Moses sent them the thousand from each tribe to the army,

them along with Phinehas the son of Eleazar the priest to the army,

with the sacred utensils and the trumpets for sounding in his possession.

(Bamidbar 31:6)

 

If you go to war in your land against an adversary that oppresses you,

you shall blow a teruah with the trumpets

and be remembered before the Lord your God,

and thus be saved from your enemies.

(Bamidbar 10:9)

 

Regarding the verse you shall blow a teruah with the trumpets and be remembered, it is not to be understood literally, as if - God forbid - there could be forgetfulness at the Throne Of Glory and the teruah would recall that which was forgotten. Rather, it is like all expressions applied to the blessed Lord that speak of affect, such as ire and anger, annoyance, mercy, and forgiveness. These states come upon Him in a metaphorical sense and in reaction to human behavior and disposition. If they [humans] act wickedly and receive a punishment or He abandons them to chance and nature, people will say He was angry and dismayed with them and then forgot them, for that is how they speak of it if one human treated another in that way. And if they improve their deeds and return to Him and He again looks after them and saves them, they would say that He remembered them and had mercy on them and forgave them. All of this is said regarding actions which He performed upon the receivers, and not because He was affected and forgot and became angry and changed His mind and had mercy and remembered and forgave. That is what they meant by saying "Could trumpets remind [Him]? But He does not forget!" Rather, if they were capable of trumpeting and did not, and because of that they were not saved, it seems to us as if they had not been brought to the Omnipresent's attention, and by trumpeting and repenting, it seems to us that He was reminded of them. However, in truth He did not forget and He had no forgetfulness; and since He did not forget, neither did He remember, for there can only be remembering after forgetting. When we talk about His remembering, it refers to His saving them again, since it seems to us as if He forgot and again remembered. That is why they said, "They are only remembered for salvations" - for it is because of acts of salvation that we feel He has again remembered them.

(Malbim Bamidbar 10:9)

 

 

The Debate Between Moses and the Tribes of Reuben and Gad

Ronit and Avi Porten

The story of how the tribes Reuben, Gad, and half of Manasseh settled in Transjordan, across from Jericho, lends the reader insights about the kind of behavior expected from the Israelites and how such behavior can affect the nation's unity and future.

Parashat Matot presents us with a dialogue between the tribes of Reuben and Gad on the one hand, and Moses on the other, just on the eve of the Israelites' entry into the Promised Land. The tribal representatives speak four times and Moses responds three times. The discussion results in an agreement forged between the two sides concerning settlement in Transjordan.

Chapter 32 opens with a description of the situation that serves as background to the tribes' request of Moses:

The descendants of Reuben and Gad had an abundance of livestock very numerous and they saw the land of Jazer and the land of Gilead, and behold, the place was a place for livestock. (32:9)

Next comes an account of their first appeal to Moses:

Ataroth, Dibon, Jazer, and Nimrah, Heshbon, Elealeh, Sebam, Nebo, and Beon, the land that the Lord struck down before the congregation of Israel is a land for livestock, and your servants have livestock.

They said, "If it pleases you, let this land be given to your servants as a heritage; do not take us across the Jordan."

At first glance, the request made by the two tribes seems natural and sensible: Scripture points out that the land in question is appropriate for grazing, and it is conquered territory (the tribes list the cities captured by the Israelites from Sihon and Og) and, apparently, ripe for settlement. The tribes' difficulties caring for their large herds could be solved by taking hold of the area; that might also allow for a less stressful division of lands among the other tribes, who would be left with more territory on the other side of the Jordan.

It should be noted that the tribes couch their request in hesitant language, they are feeling their way and testing the patience of Moses, Elazar the priest, and the princes. This impression is produced by the repetition of the word vayomru - they said in the middle of their speech, before they received an answer. It is as if they uttered the first sentence (up to is a land for livestock, and your servants have livestock) and then stopped and wait for Moses himself to draw the desired conclusion - "give us this land." But Moses did not respond, and there is a feeling of a heavy silence in the air. Moses forced them to explicitly formulate their request themselves, and then they continued: do not take us across the Jordan (see Yehiel Tzvi Markowitz's comments on this in Da'at Mikra).

Moses completely rejects their request with these very harsh words:

Moses said to the descendants of Gad and the descendants of Reuben, "Shall your brethren go to war while you stay here?(verse 6)

Then Moses rehearsed the story of the Sin of the Spies at length, comparing it to the tribes' request. Note that Moses made use of expressions found in the original telling of the story of the Spies. In the original passage we read: ... you will [thus] bear your iniquities for forty years; thus you will come to know My discouragement [tenuati] (14:34, and see Rashi and Ha'amek Davar there). In our parasha we read: Why do you discourage [taniun] the hearts of the Israelites (verse 7); and they discouraged the hearts of the Israelites (verse 9). The punishment for this was, and He made them wander [vayni'em] in the desert for forty years (32:13). The word heart appears both in the story of the Spies (Devarim 1:28) as well as in our parasha (verses 7 and 9). Apparently, the tribes took council among themselves and then promised to arm ourselves quickly [and go] before the Israelites in the war to conquer the Land (verses 16-19).

Why did Moses react so strongly to the tribes' seemingly natural and logical request, going so far as to compare it to the Sin of the Spies? A few answers may be forwarded and some of them are found in Moses' own words:

1) Demoralization - Why do you discourage the hearts of the Israelites from crossing over to the Land the Lord has given them. Moses was worried that the tribes' suggestion would weaken the will of the rest of the people to enter the Land of Israel. Perhaps they would embrace the idea forwarded by the two tribes and prefer to remain in Transjordan. Even if they do not go that far, it may still have caused them to wonder whether the tribes of Reuben, Gad, and half of Manasseh were afraid of the coming war (see Rashi on the verse). Perhaps it is simply that the nation's military power would be weakened when two and a half of the tribes opt out of fighting.

2) An offense against mutual responsibility, justice, and equality - Shall your brethren go to war while you stay here? They damaged mutual responsibility and national unity. It is not proper that one section of the people sit around placidly while the others fight to conquer their designated lands. This injustice is compounded by the fact that the entire nation fought to conquer Transjordan - the territories wanted by Gad and Rueben - while the latter would not help in the conquest of the Land of Israel which was designated for the other tribes.

3) A warped moral stance - Many commentators point out the problematic way that the tribes' made their case:

a) The tribes mentioned their cattle before their children: We shall build sheepfolds for our livestock and cities for our children. Yalku Shimoni writes: "They made the primary thing secondary and the secondary thing primary, for they loved their property more than [they loved] people."

b) The repeated use of the word mikneh [livestock], based on the root KNH [which is related to acquisition] rather than terms such as tzon [flocks] implies that they were avaricious and their property was more important to them than their families.

4) Warped religious faith - The tribes "took God out of the picture." They would fight before the Israelites and they would not return to their homes until each of the children of Israel has taken possession of his inheritance (verses 17-18).

In his response (verses 20-24), Moses emphasized his unease with the tribes' approach. He mentioned the children before the livestock: build yourselves cities for your children and sheepfolds for your flocks and he repeated the phrase before the Lord four times. The tribes thought that they were proposing an agreement with the other Israelites tribes, but Moses referred to it as an agreement made with God.

It is interesting to note that although the purpose of the Exodus was to crystallize the Israelites into a nation and bring them to the land that had been promised to their forefathers, Moses made no mention of the tribes' unwillingness to take possession of the Promised Land when scolding them.

Moses stipulated a condition for the tribes (that famous double condition, about which it is written in tractate Gittin: "From where do we learn about all conditions? From the condition stipulated of Gad and the condition stipulated of Reuben."):

You shall go at the head of the ranks in the war to conquer the Land of Israel, fighting until the conquest is complete. Only then may you return to your families and only then will you receive the territories you asked for as an inheritance.

The tribes of Gad and Reuben accepted Moses' conditions, and we indeed read in the Book of Joshua (chapter 22) that they fulfilled the condition and took an active role in the conquest. It would be expected that having completed their part of the bargain the whole affair would come to an end. The Sages, however, were uncomfortable with the tribes' behavior, as we can see from the following midrash:

The descendants of Reuben and Gad had an abundance of livestock... thus taught our Rabbis: the Holy One, blessed be He, created three gifts in the world: wisdom, valor, and wealth. If a man wins one of them, he takes all that is desirable in the world; if he wins wisdom, he wins everything. If he wins valor, he wins all. If he wins wealth, he wins all. When? When these are gifts from Heaven and derive from the power of the Holy One, blessed be He, but human valor and wealth are nothing... and so you find in the case of the Gadites and Reubenites. They were very wealthy and had much livestock and loved their possessions and settled outside the Land. Therefore they were exiled before all the other tribes, as it is said, and he exiled the Reubenites and the Gadites and half the tribe of Manasseh (I Chronicles 5:26). And what caused this? That they separated themselves from their brothers for the sake of their livestock... (Tanhuma Matot)

Acquisitiveness and avarice have their price: Transjordan was given to the tribes as a mere land-holding [ahuza], that is to say, as a temporary tenure over the land. It is not included in the promise of an eternal inheritance relating to the Land of Israel. Reuben and Gad were treated with poetic justice: they were chiefly concerned with property, and so they received territory that was easily available without any guaranties regarding the future. As a punishment they were the first to have their connection to their land broken (compare with R. Yitzhak Hershkowitz's article, Re'uven, Gad, VeHatzi Shevet HaMenasheh - T'mikha Ambivalentit UMivhan Manhigut on the website of Petach Tikva's yeshivat hesder.)

Nothing comes without a price. Despite their having completely fulfilled their side of the bargain, the danger facing the two tribes had not abated. The danger of avarice, of separating oneself from the community, and the danger of living outside the Beloved Land, all of these led to Gad and Reuben being the first tribes to lose their possessions and to be torn away from the Israelite community to taste the bitter taste of exile.

Ronit and Avi Porten live in Jerusalem. Ronit works in the human resources department of Sharei Tzedek hospital and Avi is an attorney.

 

Midrashei Tzafon

From the pen of our member, Ronen Ahituv

Any vow or any binding oath of self affliction, her husband can either uphold it or revoke it (30:14).

Could it be that she is under her husband's control, for it says: that every man dominate in his household (Esther 1:22)?

It would be just, that since the woman sinned against her husband's will, and she was told, he shall rule over you (Bereishit 3:16), that she not be able to make a vow without her husband's permission!

We learn from the words self affliction that he can only revoke vows of self affliction.

Did you allow all the females to live? (31:15). Could it be that they killed all the women? Rather, we learn from the words They were the same ones that they only killed those who caused them to sin at Baal Peor.

Every daughter who inherits property... (36:8)

Could this hold true throughout the generations? We learn from the verse this is the word (36:6) - that this word will only be followed in this generation.

For the Sages made men and women equal in most of the commandments of the Torah.

There are three contexts of gender in the parasha and all of them seem to promote anti-women messages: the cancellation of vows, the killing of the Midianite women, and the obligation of Zelafhad's daughters to marry within their families. Regarding two of the three cases, the midrash has already intervened to limit the insult to women: in the cancellation of vows (see Mishnah Nedarim 11:1) and the marriages of Zelafhad's daughters (see Bava Batra 120a). I added a drasha in the same spirit regarding the Midianite women. R. Eliezer son of R. Shimon is quoted in Yalkut Shimoni 785:

R. Eliezer son of R. Shimon says: This teaches that they knew them all and they said to each other, "She sinned with so-and-so."

While it's true that in Sifrei (Matot 5) we find R. Yishmael saying that they also killed the women who were of an appropriate age for intercourse - even those who did not engage in it - still, I preferred R. Eliezer's drasha since it was in line with the other drashot of the Sages on the parasha.

Ronen Ahituv

 

The Vengeance of the Israelites - God's Vengeance?

We have already on Bereishit 4:15 pointed out the relationship of nakom [avenge] to kum [rise up] (compare hom & naham, zol & nazal, zor & nazor, sug & nasog, potz & nafatz, utz & na'atz, doh & da'ah, etc.). It is the re-erection of rights which have been trodden under foot, or a person who has been thrown to the ground. The avenger identifies himself with the object to be raised up. That probably explains the reflexive form nakam, and also the mode of construing with the letter mem: carry out the avenging of the Israelites from [me'eit] the Midianites (Bamidbar 31:2). The purpose is not revenge, throwing down an enemy - that would be construed with the letter bet [ ba'Midyanim]. The purpose is the re-erection of Israel from the Midianites, its spiritual and moral freeing out of the power of their arts.

(Rabbi S.R. Hirsch on Bamidbar 31:2, Isaac Levy translation)

 

 

 

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