the nation of Moab, thought the same. That is why they, more than other nations, were so frustrated with the selection of the Jews as the Chosen Nation at the Exodus. אילי מואב יאחזמו רעד - "Moab's heroes were seized with trembling" (Shemos 15:15; Gur Aryeh ad loc.). The truth of this notion is further indicated by Lot's granddaughter Ruth who converted to Judaism and became the matriarch of King David. (For more on Moab's claim, see this post.) Lot was supposed to be part of our people, just like the Ten Tribes. But he, like they, was lost.

When Sodom is conquered by the armies of the four kings and Lot is taken captive, Avraham goes to war, quickly overrunning the enemy. וירדף עד דן - "He pursued [them] until Dan" (Bereishis 14:14). "There [at Dan] his strength was drained, for he foresaw that in the future his descendants would set up an [idol in the form of a] calf there" (Rashi ad loc.). Here the forces arranged against Lot are related to the future idolatry of Dan! This is no coincidence, for Lot is indeed the predecessor of both Michah and the Ten Tribes. Both were guilty of importing Egyptian ideology to Israel, both were taken captive by invading armies, both could not be saved by their brethren, and both are ultimately doomed to disappear from the pages of Jewish history. 

Lot and those who follow in his footsteps, surrendering to the natural forces of assimilation, are doomed to fall before the natural forces of attrition. Like all peoples and all societies of the earth, it is only natural that they will be erased by the winds of time. But those who follow the footsteps of Avraham and Yosef, transcending nature and maintaining their identity in the face of foreign influence, such people merit the blessing of historical transcendence - membership in the eternal nation of Israel.

Out of Egypt: Yosef's Bones & Michah's Idol

Part-one of this post dealt with the foreshadowing of our story back in Parshas Lech Lecha. Read it here.

When the time comes for the Jews to leave Egypt, the state of their spiritual health is the question of the hour. After so many years of slavery, what remains of their faith and identity? Actually, this is the central question for all the rest of Chumash. How much damage has Egypt inflicted on the soul of the Jew?

The answer is sad. At the Red Sea, the angels of heaven famously questioned God, "Both the Jews and the Egyptians are idolators! Why are You saving the Jews and killing the Egyptians?!" The Jews were so assimilated, even the angels couldn't tell them apart from Egyptians. But in order for the Jews to merit an Exodus from Egypt, they must first get Egypt out of their system. How is this going to be accomplished?

First, they will have to disavow Egyptian culture. Second, they must affirm their Jewish identity. And indeed, Hashem commands them to do these two things before they leave the country. First they were commanded to slaughter a sheep - an animal sacred to the Egyptians - and place its blood on their doorposts (12:6-7). In this way, they rejected Egyptian paganism. And then they were told to circumcise themselves, affirming their identity as Jews (12:48). It was due to the merit of these two mitzvos that the Jews were able leave Egypt (cf. Rashi to 12:6).

As we have seen, this was unfortunately insufficient. At the Red Sea the angels still couldn't tell the difference between the Jew and the Egyptian. For the sea to split, the merit of an even greater rejection of Egyptian culture was needed and this was found in none other than the bones of Yosef.

"The Sea saw and fled" (Psalms 114:3). It saw the coffin of Yosef descending into the sea. Hashem said, "Flee before the one who fled!" As the verse states, "He left his garment with her and fled and went outside" (Bereishis 39:12). (Yalkut Shimoni 873)

Like his forefather Avraham before him, Yosef was a man of steel, uninfluenced by the fleshpot of Egypt. And in the end, it was the bones of Yosef HaTzaddik, the bones which withstood the seductions of exile, that split the sea.

It is perfectly natural to be seduced. But when man refuses to be assimilated into his environment and transcends his nature, then man is truly free - and nature itself will transcend its laws in his service and deliver him to freedom.

But the bones of Yosef was not the only unusual baggage the Jews carried across the sea. The Talmud tells us that the spoils of Egypt included some contraband as well.

"A rival crossed the sea..." (Zechariah 10:11). R. Yochanan said, "This refers to idol of Michah."

Sanhedrin 103b

The Red Sea was not amused.

The administering angels were astounded. "People who worship idols walk on dry land in the midst of the sea?!"

How do we know that even the sea itself was filled with anger? For the verse states והמים להם חמה  - "The water was a wall for them" (Shemos 14:29). Don't read it חומה, "wall," rather read it חימה, "anger." ["The water was angry at them."]

Mechiltah; see Baal HaTurim ad loc. that the anger was due to the presence of Michah's idol.

[The word for wall - חומה - is spelled here in abbreviated form without a ו (as opposed to just a few verses earlier (14:22) where it is spelled with a ו). This allows the word to be vowelized in a way which transforms its meaning from "wall" to "anger."]

We learned that the sea split before the bones of Yosef, for Yosef withstood the seductions of Egypt. The Red Sea is willing to violate the laws of nature in deference of one who transcends human nature, but it is rightly incensed to have to stand as a wall before Jews who succumb to paganism and dare carry the idols of Egypt across its seabed.

Read part-three here.

Escape to Yeshiva

If you work out the years of Yaakov's life, there are fourteen years unaccounted for. Tradition tells us that between Parshas Toldos and Vayeitzei Yaakov spent  fourteen years hiding out in yeshiva (cf. Rashi at the end of Toldos citing Megillah 17a).

This is difficult on several levels. Firstly, wouldn't that be the first place Eisav would look? Secondly, long ago Yaakov was described as יושב אוהלים, "one who dwells in tents." Rashi explains, "the tent of Shem and the tent of Ever." Yaakov was always in yeshiva, and now he goes there to hide?! What did he do, change his seat? Thirdly, when Rivka was having a difficult pregnancy, she went לדרוש את השם to find out what was going on. Rashi explains that she asked Shem, which means the Yeshiva was in her neighborhood! (In her condition, she could not have traveled far.) So Yaakov hid from Eisav for fourteen years in a yeshiva down the block? The very same yeshiva he had been learning in his whole life?!

I believe the answer can be found in the Gemorah itself. The Gemorah does not say Yaakov went to hide in the Yeshiva of Shem. Nor does the Gemorah say he went to the Yeshiva of Shem & Ever. The Gemorah says Yaakov went to hide in בית עבר. (See מהרש"א מגילה שם.)

There were two different Yeshivos! Shem had a Yeshiva and Ever had a Yeshiva. This is indicated by the very first reference - יושב אהלים - "tents." "The tent of Shem and the tent of Ever." The Midrash is unequivocal: "[Yaakov] left the Beis Medrash of Shem and went to the Beis Medrash of Ever" (Tanchuma Yashan, Vayishlach 9).

There was never "one big Jewish tent." There were always (at least) two different tents.

Yaakov spent his entire life studying under his master, the Alter Zeide Shem. The Midrash says he served Shem for fifty years. When Shem passed away thirteen years earlier, Yaakov undoubtedly became the Rosh Yeshiva of Beis Shem. But now he had to hide. Where to run? To the last place Eisav would expect him to be. As a rank-and-file student in the competing, second-tier Yeshiva, the Yeshiva of Ever, Shem's great-grandson.

It never occurred to Eisav that Yaakov would go to Ever, for Eisav's arrogant mind could never understand the humility that Torah study engenders. But it was this humility that saved Yaakov's life, broadened his outlook by exposing him to a different דרך הלימוד, and - מעשה אבות סימן לבנים - became the hallmark of the true בן ישיבה.

Avraham's Finest Hour?

I heard a question this past Shabbos that gave me pause. Rabbi Kupfer spoke at Adas Torah on Friday night and he asked as follows.

Why did Avraham wait until his wife died before purchasing the Machpelah Cave? He clearly knew what he wanted (cf. 23:8-9); according to the Midrash he had known for years that the Machpelah Cave was the burial site of Adam and Chavah (cf. Baal HaTurim to 18:7). Wouldn't the responsible thing be to buy it in advance? What would Avraham do if Efron was out of town when Sarah died? In short, why wait?

This is an excellent question that I have never heard anyone ask before.

Rabbi Kupfer explained that the Machpelah Cave was a very sacred site, on the border between Heaven and Earth. Avraham and Sarah would not be worthy of it before Avraham passed the ten tests. He therefore did not buy it before passing the Akeida - which happened to coincide with Sarah's death.

I believe there is a simpler answer.

The Talmud in Sanhedrin (111a) (quoted by Rashi Shemos 6:8) reports Hashem's sharp response when Moshe complained:

What a shame for what is lost and no longer extant! ... I told Avraham "Get up and travel the length and breadth of the land for I will give it to you" (Bereishis 13), [but when] he searched for a burial site for Sara and couldn't find one for less than 400 silver shekels he didn't question me.

According to the Talmud in Baba Basra (16b), even the Satan was impressed:

Master of the World, I have wandered the entire earth and I have not found another like your servant Avraham.You said to him, "Get up and journey through the land, its length and width, for I will give it you..." (13:17). But when he wanted to bury his wife he couldn't find a place to bury her! Yet he didn't question you.

(The Ramban makes reference to this Gemora in his final comments on this episode and, in his commentary to Avos, Rabbeinu Yona counts the burial of Sarah as Avraham's tenth test.) 

This explains why Avraham never bought the Machpelah Cave - it would have demonstrated a lack of faith in Hashem's promise to give him the entire Land of Israel! The very fact that in the end Avraham was forced to pay for it and yet didn't question God was, in the Satan's view at least, Avraham's finest hour.

Out of Egypt: Avraham vs. Lot

This is the first installation of a three-part series on the Biblical roots of Jewish assimilation in exile - and the long-term consequences thereof.

Soon after Avram's arrival in Israel a famine forces him to head for Egypt in search of food. After a brief - and traumatic - stay in Egypt, Avram, Sarai and Lot return to Israel. At this point in the story, it would be fair for us to wonder what effect, if any, their trip had on them. The Torah does not disappoint.

Avram went up from Egypt, he and his wife... and Lot was with him... He journeyed on from the south to Bais El to the original site of his tent between Bais El and Ai, to the site of the first altar that he had made. And Avram called there in the name of Hashem.  (Bereishis 13:1-4)

The Torah goes out of its way to emphasize the fact that Egypt had absolutely no effect on Avraham. Despite exposure to the indulgences and immorality of Egypt, despite the drama in the King's palace and despite his new-found wealth and power, Avraham returns to his humble tent in desert and continues in his mission of teaching monotheism as if nothing happened. His nephew Lot, however, is another story.

Lot raised his eyes and viewed the entire Jordan plain. It was completely fertile - this was before Hashem destroyed Sodom and Amorah - like a garden of Hashem, like the land of Egypt... Lot chose the entire Jordan plain for himself...  (13:10) 

How could the Torah, in the very same breath, compare the region of Sodom and Amorah to both the Garden of Eden and the land of Egypt?! I heard the answer to this question from Lisabeth Kaplan o"h in the Hillel House of UCSC. She explained that the Torah here is not describing reality. It is describing what Lot saw when he "raised his eyes." And after his trip to Egypt, Lot was one confused individual.

Lot missed Egypt. He loved the time he spent there and on his return to Israel he was searching not only for the Garden of God, but for the fleshpot of Egypt too. He wanted both, and when he saw the blessed, fertile plains of Sodom and Amorah he found exactly what he was looking for - or so he thought. Thus did Lot depart from his uncle Avram to meet his doom in Sodom.

Lot's conflicted value system comes to the fore when a mob surrounds his home and demands that he hand over his two guests for sodomy. Lot refuses their demands and valiantly protects his guests - offering the mob his two daughters in their place! (Apparently, Lot learned from Avraham the proper care and treatment of guests, but never learned the wisdom of Jewish parenting, for he left Avraham's home before Avraham had children.) Here we can see the influence of Egyptian promiscuity (cf. Rashi to 12:19) on Lot's behavior. Another example, no less troubling, is Lot's consensual incest with his second daughter (cf. Rashi to 19:33).

Avram's descent into Egypt and his return to Israel foreshadows the future national exile of the Jewish people in Egypt and their subsequent Exodus and return to Israel (cf. Ramban to 12:10). (This is obviously more than a mere literary device. As the Midrash says, "The events of the forefathers are a sign for the descendants.") If we can take this idea one step further, it stands to reason that the diametrically opposed behaviors of Avraham and Lot - behaviors which ultimately tore them apart - parallel divergent attitudes of Jews at the time of the Exodus. Unfortunately, this is indeed the case. Not all the Jews wanted to leave Egypt (cf. Rashi to Shemos 10:22). And even among the Jews who did want to go, there were those who wished to take Egypt with them... but we are getting ahead of ourselves. The second half of our story must wait for Parshas B'shalach.

Read part-two here.

Sarah the Punisher II

Pharaoh is punished for taking Sarai and the verse says he is punished על דבר שרי אשת אברהם (Bereishis 12:17). Artscroll renders it "because of Sarai," but Rashi quotes a fascinating Midrash that translates the phrase literally: "by the word of Sarai." Hashem sent an angel who did Sarai's bidding. When she said "strike," the angel attacked Pharaoh. (For an explanation of the unusual punishment chosen by Sarai, see this post.)

This Midrash begs the question. Why? Why didn't Hashem just stop Pharaoh directly? Why does He put it into Sarai's hands to mete out Pharaoh's punishment?

The answer can be found between the lines of a Midrash (B.R. 53:6, cited by the Ohr HaChaim to 12:13) which relates our episode to the parsha of Sotah, the suspected adulteress:

Rabbi Yitzchok said, "Hashem said 'If the woman did not adultery and is pure and innocent, she will have a child' (Bamidbar 5:28). This woman [Sarai] entered the house of Pharaoh and the house of Avimelech and left pure - certainly she should be blessed with a child! 

This is an extraordinary Midrash. It understands that a Sotah who turns out to be innocent is rewarded with a child not due to some mysterious power of Sotah water but simply because she withstood the test of being alone with a man. It certainly follows, says the Midrash, that Sarai, who withstood the advances of the King of Egypt, should be blessed with a child. Indeed she was and they named him Yitzchok.

(Not that this was a difficult test for our mother Sarai. She was a Tzadeikes and never entertained the thought, ח"ו. But she is rewarded nonetheless. Just because it's easy doesn't mean it doesn't count. On the contrary, if a test is easy for you, you should get extra credit!)

This explains why Hashem did not stop Pharaoh. To stop Pharaoh would undermine the test that ultimately created Yitzchok. Hashem put it in Sarai's hands. If she wants, she can drop Avraham and become the new Queen of Egypt. Or, if she so chooses, she has an angel at her disposal that will stop Pharaoh in his tracks. The decision is hers.