It’s time to go! After two years and two months camped at Mt. Sinai Israel sets out for the land promised to their ancestors. During that time we have encountered a particular family who became the foundation of a particular people that would become a nation. While at Mt. Sinai they received a sense of identity and mission, communal and personal laws to live by that spanned areas such as religious activity, family, business, legal, ethical and social relationships that helped to frame their new society and understanding of God unlike their past. At Sinai they learned about the central roles of the Kohenim as well as the idea of holiness, which is defined by ones middot (character traits), meaning that human behaviors were to be rooted in the divine image within. They learned at Sinai that they would find God in each other, and were no longer captive to life’s unfair demands or injustices. Upon leaving Sinai here in the fourth book of Torah, B’midbar – or Numbers in English – we travel with Israel from Sinai to Canaan.
The initial thing we encounter in the book of Numbers and in this parasha, B'midbar, is the first of two censuses (first leaving Sinai and last entering Canaan) but also the roles of the Levities. Unlike the rest of Israel we learn here that the Levities, those who descend from Levi, will be excluded from the census and later land rights (cf. Joshua 13). Regarding Israel the census reveals there are 603,500 men 20 years and older of fighting age for the battles they will encounter along the way (Num. 1:3, 46). But just as important we also learn about the Levities and their role in the greater society to oversee all aspects related to the Mishkan in support of the Kohenim (Num. 1:47-52, 3:6). In this case we are told there are 22,000 Levities (Num. 3:39) that are divided into three Levitical families. The family of Gershon encamped behind the Mishkan and were responsible for the coverings and the hangings of the tabernacle to take them down, transport them, and reassemble them. The family of Kohath camped to the south of the Mishkan and were responsible for the ritual items like the Menorah, packing them up, their transportation and resetting them up when they reached their next stop. And finally the family of Merari would encamp near the Mishkan to the north and transported the planks and posts that they took down and set up at each location along the journey (cf. Numbers 3:21-38). The Levities we are told belonged to the service God for this purpose (Numbers 3:10-12).
Yet within all that distinction of purpose we find the following verse in Numbers 1:53 that says, “The Levities, however, shall camp around the Tabernacle of the Pact, that wrath may not strike the Israelite community; the Levities shall stand guard around the Tabernacle.” Rashi in his commentary on this verse writes the following, therefore “If you act according to My commands there will be no anger, but if not, — i.e., that strangers take part in this their (the Levities’) service, there will be anger, just as we find at the incident with Korah.” This reminds me of the story of when the waters upon the earth and in the heavens presented themselves before God, claiming they were the best of everything created. God was taken back by their assertion, and attempted to set the waters straight, but the waters continued to proclaim their supremacy. In response, God called upon the grains of sand to confront the waters, although the waters just bullied the grains. An angel of God encouraged the grains to stand up to the waters, summoning the winds to fiercely swirl about in order to gather the grains together, in the end forming the shorelines. As the grains bounded together in support of each other, they pushed the waters back, and back, and back, until one day the waters showed the grains of sand respect.
The Levities were like the grains of sand who got push back from the community, who were like the water. Rashi further reminds us of the Jewish Midrashic tradition that while all the first born were called into God’s service they lost that right do to the sin of the Golden Calf, but since the Levities did not participate in that sin, they were chosen to bear the holy duty to care for the Mishkan. Remember the Jews had already received their identity and purpose at Sinai according to Exodus 19:6 being called “a kingdom of priests and a holy nation,” but now that role was appropriated to the Levities instead who regularly stood with Moses and incurred the community anger as well. Probably the best known story of this type of opposition, which actually comes from within the Levitical ranks toward Moses himself, is with Korah and his followers who were unsatisfied with their role for all the wrong reasons that would end poorly for everyone, as we shall see in Numbers 17. This dynamic in Israel's wandering happens more than once and almost became their downfall. But the Levities did not replace Israel as “a kingdom of priests," they simply had their own role to fulfill as partners.
Rabbi Jonathan Sacks, of blessed memory, writes that “the Torah reflects the Israelite understanding of God as the unity beneath the diversity.” This infighting we will encounter can be like a plague. There is so much we can look at today albeit politically, socially or religiously that divides us, unable to see or chose to look the other way as such differences continue to break apart family units and friends who sadly forgot how to love one another regardless. But we might even see this between the synagogue who is at odds with the synagogue down the street or internally a synagogue board is divided with their clergy, let alone what is experienced at the work place or social gatherings. Its not that disagreements won't happen, it’s about what happens when the sea and the sand forget that they are partners with the same purpose even though they have different roles. The Torah is a book that sees people for what they are and in this case Moses foresaw those possible human power plays so he admonished Israel to remain unified on their shared journey despite their diversity. Its time to go, ne'si'a tova, safe travels.
Shabbat Shalom,
Rabbi Adam
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