Torah Tidbits: Parshat Terumah

25:1-2 - "'Speak unto the children of Israel, that they take for Me an offering; of every man whose heart maketh him willing ye shall take My offering."  So what if the men's hearts didn't 'make them willing' to contribute?  Would that have meant that the mishkan wouldn't have been built?  And given how its construction requires so much in the way of precious metals, stones and fabrics --as we subsequently read -- what if the required materials weren't given?  I'm just saying that while a freely-contributed system makes a lot of ethical sense, it's not exactly the most practical way to go about building the tabernacle.

25:3-7 - Wow, God is asking for a lot of valuable items:  gold, silver, brass, dyed fabrics, and animal skins (seal skins?!?) and stones...  First, are we to understand that the former Egyptian slaves took all this stuff with them at the time of the Exodus?  (They certainly didn't have the time or means to mine these metals in the desert!)  Second, while I grant that the mishkan was important, it seems so glaring that a people who were asked to give up the worship of idols would be asked right away to build a religious structure with so much wealth.

(I have heard it suggested that while the mishkan seems borderline-idolatrous from a modern perspective, at the time of its construction, it was indeed a radical departure from the kinds of religious structures employed by polytheistic cultures of the time in that, for example, there were no depictions of the divine.  This makes a lot of sense to me.  If this is right, however, it implies that idolatry is in some ways a relative, changing concept:  the specific things we would identify as idolatry aren't necessarily the same things that our forefathers would (and vice-versa).  But if that is true, then isn't it likely that at least some of the rituals and practices from centuries past are no longer able to elicit the kinds of contemplative or emotional responses that they once did and therefore should be changed?  I wonder what I -- or any Reform Jew -- would make of the mishkan if we could go back in time and bear witness to the rites that took place in it.  Would we be impressed by the animal sacrifices, the burning of incense, etc.?  Or would we be alienated and put off by the entire thing?)

25:8 - "And let them make Me a sanctuary [מִקְדָּשׁ], that I may dwell among them."  Nicely worded!

25:18-21 - "And thou shalt make two cherubim [כְּרֻבִים] of gold..."  How strange these cherubim out of all the things God might ask the Israelites to put on the cover of the Ark, and how wierd the level of detail offered in their description!  I wonder what these things meant to them at the time...

25:22 - "...and I will speak with thee from above the ark-cover, from between the two cherubim which are upon the ark of the testimony, of all things which I will give thee in commandment unto the children of Israel."  Huh?!?  This seems to be riding pretty close to the line for God to speak as if from the cherubim.  If the point is to wean the Israelites away from idolatry, why not just have the voice eminate from nowhere, or from everywhere, or from just the Holy of Holies?

25:23-30 - All these details about the table for the "showbread" [לֶחֶם פָּנִים].  Seriously, how were they supposed to make something so elaborate in the desert?!?

25:31-40 - Incredible detail on how to make the "candlestick" [מְנֹרָה].  Why are all these details -- of the number of branches (seven), its constitution (a single piece of gold), the "cups" [גְבִעִים ] on the branches that are supposed to be "made like almond-blossoms"  -- so specific?  What was the point of being so specific here?

26:4-6 - Crazy details!  About the way to connect the sections of the curtains together, with holes in specific places, and clasps made of gold.  Incredible!

Random questions: 

1. Apart from these and other passages in the Torah, is there any independent evidence that the mishkan ever actually existed?  I'm not saying it didn't, but I am curious:  Did anyone else ever see it and leave a written record?  I mean, coming across this structure in the desert must have been a sight to behold...
2. The tabernacle was a huge thing, with lots of parts, some of which were themselves incredibly large.  Are we to understand that this entire thing was taken apart, packed up, moved, then reconstructed every time the Israelites moved their camp in the desert?  For 40 years?!?  How many times, then, would this have occurred?  For how long did it ever stay in one place? 

Torah Tidbits: Parshat Mishpatim

21:1-11 - Ah yes...  The Laws.  A brief comment on these verses:  I get that slavery at the time was all right, and that the Torah is actually placing limits on its practice and implementing protections for the owned "servant."  But to make this comment is in some ways to historicize the Torah, to suggest that morals can and do change.  Surely no one in this century would turn to these verses as legitimation for slavery, right?  But if certain words of Written Torah are clearly no longer binding, then doesn't it equally follow that the same would apply (if not more so) to Oral Torah?  I'm open to hearing the counterarguments to this view, but it's subjects like this that make me on the one hand admire the ethics of the Torah for its time, but reject them for our time. 

21:4-6 - Nice...and weird.  The first of these verses (4) seems to say that if the Master provides for his Slave/Servant [עֶבֶד] a wife, that wife -- and any children that are produced -- are the property of the Master, not the Servant.  The next verse (5), though, seems to say that if the Servant loves his wife and children and does not want to be separated from them after serving the master for six years -- at which point normally he would be freed -- then, apparently instead of being rewarded for this familial loyalty, the next verse (6) explains how he is to be punished in two ways:  (a) "his master shall bore his ear through with an awl"; and (b) he loses his freedom and must serve his master forever [וַעֲבָדוֹ לְעֹלָם].  Am I missing something here?  This seems extremely punitive.  Geez. 

21:15 - "And he that smiteth his father, or his mother, shall be surely put to death."  Really?  Put to death just for striking a parent?  See comment above about 21:1-11.  A question:  Was this really such a problem in Biblical times such that this harsh punishment was demanded?  Or was the point to emphasize the need to honor father and mother?  And how often was such punishment actually imposed, if ever?

21:16 - Death penalty for kidnapping.  Kind of rich, given that slavery itself was okay.

21:17 - Here, "he that curseth [וּמְקַלֵּל]" mother or father gets put to death.  See comment on 21:15.  By the way, what constitutes a "curse" in this situation?  (Good thing this fell by the wayside.  I think I'd be given the death penalty a thousand times over!)

21:20-21 - "And if a man smite his bondman, or his bondwoman, with a rod, and he die under his hand, he shall surely be punished. Notwithstanding if he continue a day or two, he shall not be punished; for he is his money."  Uh, so if I hit my servant and he dies, I get "punished"...unless he lingers for 24 hours or more before dying, in which case I'm off the hook?!?  Yikes.

21:22-25 - Ah, yes.  A life for a life, an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth, a hand for a hand, a foot for a foot, a burn for a burn, a wound for a wound, a bruise for a bruise.  Funny, I never realized that these verses are in the context described in 21:22, in which two men are fighting and, presumably by accident, injure a pregnant woman, causing her to miscarry.  Clearly these verses aren't to be taken literally, right, that if you blind someone by accident -- even if through negligence -- your eye should get put out? 

21:26-27 - If you poke out your servant's eye or tooth, the servant should go free as compensation.  At least there's some incentive here not to mistreat your servants, right?

21:33-34 - If you open a pit, and someone's animal falls into it, you're responsible for making restitution.  Weird.  It makes sense, but why these two verses sandwiched in between verses about goring oxen (21:28-32, 21:35-36).  Why break up the flow in this way?  Is there a point?

22:1-2 - Something has to be left out here.  "If a thief be found breaking in, and be smitten so that he dieth, there shall be no bloodguiltiness for him [אֵין לוֹ, דָּמִים]. If the sun be risen upon him [אִם-זָרְחָה הַשֶּׁמֶשׁ עָלָיו], there shall be bloodguiltiness for him--he shall make restitution; if he have nothing, then he shall be sold for his theft."  So if a thief is killed while in the commission of his theft, that's okay, but what does it mean by "If the sun be risen upon him"?  Does this mean if time goes by before he is identified as the thief, i.e., not caught in commission of the act?

22:8 - A translation issue.  The verse says if two people disagree if something was stolen, according to Mechon Mamre, "the cause of both parties shall come before God [אֱלֹהִים]; he whom God [אֱלֹהִים] shall condemn shall pay double unto his neighbour."  The Kehot translation, however, translates elohim [אֱלֹהִים] as judges.  This is a big difference.  Which is it?  The latter clearly makes more sense, but the Hebrew elohim clearly points to the former translation as being right.

22:17 - "Thou shalt not suffer a sorceress [מְכַשֵּׁפָה] to live."  Hmmm.  Questions:  What the heck is a "sorceress" in this context?  Is there a modern equivalent?  And why are they so bad?

22:18 - No bestiality.  Was this a serious problem back then?  Why did this merit a prohibition?  I wonder...

22:20 - Says the verse, "And a stranger [גֵר] shalt thou not wrong, neither shalt thou oppress him; for ye were strangers [גֵרִים] in the land of Egypt."  I like the sentiment, but I wonder what exactly is meant here by ger or "stranger."  Foreigners?  Non-Jews?  Anyone not a member of one's own community?

22:24 - No usury a/k/a interest.  I'm interested to see how the Talmud deals with this little problem.

22:27 - "Thou shalt not revile [לֹא תְקַלֵּל] God, nor curse [לֹא תָאֹר] a ruler of thy people [נָשִׂיא בְעַמְּךָ]."  What's the difference between t'kaleil and ta'or?  Are these two different things?  And what does it really mean to revile/curse God?  The Torah is indeed a strange, vague book...  (And does "a ruler of thy people" mean whoever the leader is?  We in the U.S. certainly don't follow this commandment!)

22:30 -  Nice and clear:  Don't eat meat torn from living animals.

23:2 - What the heck does this mean:  "Thou shalt not follow a multitude to do evil; neither shalt thou bear witness in a cause to turn aside after a multitude to pervert justice"?  The first part I get:  don't follow the majority if it's doing the wrong thing.  But the second part?  No idea.

23:8 - No bribes.  The Hebrew here is really nice:  וְשֹׁחַד, לֹא תִקָּח: כִּי הַשֹּׁחַד יְעַוֵּר פִּקְחִים, וִיסַלֵּף דִּבְרֵי צַדִּיקִים

23:20-25 - Yikes.  Fire and brimstone about what God will do to the inhabitants of the Land of Israel so that the Israelites will take it.  But there is strangeness too:  Instead of God saying what God will do himself, instead an angel [מַלְאָךְ] is appointed "to keep thee by the way, and to bring thee into the place which I have prepared."  God tells Moses to tell the people that they should "Take heed of him, and hearken unto his voice; be not rebellious against him; for he will not pardon your transgression; for My name is in him."  This is strange.  Why does God tell the Israelites to pay heed to the angel, a messenger, as opposed to God?  How does the angel have the power to pardon transgression?  I thought only God could judge?!?  And let's not get into the implications of this verse for Middle East peace... (!)

23:27-33 - The Israelites are not encouraged to show much mercy toward the inhabitants of the Land of Israel...  How can God be this way toward innocents?  What did the Canaanites, Hittites, Hivites, etc. do to deserve being wiped out?!?

24:3-4 - Talk about leaving out the details!  After three chapters of God telling Moses what God wants the Israelites to do (or not do), here, in two verses we read:  "And Moses came and told the people all the words of the LORD, and all the ordinances; and all the people answered with one voice, and said: 'All the words which the LORD hath spoken will we do.'  And Moses wrote all the words of the LORD..."

Huh!?!

First of all, how do we know what it was exactly that the people agreed to do?  Are we to believe that Moses was able to repeat verbatim everything that God said, as opposed to giving his version of what he heard?  Second and related, what exactly did Moses write down?  Exactly what God said?  Exactly what Moses had just told the people?  And what was this that he wrote down, the Torah itself?  All pretty vague.  The most significant thing for me is that it underscores the idea of al pi adonai b'yad moshe -- according to the word of God by the hand of Moses, i.e., human beings have a role in even the most basic interpretation of what the Torah is telling us.

24:4 - The rest of the verse: "And Moses ... rose up early in the morning, and builded [sic] an altar under the mount, and twelve pillars, according to the twelve tribes of Israel."  Trying to picture this strange thing:  Twelve pillars...of what?  And where exactly is "under the mount" [תַּחַת הָהָר]?  Weird.

24:7 - "And [Moses] took the book of the covenant [סֵפֶר הַבְּרִית], and read in the hearing of the people..."  Book of the Covenant?!?  So is this the Torah?

24:9-11 - First of all, here's a truly bizarre sight:  ""Then went up Moses, and Aaron, Nadab, and Abihu, and seventy of the elders of Israel; and they saw the God of Israel [וַיִּרְאוּ, אֵת אֱלֹהֵי יִשְׂרָאֵל]; and there was under His feet the like of a paved work of sapphire stone, and the like of the very heaven for clearness [כְּמַעֲשֵׂה לִבְנַת הַסַּפִּיר, וּכְעֶצֶם הַשָּׁמַיִם, לָטֹהַר]."  Wait, they saw God!!?!  With something sapphire-like under his feet?!?  In the first place, what does this mean and what did it look like?  I can't picture this.  Second, I thought God was pretty clear that only Moses could come near.  In 24:2, God says "Moses alone shall come near unto the LORD; but [Aaron, Nadab, and Abihu, and seventy of the elders of Israel] shall not come near; neither shall the people go up with him.' "  But then in 24:11, God seems to backtrack on this: "And upon the nobles of the children of Israel He laid not His hand; and they beheld God, and did eat and drink."  What could this possibly mean?

24:12 - "And the LORD said unto Moses: 'Come up to Me into the mount and be there; and I will give thee the tables of stone, and the law and the commandment, which I have written, that thou mayest teach them.' "  Huh.  So then what was Moses writing down before, and telling to the people, then reading out loud to the people?

24:13-14 - God has just told Moses to come up to the mountain to receive tablets, the law, etc.  In this verse, though, we read "And Moses rose up, and Joshua his minister; and Moses went up into the mount of God."  Was Joshua going with him?  The text is unclear.  It would seem not, as it says Moses went up [וַיַּעַל מֹשֶׁה], not 'Moses and Joshua' went up.  But in the next verse Moses tells the elders "wait for us here until we return to you" [שְׁבוּ-לָנוּ בָזֶה, עַד אֲשֶׁר-נָשׁוּב אֲלֵיכֶם].  Wait for us until we return.  So does Joshua go with him or not?

(Rashi offers a possible explanation (see his commentary on 24:13 here), based on what we have not yet read:  "I do not know what business Joshua had here [לא ידעתי מה טיבו של יהושע כאן], but I would say that the disciple [Joshua] escorted his mentor [Moses] until the place of the limits of the boundaries of the mountain, for he was not permitted to go past that point. From there Moses alone ascended to the mountain of God. Joshua pitched his tent and waited there for forty days. So we find that when Moses descended, “Joshua heard the voice of the people as they shouted” (Exod. 32:17). We learn [from there] that Joshua was not with them."  Perhaps.  But it begs the question of why these key details are left out in the first place...)

Torah Tidbits: Parshat Yitro

18:14-16 - An interesting story...  Jethro, Moses's father-in-law, asks Moses what he's doing sitting around dealing with the masses all day.  Moses answers "'Because the people come unto me to inquire of God; when they have a matter, it cometh unto me; and I judge between a man and his neighbour, and I make them know the statutes of God, and His laws.'"  My question is what "statutes"? what "laws"?  The Torah has not yet been given!  (I know, I know, midrash invariably explains how the Torah was already revealed to Moses or some such thing.  But I found these verses jarring anyway.)

18:17-23 - Jethro tells Moses why his plan isn't a good idea, and suggests instead appointing others to handle all but the most important matters and questions:  "Hearken now unto my voice, I will give thee counsel, and God be with thee: be thou for the people before God, and bring thou the causes unto God."  But who is Jethro to make this kind of suggestion?  How does he know what God does or doesn't want?  Why in this case has God remained silent, not telling Moses what to do?  Perhaps this is because the matter concerns the interpretation of the law rather than its content; the latter is God's job (through Moses), but the former is a human job.  Maybe.

19:3 - Trying to picture this:  "And Moses went up [עָלָה] unto God, and the LORD called unto him out of the mountain [מִן-הָהָר]..."  So Moses climbs the mountain...part way?  Then God calls to him from the mountain?!?  Not from the heavens, not from the top of the mountain, but from the mountain?  Interesting...

19:7-8 - Another minor point of confusion (inconsistency?):  God has just finished telling Moses that, if the Israelites keep their side of the covenant, they will be for God "treasure from among all peoples."  Moses is then instructed to tell the "children of Israel" about this.  First, we read that "Moses came and called for the elders of the people [זִקְנֵי הָעָם]" to give them the message.  Immediately thereafter, though, we are told "And all the people [כָל-הָעָם]answered together, and said: 'All that the LORD hath spoken we will do.'"  So who got the message?  The elders or all the people?  (Or does "all the people" refer to just the elders?)  The difference is critical, because this is the moment of acceptance before the giving of the Ten Commandments.  Did all the people agree, or only the elders?!?

19:14-15 - "And [Moses] said unto the people: 'Be ready against the third day; come not near a woman.' "  Oy.  Vey.  I get it, I really do; things were different back then.  Purity was a different ball of wax, as it were.  Or was it?  Purity laws are still fundamental aspects of Orthodox Judaism, and of all the things in the Torah I have a problem with, this is way up there.  I'll keep my powder dry on this for now, but as far as I can tell, this is the first mention about women having the potential for being unpure...

19:16 - A nitpick:  "...there were thunders and lightnings [sic] and a thick cloud upon the mount, and the voice of a horn [קֹל שֹׁפָר] exceeding loud"  A shofar?  Was God blowing a shofar?  Hmmmm.....

19:21-24 - Weird.  God tells Moses to tell the people not to approach the mountain lest they die.  In the immediately following verse, God then says that the priests who do approach should "sanctify themselves" lest they die.  Moses, rightly I think, then points out to God that "'The people cannot come up to mount Sinai; for thou didst charge us, saying: Set bounds about the mount, and sanctify it.' "  God replies, you and Aaron come up, but "let not the priests and the people break through to come up unto the LORD."  Huh?!?  Did God get confused and miss the part where he told Moses none could approach?!? 

20:2 - Ah yes, the Ten Commandments...  Here's #1:  "I am the LORD thy God..."  Not to be nitpicky here, but frankly this isn't a commandment.  Proclamations 2 through 10 are clearly commandments -- do this, don't do this -- but #1 is a statement.  If the commandment were to know that the Lord is God or to believe that the Lord is God, then why doesn't it say so?  (To be fair, the statements that constitute the "official" Ten Commandments are not universally recognized as the same.  See this interesting chart.)

There is a strange divergence between the verse numbering in Mechon-Mamre on the one hand, and other sources I have seen on the other.  Specifically, Mechon-Mamre incorporates the words "Thou shalt have no other gods before Me" [לֹא-יִהְיֶה לְךָ אֱלֹהִים אֲחֵרִים, עַל-פָּנָי] into verse 20:2, while the other sources I have consulted say that these words make up their own verse, 20:3.  This throws off the verse numbering for the rest of this chapter insofar as I am providing links to the Mechon-Mamre site.  It seems to me that Mechon-Mamre must be wrong, but to avoid confusion, for the verses that follow, I will provide the link to the verse as numbered in Mechon-Mamre, then include the actual number in brackets immediately after.  Weird!

20:3-5 [20:4-6] - #2 = No idols...  But the verse reads differently than I had always thought:  It doesn't say no idols of other Gods...it says no idols or graven images whatsoever "of any thing that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth."  What?!?  The commandment is no sculptures or pictures of anything at all, even if they are not intended to be worshipped?!?  The next verse says "thou shalt not bow down unto them, nor serve them," but if the intention was to allow likenesses of things but not to allow their worship, why not say 'thou shalt not worship idols or graven images'?

20:6 [20:7] - Commandment #3, not to take the "take the name of the LORD thy God in vain."  Yet another instance of the Torah leaving out the key details of something supposedly of critical importance.  I hope I don't do this without realizing!! : (

20:7-10 [20:8-11] - Commandment #4 - remember the Sabbath and keep it holy.  See, here we get some specific instructions, viz. don't work.  Of course, what constitutes work isn't said here, but at least we get direction.  (Of special note: look at the list of who shouldn't do work:  "thou, nor thy son, nor thy daughter, nor thy man-servant, nor thy maid-servant, nor thy cattle, nor thy stranger that is within thy gates."  So why, then are shabbas goys all right?)

20:11 [20:12] - Commandment #5, to honor mom and dad.  Ugh.  I'll get to this in my Mitzvah of the Week project at the proper time, but it's worth pointing out here, again, that the Torah offers no explanation of what this means.  The other interesting thing is the second half of this verse:  "that thy days may be long upon the land which the LORD thy God giveth thee."  This is the only one of the Ten Commandments to offer an explanation of why one might want to do it.  Is it possible that honoring father and mother wasn't so self evident? ; )

20:13 [21:14] - Commandment #10 (6-9 are pretty self-explanatory) - 'Do not covet...'  This is also an interesting commandment in that it seems to prohibit an emotion rather than behavior or belief.  How is one supposed to stop one's self from feeling something?!?

20:15 [20:16] - In this verse, the people of Israel say to Moses after hearing the Ten Commandments "'Speak thou with us, and we will hear; but let not God speak with us, lest we die.'"  Uh, but in verse 20:1, we read "And God spoke all these words, saying..."  Didn't they already hear God's voice, then?  The last verses of Chapter 19 relate God telling Moses to go tell the people "So Moses went down unto the people, and told them," but 20:1 doesn't say 'Moses spoke to the people, saying'; it just says "God spoke all these words."  Who said what to whom?!?  The verses that follow are more confusing.  First Moses reassures the people they won't die ("'Fear not; for God is come to prove you, and that His fear may be before you, that ye sin not.'")  Then "Moses drew near unto the thick darkness where God was" at which point God tells him:  "Thus thou shalt say unto the children of Israel: Ye yourselves have seen that I have talked with you from heaven."  So here it is implied that the people did hear God talking to Moses, in which case they did hear God's voice.  Which way is it?

20:20 [20:21] - Neat idea here:  "in every place where I cause My name to be mentioned I will come unto thee and bless thee" [בְּכָל-הַמָּקוֹם אֲשֶׁר אַזְכִּיר אֶת-שְׁמִי, אָבוֹא אֵלֶיךָ וּבֵרַכְתִּיךָ].  We need no set, "special" place to worship God; wherever we are, there God is.

Torah Tidbits: Parshat Beshalach

And now, finally, I am caught up!  Phew!  Now it's time to keep the Torah Train on the Tracks and turn to other things...  Stay tuned!

13:19 - "And Moses took the bones of Joseph with him..."  (This must mean Joseph's mummy, right, per Genesis 50:26.)

13:21 - Interesting:  "And the LORD went before them by day in a pillar of cloud, to lead them the way; and by night in a pillar of fire, to give them light; that they might go by day and by night."  If memory serves, this is the first time we read in the Torah about something (a) supernatural/miraculous, something that couldn't even possibly be explained away, and (b) that was witnessed by the masses. 

14:19 - God gets ready to part the Red Sea, when we read that "And the angel of God, who went before the camp of Israel removed and went behind" the Egyptians.  Huh?!?  Didn't we just read in 13:21 that it was "the LORD" that was doing the guiding?!?  Did I miss something?

15:1-18 - The Song at the Sea in praise of God...  Quite beautiful, actually.  But there are some snags.  How was Moses able to sing about things that hadn't yet happened?  Like what Pharaoh said after the Israelites had left (15:8)!  Like speaking of the destruction of the peoples of the Promised Land in the past tense (15:14-16)!  The building of the Temple (15:17)!  Geesh.

15:20-21 - Nice interlude for Miriam here, who, after the long Song at the Sea, "took a timbrel in her hand; and all the women went out after her with timbrels and with dances" and sang. 

15:26 - Ah yes, the fire and brimstone:  After only three days wandering the desert, they can't find water, and the people turn to Moses for answers.  God provides water, saying "'If thou wilt diligently hearken to the voice of the LORD thy God, and wilt do that which is right in His eyes, and wilt give ear to His commandments, and keep all His statutes, I will put none of the diseases upon thee, which I have put upon the Egyptians; for I am the LORD that healeth thee.'"  I know I have a lot to learn in terms of understanding the role of punishment vs. rewards, and I'm sure my thinking will evolve on the subject...but frankly this is some of the hardest stuff to swallow in the Torah:  That punishments and rewards are causal effects of whether or not I observe the law.  I just don't -- I can't -- see the world working this way.  I can't believe in a God that operates in this manner, nor in a religious-legal system predicated on God doing so.

16:2-3 - So this is where Jewish whining comes from:  "...and the children of Israel said unto [Moses and Aaron]: 'Would that we had died by the hand of the LORD in the land of Egypt, when we sat by the flesh-pots, when we did eat bread to the full; for ye have brought us forth into this wilderness, to kill this whole assembly with hunger.'"  Nice!  But it makes me wonder:  Why don't we talk about this during Passover?  I think it would make a good subject:  Why is it, just when we've gotten the greatest thing in the world (i.e., freedom), we complain and want more?  I would think the haggadah should talk about this lessons in this...

16:13-15 - Another nomination for the "strangest verses in the Torah" award:  God produces manna, apparently overnight, and in the morning, "when the layer of dew was gone up, behold upon the face of the wilderness a fine, scale-like thing, fine as the hoar-frost on the ground."  Say what?  Kehot translates this as follows:

When the sun rose and the layer of dew rose, behold, over the surface of the desert a thin substance that had been packed within the two layers of dew was exposed, as if the dew had been peeled back. It had a thin crust on top and was as fine as the frost on the ground. Underneath this was another layer of dew.  This substance was thus protected by dew both above and below. Although dew usually descends from the atmosphere onto the earth, here, the dew miraculously rose from the ground.

I still can't figure out what this is supposed to look like...

17:11-12 - Curious:  When Moses physically lifts his hand on the hill top, Joshua and the Israelites prevail over the forces of Amalek.  When Moses lowers his hand, though, Amalek prevails.  As if to drive the point home that there is an actual connection between the position of Moses's hand and the fortune of the Israelites in battle, we read that "Aaron and Hur stayed up his hands, the one on the one side, and the other on the other side; and his hands were steady until the going down of the sun."  Why was this necessary?  Why not just wave the staff once or some such thing?  Seems like overkill.

17:14-16 - I don't get it.  A couple mitzvot directly pertain to never forgetting what Amalek did and to destroy their seed...but what did they do that was so bad?  This is it?  Huh...

Torah Tidbits: Parshat Bo

10:7 - I understand that, according to both the narrative and many commentaries, God needed to unleash the plagues on Egypt not only so that Pharaoh would let the Israelites go but because God wanted the Israelites themselves to see his power.  I get that.  But here is another one of those verses that give me pause:  Pharaoh's courtiers basically tell their king to give in, but he won't.  So despite the fact that clearly there were Egyptians ready to free the Israelites, God keeps hardening Pharaoh's heart (in 10:20), which sets the stage for the worst plagues to come.  I'm not a fan of collective punishment no matter what the reason.

10:24-27 - The back and forth between Moses and Pharaoh over the so-called three day sojourn into the desert continues, with almost comedic effect.  Here, Pharaoh, who by now clearly understands the Israelites are asking for freedom, not a vacation, says they can go into the desert...if they leave their flocks behind.  Moses offers a fabulously opaque excuse:  since they didn't know exactly what animals God would want them to sacrifice, they needed to bring all of their animals along with them!  But God "hardens" Pharaoh's heart, and the answer is no.  (Though it seems to me that the word used here, וַיְחַזֵּק , is better translated as "strengthened" than "hardened," no?)

11:2 - Unless I've missed something, this is the first time God says please!  Mechon Mamre translates the Hebrew "דַּבֶּר-נָא, בְּאָזְנֵי הָעָם" as "Speak now in the ears of the people," but Kehot translates it -- more accurately, I think -- as "Please speak to the people".  It's weird, because Mechon Mamre literally translates "in the ears of the people" but ignores the na suffix on the word "speak," while Kehot does the opposite, leaving out "ears" but including "please."  My question is:  Why does God say "please" here?  Why not just command?

11:7 - What the heck does this mean:  "But against any of the children of Israel shall not a dog whet his tongue, against man or beast; that ye may know how that the LORD doth put a difference between the Egyptians and Israel."  What do dogs have to do with anything?!?

12:2 - "'This month [Nisan] shall be unto you the beginning of months; it shall be the first month of the year to you..."  This may be an ignorant question, but huh?!?  I thought Tishrei was the first month of the year, ergo Rosh Hashanah?

12:11 - A poetic verse (in Hebrew), and a great image:  "And this is how you shall eat it: with your waist belted, your shoes on your feet, your staff in your hands, and you shall eat it in haste this Passover offering to God."  Do traditional sederim do something to commemorate this?

12:12 - Fascinating!  I always thought the slaying of the firstborn was carried out by the Angel of Death, not God (a la verse 9 of had gadya), but the text is very clear (both here and at 12:27 and 12:29):  It was God alone who does the killing.  This makes sense, but why did I have it my head that it was the Angel of Death?!?

12:14-20 - These verses made me sigh.  Here we have in unambiguous, explicit details about what we're supposed to do on pesach: (a) eat matzot, (b) not to eat anything leavened or have anything leavened in the home, (c) not to work on the first and last of the seven days of the holiday, and (d) to do these things "for all generations."  So much in the Torah is ambiguous; so many of the mitzvot, it seems to me, are not explicitly commanded in the Torah but rather by the commentators.  But here we have a nice set of dos and don'ts that leave little to the imagination.  This begs the question:  Of the 613 mitzvot, how many are clear like this?  I wonder...

12:21-23 - I'm sure there's a good answer for this, but why would God need the Israelites to mark their houses with blood so that their firstborn would not be killed?  Doesn't God know everything?  A shudder to think the alternative was the case:  That putting blood on the house was the litmus test to find out who didn't believe in God...

12:35-36 - Let me get this straight:  The Israelites "asked" the Egyptians for their "silver and gold," and because "the LORD gave the people favour in the sight of the Egyptians...[the Egyptians] let [the people] have what they asked," and in doing so "despoiled the Egyptians."  Are we to understand that God made the Egyptians give up all their wealth?!?

12:38 - Who, exactly, made up the so-called "mixed multitude" [עֵרֶב רַב] that accompanied the Israelites when they left Egypt?  Obviously non-Jews...  But who were they?  Why did they come?  What happens to them?  Weird...

12:43-50 - Concerning the laws of pesach, God has a lot to say here about who can't eat of the sacrifice:  not "aliens" (or "strangers"), and not "A sojourner [nor] a hired servant."  And you can't take it out of your house, "neither shall ye break a bone thereof."  Etcetera.  If this means non-Jews can't eat of the sacrifice, then what of matzah?  What of the ceremonial foods eaten at a seder to take the place of the sacrifice?  (An aside:  Why don't we eat lamb on pesach?  The Temple and the preisthood were not yet established, so there were no rules about ritual sacrifice to follow.  Ergo, the destruction of the Temple, it seems to me, should not have any bearing on whether we sacrifice lambs today.  I'm probably missing something...

13:1-2 - A-ha moment #1!  So this is where pidyon haben comes from:  God sparing the firstborn of the Israelites!

13:9 - A-ha moment #2!  So this is why we put a bayit of the tefillin on the arm:  because God took us out of Egypt with a mighty hand!

13:14-16 - Where the Torah tells us about the "good son," in eloquent Hebrew:  "If in time to come, your child asks you, saying: 'What is this?' You shall say to him, 'With a mighty hand God brought us out of Egypt, from the House of Bondage.'"

Is the Kotel a Jewish tourist trap?

Yesterday's article by URJ President Rabbi Eric Yoffie at jweekly.com, about recent events at the Kotel, got me thinking.

(For those who missed it, "Women of the Wall," a group of women who meet regularly to conduct services at the Kotel, ran into trouble last November when one of their group brought a Torah scroll and put on a tallit.  That ran afoul of a previously-issued High Court ruling that required the group to adhere to the regulations for behavior at the Kotel, regulations, of course, written by Orthodox Jews who are, shall we say, unsympathetic to such behavior.  You can read a contemporary account of what happened here.)

I get why some Orthodox Jews view it as a holy place.  It's the sole remnant of the Temple.  Insofar as some pray for the restoration/rebuilding of the Temple, it stands to reason that the Kotel is hugely significant.  (Why it's considered to be a synagogue for legal purposes is another matter...)  But for the rest of us Jews who do not hope and pray for the restoration of the Temple and the resumption of sacrifices...why do we make such a big deal out of it?  Yoffie writes, "Throughout the generations, the Kotel has been a source of inspiration to Jews everywhere. It is a concrete symbol of our love for Jerusalem and our common Jewish destiny. The Wall belongs to the entire Jewish people; it must be a place that unifies our people, where all Jews are welcomed and all are respected." 

Frankly, I don't buy it. 

As far as I can tell, the Kotel is a tangible symbol of what divides Jews, not unites them:  Those who long for the restoration of the Temple vs. those who don't; those who view it as a powerful religious site vs. those who view it as a powerful nationalist site.  It may be "a source of inspiration to Jews everywhere," but if the things we're being inspired to do are widely divergent, it's hard to see how it unifies us.

The first time I went to the Kotel was in High School, on Tisha B'av.  It was one of the most profoundly moving experiences of my life.  I had planned for my semester in Israel for years, hoped and dreamed it would come...and when I saw it lit up at night, thousands of Ultra-Orthodox chanting Eicha, I wept on the stones for what seemed like hours.  By the end of my six months in Israel, it still felt special.  Several years later when I returned, it felt familiar, but there was something strange about being there -- I felt as if I was supposed to feel something, and the more I thought about it, the more I didn't know what was even appropriate to feel.  And, of course, I got hit up a dozen times for money every time I went to pray. 

And then it started to feel a bit idolatrous. 

In my opinion, one of the genius things about Judaism is its distinction between real holiness and its trappings.  Jews aren't supposed to have holy places -- anywhere 10 Jews come together to pray is perfectly holy enough, thank you.  We don't need art, or things, or monuments...just Torah and people.  The Kotel, though, seems to undo all of this, as if the remnants of the retaining wall of the Second Temple could ever be imbued with any holiness beyond that brought by the people who go there...and the Orthodox certainly have no monopoly on that.

Don't get me wrong, I think people have the absolute right to feel whatever they want to feel about the Kotel.  That's none of my business.  But from where I stand, it's the ultimate Jewish tourist trap:  That place to which we're all supposed to go, supposed to feel something...supposed to put our prayers on paper and stick them between the stones where they're supposed to get to God faster.  Where we get hit up for money from every other Black Hat in Jerusalem. 

Others can have a blast there if they must, but sorry to say I think it's baloney.

Mitzvot of the Week: #2, #3 - Not to believe in other gods/To believe that God is one

Introduction:

The Rambam doesn't make things easy here.  By my reading, there is a "double-double" approach to the uniqueness of God.  First, as in Week 1, he seems to approach this mitzvah from two different angles, "belief" in vs. "knowledge" of God's oneness.  Second, the mitzvah is really two mitzvot, one positive, one negative.  So what we have here, at first blush, are four possible approaches -- (1) to believe in God's oneness and (2) not to believe in other gods (from Sefer HaMitzvot); and (3) to know that God is one and (4) not to consider that there are other gods (from Mishneh Torah).  I look at his arguments for all four of these positions, but I adhere to the Rambam's classification system by considering that these positions really constitute two mitzvot, opposite sides of the same coin.

In Sefer HaMitzvot (Negative Commandments - Mitzvah 1), "The exhortation against believing [מלהאמין] in the Divinity of aught beside Him" is stated as the first negative commandment.  The Rambam here cites Exodus 20:3:  "There shall not be unto you any other gods before my presence" (לֹא-יִהְיֶה לְךָ אֱלֹהִים אֲחֵרִים, עַל-פָּנָי).  As with the first mitzvah concerning belief/knowledge of God, he cites Makkot 23a as to the status of this "exhortation" as a negative commandment. 

On the positive side (Positive Commandments - Mitzvah 2), he writes that to believe in God's oneness means "to believe [להאמין] that the Maker of the creation and its First Cause is one, as the Exalted One has said (Deuteronomy 6:4): "Hear O Israel, the Lord our God, the Lord is one." "The intent here," Rambam continues, "is that He took us out of the house of bondage and bestowed upon us what He did out of lovingkindness and beneficence only, so that we believe in the Unity, as is our obligation." This mitzvah, he says, is also known as "mitzvath yichud" (i.e., the commandment of unity).

In the Mishneh Torah, however, these mitzvot are explained slightly differently.  In Chapter 1.6, he explains that "Anyone who presumes [המעלה על דעתו] that there is another god transgresses a negative commandment" [emphasis mine] while in Chapter 1.7, he writes "The knowledge of this concept [that God is one] fulfills a positive commandment, [as implied by Deuteronomy 6:4]..." [emphasis mine]. 

Some preliminary thoughts and questions: