Zelophehad's Daughters Marry

Ariel Rathaus

The Book of Numbers ends with the mention of a festive event, the marriage of Zelophehad's daughters with their cousins, "the families of the sons of Manasseh the son of Joseph." However, as often happens even today, tension and contention preceded this wedding.

At the end of Parashat Masa'ey, the second episode in the story of Zelophehad's daughters is told (Numbers 36:1-10), and it may be said that this episode creates a new conceptual balance, giving the story additional meanings and, to a degree, even suggesting conclusions contrary to those that could have been drawn from the story of Zelophehad's daughters in Parashat Pinhas (Numbers 27:1-11). Whereas in the first episode of the story, we saw how those five "intelligent, inquisitive, and righteous" daughters (Bavli, Baba Batra 119b) insist on their right to inherit their late father's portion in the Land of Israel, since the deceased had no sons, and how they won the ideological and Halakhic battle hands down, now, in Parashat Masa'ey, other winds are blowing, and the sisters suffer a certain setback.

Although Moses confirms their right, he gives in to the claims of the heads of the families of Sons of Gil'ad, who had expressed their opposition and apprehension: if the daughters inherit, and if they marry men who do not belong to the same tribe, then the tribe's portion will be transferred, by marriage, to other tribes, and, even worse, that which was transferred "shall be taken from the lot of our inheritance" (Numbers 36:3). Moses accepts this argument and decrees, according to God, that the freedom of Zelophehad's daughters to marry out of their tribe must be restricted, so that their father's portion will not be transferred to other tribes.

Zelophehad's daughters obey Moses, because they are "righteous," but this restriction most definitely limits the right to choose a spouse, within the categories of marriage permitted by the Torah, and it is not surprising that the Gemara states that the Bible was merely giving "good advice" to Zelophehad's daughters with respect to their choice of husbands (Bavli, Baba Batra 120a), and in any event this restriction was not for all generations, if similar circumstances should arise, but only for the members of that generation (Baba Batra 121a). Furthermore: according to Rav Yehuda in the name of Shmuel, the date of the Hebrew festival of love and matchmaking, the fifteenth of Ab, was set to celebrate the day "the tribes were permitted to intermarry" (Baba Batra 121a; Bavli, Ta'anit 30b) - i.e. the cancellation of the prohibition that had been imposed initially upon "every daughter who inherited an estate." Rabbi Yosef Haim of Baghdad, in his commentary on Ein Ya'aqov, speaks at length of the feeling of relief that prevailed and spread among the people after the cancellation of this prohibition (actually from the men's point of view and not that of the women), that great joy in the removal of barriers.

[This was the day] when the commandment of marriage spread the most among the Jews, when the tribes were permitted to intermarry, several passages were opened before every single Jew, to take a wife from there, and therefore on that day we say to a young man: raise your eyes and look at any maiden you wish, for you are not required to take a wife from among your relatives in particular, but you may take whatever your heart wishes. (Ben Yehoyada, Ta'anit, the end of Ch. 4).

However, all this took place much later. In Moses' generation, as we have noted, the claim of the heads of the families of the Sons of Gil'ad was accepted, as, previously, the claim of Zelophehad's daughters had been accepted when they demanded their right of inheritance. The Torah offers a compromise between these positions, between the claim that daughters have the right to inherit an estate and the argument that this right of inheritance could cause disorder in the division of property.

What was the basis of these two arguments? The urge of Zelophehad's daughters to appeal to Moses, almost impertinently, to tell him that he had forgotten them, as it were, is understandable. Ownership of property was to be the main source of livelihood in the in the agricultural society that was to arise in the Land of Israel, and Zelophehad's daughters simply demanded the right to make a living on their own. The Midrash greatly heightens the pathos and the moral foundation of their claim by attributing a feminist argument to them in the full sense of the term, the absolute demand for an egalitrian relationship toward women with respect to earning a livelihood:

Since Zelophehad's daughters heard that the land was to be divided according to tribe [meaning to the men in each tribe] and not to the women, they all gathered together to take council, saying: The mercy of the Place is not like the mercy of flesh and blood. Flesh and blood are merciful toward men more than toward women, but He who spoke and the world came into being is not like that, but His mercy is upon everyone, men and women, as it is said (Ps. 145:9): "God is good to everyone, and His mercy is on His creations." (Sifri, Pinhas, 133)

While it is true that Zelophehad's daughters make their argument from a personal motive, to solve their individual problem, according to this Midrash, their words draw upon deep theological sources, from seeing God as merciful. From this insight and inner truth, that God is far more merciful and forgiving than people are, they set out to ask Moses for their dead father's portion. While these ideas are not exactly the simple meaning of the Bible, where the emphasis, at least formally is still on retaining the father's name and not on the daughters' requirements (see Numbers 27:4), nevertheless they do not contradict the literal meaning.

In contrast, the demand made by the heads of the families of the Sons of Gil'ad is less clear with respect to its essential values. What exactly motivates them? Should we not say that their claim is only advanced to protect the territorial interests of the Sons of Menassah, which is to say only the egotistical-tribal element? Does their claim not testify to a desire for property that demands satisfaction at any price, even at the expense of the right of Zelophehad's orphaned daughters to marry whomever they please?

In his commentary on the Torah, Meshekh hokhma (The Sowing of Wisdom), R. Meir Simha of Dvinsk presents the heads of the families as the ones who sought to forbid Zelophehad's daughters from marrying out of the tribe, though they knew very well that their demand was not justified with the respect to the value of bringing people together, a value that the Torah wishes to instil. "For they understood that something like this could not be permanent, for then the Israelites would be divided among themselves, and they would not be connected and bound together with one another." Therefore they knew that their demand was invalid from the start, but nevertheless they did not advance it for unworthy [egotistical] reasons. They regarded it as an immediate imperative, a ruling that must be enforced temporarily, "until they hold [the Land of Israel] and everyone will be solidly ensconced in his estate" (Meshekh hokhma, Numbers 36:1). Rabbi Samson Raphael Hirsch writes about the need to retain the original estates and the tribal borders until all the families and tribes will hold their lands securely and begin to live the life of a nation rooted in its land:

The Torah attributes great value to preserving the boundaries of the tribes and the dwelling of each tribe in its own estate. This is meant to assist in the maintenance of the general and uniform functioning of the nation in all the variety of virtues particular to each tribe, and for that reason there is a need to permit each tribe to develop properly in its area and estate. From this point of view, there is special importance in retaining the estates at the start of the inheritance of the land and in the period soon after it... In all following times the Torah does not forbid the tribes to mingle with each other and intermarry; on the contrary: three times a year the nation as a whole comes together around the general Temple, and this commandment will lead to flexibility and actually lead to the entire unity of the nation. (Commentary on Numbers 36:6-7 by Rabbi Samson Raphael Hirsch; cf. Nachmanides on that passage).

When we weave these midrashic and exegetical threads together into a single fabric, we find that we have here a controversy on principles in which two opposing demands, both just and well-founded confront one another. Neither of these demands is entirely personal. Both are based on an ethical value (either with respect to individual or general needs).

Moreover, the Torah itself emphasizes strongly that both Zelophehad's daughters and the heads of the families were right, each in their own way, because it repeats an expression twice: "Zelophehad's daughters speak right" (Numbers 27:7), which corresponds with, "The tribe of the sons of Joseph have said well" (Numbers 36:5). The confrontation between the demands of Zelophehad's daughters and those of the heads of the tribe are in fact presented as a "disagreement in the name of Heaven," of which one may say, as one says of the controversies between the House of Shamai and the House of Hillel, "both these and these are the words of the Living God."

A controversy in the name of Heaven means, among other things, that the disagreeing sides are also close to each other, sharing the same purpose, united in their desire to sanctify the name of Heaven in their positions. Probably one of the most important conclusions that can be drawn from comparing the episodes in Parashat Pinhas to the one here in Parashat Masa'ey is that there is great similarity in the principled position from which those in disagreement start out: beyond the fact that they say the opposite things, and there is a conflict of interest between them, there is also agreement between the sides about the way in which a Jew should relate to the spiritual and Halakhic authority to which he or she is subject.

According to the Midrash presented above, Zelophehad's daughters are not willing to accept the laws of the division or property as presented by Moses until then, because they do not relate to the status of women whose fathers have died, leaving no male heirs. Such an omission is impossible in their view, because it contradicts the very conception of God as having mercy on all His creatures, and therefor they dare to approach Moses and argue that a mistake has been made - and the Holy One Himself makes a Halakhic ruling in their support.

On the other hand, the heads of the tribes do not easily submit to this "Torah opinion," expressed by the Holy One Himself, and they do not believe that they must submit to it unquestioningly. The ruling that was issued according to the justified demands of Zelophehad's daughters conflicts with their conception of the process of establishing an orderly society in the Land of Israel, a process that demands at first - according to Rabbi Samson Raphael Hirsch - the separation of the tribes, so that they can develop their specific virtues, and in this manner, lay a richer and more varied foundation for the unity of the Jews. Hence, the heads of the tribes do not hesitate to appear before Moses and submit the entire issue for review from their point of view.

Zelophehad's daughters speak in the name of pure ethics, whereas the the heads of the tribes speak in the name of social reform, national-social need. What they have in common is that both of them agree that that the system for determining the Halakhah does not function in an abstract realm, entirely separate and autonomous; neither side is prepared to silence the voice of human morality or the voice of logic and common sense in response to Halakhic decisions, even if they have been issued in the very highest tribunal of the Torah.

 

 

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