Jüdisches Denken zu Schemuel I 6:19

58. The Rabbi: The community whose guardian and compensator is always in its midst--I mean God. Joshua said: 'You cannot serve the Lord, for He is an holy God' (Joshua 24:19). Notwithstanding this, his community was so zealously observing that, in the matter of the trespass of 'the devoted thing of Jericho,' not more than the one, Achan, was found disobedient among more than six hundred thousand. The punishment followed immediately, just as it did in the case of Miriam, who was afflicted with leprosy; also in the cases of Uzzah, Nadab and Abihu, and the people of Beth-Shemesh, who were punished because they had 'looked into the ark of the Lord' (I Samuel 6:19). It was one of the wonderful traits of God that His displeasure for minor transgressions was shown on the walls of houses and in the clothes, whilst for more grievous sins the bodies were more or less severely stricken. The priests were appointed to study this profound science and to discover to what extent these trials were God's punishment (this often took them weeks to find out, as was the case with Miriam), or how much was simply constitutionally curable or incurable. This is an abstruse science to which God pointed in the words: 'Take heed in the plague of leprosy, that thou observe diligently and do according to all that the priests, the Levites, shall teach you' (Deuteronomy 24:8).

59. Al Khazari: Hast thou a satisfactory argument on the matter?

Lest you contend that though the reason suffices, whence do our sages derive this death penalty, it not being found in the negative commandment of "Do not turn aside," the answer lies in several other questions which follow in the wake of the first. For we find many individuals to have incurred great punishments for a single transgression the severity of which is not made manifest in the Torah, viz. (Sotah 5a): "Why was Asa punished? Because he conscripted sages for palace duties," (Sotah 35a): "'And the anger of the L-rd burned against Uzzah and G-d smote him there for his error' (II Samuel 6:7) — R. Yochanan and R. Elazar differ here, one saying: 'for his forgetfulness…'" That is, he did not stop to consider: "If the ark supports its supporters, is it not capable of supporting itself!" And so with the men of Beth Shemesh (Sotah 35a): "'…because they looked at the ark of the L-rd' (I Samuel 6:19) — Because they looked, He smote them? R. Avahu and R. Elazar differ here, one saying that they continued harvesting as they bowed, and the other, that they also added words: "Who angered you [that you did not rescue yourself from captivity], and who appeased you [that you decided to return]?" Now we find no allusion for the death penalty in these instances in all the ways of the Torah as we find no allusion for it in the instance of one's transgressing the words of the sages. We find Reuven, too, to have incurred a great penalty for a minor transgression, viz. (Shabbath 55b): "R. Shmuel b. Nachmani said in the name of R. Yonatan: 'All who say that Reuven sinned are mistaken, for it is written (Genesis 35:22): "And the sons of Israel were twelve" — this teaches us that they were all equal in saintliness,'" and (Ibid): "R. Shimon b. Elazar said: 'Spared was that righteous one from that sin and he never came close to doing that deed. Is it possible that his children would stand on Mount Eval and declare (Deuteronomy 27:20): "Cursed be he that lives with his father's wife" if he himself had been guilty of that sin! How, then, am I to understand (Genesis 35:22): "And he lay with Bilhah, his father's concubine"? He protested the shaming of his mother, saying: "If my mother's sister [Rachel] was my mother's rival, should the maidservant of my mother's sister [Bilhah] be my mother's rival!" — at which he arose and transferred her bed [to the tent of his mother, Leah].'" Now if this was the case — that he did not sin and all who say that he did sin are mistaken — then how could this "sin" have caused him to lose three crowns? That of the first-born, that of the priesthood, and that of royalty?