The book of numbers begins at the point where Exodus leaves off.

The book covers the years of the peoples wanderings in the wilderness. However only the beginning in closing periods are described. The 38 years in which a new generation matures received no attention at all.

Section 1. Regulations promulgated at Sinai.

Section 2. The early days of the march, various rebellions, and of old leader ship with the deaths of Miriam and Aaron, judgment on Moses.

Section 3. Book of Balaam.

Section 4. The events immediately preceding the invasion of Canaan, boundaries of the promised land, final instructions before the crossings are given.

The Torah is essentially a document of faith. That is it views reality as an aspect of divine and human interaction; memories and traditions of events were intermingled with cultic and symbolic elements. A vision of the past as it might have been and, as it was later believed to have been in fact. In this way myth and legend helped both to create and fashion “history.“.

The name of the book is in English rendering of the Latin numeri which in turn was a translation of the Greek, chosen in recognition of the extensive statistical material that opens the book.

the popular Hebrew name “in the wilderness” is a fitting title for the book as it is the fifth and sixth words in the opening chapter.

Definition of history: the intellectual form in which a civilization renders account to itself of its past.

Censuses, here and later (chapter 26), give this book its Rabbinic name Pekudim (accounts), and its English name (based on the Septuagint), Numbers.

For the Rabbis, the desert, the wilderness is actually a desirable place to be — very different than what the English words perhaps imply. In our parlance, the words conjure images of desolation and helplessness. In the Rabbis’ view, however, the desert is a place where we can see more clearly, unencumbered by other distractions. The desert reflects freedom and uncluttered vision, allowing us to take stock of our lives and ourselves in an environment devoid of outside pressures.

A simple headcount was not God’s purpose in directing this exercise, nor was it intended as a way to evaluate troop strength in anticipation of preparing to enter the Promised Land.

Taking this census was about assessing our inner strength, helping us to explore what we as the Jewish people can accomplish when we unite our capabilities as individuals.

The order and strategy of Numbers may have helped save our people from the dangers of the wilderness, yet it is that very experience of the wilderness, our work together to carry the blessing of God forward, that makes us worth saving.

I’d even like to propose Parshat Bamidbar as a model for true Jewish pluralism: each individual finding his or her unique mission within the broadest Jewish framework, organized with like-minded people into sacred organizations, and each person and each community seen as a necessary, equal component of the whole. Only when we see that different people and different communities have their own sacred purpose can we move together on our journey.

The true goal of the Exodus was to take Egypt out of the Israelites. The experience of the seemingly endless journey transformed a people — crushed, frightened, subservient and dependent — into a people with initiative, self-respect, anger at oppression and even militancy. The Israelites at the Jordan are a very different people from the one that left Egypt. They are ready to fight their own battles. They are a community committed to one another and to the covenant that binds them together.

Several Hasidic commentators see in our verse a hint of how Jews must seek to understand their own, unique purpose in life. For example:

. . . each person under his standard with the banners of his family: Every Jew must know and think that he is unique in the world, and there was never anyone exactly like him–if there were someone like him (before), there would have been no need for you to come into the world. Every single person is someone new in the world, and it is her duty to improve all her ways, until all of Israel has attained perfection (Beit Aharon, quoted in Itturei Torah).

The visual metaphor of the Book of Numbers is striking: Each person finds his or her place in a particular camp, and the camps find proper the relationship to each other –and only then can the entire people move forward, with the Presence of God “dwelling” in the middle.

I’d even like to propose Parshat Bamidbar as a model for true Jewish pluralism: each individual finding his or her unique mission within the broadest Jewish framework, organized with like-minded people into sacred organizations, and each person and each community seen as a necessary, equal component of the whole. Only when we see that different people and different communities have their own sacred purpose can we move together on our journey.

The alternate explanation is intensely psychological in nature. Making oneself hefker (ownerless) does not speak as much to the idea of an individual being owned by another, but rather the manner in which one views himself.

An individual who is “full of him/herself” will have difficulty accepting and following the directives of virtually any outside authority figure; consequently at least some degree of hitbatlut (self-abnegation) is expected of the truly spiritual individual. Being out in the desert powerfully contributes to an individual’s sensibility that his or her existence is relatively insignificant when compared to the grandiose scale of Creation.

The figurative symbolism of receiving the Torah in the desert appears to parallel a number of other rabbinic themes stressing humility and self-abnegation as a prerequisite for an individual to properly understand and carry out the Commandments of God. Moses, the intermediary between God and the people when the Torah is first given, is described as (Numbers 12:3) “Anav me’od mikol ha-adam asher al penai ha-adama”–the most extremely humble individual on the face of the earth.

The Torah suggests that God orchestrated the Jews’ going into the desert because the atmosphere created in such desolate and lonely surroundings would be extremely conducive for the entire nation to abandon the example of their previous malevolent flesh-and-blood masters. Instead, the belittling impact of the desert would inspire them to focus upon serving humbly and selflessly the Creator of the Universe.

“Because the Levites are taken in place of the first-born, they cannot be redeemed from their special service, constraints, or obligations. Similarly, the kohanim (the priestly tribe associated with the tribe of Levi) cannot be redeemed. All other Israelites, however, can be redeemed according to the instructions offered in Num. 18:15–16:

The first issue of the womb of every being, man or beast, that is offered to Adonai shall be yours; but you shall have the first-born of man redeemed…. Take as their redemption price, from the age of one month up, the money equivalent of five shekels….

Thus, God commands the people to redeem every first-born son, and God takes the Levites for Temple service in place of the first male issue of the womb. This redemptive exchange is the basis for pidyon ha-ben, the ritual for “the redemption of the first-born son.”

While many rituals and prayers are associated with childbirth, none of them focus on the change from person to parent. Our rich and beautiful heritage, while replete with blessings for mitzvot associated with special occasions and blessings that acknowledge God’s role at these moments, offers no specific blessings for people to say at times of personal inner change. There are traditional blessings such as ha-tov v’ha’mativ (“Who has done good things for me”) and shehechiyanu (“Who has kept us alive”), which may be recited at any important moments, but neither one specifically relates to the particular occasion of bringing forth life for the first time. There is no distinct blessing for a man to say upon becoming a father, or for a woman to say upon becoming a mother. Therefore, many contemporary Jews who wish to adapt the traditional form of blessings for these personal moments have sought to invent new brachot.7”

Excerpt From

The Women's Torah Commentary

Rabbi Elyse Goldstein

https://books.apple.com/us/book/the-womens-torah-commentary/id1133753963

This material may be protected by copyright.

RABBI EDWARD FEINSTEIN is senior rabbi of Valley Beth Shalom in Encino, California

“Bemidbar means “in the wilderness,” for the book commences in the wilderness of Sinai. But more than a physical location, Bemidbar depicts a social wilderness, a human wasteland. This is a place where everything falls apart. It portrays a people wandering—without a shared vision, shared values, or shared words. Leaders attempt to lead, but no one listens. The people of this wilderness, driven by fear and jealousy, moved only by hunger, thirst, and lust, have no patience for God’s transcendent vision. This is a book of noise, frustration, and pain.”

“Bemidbar may be the world’s strongest counter-revolutionary tract. It is a rebuke to all those who believe in the one cataclysmic event that will forever free human beings from their chains. It is a response to those who foresee that out of the apocalypse of political or economic revolution will emerge the New Man, or the New American, or the New Jew. Here, Bemidbar offers, is the people Israel miraculously freed from Egyptian slavery. Here is the people Israel who stood in the very presence of God at Mount Sinai—the quaking mountain aflame and covered in smoke. Here is the people Israel who heard Truth from the mouth of God, the people instructed by Moses himself. And still, they are unchanged, unrepentant, chained to their fears. The dream is beyond them. God offers them freedom, and they clamor for meat. “How long will this people spurn Me, and how long will they have no faith in Me despite all the signs that I have performed in their midst?” (Numbers 14:11)”

“It falls heaviest on Moses. In the course of Bemidbar, everyone in his life will betray him. Miriam and Aaron—his family members—betray him, murmuring against him. His tribe rebels against him, under the leadership of his cousin Korach. His people betray him, accepting the dispiriting report of the ten spies over the vision of the two. And finally, even God betrays him. Told to speak to the rock, he hits it instead. And for this, he will not see the journey’s end. But of course he hit the rock! Nowhere in Bemidbar do words function. Nowhere do words nourish, inspire, or heal”

It should have turned out so differently! Where did I go wrong? Every man has tortured himself with the torment Moses feels in Bemidbar. And that’s the ultimate lesson. Listen to the Torah’s wisdom: the agony, the self-doubt, the frustration are part of the journey through the wilderness. Any man who has ever held dreams, ever championed an ideal, ever reached for greatness—any man who has ever worn Moses’s shoes or carried his staff—knows the anguish of Bemidbar. But know this, too: You’re not alone. You’re not the first. You’re not singled out. And most of all, you’re not finished. The torturous route through the wilderness does come to an end. There was hope for Moses. There is hope for us.”

“At the end of the Book of Bemidbar, we arrive in the Promised Land. But we arrive exhausted, depleted, defeated. If the Torah ended here, we would be a very different people. But the Torah goes on to a new book. Bemidbar gives way to Devarim, Deuteronomy. This is much more than just turning a page. It is the turning of the heart, the changing of the world. Devarim means “words.” This is a book of shared words, shared values, and shared direction. Moses talks; people listen. Moses leads; people follow. Where once there was division, there is now shared vision. Where once there was dissension, there is now dialogue and consensus. The key word of Devarim is Shema, “Listen!” Devarim is a book of listening.”

“This is the Torah’s message of hope. Nothing worth doing in life can be accomplished without crossing the midbar, the wilderness. But wilderness is not the last word. Beyond the midbar, there is a promised land of devarim. Consensus, common direction, shared values can be reached. Peace is not idle dream. It’s out there—at the edge of the wilderness, at the end of the journey”

Excerpt From

The Modern Men's Torah Commentary

Rabbi Jeffrey K. Salkin

“In Babylonia, in talmudic times (before the year 600 C.E.), the books of the Torah were stitched together into one long scroll. The Torah scroll was then so heavy that it required more than one wood roller. The scribes attached each end of the long scroll to its own rod. In the Talmud each rod is called an amud, a “pillar”. Later, because they were made of wood, and because the Torah was often called “a tree of life”, the rollers were given a new name—each was called an eitz chayim, “a tree of life”.”

“In ancient libraries each book was a separate scroll. In Hebrew, a long scroll—especially one that tells a single story (like the story of Esther)—was called a megillah (Hebrew for “scroll”). Before the first century C.E. important or long scrolls were also attached to a handle (a rod or roller) of wood to make it easier to roll and store the scroll after reading it. We know such scrolls were attached to wooden handles because of a mistake made by the Jews of Alexandria, Egypt. Not recognizing the meaning of the Hebrew word megillah, they translated it into Greek as “handle”.”

“At the same time, there was another group of Israelites—the ten tribes who had broken away from Solomon’s empire to found the northern Kingdom of Israel. This kingdom came to a sudden end in 722 B.C.E. when it was conquered by the Assyrians. Most of its people—the important folk, especially those who lived in the cities—were carried off to Assyria. The ten tribes were “lost”. But many villagers and small farmers were not carried off by the Assyrians. At least one temple, the one at Beth El, continued to operate. And some scholars believe that after the disaster of 722 a few northern priests began collecting the laws and stories of the northern Israelites so that they would not be lost along with the tribes and the kingdom.”

“

One People, Different Memories

The laws and stories collected in the north were much like those of the south (after all, the twelve tribes of Israel were once one people, though they had divided into two kingdoms). But there were differences, too. For example, the northern priests thought that God met Moses on a mountain called Horeb, not Sinai. In their stories God often spoke through angels or in dreams. Joshua was an important hero to the northern priests, perhaps because Joshua was from the tribe of Ephraim, the territory at the center of the northern kingdom. The graves of Rachel, Joseph, and Joshua were important to them because they were also in the hills of Ephraim. The E-tellers were probably Levite priests, but you can also think of them as loyal to Ephraim.”

“The work of the priests was suddenly interrupted when the Babylonians conquered Judah and destroyed the Temple (around 586 B.C.E.). The most important Israelites of Judah—including the priests—were rounded up and carried off to Babylonia. The Israelites became known by a new name in Babylonia. Since they came from Judah, they were called Judeans (still later the Greeks called the “Judeans” by the name “Jews”).”

Excerpt From

The Torah: Portion-by-Portion

Seymour Rossel

“D’rash: Kaplan’s Insight

The study of Torah was not intended to provide a body of knowledge, but rather a religious experience.”

“It is the source through which each of us can transcend the sorrows of daily life, embrace the grand sweep of Jewish spiritual history, and connect with all that is holy in our lives.”

“In this sense, “Torah” itself becomes a metaphor for all Jewish learning throughout the history of our people. Torah represents our ongoing search for purpose in life, our commitment to strengthening Jewish peoplehood, and our quest for holiness in the commonplace.”

That’s why these words of Mordecai Kaplan have always been powerful for me. I, too, study Torah not for the sake of mere “knowledge,” but rather as a path toward a deeper understanding of the truths, value, and meaning of life itself.”

Excerpt From

A Year with Mordecai Kaplan

Steven Carr Reuben

Part 1

In a similar vein, R. Isaac Arama (1420–94) asks why all the seemingly dull details of the census are necessary. Did God not know the number of Israelites encamped in the desert in any case? Taking account of them one by one, R. Arama argues, serves to teach that each one has individual worth, and is not just a member of the collective. “They were all equal in stature,” Arama writes, “and yet the stature of each one was different” (Akeidat Yitzhak, Be-midbar, #72).”

“Leibowitz couches her comments negatively, as a statement of what Judaism rejects, but we can just as easily formulate it positively, as a reflection of what Judaism passionately affirms: Being part of a collective, no matter how important or sacred, should never be allowed—must never be allowed—to obliterate human difference and individuality.

Another message may well be implicit here also: Judaism traditionally demands relative uniformity of practice (recall that the chieftains all bring the very same sacrifices), but such uniformity need not—must not—efface real differences in opinion, experience, and insight, which are to be treasured rather than overcome.”

“If every Jew is a letter in the Torah, then every Jew has unique Torah to teach, insights into God’s teaching that are unavailable to anyone else. Without exposure to Torah, something in the very being of that Jewish person remains tragically dormant and unrealized. And conversely, without the world of Torah being exposed to that person, something crucial in the Torah remains buried, hidden from sight. R. Abraham Joshua Heschel writes that “a Jew without the Torah is obsolete.”5 Maybe so, but it is equally the case that the Torah without any particular Jew is incomplete.”

Part 2

“The Torah was given in the desert, in other words, to emphasize its universal availability. Whatever the Israelites might have been tempted to believe, the midrash teaches, the Torah was not intended to be their exclusive possession; on the contrary “the giving of the Torah in the desert—a no-man’s land—was a clear signal that the Torah was not the property of one nation but was intended for all peoples.”8”

“In theological terms “universalism” can entail the affirmation that as Creator of all, God cares for every human being on the face of the earth. But such universal concern can bring with it the insistence that all humanity must serve God in the one true way right now—and human (and Jewish) history is littered with the corpses of those who resisted other people’s universalist passions.

“Particularism,” in contrast, can take chauvinistic forms, whereby God loves us but is indifferent—or even hostile—to everyone else. But particularism can also enable people to make space for others without tyrannizing them. Confidence in divine election can render Jews arrogant and at times even indifferent to the fate of others, but it also frees us from the temptation of global conquest”

“A sense that Christ is the truth that must be embraced by all can lead Christians to a deep sense of kinship with all humanity, but, as history has shown, it can also lead them to violence and imperialism.13 As Daniel Boyarin wonderfully puts it, “the genius of Christianity is its concern for all the peoples of the world; the genius of Rabbinic Judaism is its ability to leave other people alone.”14”

“Jewish theology attempts to negotiate this minefield by means of the Noahide covenant, which “places all peoples in a relationship of grace and accountability with God.” This implies that in Judaism, as Jon Levenson argues, “Israel’s relationship to God is both unique and universal: No other people has it, yet all humanity has something of the same order.” A full consideration of the covenant with Noah in Jewish theology and law is beyond the scope of this essay, but it is no doubt worth noting that “one of the reasons for the absence of a missionary thrust in [most of] [R]abbinic theology is the doctrine of human dignity in general, whether Israelite or not. Those who think outsiders can have a proper relationship with God as they are will feel less of an impulse to make them into insiders.”15

The goal, we might say, is to care deeply about people while also remembering how to leave them alone.”

Excerpt From

The Heart of Torah, Volume 2

Shai Held

“The petichah builds the text around the word be-midbar (in the wilderness), found in that verse, and connects it to another verse in the book of Jeremiah in which the same word appears. It begins with the question, Why does the Lord ask there, “Have I been like a wilderness to Israel?” It interprets this question as being God’s way of saying that when the Israelites were in the wilderness for forty years, God did not allow them to suffer the usual deprivations one encounters in the wilderness—shortage of food and supplies, darkness, dangers, unbearable heat. On the contrary: in the wilderness God supplied all their needs, as the manna testifies, and took extraordinary care of the people. So too has God cared for them ever since. Therefore, contends Jeremiah, the people have no right to abandon God and rebel against the Lord. This homily thus explains why it was important to mention there that all this took place in the wilderness: because it was the place in which they did not suffer because of God’s concern and care.”

Excerpt From

A Year with the Sages

Reuven Hammer

“Based on geographical criteria and ideological motifs, three major units can be distinguished, reflecting a literary sandwich of sorts: (1) the final encampment at Sinai and preparation to resume the wilderness trek (1.1–10.10); (2) the generation-long march in the desert from Sinai to Moab (10.11–22.1); (3) the encampment on the plains of Moab and preparation to enter Canaan (22.2–36.13). Unit one marks the period when Israel, having received God’s teaching, readies itself for the desert march to its final destination. This is the first time that the people enter the wilderness while they are bonded by covenant to the LORD. The wanderings in the second unit form a bridge between the first and last units. The generation of the Egyptian bondage dies in the desert and a new generation matures. In unit three this new generation prepares to embark on a journey once more, this time to enter the promised land as a national entity.”

Excerpt From

The Jewish Study Bible

Adele Berlin & Marc Zvi Brettler

https://books.apple.com/us/book/the-jewish-study-bible/id931861581

This material may be protected by copyright.

Both Exodus and numbers are stories of travel, journey. Exodus is a journey-from. Numbers is a journey – to.

Exodus and Numbers represent two different kinds of liberty. Isaiah Berlin. Exodus is about negative freedom, hofesh.

Numbers is about positive freedom, herut.

Why is Moses‘s reaction so different in Exodus as it is in Numbers.

A helpful distinction is between technical challenges and adaptive ones. A technical challenge is one in which there is a practical problem and the people turn to the leader for a solution. An adaptive challenge is one where the people are the problem. It is they who must change. Here the leader cannot solve the problem on his or her own.

In Exodus the leadership Moses was called on to show was essentially technical. The people were thirsty and hungry and through Moses God provided water and food and escape from the Egyptian army.

Numbers the challenge is different. They no longer had God to fight their battles for them. He would give them the strength to fight them for themselves. They had to adapt, to change.

The despair of Moses was that he saw the people had not changed despite the fact they had received the Torah at Sinai. Moses could already see that they were not ready for the adaptive challenge.

My opinion

There is a kind of bondage in freedom, the bondage of law, obligation and responsibility ( WALZER)..

There is also a freedom in bondage where are you are not required to think or decide.

Sacks

The two political ideas to which Numbers is opposed are never and immediately. Never is the council of despair and political reaction. Immediately is the temptation of political messiahinism and revolution. Both end in oppression.

Unlike other nations in Judaism the law was given before entering the land.

Red Heifer-

The ritual of the red heifer conveys the message that just as the ashes of death are dissolved in the waters of life, so the death of individuals is mitigated by the ongoing life of the nation. Mortality dissolves into the eternity of God and the people of God.

Law is the shape of order, and it coexists with freedom when people understand that the law is not an arbitrary expression of divine will. It arises from a specific history and from the way the community remembers that history.

The book of numbers is an anti-myth. In myths the hero often reluctantly undertakes a journey in which he faces a series of trials as a result of which he develops extraordinary strength of character. He then returns, transformed.

The Torah represents three significant differences.

First the journey is undertaken not by an individual but by an entire people.

Second, the departure-return takes several centuries.

Third, the people fail most of their trials.

The Torah attributes the people’s successes to God and the failures to themselves.

In virtually all ancient cultures, humans battle against implacable and overwhelming forces, external to themselves and indifferent to human suffering. That is the basis of the literary genre of tragedy.

Monotheism as Jack Miles has shown internalizes the forces that are externalized in myth and science. The real battle lies within – within the human will.

The message of Numbers is that the human will is weak, but not terminally so. There is no doctrine of original sin in the Torah. Humanity can achieve freedom with order but it is hard and needs constantly to be fought for.

The entire Balaam story, with it’s talking donkey who sees the angel Balaam himself cannot see repeatedly emphasizes that the words Balaam uses are not his but God’s. Therefore this declaration of love is uttered by God – not directly Nor through Moses, not even in the hearing of the Israelites themselves.

Torah offers a unique contrast to the way of thought we have come to regard as western, whose origins are in ancient Greece.

First it includes philosophy in the narrative mode. It teaches not truth as system but truth as story.

Second it portrays law not as it reflects the will or wisdom of the legislator, but rather it is as it emerges from history, as if to say: this is what went wrong in the past and this is how to avoid it in the future.

Third, in regards history itself as an ongoing commentary on the human condition. The Torah is about the truths that emerge through time.

Science is about nature; Judaism is about human nature.

A key concept is the idea of liminal space, the place that is neither here nor there, neither starting point nor destination, but the space in between. This is what the wilderness was. It was not Egypt, not Israel, but the no man’s land in between. Liminal space is important not for what it contains nor how large it is, but rather, because of what happens there. It is the place of transformation.

It was in Israel that a revolutionary idea was born, that God was not in nature but beyond, for it was he who created nature in the first place.

Freud

The prohibition against making an image of God which means the compulsion to worship an invisible God. This signified subordinating sense perception to an abstract idea; a triumph of spirituality over the senses.

Words are best heard in the silence of the desert, in the wilderness.

The Torah is God’s word to human beings.

Nevi’im represents God‘s word through human beings.

Ketuvim are the words of human beings inspired by the Holy Spirit to to God.