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עַל־כֵּ֛ן יֹאמְר֥וּ הַמֹּשְׁלִ֖ים בֹּ֣אוּ חֶשְׁבּ֑וֹן תִּבָּנֶ֥ה וְתִכּוֹנֵ֖ן עִ֥יר סִיחֽוֹן׃
그러므로 시인이 읊어 가로되 너희는 헤스본으로 올지어다 시혼의 성을 세워 견고히 할지어다
Kedushat Levi
Another dimension of the line:עתה ילחכו הקהל את כל סביבותינו כלחך השור את ירק השדה; will become clearer when we look at Rashi on this verse.
Before doing this, however, we need to explain the meaning of a few verses in the previous portion חקת. We read in Numbers 21,27: על כן יאמרו המשלים באו חשבון תבנה ותכונן עיר סיחון, “therefore the bards would say ‘come to Cheshbon, it will be rebuilt and well founded as a city belonging to Sichon.’” The same bards continue with lamenting the fate of Moab from whom this city had been conquered by Sichon. (verses 28-30) Apart from the short summary of Moab’s history and Sichon’s might in these verses, what is especially remarkable is that the future tense used in relation to the city of Cheshbon, i.e. the future tense about a city that had already been rebuilt and reinforced, seems difficult to understand. Instead of the poet wishing for rebuilding of the city, he should have wished for its continuing to endure, i.e. תהיה עיר סיחון וגו'. Furthermore, the poet quoted speaks of the inhabitants of the city formerly having become refugees and prisoners, describing the males as “refugees” and the females as “prisoners.” Why this distinction?
We will clarify all this commencing with a statement in Gittin 38 according to which the members of people of Ammon and Moav respectively had been “ritually cleansed,” i.e. permitted to be conquered by the Jewish people through their having experienced becoming slaves of Sichon. Israel had been forbidden to annex Moab and Ammon as long as these lands had retained their independence. Any part of their lands which they had “lost” to predator nations had not been included in the Torah’s prohibition. That prohibition had been designed to prevent members of those two nations to be elevated to the status of converts to Judaism and membership in the Jewish people. The concept of not being allowed to join the Jewish people through conversion, signals to the rest of mankind that these two nations are considered as the ultimate source of destruction and desolation, as they are banned by Divine decree from rehabilitating themselves spiritually. If any of these people, through having been captured in war by another nation, had felt themselves degraded, this was not so in the long run, as they had then become qualified as potential members of the Jewish people. When the poet refers to the Moabites as captives and fugitives respectively, followed by the wish that Sichon’s city be rebuilt in the future, he refers to the new hope that the Moabite victims of Sichon’s conquest can now have, since they have become redeemable spiritually if they were to convert to Judaism. When something is legally incapable of being elevated to sanctity, it is called הרוס and חרוב, in Hebrew, whereas once this legal restriction has been removed it is called בנוי, built or rebuilt. Hence the poet congratulates the inhabitants of that city as becoming “rebuilt.” At the same time the poet mourns the fact that the remainder of the state of Moab that had not been captured by Sichon will remain forever condemned to being spiritually irredeemable. Another way of phrasing what we have just explained is that the redemption of the wicked is predicated on his first having experienced defeat, capture. The anonymous poets whom the Torah quoted in Numbers 21,29 appear to have had prophetic insight for those who could attune their ears to this.
The reason why the poets spoke of the refugees in the masculine mode, i.e. פלטים, is that the males benefited by their becoming refugees, as they had been forbidden to convert to Judaism, a barrier that had been removed from them by their becoming fugitives. As long as they represented a minority of the inhabitants of Sichon’s state they would be “legally” absorbed according to Jewish law as described in B’rachot 28, and henceforth be considered as Emorites.
The reason that nowadays former Moabites and Ammonites are accepted for conversion to Judaism is that we cannot determine who is and who is not a descendant of these people, and since they form a minority of whatever people they now belong to they have benefited by that status of being “absorbed” as a minority.
Concerning the female members of Moab described by the poets as prisoners, i.e. בשבית, this means that their captivity has no hidden redeeming feature, and is absolute. This is due to the females of the nations Ammon and Moab never having been included in that ban on conversion. The Talmud Yevamot 69, ruling on that subject, based it on the Torah having written (Deut. 23,4)לא יבא עמוני ומואבי בקהל ה' , “neither a member of the people (masculine) Ammon or Moab must be part of the community of Hashem.” The use of the masculine adjective is used by the Talmud to teach that female Moabites were never included in that prohibition, hence Ruth, David’s grandmother, could convert. They therefore did not mind their intermediate status as captives of the Israelites as the fact that they had been captive was sufficient for them to be elevated to the level of the עולם הבריאה, even by natural born Israelites, as they did not require such a major spiritual ”elevation,” as did their male counterparts.
Before doing this, however, we need to explain the meaning of a few verses in the previous portion חקת. We read in Numbers 21,27: על כן יאמרו המשלים באו חשבון תבנה ותכונן עיר סיחון, “therefore the bards would say ‘come to Cheshbon, it will be rebuilt and well founded as a city belonging to Sichon.’” The same bards continue with lamenting the fate of Moab from whom this city had been conquered by Sichon. (verses 28-30) Apart from the short summary of Moab’s history and Sichon’s might in these verses, what is especially remarkable is that the future tense used in relation to the city of Cheshbon, i.e. the future tense about a city that had already been rebuilt and reinforced, seems difficult to understand. Instead of the poet wishing for rebuilding of the city, he should have wished for its continuing to endure, i.e. תהיה עיר סיחון וגו'. Furthermore, the poet quoted speaks of the inhabitants of the city formerly having become refugees and prisoners, describing the males as “refugees” and the females as “prisoners.” Why this distinction?
We will clarify all this commencing with a statement in Gittin 38 according to which the members of people of Ammon and Moav respectively had been “ritually cleansed,” i.e. permitted to be conquered by the Jewish people through their having experienced becoming slaves of Sichon. Israel had been forbidden to annex Moab and Ammon as long as these lands had retained their independence. Any part of their lands which they had “lost” to predator nations had not been included in the Torah’s prohibition. That prohibition had been designed to prevent members of those two nations to be elevated to the status of converts to Judaism and membership in the Jewish people. The concept of not being allowed to join the Jewish people through conversion, signals to the rest of mankind that these two nations are considered as the ultimate source of destruction and desolation, as they are banned by Divine decree from rehabilitating themselves spiritually. If any of these people, through having been captured in war by another nation, had felt themselves degraded, this was not so in the long run, as they had then become qualified as potential members of the Jewish people. When the poet refers to the Moabites as captives and fugitives respectively, followed by the wish that Sichon’s city be rebuilt in the future, he refers to the new hope that the Moabite victims of Sichon’s conquest can now have, since they have become redeemable spiritually if they were to convert to Judaism. When something is legally incapable of being elevated to sanctity, it is called הרוס and חרוב, in Hebrew, whereas once this legal restriction has been removed it is called בנוי, built or rebuilt. Hence the poet congratulates the inhabitants of that city as becoming “rebuilt.” At the same time the poet mourns the fact that the remainder of the state of Moab that had not been captured by Sichon will remain forever condemned to being spiritually irredeemable. Another way of phrasing what we have just explained is that the redemption of the wicked is predicated on his first having experienced defeat, capture. The anonymous poets whom the Torah quoted in Numbers 21,29 appear to have had prophetic insight for those who could attune their ears to this.
The reason why the poets spoke of the refugees in the masculine mode, i.e. פלטים, is that the males benefited by their becoming refugees, as they had been forbidden to convert to Judaism, a barrier that had been removed from them by their becoming fugitives. As long as they represented a minority of the inhabitants of Sichon’s state they would be “legally” absorbed according to Jewish law as described in B’rachot 28, and henceforth be considered as Emorites.
The reason that nowadays former Moabites and Ammonites are accepted for conversion to Judaism is that we cannot determine who is and who is not a descendant of these people, and since they form a minority of whatever people they now belong to they have benefited by that status of being “absorbed” as a minority.
Concerning the female members of Moab described by the poets as prisoners, i.e. בשבית, this means that their captivity has no hidden redeeming feature, and is absolute. This is due to the females of the nations Ammon and Moab never having been included in that ban on conversion. The Talmud Yevamot 69, ruling on that subject, based it on the Torah having written (Deut. 23,4)לא יבא עמוני ומואבי בקהל ה' , “neither a member of the people (masculine) Ammon or Moab must be part of the community of Hashem.” The use of the masculine adjective is used by the Talmud to teach that female Moabites were never included in that prohibition, hence Ruth, David’s grandmother, could convert. They therefore did not mind their intermediate status as captives of the Israelites as the fact that they had been captive was sufficient for them to be elevated to the level of the עולם הבריאה, even by natural born Israelites, as they did not require such a major spiritual ”elevation,” as did their male counterparts.
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Kedushat Levi
When we keep the above in mind the verse (Numbers, 21,27) תבנה ותכונן עיר סיחן, “let it be built (Cheshbon) as the city of Sichon, and let it be firmly established, becomes clear.” The city in question is one that Sichon had captured from Moab. It had therefore become permitted for the Israelites to be taken as if it were part of the Emorite (Canaanite) nation, whereas the Torah had warned the Israelites not to infringe on Moabite territory. (Deut. 2,9). The Talmud in Gittin 38, states, that Sichon, by conquering part of the territories of Ammon and Moab, “cleansed” i.e. made permissible, the subsequent conquest of these lands by the Israelites. Incidentally, this statement also shows that Jewish law recognizes capture of lands of one nation by another to be considered as legal after the event. If reference is made by the Torah to this event which might have occurred hundreds of years prior to the war between Israel and Sichon, it is only in order to prove the legality of Israel taking over these cities and rebuilding them. The Torah emphasizes that the city was legally Sichon’s by describing it as עיר סיחון, “Sichon’s city.”
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