A Tale of Two Mountains

When God your Lord brings you to the land which you are about to occupy, you must declare the blessing on Mount Gerizim, and the curse on Mount Ebal.      Deuteronomy 11:29

                Mount Gerizim and Mount Ebal delimit the city of Sh’chem. Mount Ebal on the north and Mount Gerizim on the south.

                There is a noticeable difference between the two mountains: Mount Gerizim, the mount of the blessings, is green and fertile while Mount Ebal, the mount of the curses, is relatively arid and barren. (This is true at least for the slopes facing Sh’chem.)

                Rabbi Shimshon Raphael Hirsch explains the symbolism of the choice of Mount Ebal and Mount Gerizim as the places for the curses and blessings. Man is faced with the choice between “The blessing (which will come) if you obey the commandments of God” [v. 27] and “The curse (which will come) if you do not obey the commandments of God.” [v.28] It is this choice which determines whether there will be the fruitfulness and plenty of Mount Gerizim or the desolation of Mount Ebal. The difference between the two mountains symbolizes “the extreme choice between attaining the highest degree of spiritual ascent and the deepest animalistic degradation, the choice between blessing and life and curse and death.”

                Ultimately, the blessing and curse are dependent upon “our behavior towards that which is to bring blessing,” namely observance of God’s mitzvot. “By our own moral behavior, we have to decide for ourselves for a Gerizim or Ebal future.”

                We were commanded upon entering the Promised Land, to build an altar specifically on Mount Ebal, the mount of the curse [Deuteronomy 27:5], while we would expect to build the altar on the mount of blessing, Mount Gerizim.

                Ḥizkuni (1250 - 1310) suggests that building the altar on Mount Ebal was, as it were, compensation for the six tribes who stood at the foot of Mount Ebal for the curses [Deuteronomy 27:13], “to comfort and calm them.”

                Rabbi Hirsch, following his own approach, notes that as the Torah was given in the wilderness, a place of desolation, so too, the first altar which the nation of Israel built in its Land was built in a place of desolation, Mount Ebal. Rabbi Hirsch suggests the symbolic significance of the choice of Mount Ebal for the location of the altar:

It was on Ebal, the bleak mount, that the altar of the Torah was built, for completely without prior conditions for it, is an Ebal to become a Gerizim through Torah. Land and people belong intimately together, neither really blossom without the other.

                The great lesson of the altar on Mount Ebal is that “the altar of Torah can be built on the most desolate soil,” and fulfillment of Torah can turn that desolate soil into fertile and blessed land.

                The choice is ours!

The Hafetz Hayyim and Mongolia

You shall not go about as a talebearer among your people…                                           Leviticus 19:16

It is a negative commandment not to tell anyone things that another person said about him. There is an even greater sin included within this prohibition, and that is evil gossip, which refers to one who speaks disparagingly of his fellow-man, even if he tells the truth. The Concise Book of Mitzvot compiled by Ḥafetz Ḥayyim [Negative Mitzva #77]

       My friend Barry, who took early retirement from his position as advisor to the Governor of the Bank of Israel and now works as an international consultant, recently returned from a trip to Mongolia.

Upon meeting Barry and noting his kippa, the Deputy Governor of the Central Bank of Mongolia asked Barry if he is familiar with Rabbi Yisrael Meir Kagan, adding, “You might know him as the Ḥafetz Ḥayyim.”  Barry expressed curiosity about his interlocutor’s familiarity with the rabbi.

The Deputy Governor explained that he completed his doctorate in the United States where his mentor was a Jewish professor. At some point the Deputy Governor told his mentor that staff meetings at the Central Bank of Mongolia were totally unproductive, as the participants spent most of their time screaming at each other. The professor gave his student an English translation of the Ḥafetz Ḥayyim’s Shmirat haLashon (“Guarding the Tongue”), which the student read. The Deputy Governor returned to Mongolia with copies of Shmirat haLashon, and insisted that all participants in meetings read it.

Since then, the meetings at the Central Bank of Mongolia have become more civilized and productive.

This is sent in honor and appreciation of my friendship with Barry and Carol, which has already entered its fifth decade.

By the Rivers of Babylon

By the rivers of Babylon we sat down and wept as we remembered Zion.                    Psalms 137:1 Jeremiah said to them (the Israelite exiles):”I take heaven and earth as my witnesses, if you had cried but once while still in Zion, you would not have been exiled.”          Midrash Tehilim 137

      At first glance, Jeremiah’s comment is difficult to understand, since the time for crying would seemingly be after  the Temple’s destruction and Israel’s subsequent exile from its Land.

However, there are cries of sorrow and cries of joy. Jeremiah’s intention is: had the Israelites cried tears of joy (even once) during the time they were in Zion, thereby expressing their joy at the Temple’s existence, then they would not have been exiled.

        Two verses later, we find the Babylonian captors’ taunt of the Levites (who were responsible for musical accompaniment of the Temple service):

For there our captors asked us to sing; our tormentors requested songs of joy: "Sing us a song of Zion!" they said.

The Midrash [Breishit Rabbati, Parashat vaYetzei] provides the Levites’ response:

World class fools; had we but sung (the song of Zion) we would not have been exiled from our Land.”

    The first Midrash elucidates the second. Rabbi Shimshon Pinkus comments that crying flows from within a person and therefore is an expression of a deep attachment. Accordingly, we can understand the Levites’ response to be: had we but sung a song of Zion which originated from within us, from our hearts and souls, we would not have been exiled.

      In truth, the exiled Israelites took Jerusalem with them to Babylonia and to all corners of the earth to which we were subsequently exiled. It is unique in world history for a nation to have been exiled from its land and return to re-establish its sovereignty, and we have done it twice, with the second exile having lasted 1878 years! It is clear that the reason we Jews were privileged to return to Jerusalem is the simple fact that we never abandoned her. Throughout the years of exile, three times daily and whenever reciting the Grace After Meals, we continued to pray for the rebuilding of Jerusalem, and the Holy City is prominent in all our rituals. This connection to our eternal capital has allowed us to return, while all those who tried to keep us from her have disappeared from history.

      May the tears of sorrow we shed over Jerusalem in her destruction bring us to be privileged to cry tears of joy at her rebuilding, and may we merit singing songs of Zion which originate from the depths of our hearts and souls, within the rebuilt Jerusalem.

This Dvar Torah is dedicated to the memory of my wife. Sunday, 14 Menaḥem Av, would have been our 44^th wedding anniversary. It was the tears of joy which Gloria shed in Jerusalem which first attracted me to her. Through God’s grace, we had more than 41 years together to cry tears of joy and of sorrow within the Holy City, with the joyful tears exceeding the sorrowful ones.

Matot, Masei and the Three Weeks

         

We (naḥnu) will pass over as the vanguard before the Eternal into the land of Canaan …          Numbers 32:32

The sons of Gad and Reuven use the unusual form “naḥnu” rather than the common “anaḥnu,” which Ba’al haTurim relates to two other verses which also use the form “naḥnu”:

We are all the sons of one man …  Genesis 42:11

We have sinned and rebelled… Lamentations 3:42

My father explained the connection among the verses. Whether it is the vanguard going to fight God’s battles or the sinners of Israel, “we are all the sons of one man.” Every Jew must feel a sense of responsibility for all fellow Jews. Through this bond of unity and feeling of mutual responsibility, the sons of Gad and Reuven were empowered to enter the Promised Land as Israel’s vanguard. Ultimately, the tribes’ acceptance of their communal responsibility, rather than focusing on their narrow personal interests, is the guarantee of their success in liberating the Holy Land.

This message of the importance of feeling common kinship and unity is especially timely, as Parashat Matot is always read during the period of three weeks of mourning the destruction of the Temple, since the second Temple was destroyed as the result of baseless hatred (sin’at ḥinam) among the Jews.

            The Hassidic master, the Rebbi of Skolin noted that Parashat Masei is always read during the Three Weeks, the period of national mourning from the 17^th of Tammuz until the 9^th of Av, and explained that there is a valuable lesson to be learnt from this timing.

            All the journeys of the Children of Israel and all their travail in the desert were for the purpose of reaching the Promised Land. So too we must be aware that all of Israel's journeys through the long and bitter exile are for the purpose of purifying us until we reach the final redemption which will bring Israel's return to its Land.

The Great Treachery

            In no fewer than four parashot, Tzror haMor attacks the “treachery” of the Tribe of Gad, who “despised the Desirable Land, the Land flowing milk and honey, and chose to settle in an unclean land, full of idolatry and the spirit of impurity.” Gad was guilty of two evils: “failure to see the sanctity of the Land of Israel and to love it,” despising the Land which is “desired by all nations, and give (to Israel) by the hand of God,” “not wanting to enter the Land of Israel, the Holy Land;” and “they failed to see the impurity and ugliness” of the land outside the Holy Land.”

            The Request of the Tribe of Gad to remain east of the River Jordan was “against the Divine will and against that of Moses’” and in making this request, the sons of Gad followed the approach of the spies in despising the Land, as well as the approach of Koraḥ, who dissociated himself from the congregation.

            In despising the Land, the sons of Gad “turned away from God, and were comparable to idolaters, as our Sages taught ‘Anyone who lives outside the Land is considered as one who does not have a God.’” [Babylonian Talmud, Ketubot 110b] Indeed, the nine and a half tribes who settled west of the Jordan suspected the tribes of the eastern side of the River Jordan of “rebellion against the Lord.” [Joshua 22:16]

            Tzror haMor sees the name “Gad” itself as conveying the treachery. Concerning the naming of Gad, we read:

Good fortune has come (ba gad) and she (Leah) named him Gad.                              Genesis 30:16

The words “ba gad” are written in the Torah as a single word and without the letter aleph, the spelling of the word which means treachery. Tzror haMor suggests that Leah’s choice of name conveyed a prophetic insight of the “great treachery” destined to be committed by the Tribe of Gad in choosing to remain in an impure land and abandon the desired Land, the Holy Land.

            Tzror haMor labels Gad’s preference for an inheritance east of the River Jordan not only as “treachery” but as well as a “great rebellion” against the Divine will. The motivation for Gad’s choice was the fact that the tribe was shepherds and their fear that the Land would be insufficient for their needs. In this consideration, Gad “failed to see that ‘No one ever said the place is too narrow.’” [Avot 5:5]  As well, Gad “failed to see that ‘the Land expands when Israel is upon her and contracts when they are not.’” [Babylonian Talmud, Gittin 57a]

            In addition, the Tribe of Gad ignored the fact that the Land is called “the desirable Land because the fathers of the world (our Patriarchs) desired it and it was given to them by (Divine) oath, as Scripture states ‘to your descendants will I give this Land’.” [Genesis 12:7]. As well, Gad ignored “all that Moses had done in order to enter the Land.”

            (The reason that the Tribe of Gad, and not Reuben is the subject of Tzror haMor’s strong criticism is the fact that “the sons of Gad advised Reuben to join them, and they (Gad) initiated the treachery. Thus Gad sinned and encouraged Reuben to sin along with him.” The verses are consistent in presenting Gad as the spokesperson, indicating that he was the initiator.)

            We may comment that Tzror haMor attacks Gad for choosing the eastern side of the River Jordan, which, though it is not the Land of the Shechina, has the sanctity of the Land. That is, “the eastern side of the Jordan is part of the Land of Israel, though its level of sanctity is below that of the main part of the Land (west of the Jordan).” [Talmudic Encyclopedia – Eretz Yisrael 208]

            Given this fact, what would Tzror haMor have to say about our brethren who choose to remain on foreign soil, in places completely devoid of sanctity, which are totally outside the Land!?!

Numbers and Joshua

Bemidbar, the fourth book of the Torah, deals with the preparations for Israel’s entry into its Land, and as such, presents a quantum change, from a lifestyle which is centered on miracles (the clouds of glory, manna, Miriam’s well, etc.) to one which must be lived on a natural level.    

            Bemidbar, in a real sense is the precursor to the Book of Joshua (since Deuteronomy is essentially Moses’ review of the experience of forty years in the wilderness). The events described in the early chapters of Joshua convey a gradual weaning of the Israelites from dependence upon overt miracles.

            To enter the Promised Land, Israel crossed the River Jordan in a miraculous manner:

… When the feet of the Kohanim who carried the ark dipped in the edge of the water (of the Jordan), the waters flowing from above stood and rose up in one heap …                Joshua 3:15-16

The Israelites took no part in the miracle of crossing the Jordan; it was exclusively God’s work.

            Israel’s first conquest in the Land, Jericho was accomplished miraculously, as we read:

Encircle the city and march around it once. Do this for six days. And seven Kohanim shall carry seven rams’ horns in front of the ark. On the seventh day, circle the city seven times, with the Kohanim blowing the shofarot. Have them blow a long blast on the shofar, and when you hear the blast, have all the people shout a mighty shout, and the wall of the city will collapse…  And the vanguard went before the Kohanim who blew the rams’ horns, and the rearguard went after the ark …            Joshua 6:3-5,9

            While the conquest of Jericho was miraculous, the Israelites participated in effecting the miracle.

            The second conquest in the Land, the capture of Ai, was achieved without relying on an overt miracle, as described in Joshua 8:3ff.

            Thus, we see a progression from overt Divine intervention with no human component to God and the Israelites acting together to the Israelites acting without overt Divine intervention. It is to be noted, that lack of overt intervention by God, of course, does not imply lack of His providence over His chosen people. (In fact, God instructed Joshua: “Stretch out the javelin in your hand toward Ai, for I will give it into your hand,” [Joshua 8:18] which was the sign to begin the attack on Ai.)

            In the battle which Joshua fought after capturing Ai, the Battle of the Ayalon Valley, he and the Israelites benefitted from two overt miracles: at the Bet Ḥoron descent, God cast stones from the heavens upon the fleeing Amorites soldiers, killing more soldiers than were killed by Joshua’s troops, [ibid. 11] and the sun stood still long enough for Joshua to complete his victory over the coalition of five Amorite kings. [Joshua 10:12-13] This apparently reverses the trend and reverts to God’s open intervention. 

            However, as Yigal Ariel noted in his commentary on the Book of Joshua, Joshua did not request the first miracle. Thus the message is that when Israel is ready to its part, God, as it were, is not averse to performing miracles in support of Israel. It seems clear that had Joshua not acted in a natural manner, God would not have intervened on his behalf.

Focus of the Seven Lamps

And God spoke to Moses, saying: “Speak to Aaron and say to him: when you light the lamps, the seven lamps shall give light towards the body of the menorah.”   

                                          Numbers 8:1-2

          “The body of the menorah” is the central branch [Rashi, verse 2], and therefore Kli Yakar posits that the verse should have stated “the six lamps shall give light towards the body of the menorah,” since the verse teaches that the wicks of the six lights are turned toward the light of the central branch of the menorah.

       My father suggested that the verse teaches that even the central light, which represents the light of Torah, must be turned, as it were, internally, that Torah is to be studied for its own sake.

          The six branches of the menorah represent “wisdoms” other than Torah, and this concept provides an additional answer to Kli Yakar’s question: it is only when all seven lights shine together, with Torah at the center, that the other “wisdoms” can be of real value.