Last week, on the eve of the departure of Secretary of State Dulles and Mutual Security Administrator Stassen, to the State of Israel and the Arab Countries of the Near East, the American Council for Judaism held its annual convention in San Francisco. The convention, well-covered in the American press for an organization so small, spewed forth its usual poison under the guise of pro-Americanism and anti-Zionism, pro-Arabism and anti-State-of-Israel.Normally, the rantings of this numerically small but vociferous purple fringe of American Jewry would not call for an answer by Zionists and teachers of religion. Americans, both Jews and non-Jews, have already become immune to the pompous malice this outfit yearly injects into the press. But the attack this year is most ominous because of two reasons: first, as we pointed out, it comes at a critical moment in the power-equilibrium in the Near East and in the relations of Israel to the new American administration. Second, their accusations of disloyalty against American Zionists smell strongly of the Pravda charges against Israel and Jews in general, especially before their recent “teshuvah”. I believe that a sermon on “da mah le’hashiv le’apikorus”, on the rebuttal to their perverted charges, is an essential of religious education. In fairness to the council, allow me to read to you a short statement of their principles which they have prepared and which they disseminate in every propaganda release.“The American Council for Judaism is a national educational organization whose primary objective is the advancement of the ethical, spiritual, religious aspects of Judaism. The council rejects the notion that Judaism is in any sense a nationality, or that Jews constitute a “race”, a “nation apart” or a “culture”. The only homeland of American Jews, the council maintains, is the United States of America. The council therefore favors the social, economic, political and cultural integration into American institutions of all Ame…

There is a geography of the spirit as well as of nature, a topography of the soul as well as the soil. I do not mean this only in the poetic sense – that there are mountains in man's life when his vision is almost unlimited and he has ascended new heights; that there are valleys when he brushes with the shadow of death in the depth; long plateaus of inactivity and boredom; and volcanoes when he explodes emotionally and his soul quakes with new experiences. I do mean it in the Torah’s choice of words, which while apparently geographic, are on a deeper level symbolic of the spiritual. Not only poetry and metaphor, but Torah and tradition spoke to man about the geography of his life.The Rashbam makes a brief but incisive remark on the key word of today’s sidra which is most relevant to our subject. That word is one by which the entire fourth book of Moses is known – bamidbar, which means in the desert, or wilderness. “And the Lord spoke unto Moses in the wilderness of Sinai in the tent of meeting,” the latter term referring to the Mishkan or Tabernacle. Rashbam points out that until the Ohel Moed was built, the revelation of God to Moses always took place behar, on the har, on [the] mountain top. Once the Tabernacle was built, however, the Bible no longer refers to God’s command given to Moses on Mount Sinai, but rather bamidbar, in the wilderness.Before the Ohel Moed, it is always behar, on the mountain; afterwards it is bamidbar, in the Ohel Moed – in the tabernacle, in the desert or wilderness.Here indeed is an implied geography of the spirit. Consider the symbols of mountain, desert and tabernacle: behar, on the mountain of Sinai, was the place where God revealed Himself, but only Moses was there to experience the revelation and hear the word of God. The rest of Israel was not even permitted to go near the mountain. Moses specifically commanded the people to keep away from the mountain where only he might ascend. The mountain, therefore, represents the faith of th…

In our sidra of this morning, the first of the Fourth Book of Moses, we read of the peregrinations of Israel in the desert. The people was to be divided according to its tribe and to march through the wilderness in a set pattern and order. Each tribe, in addition, was to have its own banner, or flag. This banner or degel was to differentiate it from all the other tribes of Israel. What is the origin of this interesting commandment? Our sacred tradition gives us an amazing answer. That is, that God did not command the Israelites concerning the degalim on His own initiative. Rather, he merely acceded to the request of the Jews who insisted upon the banners in the desert. Nitavu Yisrael she-yihyu lahem degalim k’malekhei ha-sharet – the Israelites desired that they have banners just like the ministering angels.What a remarkable statement! Are we to imagine that the Israelites conceived of the angels as tin soldiers – and envied them? Do angels really parade as if they were in an elementary school play?In order to understand the profound symbol of the banners in the desert and their relation to angels, we must understand that there are two words for a banner or flag in Hebrew, and each has a different connotation. Those words are degel and nes. Nes is an external symbol, a sign to others; it is meant for outsiders. Thus, Isaiah speaks of the Messiah’s function towards the rest of the world at the end of the day; ve’nissa nes la-goyim me’rachok – “He shall raise a nes for the nations from the distance.” The nes is meant for other nations; it is for the distant, for the outsider. Degel on the other hand is a symbol of the fulfillment of one’s own purpose, his own destiny, the meaning of his own life for himself. Nes implies a communication with others; you identify yourself thereby to others. Degel implies communion with yourself; you identify yourself to yourself – it is a symbol of self-identity. Nes will cause people to rally. Degel will rally people to a cause. Nes…

The fourth book of the Torah which we begin today is known not only as Bamidbar, “in the desert,” but also as Chumash Pikudim,” the book of musterings,” for the several times that Moses is commanded to count the numbers of the Israelites. Thus, in this morning’s portion we read of one such census. It is interesting that we read later, in the portion of Pinchas, of another census that is taken thirty-eight years later. Remarkably, whereas one might have expected the population to grow during the course of almost four decades, the opposite is true. There is a loss in population of almost 2,000 from 603,000 to 601,730. Even more remarkable is the fact that the tribe of Simeon alone sustained a loss of over 37,000 which means that the population of the tribe was cut in more than half! Why did this happen? What accounted for this loss instead of growth in numbers? The answer is that a terrible plague afflicted our ancestors in the desert during this time. We read about it in the portion of Balak. Under the influence of the evil prophet Balaam, the Moabite and Midianite women attracted the Israelite men to the worship of the pagan deity Baal Peor. This cult was distinguished by extreme licentiousness, and a number of unspeakably obscene rites. The Israelites were punished for this shameless immorality by a plague which decimated the population of the people, and especially the guilty tribes such as Simeon.Concerning this plague, one of our most incisive commentators (Rabbi Meir Simhah, in Meshekh Hokhmah, end of Balak) asks: there was, after all, more than one tragic incident of back-sliding, of moral failure, of perfidy and punishment in the desert, to the incident of Baal Peor we must also add the infamous and scandalous act of disloyalty by Israel – the worship of the egel ha-zahav, the Golden Calf, Yet, the method of punishment was different for each of these. The worshippers of Baal Peor were punished mostly by a plague (the number punished by the shoftim – judges –…

At the very beginning of this morning’s sidra there appear two words which give their name to the entire fourth book of Moses, and in which our Rabbis saw a special, paradoxical significance. Midbar Sinai, the wilderness of Sinai, describes the place where the Torah was given. But the Rabbis taught that it also describes something about the nature of Torah itself. The word Sinai evokes the thought of the great revelation and giving of Torah. The word midbar, wasteland, calls to mind the vast stretches of arid desert which belong to no one and remain unclaimed and unwanted.The Sages formulated the relationship of these two apparently dissimilar words in halakhic terms: ein ha-Torah niknit ela le’mi she’oseh atzmo hefker ke’midbar – Torah can be acquired only by one who makes himself as unclaimed, as ownerless, as the desert. One can aspire to the greatness and holiness of Sinai, only if he approaches it as if he were unclaimed as midbar.Now, this doctrine of making one’s self hefker as a wasteland when approaching Torah, has two very important consequences. First, it implies that the Jew must come to the enterprise of Torah fresh, clear, unclaimed by other ideals and philosophies, and uncommitted to any other way of life. If, however, you come to Torah with an alien bias, with a previous commitment, if you are not hefker when you approach the teachings of Sinai, then Torah cannot be acquired by you.This thought comes to mind in the case of the British Rabbi who has involved himself and the entire community in an altercation with the Chief Rabbi, a controversy which has been widely reported by both the general and the Jewish press. This particular Rabbi has denied the fundamental Jewish principle of Torah min ha-shamayim, the idea that the entire Torah is the work of God and not the work of man, and yet claims for himself the honorific title of “Orthodox.” Now this is not the place to discuss the significant political and social implications of the crisis that has gr…

Our Haftorah for this morning, from the second chapter of Hosea, begins on a high optimistic note: “And the number of the children of Israel shall be as the sand of the sea, which cannot be measured or numbered.” For a people which chronically suffers the status of a minority, this prophecy comes as a cheerful source of encouragement. The verse seems simple enough. Yet the Rabbis of the Talmud (Yoma 22b) detected in this statement an apparent contradiction. The first half of the verse says that the number of the Children of Israel will be very large – as great as the sand of the sea. That, indeed, is a large number, but it is not infinite. The second half of the verse speaks of the population of Israel being so great that it cannot be measured or numbered; this implies an even greater number of Israelites.This is, of course, only an apparent contradiction, because the prophet wants to explain his metaphor and tells us that by the words “as the sand of the sea,” he means that the people of Israel will be well nigh too many to count. But the question of the Rabbis, counterposing the idea of a finite with the idea of an infinite number, was meant merely to introduce the answer they offer: kan bi’zeman she’osin retzono shel Makom, when Hosea speaks of the Children of Israel being beyond number he refers to a time when the Children of Israel will do the will of God; and kan bi’zeman she’ein osin retzono shel Makom, when Hosea speaks of us being merely as many as the particles of sand on shore he refers to a time when we will not perform the will of God.Now this is a strange answer. When one reads the beginning of our Haftorah, one finds himself in a mood which is favorable to our people who obviously are considered as deserving of divine reward. How, therefore, can the Rabbis maintain that the great promise that we will be as many as the sand of the sea refers to a time when we do not do the will of God? I should like to propose an answer, which, to my mind, touches the…

The world-wide student unrest which we are now experiencing, which is responsible for much wider social and political havoc, and the reaction of many more conservative elements to these demonstrations, generally revolve about the words “law and order.” Some have treated the concept represented by these words with contempt, as if it were nothing more than a hypocritical shield for the entrenched establishment and therefore something which must be abolished and overcome in order to institute a more just form of life. Others have, indeed, used “law and order” as a convenient excuse to cut down criticism and avoid necessary changes in the social order.What is the Jewish view towards law and order in this period of social and political upheaval? A detailed exposition cannot be given within the confines of a brief talk, but we can attempt to adumbrate several general ideas.Our sidra begins and ends with a statement advocating law and order. At the beginning of today’s reading, we are told of the commandment to the Children of Israel, concerning the diglei midbar, the flags or standards about which the tribes are to gather and according to which they are to march in a prescribed order. The peregrinations of the Israelites through the great desert of Sinai was not to be a helter-skelter rush of an unruly mob; it was to be an orderly march of the hosts of the Lord who follow His direction in the prescribed manner. So impressed were the Rabbis by the ability of these former slaves to gather about their standards in an orderly fashion, that they maintained that even the ministering angels were envious of this capacity of the Israelites to follow the diglei midbar!This same sidra ends with a commandment concerning the family of the Kohathites, of the tribe of Levi. We read: “And the Lord spoke unto Moses and unto Aaron saying, “Cut ye not off the tribe of the families of the Kohathites from among the Levites; but thus do unto them, that they may live and not die, when they app…

In this morning’s sidra, the Torah commands our ancestors to prepare d’galim, or flags, for themselves. Each tribe was to have its own ensign, and each cluster of three tribes was to have its own standard. איש על דגלו באותות לבית אבותם יחנו בני ישראל, “the children of Israel shall pitch their camps, each man according to his own standard, according to the ensigns of his father’s house.” Why are flags so important that they must be mentioned in the Torah? What do they really mean? And would it not have been more appropriate to command the preparation of standards during the years of conquest under Joshua, when such military appurtenances were more pertinent, than in the journey through the desert under Moses?The answer, I suggest, is that the d'galim are symbols of order and discipline, of a purpose and a cause which they represent. They reminded the Israelites not only of their allegiance to each other, but also of their past, their roots in tradition. Rashi quotes the Sages: באותות לבית אבותם - באותות שמסר להם יעקב אביהם כשנשאוהו ממצרים. Their order of march under their flags through the desert was identical with the order of their ancestors, the twelve sons of Jacob, which they followed according to the command of their father, when they bore the coffin of their father Jacob from Egypt to Canaan. The march of the tribes through the desert recapitulated the march of the twelve sons of Jacob from Egypt to Canaan. History was being relived, and the Jews who gathered around the flag in the desert were conscious of their roots in this glorious history. The d'galim, therefore, represented a mutual commitment to the past, to the forefather, and also to the future – on to the Promised Land.And this is necessary more in a midbar than at any other time and place! It is precisely when the outside world is characterized by wildness, by hefker, by anarchy and disorder, by fragmentation and disintegration, when there is a wasteland without – that we must be sure there is no wi…

The sidra of Bamidbar tells us of the census that Moses conducted, under Divine command, of men of military age: מבן עשרים שנה ומעלה כל יצא צבא בישראל. He counted all men capable of serving in the army, men of the age of twenty and over. There was one exception to this rule, and that was the tribe of Levi: אך את מטה לוי לא תפקד בתוך בני ישראל, “But the tribe of Levi you shall not count, and their sum you shall not take amongst the children of Israel.” Levi was not included in the general count, but was numbered in a special census.Why this exception? The Midrash gives us one answer: כדאי הוא לגיון של מלך להיות נמנה לבדו; the private legion of the King is of such dignity that it ought to be counted separately.That is a good answer, but it does not account for a major difference between the general census and that of Levi. All other Israelites were numbered from the age of twenty years, whereas the Levites were numbered from the age of thirty days.A contemporary Israeli Rabbi (Rabbi Ben Zion Firer) offers an answer that is full of insight. Levi, he maintains, was excluded from both military census and service precisely because this tribe was most prone to fight, most anxious to take to the sword!This was an ingrained characteristic of the Levites inherited from the founder of the tribe, Levi himself. When his sister Dinah was ravished by Shechem, it was Levi together with Simeon who avenged their sister’s honor by destroying Shechem and his entire tribe, much to the displeasure of their father Jacob. And later on, when the children of Israel danced about the Golden Calf and Moses wanted to turn to those who were loyal to God to cut down the idol worshippers, he immediately addressed the tribe of Levi: והרגו איש את רעהו ואיש את קרובו, kill each man his brother and his friend and his relative. Levi was perfectly suited to this task. This was the tribe that was courageous and strong, precipitous and determined.What the Torah, therefore, meant by the exclusion of Levi fr…

The word “schlemihl” is a Yiddish – and Anglo-Yiddish – pejorative term for a special kind of personality, whose characteristics are apparently self-evident. Maurice Samuel has written of him, “It is the schlemihl’s vocation and profession to miss out on things, to muff opportunities, to be persistently, organically, preposterously, and ingeniously out of place.”What is the origin of this particular term? It is hard to say. There are a number of theories. The most probable, to my mind, is a passing reference in today's sidra. In the listing of the heads of the Tribes of Israel we read: לשמעון שלומיאל בן צורישדי “the head of the tribe of Simeon was Shelumiel the son of Zuri-Shaddai.”In what way was Shelumiel a “schlemihl?” It is quite puzzling, because we really know very little from scripture about the biblical Shelumiel. And the name itself – “God’s peace” – tells us nothing about him.However, when we turn to the Talmudic-midrashic tradition, we do find some hints about the personality of Shelumiel that may provide biblical dimensions for the well-known “schlemihl.”The Talmud (Sanhedrin 28b) records the opinion of Rabbi Yohanan that Shelumiel had five different names. One of the people with whom this Shelumiel is identified, gives us, I believe, a measure of understanding into why Shelumiel had become a model of ridicule and failure, a laughing-stock for generations. And the story itself is very far from a laughing matter.Shelumiel is identified with זמרי בן סלוא, Zimri the son of Salu, who is later (Numbers 25:14) described as a prince of the tribe of Simeon. The story that is told to us in the Torah, later in this book, is that after the incident with Balaam, the Children of Israel began to be attracted to the daughters of Moab and Midian in the pagan rites of baal-peor. These rites were immoral, obscene, and all of this was planned by Balaam who, having failed to curse the Israelites, decided upon this device so that they might bring curse upon themselves. Thes…