CHUKAS, NUMBERS 19:1–22:1

 CHUKAS, NUMBERS  19:1–22:1

This week’s Parshah, CHUKAS is difficult; we learn about:

1. The laws of the red heifer, whose ashes purify a person who has been contaminated by contact with a dead body.

2. The death of Miriam and the people’s thirst for water.

3. Moses is commanded to speak to a rock and command the rock to give water. Moses strikes the rock instead. Water gushes forth, but Moses is told by Hashem that neither he nor Aaron will cross the Jordan and enter the Land.

4. Aaron passes away, and the Israelites mourn his death.

5. Snakes attack the camp.  At Hashem’s direction, Moshe fashions a bronze snake that protects and heals the people.  A thousand years later King Hezekiah destroys this serpent.

6. Moses leads the people in battles against Sichon and Og and conquers their lands.

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In the Parshat Chukat at 19:2, Moshe and Aaron are commanded regarding a type of statute known as a חוק

זֹ֚את חֻקַּ֣ת הַתּוֹרָ֔ה אֲשֶׁר־צִוָּ֥ה יְהֹוָ֖ה

“This is the statute ( חוק ) of the Torah which the Lord commanded…”

A חוק is a law that has no rational basis, such as the Laws of Kashrut.  We keep kosher because Hashem commands us to do so.  We do it out of love, as a means of coming closer to Hashem.  Perhaps in the future as our understanding grows, it is possible that we will comprehend the basis for the חוק.  And then what was once a חוק will now be Mishpatim, laws that have a rational basis.

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In the Parshah at 20:8,

 קַח אֶת-הַמַּטֶּה, וְהַקְהֵל אֶת-הָעֵדָה אַתָּה וְאַהֲרֹן אָחִיךָ, וְדִבַּרְתֶּם אֶל-הַסֶּלַע לְעֵינֵיהֶם, וְנָתַן מֵימָיו; וְהוֹצֵאתָ לָהֶם מַיִם מִן-הַסֶּלַע, וְהִשְׁקִיתָ אֶת-הָעֵדָה וְאֶת-בְּעִירָם.

 “Take the rod, and assemble the congregation, you and Aaron your brother, and speak unto the rock before their eyes, that it gives forth its water; and you shalt bring forth to them water out of the rock; so you shalt give the congregation and their cattle drink”.

We needed water, but how much?

Our encampment looked something like the Azraq temporary refugee camp in Jordan.

 The Azraq temporary refugee camp provides a good approximation of what is needed in terms of basic human requirement.

The camp houses about 35,000 people, half of which are children.  The camp is divided into four districts.

Thirty five liters of water per person per day is needed to meet daily needs.  Water comes from a well and is delivered by trucks.  Women line up at the water distribution points

 Families live in temporary dwellings. There is no cement or concrete construction.   Each dwelling has a floor space of 24 square meters and can take a maximum of five refugees. Each group of six dwellings share lavatories.  Boredom is a big problem.

It was probably the same back then.

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In the Parshah at 21:33 we learn that the Bnei Yisrael fight against King Og of Bashan, the giant.  Og is huge and sleeps in an iron bed that measures 13 feet long by 6 feet wide. 

We are yet in the final years of the Bronze Age.  It will take the materially more advanced Philistines several more years to bring iron into our Land.  And we did not yet possess the know how to smelt iron from iron ore.

So where did Og get enough iron for his special bed?  Part of the answer is found in Egypt in the tomb of a Bronze Age pharaoh known as King Tut. In his tomb is found a dagger made of iron, a special kind of iron only found in meteorites.

We will learn in Devarim at 8:9 that our Land contains stones of iron

This must be the same source of iron from which Og's iron bed was fashioned.

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In the Parshah at 20:12 we learn that Moshe will not be entering the Promised Land.  I think that Moshe, a matchless charismatic leader who led us from slavery and out of Egypt and who truly loved the Bnai Yisrael has lost much of his following. The ten spies exhibited a loss of confidence in him, likewise the Korach rebellion shows the discontent among the Tribes, of the firstborn, of the Reuvenites, of Dathan and Abiram, of the Leviim and in all of the Bnai Yisrael across the board.  

Tragically the time for a new leader is approaching.

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At Numbers 21:1 we learn that the Canaanite king of Arad waged war against us.  And he took captives.  We wanted to fight back, but first we made a vow to Hashem…Hel[p us and whatever cities we capture we will consecrate them to the Lord.  Hashem heard our voice and we defeated the King of Arad.

In this instance the Israelites did not have to fight for themselves, something of a new situation. We had to fight the enemy without having a miracle, completely naturally.

Do you think this change advantageous or disadvantageous for the nation?

What we understood was that although victory could not be attained without God’s help, in war we have to fight on our own with natural tools, a test of our independence.

The bottom line is victory can only be achieved if we remember the source of our strength and success.

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The Haftarah portion is from Judges 11:1-33.  It is the story of Jephthah, a renown warrior from the land of Gilead which is under attack from the Ammonites.  Gilead is east of the Jordan River and is the portion given by Moses to the Tribes of Reuven, Gad and the half Tribe of Manasseh.  Gilead had been taken from Sichon and Og.

Jephthah had been driven out of Gilead by his brothers, 1:3:

וַיִּבְרַח יִפְתָּח מִפְּנֵי אֶחָיו, וַיֵּשֶׁב בְּאֶרֶץ טוֹב; וַיִּתְלַקְּטוּ אֶל-יִפְתָּח אֲנָשִׁים רֵיקִים, וַיֵּצְאוּ עִמּוֹ.

“Then Jephthah fled from his brothers, and dwelt in the land of Tob; and there were gathered to Jephthah men with nothing to lose, and they went out with him”.

If Jephthah and his men will fight against the Ammonites, and will be successful, he will be the leader of the Gileadites...and so it happened.

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ASSIMILATION: A CONSEQUENCE OF EXILE

This week we begin the month of Tammuz, a month named for a Babylonian deity.  It is an example of how assimilated we became when we were exiled to Babylon in the 6^th century BCE.

 Psalm 137 tells of our profound sadness and longing for Jerusalem at that time.

I like Boney M's rendition:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l3QxT-w3WMo

Tammuz is the god of the harvest; he was loved by the goddess Ishtar.  She was known as the goddess of prostitutes, and her alternate names of Har and Hora gave rise to the terms “harlot” and “whore”.

Tammuz was killed by a boar.  Ishtar was devastated by his death.  When Tammuz died, all vegetation died.  Humans animals would no longer mate, and the Earth, herself, was dying.  Ishtar journeys to the netherworld and revives Tammuz  saying: "Great Tammuz is reborn, the fruits of the Earth are ours once more. Bring them forth, let us enjoy them!"

 

 You can see the inroads of assimilation in our texts at least as far back as the prophet Ezekiel.  In the Book of Ezekiel at 8:14 consider this verse:

וַיָּבֵא אֹתִי, אֶל-פֶּתַח שַׁעַר בֵּית-יְהוָה, אֲשֶׁר, אֶל-הַצָּפוֹנָה; וְהִנֵּה-שָׁם הַנָּשִׁים יֹשְׁבוֹת, מְבַכּוֹת אֶת-הַתַּמּוּז 

Then He brought me to the door of the gate of the LORD'S house which was toward the north; and, behold, there sat the women weeping for Tammuz."

At that time Jewish women were ceremoniously mourning for the pagan god Tammuz..shame on us.

 

KORACH, NUMBERS 16:1-18:32 REBELLION & CONFLICT RESOLUTION

 KORACH, NUMBERS 16:1-18:32 

REBELLION & CONFLICT RESOLUTION

In our Parshah there is a two-pronged attack against the appointment of Aaron and his sons to the priesthood, and against Moses as the leader of Israelite nation.  This ultimately comes down as a rebellion against God.

Aaron and his sons’ appointment to the priesthood begins in the Book of Exodus at 28:1, when Hashem makes a declaration to Moses:

וְאַתָּה הַקְרֵב אֵלֶיךָ אֶת-אַהֲרֹן אָחִיךָ וְאֶת-בָּנָיו אִתּוֹ, מִתּוֹךְ בְּנֵי יִשְׂרָאֵל--לְכַהֲנוֹ-לִי:  אַהֲרֹן--נָדָב וַאֲבִיהוּא אֶלְעָזָר וְאִיתָמָר, בְּנֵי אַהֲרֹן.

“And you shall bring near to you Aaron your brother, and his sons with him, from among the children of Israel, that they may minister unto Me in the priest's office,  Aaron, Nadab and Abihu, Eleazar and Ithamar, Aaron's sons”.

Contrary to Hashem’s declaration, Korach, Aaron’s cousin wants to open or maybe reopen the Priest’s office to everyone or at least to the First Born.  It was the First Born who at Mt. Sinai offered up the sacrifices to Hashem:

Exodus 24.5 - 

 וַיִּשְׁלַח, אֶת-נַעֲרֵי בְּנֵי יִשְׂרָאֵל, וַיַּעֲלוּ, עֹלֹת; וַיִּזְבְּחוּ זְבָחִים שְׁלָמִים, לַיהוָה--פָּרִים.

 "And he sent the young men of the children of Israel, who offered burnt-offerings, and sacrificed peace-offerings of oxen unto the LORD".

נַעֲרֵי, young men or youths is interpreted as the First Born (Talmud Bavli, Zevachim 112b).

Although the First Born had a taste of offering sacrifices, they lost that privilege at the Sin of the Golden Calf.

The Priesthood was, is and will be an exclusionary office.   Korach is assisted by 250 First Born tribal leaders, including possibly some Levites.  They too wanted the privilege to offer sacrifices on the Altar, the Mizbeach (מזבח).  They maintained that offering sacrifices, ie. being Priests, should not rest exclusively with Aaron and his family.

Secondly, Dathan and Abiram are causing a problem for Moses.  They are leaders from the Tribe of Reuben.  They do not want to wander and die in the dessert for the next 39 years.  For better or worse they want to return to Egypt, the home that they had known.  After all, they will not be allowed to enter the Promised Land.  

However there is no turning back.  In comparison to the ten spies who were killed outright, the generation of the dessert were given a life sentence without any hope of parole.

Moses needs and has the full support of Hashem.  The ground opens up, as if it is a living being and swallows up Korech, Dathan and Abiram.  The 250 co-conspirators who are carrying their fire pans bring down a heavenly fire that consumes them all. It is similar to what happened to Aaron’s sons Nadav and Avihu.  

You play with fire and you get burned.

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A PRACTICAL WOMAN SAVES HER HUSBAND'S LIFE

In the Parshah, Korach is assisted by three co-conspirators: Dathan, Abiram and On son of Peleth.  Korach, Dathan and Abiram perish, but On’s situation is in clouded in mystery. 

 The Midrash (Numbers Rabbah 18:20) comes out and says that On’s wife saves the day: On’s wife was wise and practical.  She sums up for her husband that he is in a lose-lose situation.  Then she gets him so drunk that he falls asleep.  

When the boys come by to fetch her husband, she stands at the entrance to her tent and loosens her hair.  This unseemly act causes the boys to turn tail and run off to their doom.

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I heard a shiur by Rabbi Riskin in which Moses’ punishment not to enter Israel (Parshat Chukat next week) is directly attributed to his encounter with Korach in this week’s Parshah.  No one sticks up for Moshe.  Not one of shows gratitude for all that he has done.  And Moshe is angry. Then next week when Moshe encounters the rock, his misplaced anger comes out.  The rock becomes the Jewish people, stiff-necked, hard and implacable.  And he strikes it.  

Rabbi Riskin concludes that to be a leader of the Jewish people, one must not lose patience, must be forgiving and love us passionately despite our failings.  

Korach failed in his rebellion, but in doing so he may have pushed Moshe out of his office

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The Punishment of Korah (detail from the fresco Punishment of the Rebels by Sandro Botticelli (1480–1482) in the Sistine Chapel)

 In a previous Parshah, Behaalotecha, Eldad and Medad were prophesying.  Joshua becomes outraged. Moses calms him down, gracefully saying, “If only all of G-d’s people would be prophets!”  Yet in Parshat Korach, when Korach challenges Moses’ authority saying, “The whole community is holy, and the Lord is with them, why then do you exalt yourself over the community of G-d?”

And in this instance Moses uses his power to call upon a miracle to eliminate his opposition. 

What’s going on here?  How are the two instances reconciled?

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MOTHER EARTH
The Land of Israel is held to be a special place within the
world, within the planet Earth. The Land of Israel may be viewed as being
part of a living organism (the Earth) with self-regulatory functions. This view
seems similar to those who adhere to the Gaia-Mother Earth theory where
the Earth itself is deemed to be organic and alive. 


Is the Earth and/or the Land of Israel alive and do they exhibit self-
regulatory functions?
Consider the Torah reading at 18:25 and18:27-28:

וַתִּטְמָא הָאָרֶץ, וָאֶפְקֹד עֲוֺנָהּ עָלֶיהָ; וַתָּקִא הָאָרֶץ, אֶת-יֹשְׁבֶיהָ.

“And the land became defiled, and I visited its sin upon it, and the
land vomited out its inhabitants”

 כִּי אֶת-כָּל-הַתּוֹעֵבֹת הָאֵל, עָשׂוּ אַנְשֵׁי-הָאָרֶץ אֲשֶׁר לִפְנֵיכֶם;

וַתִּטְמָא, הָאָרֶץ

וְלֹא-תָקִיא הָאָרֶץ אֶתְכֶם, בְּטַמַּאֲכֶם אֹתָהּ, כַּאֲשֶׁר קָאָה אֶת-הַגּוֹי,

אֲשֶׁר לִפְנֵיכֶם.

“For the people of the land who preceded you, did all of these abominations, and the land became defiled. And let the land not vomit you out for having defiled it. as it vomited out the nation that preceded you”.

Consider the Earth opening up and swallowing Korach and his followers or the Earth crying out regarding the blood of the murdered Abel.

A rhetorical question, an answer is not expected:
If the Earth is an entity that embodies the properties of life, where then
would you place Israel? Zionist that I am, without missing a beat, I would
exclaim: the heart!

For a better answer, at least to me, consider Israel to be part of a cell, one
of the trillions of cells that you and I have and which together comprise our
body, our universe so to speak. If Israel is a distinct part of a cell, I would
place it within the cell’s nucleus where it has its own special DNA as does
us Jews. For me, Israel is the equivalent of a cell’s mitochondria, where
the energy needed for the cell’s function is produced. What do you think?

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The  Haftarah portion is from Samuel I, 11:14 - 12:22. 

About 400 years before, Joshua, starting out from Gilgal, had conquered the Land.  It had taken him 14 years.  Then for a period of more than 300 years, from time to time when we were beset by enemies, we were led by Prophets and Judges.  Our enemies were the Ammonites or the Moabites or the Philistines and even some remaining Canaanites.

Now we requested a different kind of leadership; we wanted a King.  Hashem listened and although not entirely pleased, granted the request.  Saul, the Benjaminite was anointed King of Israel.  Samuel, who unselfishly administered to us for 40 years, traveling from village to village on his own dime, begrudgingly went with the program.  Listening to his words I hear some regret and remorse.

"YOU CAN'T ALWAYS GET WHAT YOU WANT"

 https://youtu.be/krxU5Y9lCS8

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PARSHAT SHELACH,NUMBERS 13:1–15:41

PARSHAT SHELACH,NUMBERS 13:1–15:41

In our Parsha, 13:2, Hashem commands Moshe to

“Send out for yourself men who will scout the Land of Canaan”.

שְׁלַח לְךָ֣ אֲנָשִׁ֗ים וְיָתֻ֨רוּ֙ אֶת־אֶ֣רֶץ כְּנַ֔עַן

In Devarim 1:22, a parallel passage reads:

"Let us send men ahead of us so that they will dig into the land for us…”

נִשְׁלְחָ֤ה אֲנָשִׁים֙ לְפָנֵ֔ינוּ וְיַחְפְּרוּ־לָ֖נוּ אֶת־הָאָ֑רֶץ

None of these passages speak to spying. Spying is an activity done in secret. Scouting (תִיוּר) and/or to dig (לחפור) [investigating] is not spying. So what is the basis for calling these men spies?

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In Parshat Shelach at 14:8, Joshua and Caleb, the two dissident spies,  counter the arguments posed by the ten other leaders of the Bnai Yisrael:

אִם-חָפֵץ בָּנוּ, יְהוָה--וְהֵבִיא אֹתָנוּ אֶל-הָאָרֶץ הַזֹּאת, וּנְתָנָהּ לָנוּ

“If the Lord desires us, He will bring us to this land and give it to us…”

This is an argument that calls upon us to have faith in Hashem.

Years later, despite the Bnai Yisrael being battle hardened, our faith in Hashem is reciprocated when He brings down the walls of Jericho. And after that miracle it took seven more years of bloody fighting before the Canaanites were routed and an additional seven years of mopping up and land dispersal.

That was over three thousand years ago.  Likewise in today’s times, it takes more than faith alone. For example:

 In the battle for Jerusalem in 1967, Ammunition Hill was the Jordanian strong point.  In just a few hours time, half of the IDF paratroopers involved in the battle were either killed or wounded before overcoming the enemy. 

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What I like best in the Parshah is the dialogue between Moshe and Hashem that takes place after Hashem calms down after visiting the plague on the nay-sayers, and after Hashem has condemned the current generation to die in the desert for having rebelled against Him.  At 15:2-27 Hashem instructs Moshe in detail regarding bringing sacrifices when we enter and are domiciled in the Land:

כִּי תָבֹאוּ, אֶל-אֶרֶץ מוֹשְׁבֹתֵיכֶם, אֲשֶׁר אֲנִי, נֹתֵן לָכֶם.

“When you will come to the Land that I am giving to you, your settlements…”

For me the focus is on the word מוֹשְׁבֹתֵיכֶם …your settlements, abodes, residences, domiciles, the places where you sit.  Hashem, despite all, does not give up on us.

And as an aside: I live in Nahariya which adjoins the Moshav Shavei Tzion. 

 Come visit.

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I don’t claim to be an expert on espionage.  But my favorite genre of film and reading material happens to be mystery & thrillers, many of which involve spying.  I’ve seen or read a hundred of them.  In 2009 I read “A Most Wanted Man” written by David Cornwell, better known as  John LeCarre´.  He is a master of espionage fiction, and incidentally a person who worked for MI6.  I saw a connection between that book  and this week’s Parshah.  This is the letter that I wrote to LeCarre´: 

Nahariya, Israel

August 27, 2009

Dear Mr. Cornwell:

I just had the sublime pleasure of reading “A Most Wanted Man”. In it there is a curious convergence of a theme found in your contemporary tale of intrigue with that of another espionage tale which is found in a most unlikely place, the Book of Numbers. The theme as I see it is: committees do not make for successful espionage.

In the Book of Numbers there is a tale of intelligence gathering, one that took place some 3300 years ago. It is the story of the “m’ragleem”, the spies (Numbers 13:01-14:39).  What is interesting to me is the structural similarity between the Joint Steering Committee in “The Most Wanted Man” and the biblical m’ragleem. They are espiocrats all and the eventual outcome of both tales is comparable

The m’ragleem are a joint steering committee of sorts.  They are a select assemblage; some say men of distinction, one from each of the 12 tribes of Israel, who are chosen to reconnoiter the Land of Canaan.  Ultimately, 10 of the 12 committee members give into their collective fear. These majority members issue an “evil” report for which they are punished.  The mission ends in failure and the Israelites are destined to wander in the wilderness for a total of 40 years.

One message presented in both narratives is that spying by committee does not work.  That lesson seems to have been learned by Joshua, one of the two dissident biblical committee members.  Years later when the mantle of leadership falls upon Joshua, one of his first acts is to mount a surveillance operation against the stronghold of Jericho. This is done not by committee of distinguished men, but by a 2-person infiltration team who spy out Jericho’s defenses.  There is stealth, detection, recruitment of a female operative, tradecraft, deception, concealment and escape (Joshua 02:01-02:24). Ultimately, there is victory. 

In “A Most Wanted Man”, the reader feels a sense of revulsion towards the Joint Steering Committee.  The same is true how Scripture and biblical commentators treat the m’ragleem. They die at the hand of heaven, and some say because of their wickedness are denied a portion in the world to come.  I hope Bachmann would have some consolation with that outcome.

Thank you for having once more treating this reader to a tale most current, but in a certain sense timeless.

Yours truly,

Michael Jaron

LeCarre´ graciously thanked me, and among other things wrote “in matters of intelligence there is no such thing as a joint committee!".

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A MESSAGE FOR TODAY

On a recent Shabbos I was thinking about my family and the negative impact of assimilation on our numbers.  A very recent Pew Research Center finding held that 42% of American Jews have a non-Jewish spouse.

I became kind of glum, but it being Shabbos I had to work my way out of the doldrums.  I came across a passage from the Book of Numbers, Chapter 23, Verse 9. It is a response from the gentile prophet Billam to the king of Moab in which Billam visualizes a future Jewish Nation.  Billam says that the Jewish Nation will be a nation alone, and that it will not consider itself to be like the nations of the world.

Literally [my translation] -

“they are a people who will live alone and it will not consider itself within the nations.”

And it is true: Israel is a place for Jews to be Jewish

In many ways, Israel is unique.  We are one of a kind.

We do not belong to any bloc of nations.

Israel is the only country in which Hebrew is the spoken language.

Israel is the world’s only Jewish State.

Israel is unique in that it is partly religious and partly secular, yet it is a liberal democracy with an ideological mission called Zionism.

In the Book of Leviticus, 19:2, HaShem says:

קְדֹשִׁים תִּהְיוּ:  כִּי קָדוֹשׁ, אֲנִי יְהוָה אֱלֹהֵיכֶם.

“…You shall be holy; for I the LORD your God am holy.” 

The Hebrew word for “holy” is kodesh which has as its root kdsh.  Implied in this root is something that has been separated.  So old Billam got it right.

 Israel as a nation and Jews as a people are indeed separate  They are alone with not many friends.  Worse than that, worldwide they are vilified and attacked on a national and personal level.  It is no wonder that we take up arms against our enemies here and abroad.  

Rav Soloveitchik wrote:  "Jewish blood is not free for taking..."

Jewish blood is not cheap.

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 ANOTHER MESSAGE FOR TODAY

Last week’s Parshah ended with Miriam being punished for speaking disparagingly about her brother, Moses, and his black wife, Zipporah. This week’s Parshah begins with ten of our leaders having negative opinions regarding conquering the Land of Israel.

Many commentators seek a connection: Miriam is punished for her unkind words and likewise our ten Tribal Princes die in a plague for their unkind words. Personally, I do not like making these kind of connections.

However, look at what Miriam said at 12:1: 

“Miriam and Aaron spoke against Moses regarding the Cushite woman he had married, for he had married a Cushite woman”.

וַתְּדַבֵּר מִרְיָם וְאַהֲרֹן בְּמֹשֶׁה, עַל-אֹדוֹת הָאִשָּׁה הַכֻּשִׁית אֲשֶׁר לָקָח: כִּי-אִשָּׁה כֻשִׁית, לָקָח


A Chushite is an Ethiopian, hence a black woman.

In this particular instance “A Black Life Did Matter” and trumped over ten non-black lives.

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In the Haftorah portion, Joshua sends out two unnamed spies. Midrash identifies them as Pinchas and Caleb. This cannot be so because if captured they would likely give away too many important secrets while under interrogation. Also they are far too old for field work.

Well, if not Pinchas and Caleb, then who? It would have to be someone who Joshua trusted. My first guess would be family, someone from his Ephraim Tribe, or better yet someone from his clan. 

However, in my imagination I’m thinking of Moshe’s two sons, Gershom and Eliezer. In this speculative scenario, Moses their father has been separated from his family. The boys need a strong substitute father figure. Uncle Aaron is too busy with his own brood. Who better than the bachelor Joshua to fill the gap. He raises them like his own, has trained them and trusts them implicitly.

Rachav and the two spies, James Tissot, 1896-1902

In the Haftorah portion for Parshat Shelach, two anonymous Israelite spies are housed in the house of a woman named Rachav, who is described as a זונה:

"And Joshua the son of Nun sent two men out of Shittim to spy secretly, saying, Go see the land and Jericho. And they went, and came to the house of an innkeeper named Rachav, and they lay there".

וַיִּשְׁלַח יְהוֹשֻׁעַ-בִּן-נוּן מִן-הַשִּׁטִּים שְׁנַיִם-אֲנָשִׁים מְרַגְּלִים, חֶרֶשׁ לֵאמֹר, לְכוּ רְאוּ אֶת-הָאָרֶץ, וְאֶת-יְרִיחוֹ; וַיֵּלְכוּ וַיָּבֹאוּ בֵּית-אִשָּׁה זוֹנָה, וּשְׁמָהּ רָחָב--וַיִּשְׁכְּבוּ-שָׁמָּה.

In this translation, a זונה is described as an innkeeper, but in many other translations the word זונה is commonly described as a prostitute. While it is understandable why a translator would want Rachav to run a bed and breakfast instead of turning tricks, the problem is how do you transition from being a whore to being an innkeeper and remain loyal to the text?

The answer lies in taking the root of זונה to be the letters zion-nun or זן.   Remember the first blessing in the Grace after Meals where Hashem is described as the הזן את הכול, the nourisher of everyone. 

There you have it, not quite plain as day, in the ברכת המזון

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People of The Book squeeze meaning out of the text. That’s what we do.  Don’t be bashful; go ahead and give it a try.  But how?

In my opinion the way to start is to look to how the best of the best of Biblical Commentators went about making interpretations.  Hands down, that would be the 11th century commentator on the Torah, par excellence, Rashi. What was his interpretive method?  And even though we sorely lack Rashi’s knowledge, wisdom and capacity, can we give it a try without thoroughly embarrassing ourselves?

I think so, and I will go so far as to speculate that Rashi would encourage us to do so.  Quoting from Avram Grossman’s 2012 book “Rashi” on his interpretive method: “According to Rashi, every biblical verse – and in particular, every verse in the Torah – bears a significance and message that go beyond merely conveying information.  Accordingly, one must do more than interpret the literal meaning of the words”.

Try this on for size:

The opening words of the Haftarah portion read: וַיִּשְׁלַח יְהוֹשֻׁעַ, “Joshua sent…”

Who is Joshua?  We have a tradition that you can tell something about a person by delving into the meaning of his name.  In this case,  יְהוֹשֻׁעַ means “God saves” or rescues or delivers.  Perhaps we have a foreshadowing of what the two spies are going to encounter.

 The root of the word וַיִּשְׁלַח when used as a noun has the connotation of an emissary or agent. So maybe, we have here: “God’s saving emissary”.  This could point to either Joshua or the two men or Rachav.  My money is on the later.

 Joshua sends out two men. They are spies.  What kind of spies are they?  The text says שְׁנַיִם-אֲנָשִׁים מְרַגְּלִים חֶרֶשׁ. The possible answers may focus on how you interpret the word חֶרֶשׁ.  If חֶרֶשׁ is being used as an adverb, then they were sent out secretly.  But why the need for secrecy?  An obvious answer, and one that relates to our world today, is to avoid intelligence leaks.  This is a clandestine secret mission, fraught with danger.  The fewer people who know about it, the better.  Was there possibly a spy from Jericho in the Israeli camp?...maybe, maybe not, best not take a chance.

 חֶרֶשׁ can also mean silently.  That’s an easy one; silence or stealth goes without saying. However, חֶרֶשׁ has an implication of being deaf.  There is a commentator who suggests that the spies should pose as being deaf.  This is so because then the inhabitants of Jericho thinking that they are deaf will talk openly around them, and perhaps reveal secrets. 

And perhaps a “deaf” person has difficulty in speaking.  By not speaking, the spies won’t be revealing their lack of facility with the Canaanite language.

 חֶרֶשׁ can also signify earthenware or clay pots.  There is another commentator who suggests that the spies should pose as merchants selling clay pots.  This would be their cover when question by the city’s gatekeeper: “What is your business here?” “We’re here to sell our pots”.  Likewise, חֶרֶשׁ can also mean a carpenter, and another cover story: “We’re just here to erect some scaffolding for the city’s walls”.

Spies want to blend in. They do not want to be remembered.  They do not want to call attention to themselves.  A pair of deaf people, pottery salesmen or carpenters are sure to be remembered.  And those commentators who are surely heads and shoulders above us laypeople would have benefited if they had read Graham Greene or John LeCarre, both of whom worked for MI6.

 Falling back on Rashi, the master of interpretation, I suggest that חֶרֶשׁ refers to the word plow or plowman.  The B’nai Yisrael are nomads.  At this juncture they are not farmers.  I’m thinking that the two spies changed out of their herdsman attire, got rid of the pungent odor of the flocks by taking a good bath and donned a farmer’s clothing.  If asked, they tell the gatekeeper that they are in town to buy seeds for next year’s planting.  I think it will fly, not only in the sense of a good cover story, but in the literal sense of the text.

The reality however turned out to be that their cover must have been blown from the start.  It did not take very long before the King’s henchmen to catch on to them.  But for the quick thinking of Rechav, the mission would have been a disaster.

 But going beyond the literal sense of the text, consider what a plow or plowman does.  It or he turns up the dirt which is exactly what the two spies have been tasked to do.  And incidentally, one verse later, that is what they will be accused of, “digging” into the land”, לַחְפֹּר אֶת-הָאָרֶץ.

 I could go on and explain how and why Rachav is sometimes referred to as an innkeeper and not a hooker, but by now you get the gist of making interpretations.  Try it yourself.  Run your commentary past your Rabbi or maybe your wife or husband.  Put a smile on Rashi’s face.

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Squeezing a little bit more from the text:

In general terms what were the men that Moshe sent out commanded to do?
Were they spies?
In this Parshah and in Sefer Devarim they are not called by any term.
But, there is a clue as to what they are is found in what they are commanded to do:
In verse one and two , Hashem told Moshe to send out men, and they will וְיָתֻ֨רו the Land…

The infinitive is לתור which means to tour, explore or to survey and is found in verse 17.  A person who surveys, looks carefully and thoroughly at someone or/and somethings, so as to do an appraisal of them.

These men are charged to collect information about their enemy who they intend to battle and report on the Land in which they will reside.  A person who engages in this activity is a מרגל, a spy.

As an aside: It is interesting to note that without the vowels, וְיָתֻ֨רוּ֙  becomes יתרו, Moshe’s father-in-law, who in my opinion was a conniving renegade spy. 

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TZITZES: THE MALE CHASITY BELT

At the conclusion of the Parshah at 15:39 we are commanded regarding the wearing of tzitzes:

“…and you shall not lust after your heart and after your eyes after which you are going astray”.

וְלֹא-תָתוּרוּ אַחֲרֵי לְבַבְכֶם, וְאַחֲרֵי עֵינֵיכֶם, אֲשֶׁר-אַתֶּם זֹנִים, אַחֲרֵיהֶם

The translation is a little difficult, but you are already know that זֹנִים is a reference to harlotry, and תָתוּרוּ has something to do with checking things out.  However, לְבַבְכֶם, “your hearts”, brings up another issue.  In the Chumash, heart does not have a romantic connotation.  The function of the heart to the biblical person thirty five hundred years ago comes most close to the function of the mind.  There is no word for “brain” in the Chumash.  In Egypt at that time, the brain was just a waste product to be discarded in preparing a mummy.  The gist of the commandment goes to not exploring lustful thoughts that will get a man into trouble.

In effect, the tzitzes are akin to a male chastity belt.