THE LORD SPOKE TO

PLAGUE HAD BEGUN AMONG THE PEOPLE.

HE STOOD BETWEEN THE DEAD AND THE

LIVING UNTIL THE PLAGUE WAS CHECKED.

                                                                                                                                                (Bemidbar,

chap. 17)

Deadly

Poison and the Angel of Death Can Also Be Agents of Life – It All Depends on

the Person

The Angel of Death gave

him [Moshe] a word [advice] (Rashi: To light the fire pans with incense during

the plague, and to stand between the dead and the living) as is written: (Bemidbar 17) "He put on the incense

between the dead and the living until the plague was checked." Had he

written in the Torah)?

(Bavli, Shabbat 89a, and Rashi ibid., ibid.)

"He stood

between the dead…" He [Aharon] grabbed the Angel and forced him

to stand.

Said the Angel: Let me

fulfill my mission.

He said to him: Moshe

commanded me to prevent you.

He said: I am the

messenger of the Omnipresent and you are the messenger of Moshe.

He said: Moshe says

nothing on his own, only that which he hears from the Almighty; if you do not

believe me, here, The Holy One, Blessed Be He, and Moshe are at the entrance to

the Tent of Appointment, come with me and ask. This is what is written: "And

Aharon returned to Moshe".

An alternative

explanation: Why with incense? Because the Children of Israel were slandering

the incense, saying that it was a deadly poison, causing the death of

Nadav and Avihu, and through it 250 persons were burned. Said The Holy One,

Blessed Be He: Behold, it has stopped the plague – it is the sin which

kills.

(Rashi, Bemidbar 17:13)

CHAZAL AND KORACH

Avigdor

Shinan

Chazal

dealt at length with Korach and the story of the controversy he aroused against

Moshe and his leadership in the desert; no wonder, then, that rabbinical

literature paints him in a most unflattering light, and that harsh and

pejorative words were leveled at him, such as the charge that Korach was

envious of Moshe and Aharon, that he sought status of which he was not worthy,

and even brazenly declared "Torah was not given from Heaven, and Moshe is

not a prophet and Aharon is not high priest"

(Yerushalmi, Sanhedrin 10:28a). And so severe was their transgression,

that Rabbi Akiva – although not all sages were in accord – categorically

decreed that "Korach's band is not destined to rise up [from Sheol, and

rise up at the resurrection]" (Mishna,

Sanhedrin 10:3) and many similar statements.

Our

Sages portray Korach as – among other things – an exceedingly opulent man.

The term "rich as Korach" is still current today. From whence did

he attain this wealth? In our sources we find two, quite similar, answers.

According to the first: "Yosef hid three treasures in Egypt. One was

revealed to Korach, one to Antoninus son of Asvirus, and one was hidden for the

righteous for the distant future" (Pesahim

119a). The tremendous wealth of Yosef, who gathered "all the

silver found in the land of Egypt and the Land of Canaan" (Bereishit 47:14) was revealed – and will be

revealed – in three stages, past, present, and future. Part of it came into

Korach's possession (no explanation given as to how), part went to an affluent

Roman contemporary of the Sages, and part lies in wait to serve as reward for

the righteous in the world to come. Here is the description of Korach's wealth

as appears in the Talmud Bavli: "Said Rabbi Levi: A burden of three

hundred white mules was the key to Korach's treasuries" (Sanhedrin 100a). This is to say that transportation of merely the keys to his

treasuries required three hundred white mules, beasts known for their great and

wild strength. Rabbi Levi continues (ibid.) and

determines that the keys were made not of heavy metal, but of pieces of

leather, which are, of course, much lighter. From this we assume that the

number of keys was much greater than we had thought. A different version has

Korach accruing his wealth through his faithful service to Israel's greatest

enemy, Pharaoh; he became his Minister of the Treasury, and therefore "he

held the keys to his treasures in his hand (Bemidbar

Rabba 18:16).

Why

did the Sages wish to present Korach as a wealthy man? It is difficult to

discern any Biblical basis for this idea. The Bible records that the earth

opened its mouth in order to swallow Korach and his followers, their homes and "all

Korach's people and all their possessions." These words are

insufficient to support any determination that he was very wealthy. It seems to

me that the answer to this question must be sought in the Sages' attitude to

conspicuous wealth. Kohellet speaks of "riches hoarded by their owner

to his misfortune", i.e. wealth which leads to arrogance, pursuit of

glory, and claims to special privilege; this, says Resh Lakish, was "Korach's

wealth" (Bavli, Sanhedrin, ibid.). It

is difficult to know whether Chazal, when dealing with Korach, saw before them

a single, identifiable, historical figure, against whom they shot their arrows,

or whether they simply desired to teach their listeners general advice,

suitable for every place, for all times, and for every person. Wealth blinds

its possessor, and leads him to behave improperly and disregard all that is

holy.      

To a

different, but similar, matter. When the Sages wish to bring an example of a

wicked person who ridicules the mitzvot and denies their divine source, they

exploit – among others – the image of Korach. Thus, in Midrash Bemidbar Rabba (18:3) "Korach rose up and made them [the

princes of the assembly] a banquet… the sons of Aharon came to collect their

gifts, the breast and the thigh. They [Korach's party] stood against them,

saying: Who commanded you to take this, was it not Moshe? We give you nothing;

the Omnipresent did not so speak!" The midrash in Tehillim, expounding the

passage "Happy is the man… who… has not joined the company of the

insolent" speaks in yet more scathing terms:

This

refers to Korach, who derided Moshe and Aharon. What did he do? He gathered all

the crowd… and began to ridicule, saying: There is a widow in my

neighborhood, and with her are two orphan girls, and she has a single field.

When she comes to plow, Moshe says "You shall not plow with ox and

donkey together". She comes to sow, he says to her "You shall

not sow with mixed seeds". She comes to harvest and make sheaves, he

says to her: Give me the heave offering, the first tithe and the second tithe.

She justified her fate and gave it him. What did the widow then do? She sold

the field, and bought two lambs, in order to make garments from the wool and to

benefit from their offspring. When they gave birth, came Aharon and said, "Give

me the firstborn, for so said The Holy One, Blessed Be He, "Every

the Lord your God, etc." She justified her fate and gave him the

newborn. Arrived the time for shearing, and she sheared them. Came Aharon and

said to her: "Give me the first part of the shearing." She said: "I

have no strength to stand against such a man, I will slaughter them and eat

them." No soon had she slaughtered them, then Aharon came and said to her:

"Give me the arm and the jaw and stomach [which belong to the priest]."

She said: "Even after I have slaughtered them, I have not been spared from

your hand. I hereby proscribe them from my use!" He said to her: "If

they are proscribed – they belong to me in their entirety, as is written "Everything

that is proscribed in Israel shall be yours. " He took them, leaving

her weeping with her two daughters.

We

have before us an extremely caustic satire on the mitzvoth. According to

Korach, Moshe – of the House of Levi – and Aharon the Priest concocted many

mitzvot in order to make people's lives difficult, and to plunder them by

taking the many gifts designated for the priests and Levites. It appears that

in the days of Chazal, too, there were people who thought the yoke of mitzvoth

too heavy, or that the priests and Levites unlawfully enjoy preferred status;

the Sages, who could not accept such a perverted understanding of the Torah's

laws, chose to express ideas such as these while defining them as nefarious

scorn – and placing them in the mouth of the great heretic, Korach.

It

seems reasonable to conclude that by emphasizing Korach's wealth and by

presenting his negative attitude towards God's commandments, the Sages make use

of him as an image from the past which serves as a springboard for dealing with

issues of contemporary interest. This is true also of the Sages' determination

that the controversy which Korach aroused is a classic example of controversy "not

for the name of heaven". Literature of Chazal and their world is replete

with disputes, but these are acceptable only when they are directed towards a

good goal and motives are pure. Not so the controversy of Korach, who was "a

wicked brother" (Bemidbar Rabba 18:14);

his motives stemmed from excessive haughtiness, envy, desire for high office,

and the search for conflict.

Our

Sages had little use for the past, unless it served them in their understanding

of the present and in their preparation of their disciples, listeners, and

readers for the future. When the Sages came to deal with the social dangers

inherent in great wealth, with the obligation to accept the divine source of

the mitzvot – "Torah from Heaven" – and with the ban against

controversy which has no basis or proper goal, they found in the story of

Korach's rebellion a gold mine.

Prof. Avigdor Shinan teaches in the Faculty of Hebrew

Literature in the Hebrew University in Yerushalayim

Essential Holiness as against Perpetual

Striving for Holiness; Korach and Moshe

Throughout the generations of Jewish history, there arose disciples of

Moshe and disciples of Korach. The concept of kedusha – "So that you

God" – is anchored at the basis of Halakhic Judaism. It charges

every individual from Israel and the Israelite nation with the difficult task

and the noble to strive for kedusha – to sanctify themselves with

a life of Torah and mitzvoth. But there were also those followed in the

footsteps of Korach – seeing the holiness of Israel as a given essence,

ingrained in the nation of Israel, automatically imbuing it with high religious

status. It must be said that there were great and good people who were caught

up in this Korachite religiosity, which turns Judaism from the service of God

to nationalist chauvinism. One of Korach's disciples, in this sense, was Rabbi

Yehuda Halevi (in the Kuzari – in contrast to the heavenly author of prayers

and selichot, which are the most exalted documents of pure faith); such

were most of the Kabbalists; such was the Maharal of Prague, and such was, in

our time, Harav Kook, whose teachings became a stumbling block for his students

and his students' students. On the other side we find a line of kedusha

which has its base in the end of the Kriyat Shema ["You shall be holy"],

and extends from Moshe son of Amram, by way of Rabeinu Moshe ben Maimon, to the

Gate of Kedusha in the "Mesillat Yesharim" of Rabbi Moshe Hayim

Luzatto.

(From Y. Leibowitz: "Paths

to Faith in Judaism" in Faith, History, and Values, p.19)

"I Have Not Taken the Ass of Any One

of Them" A Proper Characteristic of a Public Figure

According to the plain reading, custom was that the public ruler would

be carried on a horse, as per Kohellet (10:7) "I

have seen slaves on horseback, and nobles walking…" from here we see

that the proper order is the reverse; but even the servant who accompanies his

master on his travels is given a donkey. Not only did I never take one's horse

to a Midrash of Chazal: Even the donkey upon which my wife rode when we

traveled from Midyan to Egypt was not theirs. It should be noted that he could

have made an even more remarkable claim, that even the bread he ate in Egypt

was not taken from the public. [But he does not make any such claim]. From this

we learn that it cannot be rightfully expected of one who constantly engages in

public affairs that he not eat from public funds, for he must set aside some

hour for his sustenance, which results in not attending to public needs; the

public prefers that even that hour be devoted to their needs and that the

leader eat at their expense. Moshe, too, ate at public expense, and only the

donkey on which he brought his wife was his. In fact, the presence of Moshe's

wife and children in Egypt was unnecessary – they returned to Midyan

immediately – but she had asked him to be able to see the glory of the exodus

from Egypt (Mechilta

Yitro). This was not essential

for the life of one who deals with public needs, certainly it is not a

characteristic of the righteous to burden the public with more than is

necessary for life's essentials.

(The Netziv of Volozhin;

Haamek Davar, Harchev Davar, Bemidbar 16:15)

It is proper, therefore, that we review and internalize that final

passage of these thoughts of the Netziv. They are worthy of being said to all

generations – especially to this generation, in which it is not customary to

emulate the attributes of Moshe our teacher.

(Y. Leibowitz, Seven Years of

Discussion on the Weekly Parasha, p. 694)

Editorial

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(Editor), Miriam Fine (Coordinator), Itzhak Frankenthal and Dr. Menachem Klein

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