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וישמע הכנעני AND THE CANAANITE HEARD — He heard that Aaron had died and that the clouds of glory had disappeared and he believed that now he was at liberty to wage war against Israel, as it is related in Rosh Hashana 3a; Amalek was from olden times a whip for chastising Israel — always held in readiness to be God's agent for Israels punishment (Midrash Tanchuma, Chukat 18).

AND THE CANAANITE, THE KING OF ARAD, HEARD. We find [mentioned] amongst the conquests of Joshua: the king of Arad, one.²¹⁷Joshua 12:14. Ramban is to ask: since the verse in Joshua clearly indicates that Arad was in Canaan proper, to the west of the river Jordan: so how — as indicated in this section — could its king fight against Israel whilst they were still on the eastern bank of the Jordan: Moreover, in the section dealing with the [stages of the Israelites’] journeyings [in the wilderness], it is written, And the Canaanite, the king of Arad, who dwelt in the south in the land of Canaan,²¹⁸Further, 33:40. and Scripture does not refer to [that land which is] on the eastern side of the Jordan as “the land of Canaan” without qualification, just as He said, the land of Canaan according to the borders thereof.²¹⁹Ibid., 34:2. Verses 10-12 ibid., define the eastern boundary of Canaan as the Jordan: hence we see that the word “Canaan” does not include land east of the Jordan. So the question reappears: how come that the king of Arad, a land west of the Jordan, came to fight the children of Israel who were now encamped east of the Jordan? Furthermore, [if Arad was to the east of the river Jordan], Moses should have given the land of the king of Arad to one of the tribes of Israel [as their inheritance, in the same way that he divided up the other lands which he conquered]; but Scripture always tells²²⁰Ibid., Verses 13-15; Joshua 12:6, etc. that it was the land of Sihon and Og, the two Amorite kings, which Moses gave to the two tribes [Reuben and Gad] and to the half-tribe [of Menasheh], whereas the nine tribes and the [other] half-tribe [of Menasheh] received their inheritance after they crossed the Jordan into the land of Canaan. Perhaps we may explain [that the reason for this is] that Israel utterly destroyed their land, and did not settle therein at all. But that is not [the] correct [explanation of the word v’hacharamti in Verse 2]. Similarly Rashi explains [that the expression: And Israel vowed a vow unto the Eternal, and said, If Thou wilt indeed deliver this people into my hand,] then ‘v’hacharamti’ their cities²²¹Further, verse 2. means that Israel would dedicate the spoils [of those cities] to the Most High [and not that they would destroy the cities themselves].²²²Hence the question would be: If Arad was on the eastern side of the Jordan, why did Moses not give it to any of the tribes?
The correct interpretation appears to me to be that this king of Arad dwelt in the south²¹⁸Further, 33:40. on the western side of the Jordan, in the land of Canaan near the Jordan, bordering onto the land of the children of Judah, near Hebron which is in the south;²²³Above, 13:22: And they went up into the south, and came unto Hebron. and he heard from afar of the coming of the children of Israel,²¹⁸Further, 33:40. so he [the king] came by the way of Atharim²²⁴Here in Verse 1. to the plains of Moab to fight there against Israel. This is the meaning of the word ‘vayishma’ (and he heard) [i.e., he heard from a distance]. Therefore Scripture relates that he dwelt in the south in the land of Canaan,²¹⁸Further, 33:40. [to point out] that he came from another land, to the place where Israel was [encamped]. Then Israel vowed a vow unto the Eternal²²¹Further, verse 2. that if He would deliver him [the king of Arad] into their hand, they would dedicate all that they had to G-d. And Scripture [further] relates²²⁵Further, Verse 3. that G-d heard their prayer, and the vow that they had vowed unto G-d, they fulfilled,²²⁶See Isaiah 19:21: and they shall vow a vow unto the Eternal, and shall perform it. for they killed them now in the days of Moses, as He had commanded, None devoted, that may be devoted of men, shall be ransomed; he shall surely be put to death,²²⁷Leviticus 27:29. See Ramban ibid. and they gave all their spoils into the treasury of the House of the Eternal.²²⁸Joshua 6:24. Scripture continued by relating here²²⁵Further, Verse 3. that Israel also laid their cities waste when they came into the land of Canaan, after the death of Joshua, in order to fulfill the vow which they had made, and they called the name of the cities Hormah [Utter Destruction].²²⁹Ramban is thus saying that the account in Verse 3 of the destruction of the cities refers to an event which took place after Joshua’s death, and which is recorded in detail in the Book of Judges, as will be explained further on. Thus we must say that this future event was told by G-d to Moses, who wrote it down — like the rest of the Torah — at the command and dictation of G-d. Compare Ramban’s remarks in his introduction to the Commentary on the Torah, (Vol. I p. 9): “However, it is true and clear that the entire Torah — from the beginning of Genesis to in the sight of all Israel [the last words in Deuteronomy] — reached the ear of Moses from the mouth of the Holy One, blessed be He”. Since there is no difference in time for G-d, it is written in the past tense, for past, present, and future are all the same to Him. See also Ramban Vol. II, p. 192, for the reason why the tenses are often used interchangeably in prophetic statements. It is with reference to this that it is stated in the Book of Judges, And the children of the Kenite, Moses’ father-in-law, went up out of the city of palm-trees with the children of Judah into the wilderness of Judah, which is in the south of Arad,²³⁰Judges 1:16. and it is [further] written, And Judah went with Simeon his brother, and they smote the Canaanites that inhabited Zephath, and utterly destroyed it. And he called the name of the city Hormah.²³¹Ibid., Verse 17. It was then that this vow [recorded here] was fulfilled, but Scripture, however, completed the account of the matter here, just as it did in the section speaking of the descending of the manna, [where it states]: and Aaron laid it up before the Testimony, to be kept. And the children of Israel did eat the manna forty years, until they came to a land inhabited; they did eat the manna, until they came unto the borders of the land of Canaan,²³²Exodus 16:34-35. [an event which occurred] after the death of Moses, until the morrow after the Passover.²³³Joshua 5:11. Similarly, These are the names of the men that shall take possession of the Land for you etc.²³⁴Further, 34:17. constitutes a prophecy that these men will [still] live and function [at that time]; for it is impossible [to say] that G-d would specify for them men about whom there was a doubt [as to whether they would still be living; for if so], He should rather have commanded Joshua [about them] at the time of the division of the Land. [But since the command was already given to Moses, we see that the Torah speaks of future events, and that this constitutes a Divine promise that these specified men would live until the time of the division of the Land.]
It is also correct to say that already now in the days of Moses the Israelites destroyed this king [of Arad] and his people with the edge of the sword,²³⁵Exodus 17:13. and called the place of the battle Hormah, and after they crossed the Jordan, Joshua also killed the [then] king of Arad²¹⁷Joshua 12:14. Ramban is to ask: since the verse in Joshua clearly indicates that Arad was in Canaan proper, to the west of the river Jordan: so how — as indicated in this section — could its king fight against Israel whilst they were still on the eastern bank of the Jordan: who ruled after [the one in the days of Moses], together with the [other] Canaanite kings who ruled at that time. When the children of Judah came into their cities, they destroyed them as well, and called the name of the cities Hormah,²³¹Ibid., Verse 17. because [by destroying them] they fulfilled the vow which their fathers had made, and I will utterly destroy their cities.²²¹Further, verse 2. Therefore He stated here, and he called the name of ‘the place’ Hormah,²²⁵Further, Verse 3. but there [in the Book of Judges] it is written, and he called the name of ‘the city’ Hormah,²³¹Ibid., Verse 17. meaning the name of every city which belonged to the king of Arad, as they fulfilled their vow, and their spoils were dedicated to the Sanctuary. Thus [according to this interpretation] everything mentioned here happened at the same time [in the days of Moses], except that He mentioned, and their cities,²²⁵Further, Verse 3. [the destruction of which] occurred at a later time, when they came into their cities. It is for this reason that it says [here], and I will utterly destroy their cities,²²¹Further, verse 2. and does not say “[I will destroy] them and their cities,” because the verse [only] mentions their vow concerning the future, but they themselves [the people] died in the battle [at the time of Moses] and were destroyed there. And the language of the verse fits in well with this explanation of ours, for it should have said: “and He delivered up the Canaanites ‘into their hand,’ and ‘they’ utterly destroyed them and their cities, and ‘they’ called the name of the place Hormah.” But Scripture omitted the pronouns²³⁶Thus it does not say that He gave the Canaanites “into their hand” [which would refer exclusively to the hand of the Israelites of the days of Moses]. Nor does it say vayacharimu (and “they” destroyed), but instead says: ‘vayachareim’ [literally: “and ‘he’ destroyed” — i.e., the one who destroyed them — now, or later on in the days of Joshua]. Similarly it does not say vayikr’u (“and ‘they’ called”), the name of the place Hormah [in the days of Moses] but ‘vayikra’ [“and ‘he’ called” — the one who called — now or later on]. in order to indicate that He delivered the Canaanites into the hand of whoever of the Israelites He delivered them, some of them now and some of them at a later time, for G-d hearkened to their prayer, and they fulfilled their vow.

וישב ממנו, without killing a single Israelite.

וילחם בישראל. He fought against Israel. The reason the Torah had to write the words בישראל, instead of עם ישראל as it did in Exodus 17,8 when Amalek is reported as attacking Israel, may be that in this instance the Israelites themselves were the cause that the Canaanites attacked them. They had sinned. The words: וישב ממנו שבי, "he took a prisoner from among them," the word ממנו suggesting that the reason Israel was attacked at this time was Israel itself. Israel's sin at this time was their share in causing the premature death of their High Priest Aaron on account of the events at "the waters of strife." Psalms 106,32 attributes G'd's anger to the people when the Psalmist exclaims: "they angered the Lord at the waters of Merivah and Moses suffered on their account." Naturally, David did not only refer to Moses but also to Aaron who shared in that mission. He singled out Moses by name as he was the principal involved.

יושב הנגב..דרך האתרים, the “tourists” who were really spies; Moses had instructed the spies in Numbers 13,17 to enter the land of Canaan from the south, and had described the Amalekites as inhabiting that part of the land. (13,29)

וישמע הכנעני מלך ערד, “When the Canaanite King who dwelled in Arad heard, etc.” According to Rashi the “Canaanite” mentioned here was in fact the Amalekite, as we know from the description of the spies who reported that the Amalekite dwelled in the south of the Land of Canaan. (13,29) However, they had misrepresented themselves to look like Canaanites, and this is why the Torah here describes them as they appeared to the Israelites at that time. Nachmanides writes that Arad was one of the (legitimate) Canaanite kings (Joshua 12,14) Furthermore, in Numbers 33,40 this king is described specifically as dwelling in the south, in the Land of Canaan. It is not customary for the Torah to refer to the “Land of Canaan” without further detail (such as which tribe) except to the areas east of the river Jordan, as in chapter 34,2 later on. If this land had indeed been east of the Jordan, Moses should have included it in the allotment to the tribes of Reuven, Gad and half of Menashe. The nine and a half tribes all received their share of the land on the west bank of the river Jordan. Nachmanides therefore explains our verse as referring to a different king by the name of Arad, one whose territory was on the west bank of the Jordan, and this is why the Torah had to add that it was far to the south, not the lands conquered from Sichon and Og. [The whole problem is that if Arad had dwelled on the west bank, how could he have attacked Israel who had not set foot in that region as yet. Ed.] He assumes that this king dwelled between the river Jordan and the mountains of Yehudah, south of Hebron. He invaded the Israelites coming from another country. When this king heard that the Israelites had already reached the plains of Moav close to the river Jordan, the Torah reports that G’d accepted the Israelites’ prayer and delivered the Canaanites into their hands, and they made good on their vow and killed them now while Moses was still alive, who had decreed that none of the loot from that campaign was to be used personally, and it was all donated to the Temple treasury. The Torah added that even the cities belonging to that Canaanite king were placed in ban by the Israelites when they conquered them later in the days after Joshua’s death, and that they named that area Chormah. All of this has been recorded in Judges 1,16 where also the conquest of a town by the name of Tzefat is mentioned. At that time the tribes of Yehudah and Shimon co-operated in that campaign. In that chapter we are told that the sons of the Kenite, Moses’ father-in-law, ascended from the city of palm trees, (the former Jericho) to the desert of Yehudah in the south of Arad etc. It is not surprising that these names surface already in our Parshah, as it is not unusual for the Torah to refer to place names that were known to the reader of the Torah in later years although at the time the Torah was first written, and no one had a chance to read it yet, these places had not been known by these names. An example is that in Parshat Beshalach Moses and Aaron were commanded to preserve a bottle of the manna and they are reported as depositing it near the Holy Ark as a memento for future generations, although in fact this bottle was filled with manna 40 years later, shortly before the Israelites crossed the Jordan and the manna would stop falling from heaven. It is also completely in order to interpret that Israel at that time placed in ban this King of the Canaanites, i.e. defeated him and his people by the sword and commemorated the event by naming the site Chormah, although Joshua defeated that king after having crossed the Jordan at the same period as he defeated the 30 other kings of the Canaanites. To add detail, we are told in the Book of Judges that the tribe of Yehudah and Shimon had performed this feat, not Joshua personally, although he was the commander in chief, and therefore all the conquests during his lifetime are credited to him, also. In fact, this particular battle occurred after Joshua’s death had already been reported in the Book of Joshua. The author of the Book of Joshua even added that there had been military considerations why this part of the Land of Israel had not been conquered earlier. (Judges 1,19) The campaign represented the payment of the vow the Israelites had made to G’d when the events that occurred at the beginning of our chapter took place. By mentioning the name of the site already here, the Torah established the link between these two events in the mind of the reader of the Holy Scriptures.

וישמע הכנעני מלך ערד יושב הנגב, The Canaanite, i.e. the King of Arad who dwelled in the south heard, etc.” Actually, this was not a Canaanite tribe but Amalek (Tanchuma Chukat 18). The King is described as a Canaanite as he decided to speak the Canaanite dialect in order to deceive the people about his identity. He hoped to thereby make the Israelites pray for deliverance from the Canaanite attack whereas they had not been attacked by Canaanites at all. If G’d would deliver them from the Canaanites he, Amalek, would remain unscathed. Israel were not taking chances as they appealed to G’d to be delivered from the attacker without specifying his nationality. They simply said: “if You will deliver us from this nation, etc.” (verse 2).

He heard that Aharon died and [the clouds of glory] departed. You might ask: What is Rashi’s source for this? Perhaps [the explanation of the verse] is like its plain understanding, that it was because “Yisroel had come…” as the verse continues. The answer is that Rashi is answering the question: Why does it say, “He heard”? It should have merely said “Yisroel came by the route of the spies and the Cannanite King of Arad came and attacked…” As the Torah writes (Shemos 17:8) “Amalek came and attacked Yisroel” and (Bamidbar 21:23) “[They] went out against Yisroel to the wilderness; he came to Yohatz and attacked Yisroel.” Similarly it says regarding Og (ibid. v. 33), “He came out against Yisroel, [he with all his people] to wage war at Edre’i.” Rather, it was because they heard that Aharon died and the Clouds of Glory departed. Furthermore one can answer that Rashi’s proof is from Parshas Masei (Bamidbar 33:40) where it is written, “The Canaanites heard…after Aharon’s death.” There it is clear that it was only because they had heard that Aharon had died and that the Divine Presence had departed from Yisroel. Rashi explains on that verse, “From here you learn…” The words, “From here” imply that he is explaining that his proof is from there, as I will explain there. Re’m explains: It is written above וַיִּרְאוּ כל העדה ["The entire community saw…"] (20:29) and Rabbi Abahu says (Rosh Hashanah 3a): Read this as וַיֵרְאוּ ["and they feared"] with a tzerei under the yud in accordance with Reish Lakish who says that here the word כי [translated in 20:29 as "that" but sometimes meaning "because"] comes to explain the matter that precedes it. [Consequently it means that they were fearful] since the community had become vulnerable because of Aharon’s death. It appears that this was why Rashi reversed the order of the verse and explained (20:29) “that [Aharon] had died” after “the entire community of Yisroel” in order to juxtapose it to the comment, “And the Canaanite heard.” R. Yaakov Triosh.

Kap. 21. V. 1. וישמע הכנעני (siehe zu vorigem Verse). — הכנעני: wohl die erste zu dem eigentlichen Palästina gehörende Völkerschaft und als solche, d. h. sie hielten sich durch die Absicht von Jisraels Niederlassung im Kanaaniterland bedroht und warfen sich ihm daher an der Grenze entgegen. ערד, nach ת׳׳א Name des Landstrichs, nach Rosch Haschana 3a der Name des Königs, identisch mit סיחון, und zwar entweder סיחון das Nomen proprium und ערד ein Beiname, שדומה לערוד במדבר, einem Waldesel an Wildheit gleich, oder ערד der Eigenname und סיה ,שדומה לסייח במדבר :סיחון ein junger Esel (Baba Batra 78b).האתרים von תור mit vorgesetztem א׳, wie אגם und אגמון von אזנך) אזן ,גמא) von אכן ,זון von אכר ,כון von כר) כור) u. a. m.

יושב הנגב, “who resided in the southern part of the Land of Canaan;” in other words, Amalek; we have proof that Amalek resided in that part of the land from Numbers 13,29, from the report of the spies. If these people were indeed Amalek, why did the Torah not call these people by their real name but called them Canaanites? [Amalek is descended from Esau, i.e. is a Semitic tribe. Ed.] When G-d saw that Amalek attacked the Jewish people a second time, He said to Israel: “they are not out of bounds to you as are the Edomites, although genetically they are as close to you or even closer than the Edomites, Amalek having been a grandson of Esau. You may, or even must destroy them, in due course. What applies to the Canaanites, i.e. that any of them who do not voluntarily leave their land you have to kill, men women and children, applies to them also. (Compare Rashi, who says that the Israelites mistook these attackers for Canaanites as they had dressed as such. They had done so in order to cause the Israelites to pray to G-d to help them against the Canaanites, not against the Amalekites.) Rashi apparently did not accept the opinion of Rabbi Eliezer hakalir, in his liturgical prayer recited on Parshat Zachor, according to whom, on the contrary, the King of Arad (Canaanite) and his soldiers wore the uniforms of Amalekites. Some commentators on this paragraph not namedunderstand our verse as having omitted a word, i.e. “and Amalek,” after the word “Arad,” in our verse. We have indeed found elsewhere that the tribe of Canaanites under the control of the IKing of Arad, lived in close proximity to the Amalekites. (Compare (Numbers 14,25) Compare also verse 45 there.

ישב הנגב THE INHABITANT OF THE SOUTH COUNTRY — This was Amalek,as it is said, (Numbers 13:29), “Amalek was the inhabitant of the south country”. But he purposely changed his speech, talking in the “Canaanite” tongue, so that Israel might thereby be misled and would pray to the Holy One, blessed be He, that he should give the Canaanites into their power, whilst really they were not Canaanites, and their prayer would be ineffectual against the Amalakites. But Israel perceived that their clothing was as the clothing of Amalakites whilst their language was the language of Canaan; they thereupon said, “Let us pray against our enemies in general terms (without mention of any name), as it is stated (v. 2) that they said, “if Thou wilt indeed give this people into my hand”.

THAT ISRAEL CAME BY WAY OF ‘ATHARIM.’ According to the opinion of Onkelos [who rendered the verse: “that Israel came by the way which ‘the spies’ had gone”], the meaning is that when the spies came and went up from the south²³⁷Above, 13:22. and returned, the inhabitants of the Land noticed them, and this Canaanite who dwelt in the south heard about them, and so he followed the same route which they had taken, until he reached the camp of the Israelites. Onkelos has interpreted it well. And our Rabbis have said:²³⁸Rosh Hashanah 3a. “What was the report which he [the Canaanite] heard?” — because they found difficulty with the verse in the section [dealing with the stages] of the [Israelites’] journeyings,²³⁹Ramban by implication differs here from Rashi, who quoted this text of the Rabbis on the verse before us. According to Ramban, the Rabbis made their remark with reference to the verse mentioned further on. Ramban’s reason for disagreeing is apparent, because in our verse it states quite clearly the reason why the Canaanite came, namely because he had heard of the sending of the spies, as explained, and therefore he went to fight against Israel. But further on no reason is given and no war mentioned. Therefore Ramban says, the Rabbis found it necessary to give their interpretation. which states, And the Canaanite, the king of Arad, who dwelt in the south in the land of Canaan, heard of the coming of the children of Israel,²⁴⁰Further, 33:40. since it does not mention there any war, or any other event whatsoever. Therefore they said that the report was about the death of Aaron which is mentioned there,²⁴¹Ibid., Verses 38-39. and Scripture thus states that Israel’s enemies heard of the death of the righteous one, and they were consequently encouraged by that event to fight against Israel. Likewise the Rabbis have said²⁴²Tanchuma, Chukath 18. that this Canaanite was Amalek, and [therefore the Israelites] did not conquer his land, nor take any part of it; but they completely destroyed their cities.

האתרים, the letter א at the beginning is similar to the letter א at the beginning of the word אפרוח or in the word אתמול, which is a variant of תמול, meaning “yesterday.” There are many occasions when the letter א serves as the beginning of a word.

This was Amalek. Rashi explains this so that you should not pose the difficulty that the verse is contradictory, for it is written, “The Canaanite [king] heard” and afterwards it is written “who lived in the south” which refers to Amalek. [To resolve the difficulty] he explains, “They changed…”

וישב ממנו שבי, "and took a captive from amongst them." We need to explain why the Israelites did not appear troubled by the fact that they suffered a defeat at the hands of a single Canaanite nation. We could have expected them to extrapolate that if a single Canaanite nation could inflict a defeat upon them, what would happen when they would face all seven Canaanite nations? After all, we find precisely such a reaction by Joshua when he suffered a defeat at the hands of the inhabitants of the town of Ai (Joshua 7,5-9).

דרך האתרים, the correct spelling ought to be התארים, the letters having been inverted similar to when we find כבשים spelled as כשבים, (sheep) or שמלה as שלמה (garment). Compare Joshua 15,9: ותאר הגבול, “and the boundary curved, i.e. was inverted;” When the Amalekites heard that the Israelites had marched around the territory of Edom from north to south, as stated in Numbers 21,4, they concluded that they would now attack from the southern region of Edom. They used this as an opportunity to attack them as they had displayed fear of the Edomites.

דרך האתרים BY WAY OF ATHARIM — by way of the south country by which the spies (תרים) had gone, as it is said, (Numbers 13:22) “and they went up by the south country”. Another explanation of דרך האתרים is: By the way of the Great Searcher (the Ark) which used to journey in front of them, as it is said, (Numbers 10:33) “[and the Ark of the Covenant of the Lord went before them] in the three days’ journey to search out (לתור) a resting-place for them” (Midrash Tanchuma, Chukat 14).

AND HE TOOK SOME OF THEM CAPTIVE. “It was only one maidservant [of the Israelites that was taken captive].” This is Rashi’s language, based upon the words of our Rabbis.²⁴³Yalkut Shimoni, Chukath on this verse. The Sages were induced to make this comment because they were of the opinion that Israel never suffered defeat at the hands of any enemy except at times when they sinned; such as at the first war with Amalek, because they had said, Is the Eternal among us, or not?²⁴⁴Exodus 17:7. and at the second [war with Amalek]²⁴⁵Above, 14:45: Then the Amalekite … came down and smote them. on account of their sin in the [matter of the] spies, when Moses had warned them not to wage war.²⁴⁶Ibid., Verses 41-42. But in all wars which were by [Divine] command, not one man of them was missing²⁴⁷See further, 31:49. throughout the days of Moses. Therefore the Sages explained this verse as meaning that they [the enemy] took captive from Israel that captive whom they had in their possession, namely this maidservant whom the Israelites had [previously] captured from them. [The usage here of the term shevi (captive) in the sense of “servant” is] similar to the expression ‘b’chor hashvi’ (the firstborn of the captive)²⁴⁸Exodus 12:29. which means the firstborn of ‘the maidservant’²⁴⁹Ibid., 11:5. [and so here too the word shevi denotes a maidservant], since Scripture here does not say: “and he captured men from him,” or “[he captured] women and children.”
According to the plain meaning of Scripture, the sense of the verse is that these Canaanites did not kill any of the Israelites, but took a few of them captive, and when G-d [later on] delivered them into their hands, they brought them all back, and not a single one of them was missing. Scripture mentioned this in order to inform us that since the Israelites saw at first that the Canaanites were winning [the war], they made this vow to dedicate all spoil which they would take to G-d, and G-d hearkened to their voice. It is possible also that we explain that G-d was angry with these Canaanites because they came from a distant land to fight against Israel, and feared not G-d;²⁵⁰Deuteronomy 25:19. therefore He wanted that they should be utterly destroyed, and caused them to prevail at first so that the Israelites would vow to destroy them [and dedicate the spoils] to G-d.

The great pathfinder. This refers to the Ark, meaning that once they saw that the Clouds of Glory had departed and [the Israelites] only had the Holy Ark traveling before them, they came to attack, something that they had not done previously. Re’m. The other interpretation was necessary because according to the first reason there is the difficulty as to why is it written, “The route of the spies.” Did the spies establish that route? Surely it had been established for anyone to pass through. Therefore Rashi brought the other interpretation. Accordingly, Rashi brings the other interpretation and as Re’m explains, that it was because only the Ark traveled before them, but the Clouds of Glory had departed that [the Amalekites] came to attack. However, according to the other interpretation there is the difficulty as to why the Torah writes האתרים in the plural form, since it was referring only to the Holy Ark [which is singular]. Therefore Rashi also brings the first interpretation.

According to our sages in Bamidbar Rabbah 19,20 the people described here as "the Canaanite" were in reality the Amalekites. The reason they were described as Canaanites was that they dressed up as Canaanites in order to confuse the Israelites. This is the reason that when the Israelites had prayed to G'd to deliver the attacker into their hands they had referred to the wrong nation in their prayer. When they found out that the attackers had not belonged to the seven Canaanite nations they were not overly concerned at the minor victory enjoyed by the Aamalekite at that time. Their losses had been negligible [a single maidservant according to tradition. Ed.]. Another reason they were not overly concerned was the fact that as long as they did not try and enter the Holy Land, i.e. at a time when the measure of sin of its inhabitants was full, they did not worry that G'd would deliver them into their hands when the time was ripe. Our sages offer a variety of reasons for all this.

וישב ממנו שבי (more lit.,) AND CAPTURED FROM THEM A CAPTIVE — it was only one maid servant (Yalkut Shimoni on Torah 764).

One maidservant. Rashi had to explain so because the Rabbis state that Yisroel can only be defeated at a time when they act corruptly before Hashem. But here we do not find any corrupt behavior. Therefore he says that the captive who was taken here was merely the captive whom Yisroel captured from them. We need not ask how Rashi knew that there was only one, when perhaps there were two. For one can answer that the term שבי ["captive"] implies that there was only one. You might also ask how Rashi knew that the captive was a maidservant. The answer is that the term שבי implies a maidservant. For in Parshas Bo concerning the warning [before the tenth plague] it is written, “From the firstborn of Pharoh who sits on his throne to the firstborn of the maidservant…” (Shemos 11:5). Whereas later, when the plague struck, it is written “Until the firstborn of the שבי [captive]” (Shemos 12:29). Thus one must explain that שבי there refers to the firstborn of the maidservant and therefore the word שבי written here also refers to a maidservant. For if not so, Scripture should have clarified [whether] he took men, women or children from them.

“Then Moses and the Israelites sang this song to the LORD…” (Shemot 15:1) There are ten songs. The first was said in Egypt, as it says “For you, there shall be singing As on a night when a festival is hallowed…” (Isaiah 30:29) The second was ‘Then Moses sang…’ Third was on the well “Then Israel sang this song…” (Bamidbar 21:17) The fourth was the song ‘Listen now…’ (Devarim 32:1) The fifth was “Joshua addressed the LORD…” (Yehoshua 10:12) The sixth “On that day Deborah and Barak son of Abinoam sang…” (Shoftim 5:1) The seventh “David addressed the words of this song to the LORD…” (Shmuel II 22:1) The eight was “A song for the dedication of the House.” (Psalms 30:1) The ninth was Yehoshefat, as it is written “he stationed singers to the LORD extolling the One majestic in holiness as they went forth ahead of the vanguard, saying, “Praise the LORD, for His steadfast love is eternal.”” (Chronicles II 20:21) The tenth is in the time to come, as it says “Sing to the LORD a new song…” (Isaiah 42:10) This song is different, as it is named in the masculine form (shir chadash and not shirah chadasha). All the other songs are named in the feminine form because just as a female gives birth so all of these salvations had after them another subjugation; but in the time to come will be a salvation which is not followed by any subjugation, as it says “But Israel has won through the LORD Triumph everlasting…” (Isaiah 45:17) Thus it is written ‘a new song’ in the masculine (shir chadash), just as a male does not give birth. So it says “Ask and see: Surely males do not bear young!” (Jeremiah 30:6)

והחרמתי means I WILL DEDICATE their spoil (that of the cities) to the Most High.

אם נתן תתן, "If You will surely deliver, etc." The reason the Israelites repeated the words נתן תתן, is due to the fact that they were not certain which nation they were talking about. They said "if" i.e. if this nation is one of the seven Canaanite nations, all well and good. If not, Israel asked that G'd should nevertheless תתן, give that people into its hands, etc. There is a comment in the Midrash Lekach Tov according to which the first נתן refers to G'd handing back the prisoner the Amalekites had captured.

והחרמתי, all the portables shall be “holy unto G’d;” Israel vowed not to treat these objects as booty.

I shall consecrate the spoils. For if [it is explained] like the plain understanding [implying destruction], what kind of vow would it be to destroy their cities? Surely a plain vow to Hashem refers to consecration of property. Rather this expression means, “I shall consecrate…” Rashi comments further (v. 3), that according to this explanation that ויחרם refers to consecration to heaven, it would not be appropriate to say this in reference to people, as the verse continues “them and their cities.” Therefore Rashi explains that when [ויחרם] refers to people it is in the sense of killing [them], but when it refers to cities it is in the sense of consecration to heaven.

VV. 2 u. 3. ויתן את הכנעני ,אם נתן תתן וגו׳ usw. רמב׳׳ן im Kommentar bemerkt, dass das transjordanische Land nie ארץ כנען genannt werde, von diesem מלך ערד, dessen Volk hier כנעני genannt wird, heißt es noch ausdrücklich Kap. 33, 40: והוא ישב בנגב בארץ כנען. Es sei daher anzunehmen, dass er im westjordanischen Lande im Süden gewohnt und von dort her sich Jisrael entgegengeworfen habe, das Gelübde habe sich dann nicht auf die damalige Gegenwart, sondern auf die einstige Besitznahme bezogen. Daher denn auch bei ויתן וגו׳ der Terminativ fehlt, da die völlige Bewältigung der Völkerschaft erst später vollzogen ward. Israel gelobte, wenn Gott ihm den Sieg über diese sie Angreifenden verleihen werde, so werde es bei einstiger Besitznahme, als Denkmal des ersten Sieges über ein kanaanitisches Volk, dessen Städte unbewohnt lassen, aber deren Beute dem Tempelheiligtum weihen, ähnlich wie bei Jericho. — Es nannte daher auch den Ort des verliehenen Sieges חרמה. In der Tat findet sich auch unter den von Josua im westjordanischen Lande überwundenen Königen ein מלך ערד (Josua 12. 14), und nach Richter 1, 1 lag ערד im jüdischen Gebiete an der Wüste Juda — und bezieht auch רמב׳׳ן das daselbst berichtete: ויכו את הכנעני יושב צפת ויחרימו אותה ויקרא את שם העיר חרמה auf die endliche Erfüllung dieses Gelübdes. Es ist jedoch zu bemerken, dass Josua 12, 14 ein מלך חרמה unmittelbar neben מלך ערד genannt wird, welches noch der Lösung bedürfte.

ויחרם אתהם AND HE DOOMED THEM by slaughter,

ויחרם אתהם ואת עריהם. They vowed at that time to make all this loot holy, property of the Temple Treasury, as we know they did from the beginning of the Book of Judges (Judges 1,17) [possibly the author uses the extraneous word הכנעני in that verse as the reason for linking it to the fulfillment of above vow. Clearly, the Safed mentioned there has nothing to do with the Safed in the north of the Land of Israel we are familiar with. Ed.]

Yisroel’s voice. They prayed in addition to the vow; prayer that comes from the depths of the heart is called ‘voice’.

ויקרא שם המקום חרמה, “Israel called the name of the place where this occurred: Chormah, “utter destruction.” It is not to be confused with a place by an identical name referred to in the Torah in Numbers 14,45.

ואת עריהם AND THEIR CITIES as things dedicated to the Most High.

And He delivered the Canaanites. He punished them and weakened their strength.

דרך ים סוף BY THE WAY OF THE RED SEA — As soon as Aaron died and this war came upon them they turned back on the way to the Red Sea; this was the way on which they had turned back when there had been enacted against them the decree that they must wander in the wilderness in consequence of their murmuring after having received the report of the spies, as it is said, (Deuteronomy 1:40), “And take your journey into the wilderness by the way to the Red Sea”. Here they went back seven stages, as it is said, (Deuteronomy 10:6), “And the children of Israel journeyed from Beeroth-bene-jaakan to Moserah; there Aaron died”. But did he really die at Moserah; was it not at Mount Hor that he died?” But the explanation is, that there (at Moserah) they again mourned and lamented for him just as though he there lay dead before them. Go and examine the list of the stages (Numbers 33:31—37) and you will find that there are seven stages from Moserah to Mount Hor (Midrash Tanchuma, Chukat 18).

ויסעו מהר ההר דרך ים סוף לסבב את ארץ אדם, “They journeyed away from Hor Hahar in the direction of the Sea of Reeds to commence their trip around the land of Edom.” Seeing that the King of Edom did not permit them to cross his territory they were forced to backtrack seven way stations before taking the route around the land of Edom. Our sages in Tanchuma Chukat 18 link this to Deut. 10,6: “the Children of Israel had traveled from Be'erot Yaakon to Mosserot where Aaron died. We know that Aaron had died at Hor Hahar. The meaning therefore is that they backtracked and only eulogized Aaron at Mosserot so that it appeared to them as if Aaron had died then.

Since Aharon had died… Rashi is answering the question: What is meant by “they traveled from Mount Hor by the Reed Sea route…”? Surely before they came to Mount Hor they were circling around the land of Edom, as it is written “Edom refused…” (above 20:21). Thus it is evident that they had already turned back [in order to circle around Edom]. So why does it say now that they turned back? Rashi answers that “since Aharon died….”

V. 4. דרך ים סוף, es war dies ein scheinbarer Rückzug und ein langer Umweg. Dewarim 2, 1 heißt es: ותקצר נפש העם בדרך .ונסב את הר שעיר ימים רבים (vergl. Schmot 6, 9) מקצר רוח. Wie dort bemerkt ist קצר רוח, und so auch hier קצר נפש, wahrscheinlich Gegensatz zu ארך אפים und bezeichnet die Ungeduld, רוח und נפש reichen nicht aus, das verlangte Ziel zu erwarten. Insbesondere hier reichte die נפש, reichten die vorwärts strebenden Lebensgeister nicht aus, die Mühe des langen Weges mit Hinblick auf das zu erreichende Ziel geduldig zu ertragen. Ein wirklich unbefriedigtes Bedürfnis lag nicht vor.

ויסעו מהר ההר דרך ים סוף, “they journeyed from Hor Hahar in the direction of the sea of reeds, ...making a long detour around the Land of Edom, and the people’s state of mind became very short tempered.” Their dissatisfaction was not caused by the journey, but by the fact that they traveled in the opposite direction of their objective, i.e. crossing the river Jordan. This was as hard for them to swallow as if they had been sentenced to death. They had felt until recently that they were close to their objective and would soon taste the fruit of the Holy Land and they now saw all their hopes as dissolving like an illusion. To the question what they had to complain about as long as they had manna and water, the answer is that once one has set one’s sights on something that can be enjoyed by the senses, eyes, ears, taste buds, feeling it with one’s hands and one’s sense of smell, the sameness and predictability of the manna, instead of being a sign of how G–d provided for them, became something of insignificance, קלקל, “lightweight” for them. The Torah therefore told us already in Numbers 11,8 that the manna, far from being so insubstantial, lightweight, insignificant, lent itself to grinding between stones, pounding, in a mortar, boiling in a pot, making into cakes. Moreover, it tasted like cream. [It is human nature that familiarity breeds contempt. After forty years of the same diet without getting to the destination they were seeking, the people’s reaction is understandable, although it had been due to their having displayed themselves as not yet worthy to dislodge the Canaanites from their homeland. Ed.] The pleasant taste of treated manna is also described in Numbers 11,8.

Traveling was insufferable to the people. It was insufferable because they came close to the place from which they would enter the Land and then they faced a long distance again. This is as expressed in Eruvin (53b), that a short cut that becomes the long way around is more difficult than a long way that ends up short.

ויסעו מהר ההר, “they journeyed on from Hor Hahar;” the Torah now returns to the subject which had been interrupted when it described the detour around the territory of Edom. It had been interrupted by the report of the death of Aaron and the battle against Amalek as a result of that.

לסבב את ארץ אדום TO GO ROUND THE LAND OF EDOM — to go round it, because they would not permit them to pass through their land.

But they returned there … and eulogized him. You might ask: Why did they eulogize him at Moseirah? The answer is that in Parshas Pinchos (Bamidbar 26:13) and Parshas Eikev (Devarim 10:6) Rashi explains why they eulogized him at Moseirah. This is the essence of his words: When they returned to Moseirah, the Levites chased after them until Moseirah and killed several families, as Rashi explains in Parshas Pinchos. Thus they eulogized him there because it was due to Aharon’s death that the Clouds of Glory departed from them, leading the Canaanites to hear and come to attack them. This caused them to return to Moseirah, and because they returned, several families were killed. Consequently they eulogized him there, given that it was due to his death that all of these events befell them, as I explained. The reason why here Rashi explains that they turned back seven journeys, while in Parshas Pinchos he explains that they turned back eight journeys is explained elsewhere (Bamidbar 26:13). Here it means aside from the last journey there were seven journeys.

מהר ההר דרך ים סוף, “from Hor Hahar, in the direction of the sea of Reeds, i.e. from north to south in order to detour around Edom. This was not a detour around Mount Seir, of which we are told in Deuteronomy 2,1. Here we are speaking of the twenty first year of the Israelites, immediately after the nineteen years the Israelites had remained in Kadesh Barnea the point from which the spies had been sent out. After that they detoured around the territory of Edom until they came to the Kadesh in the desert of Tzin. The detour around Edom occurred in the fortieth year after the Exodus, and was due to the King of Edom’s refusal to grant the Israelites the right to use his territory as transit toward the Jordan river. They also detoured around the southern part of the Kingdom of Moav, as the Torah had not given them the right to harass that country, as we read in Judges 11,17. When they arrived at a place called Ovot, (verse 10) which was located at the south eastern corner of the Kingdom of Moav, they turned north and turned left in the direction of the river Arnon, as we read in verse Deuteronomy 919. The number of way stations during that period, have not been enumerated, although each has been mentioned in Parshat Massey, but some may have had more than one name. (Numbers 33,4143).

ותקצר נפש העם בדרך AND THE SOUL OF THE PEOPLE WAS MUCH DISCOURAGED BECAUSE OF THE WAY — because of the difficulties of the journey which were so hard for them. They said: Now we are close enough to enter the land, and yet we have to turn back. Just so had our fathers to turn back and they stayed in the wilderness thirty eight years until this day. —Consequently their soul became discouraged because of the hardship of the journey. In O. F., En cure del tour. — It would not be correct to say that ותקצר נפש העם בדרך means “[and the soul of the people was discouraged] while they were on the journey” and that it (the text) does not explain what it was discouraged through, for in every passage in Scripture where you find the phrase “the soul being discouraged”, it is there explained through what it became discouraged (the preposition ב being prefixed to the word that expresses the cause of discouragement). For example, (Zechariah 11:8) “And my soul became impatient of them (בהם)”, and, for example, (Judges 10:16): “And His soul became impatient with the enemies on account of the misery (בעמל) they inflicted upon Israel”. To anything that is hard for a man to bear the expression “the shortening of soul” (קצור נפש) is applicable - he is like a person upon whom trouble comes and his mind is not large enough to contain that matter and there is no room in his heart for that worry to abide there. Of the thing that causes the trouble the term “large” is used, denoting that it is too huge and heavy for a person. For example, (Zechariah 11:8) וגם נפשם בחלה בי, which signifies “(And also their souls] were great upon Me”; (Job. 10:16), “And it becomes large (it is a burden to Thee) even that Thou huntest me as though I were a lion”. (See Rashi on these verses and on Niddah 47a). To sum up the explanation: the phrase “shortening of the soul through a thing” signifies that one cannot bear it — that the mind cannot bear it.

ותקצר נפש העם בדרך, “and the people became impatient because of the length of the way.” The root קצר in the sense of impatient, occurs also in Exodus 6,9, when the people did not respond to Moses’ promises, i.e. ומקוצר רוח, “on account of an impatient spirit.” In this instance, the lengthy and strenuous detour around the boundaries of the Kingdom of Edom had tried their patience to breaking point. Rashi explains why the meaning of the word could not possibly be the “shortness of the way,” as after 38 years plus they perceived themselves as getting further away from their destination rather than closer to it. An alternate interpretation: The protective clouds shielding the people from the hot rays of the sun had ceased to function, as a result of Aaron’s death as these had been due to his merit, just as the water supply had been due to Miriam’s merit.

באלהים ובמשה [AND THE PEOPLE SPAKE] AGAINST GOD AND AGAINST MOSES — They placed the servant on a par with his Master (Midrash Tanchuma, Chukat 19).

וידבר העם באלוקים ובמשה, The people spoke out against G'd and against Moses. Although the people were perfectly aware that everything Moses did he did at the command of G'd, this did not prevent them from speaking out against him as they felt he should not have agreed with G'd's route for them but should have pleaded that G'd lead them through a more hospitable country. It would appear that the people's complaints in this instance did not justify G'd decreeing a major punishment as was the case when they had complained after hearing the majority report of the spies in Numbers 14,3. At that time the Israelites had demanded to return to Egypt. This time they "merely" indulged in slander against Moses and G'd. G'd punished them by letting snakes loose against them, seeing snakes symbolise slander ever since the time Eve was tricked by a snake into eating from the tree of knowledge (compare Taanit 8).

הקלקל, extremely lightweight.

כי אין לחם ואין מים, “for there was neither bread nor water.” The statement that there was no bread seems incomprehensible seeing they received the manna daily! They also must have had plenty of the water which had gushed forth from the rock in great quantities!
We must understand the people’s complaint as being a rebellion against their unnatural state of existence. Other nations had abundant supplies of bread and water both of which could be stored whereas the Jewish people wondered from day to day if they would have bread and water on the morrow. Seeing that the continued existence of the people appeared to hinge on immediate reward and punishment they felt themselves in a uniquely disadvantaged position when compared to the Gentiles.
Moreover, they claimed, “even the daily manna we receive is an inferior kind of bread as instead of giving our stomachs the feeling that it is full after having eaten it, our stomachs feel quite light, i.e. empty.” They expressed themselves as being fed up with that kind of existence. They knew of no other creature born of a mother that continuously imbibed food without having to excrete any of it (based on Yuma 75). G’d had intended that the daily dependence of the people on that day’s manna would teach them to put their faith in Him so that their dependence on Him should be like that of the slave on his master. He had related to the people as if they were on the level of angels.
They now had become guilty of a terrible slander against the heavenly manna. The people now used this fact as something negative, found fault with the heavenly food! Seeing their sin consisted of slander, G’d sent against them the creatures which had invented slander, i.e. snakes. Tanchuma Chukat 19 describes the punishment as fitting the crime seeing that however many different kinds of creature a snake devours they all taste like dust to it, as it had been cursed with: “dust you shall eat all the days of your life!” (Genesis 3,14). The Israelites by comparison had been given a single type of food, which however assumed all kinds of different tastes in accordance with the owner’s wishes. Another reason they were being punished through snake bites was that during the entire 40 years G’d had ensured that the snakes whose natural habitat is the desert would not attack any Israelite. Seeing that the Israelites had not appreciated this G’d simply did not continue to work this miracle and the snakes which now bit the people were not a plague, but merely the inhabitants of that desert.
The reason why the Torah does not write: “G’d sent snakes against the people,” i.e. seraphim, but it writes: ”the snakes which are the seraphim,” underlines that these snakes were not a new or different phenomenon at all. When Moses had told Pharaoh that G’d would punish him with an invasion of wild beasts (Exodus 8,17), he did not say הנני משליח בך ערוב, “here I am about to sent against you wild beasts,” but he said את הערוב. By this he meant that the wild beasts which are normally content to stay in their habitat will change their nature and invade the urban areas. Similarly here; the snakes which had suppressed their lifestyle by not harming the Jewish people though biting Gentiles, would now not practice any restraint whatsoever in their habitual confrontation with human beings, Israelite or not. The term לחם הקלוקל, is an insult, as if the Torah had written that the manna was the לחם קל שבקלים, “the least valuable kind of bread there was.”

The manna will eventually swell. Rashi explains “it will swell” because the Torah writes הקלוקל ["this rotten"] with a cholam, which literally implies a sense of decay. This was why they said that it would swell in their stomachs. When he explains that it was absorbed into the limbs, this was because it is written קלקל in the shortened form [without a vav] which implies the sense of קל ["light"], implying that one did not have to digest it. (Nachalas Yaakov) This is Rashi’s comment from Avodah Zarah 5a: “With this rotten bread — this is the manna because it was absorbed into their limbs and not excreted they called it rotten…” From there one sees that it is in the sense of lightness, similar to ירקרק or אדמדם ["yellowish" or "reddish" which are variations on the words ירק ["yellow"] and אדום ["red"] formed by doubling the root]. [It appears that] Re’m overlooked this Rashi.

V. 5. וידבר העם באלקי׳. Ihr Unmut wendet sich auch direkt gegen Gott, sie zweifeln nicht an Mosche Sendung, aber sie sind unbefriedigt durch die göttliche Führung. wir kommen auf diese Weise nie zum :למות במדבר ,Gott und Mosche :למה העלי ֻתנו וגו׳ Ziel und enden unser Leben in der Wüste unter ganz abnormen, einförmigen Verhältnissen. כי אין לחם ואין מים kann nicht sagen wollen, es fehle ihnen an der nötigen Nahrung, sie gestehen ja selbst sofort, sie hätten לחם, vielmehr vermissen sie Speise und Trank nach gewöhnlicher Menschenweise; die mühelose, wenngleich wundervolle Versorgung mit beiden war ihnen — langweilig, die vierzigjährige täglich sich wiederholende, so speziell fürsorgende Gottesgnade etwas — Alltägliches geworden, und dieser Unmut machte sie sogar ungerecht gegen den Nahrungswert des ihnen von Gott gereichten Mannabrotes, sie nennen es: לחם הקלקל, nach der לחם קל :פסיקתא, eine freie, leicht verdauliche Speise, so verdaulich, dass sie nach dem נימוח באיברים :מדרש שוחר טוב ganz in reproduzierende Assimilation ohne Substrat aufging, שנבלע ברמ׳׳ח איברים (Joma 75 b). Diese vorzügliche Eigenschaft verkehrte ihr Unmut in ihr Gegenteil, sie war ihnen nicht substantiell genug.

כי אין לחם....ונפשנו קצה בלחם הקלוקל, “for there was no bread (that was the product of the earth) and the insubstantial bread from heaven (the manna) the people had become fed up with.”The expression קצה is familiar to us from when Rivkah experiencing so much tension with her daughtersinlaw, the wives of Esau, told her husband that if Yaakov were to marry wives from a similar background she would become fed up with living. (Genesis 27,46, .(קצתי בחיי

למה העליתנו WHEREFORE HAVE YE BROUGHT US UP — “ye”: they (God and Moses) were both on a par to them.

Can anyone … without excreting. You might ask: Is it not written (Devarim 23:14), “You shall have a shovel aside from your weapons, and it shall be when you sit outside…”? From there it seems that they did excrete. The answer is that they excreted [food] purchased from the merchants [not the manna].

ונפשנו קצה מלחם הקלקל, "and we loathe the light bread." Perhaps they thought that the reason the arduous detour around the land of Edom bothered them so much was because they did not have the kind of food that would enable them to endure such a march more easily. People who travel on foot prefer to eat "heavy" food which is not easily digested as their very walking helps the digestive process. As soon as food has been digested one feels hungry again. Since the mannah was so easily digested they believed that the feeling of an empty stomach made it more difficult to endure the march. This is the reason the Torah introduced their complaint by mentioning the detour around the territory belonging to the kingdom of Edom. Our sages in Bamidbar Rabbah 19,21 say that the people who said all this were the remnants of the earlier generation who had nothing to look forward to but death in the desert during the coming months as they were destined to die before the Israelites would enter the Holy Land. They were fed up with their very lives. The same did not apply to the younger generation who had much to look forward to in the immediate future.

בלחם, “with the bread;” the letter ב at the beginning of this word has the vowel patach to show that a certain well known “bread” was meant.

ונפשנו קצה AND OUR SOUL LOATHETH — This, too, is an expression for “the shortening of soul” and “rejecting” (not being able to bear the trouble).

הקלוקל, as in Ezekiel 21,26: קלקל בחצים, “like flashing arrows,” a simile for the word בדולח, “shining crystal,” a word used by the Torah to describe the appearance of the manna in Numbers 11,7. An alternate interpretation: the word is a variation of קלקול, as in Jeremiah 4,24: וכל הגבעות התקלקלו, “and all the heights, (low hills) are disintegrating.” They are not providing man with strength.

בלחם הקלקל THIS LIGHT BREAD — because the manna was miraculously absorbed into their limbs (and was not execrated) they derisively called it “light”. They said: this manna will at some time or other swell up in our stomachs, for is there any mortal (lit., anyone born of woman) who takes in food and does not eject it? (Yoma 75b; cf. Rashi on Avodah Zarah 5b).

את הנחשים השרפים BURNING SERPENTS — so termed because they burn (cause fever in) a person through the poison of their fangs.

את הנחשים השרפים, the fiery snakes. It appears that as a result of the continued complaints by the Israelites against G'd and Moses, He sent the very beasts against them which their לשון הרע had given birth to. We have explained on numerous occasions that the מזיקים, destructive forces in our world, are nothing but the creatures we cause to come into being through our sins. The incident of the serpents in this paragraph proves how true the words of our sages in Taanit 8 are when they said that in the messianic future the other wild beasts will ask the serpent why it kills with a poisonous bite seeing it does not even get a physical satisfaction out of the damage it causes; the serpent replies with the verse (Kohelet 10,11)אין יתרון לבעל הלשון, "the slanderer does not get anything out of his slander." It asks: "why not ask the same question of the slanderer? What does he get out of spreading lies against people?" את הנחשים השרפים, the fiery serpents, etc. It seems quite appropriate that seeing the Israelites continued to slander G'd and Moses, that G'd sent the serpents created by these slanderous remarks against those who had caused their existence, against the slanderers themselves as per the Talmud in Taanit. In this instance the complaints of the Israelites gave birth to two kinds of serpents. The one called נחש has a poisonous bite which destroys the body, whereas the bite of the one called שרף burns the soul. The meaning of the word וישלח here is that G'd allowed the evil creations of the people's slanderous remarks to be turned against them. We find a similar use of that word in Job 8,4 וישלחם ביד פשעם, "He expelled them by means of their sin." In this instance the נחשים were the result of their slander against Moses, whereas the שרפים were the result of the Israelites having misrepresented what G'd had done. The Midrash too mentions that the שרפים were the punishment for what they said against G'd, as these serpents burn the soul.

That consume. Meaning that השרפים ["the consuming"] is a description of the snakes that are mentioned in the verse, meaning “the snakes that consume.” Not that this was a species of snake such as שרף מעופף ["a flying seraph" (Yeshayahu 14:29)] or נחש שרף ועקרב ["snake, saraph and scorpion" (Devarim 8:15)]. For if this were so the verse should have said והשרפים ["and the seraphim"]. [One might ask:] It is written, (v. 8) “Make yourself a שרף ["consuming snake"]” which implies that it was a species of snake called the saraph. The answer is that it means “make for yourself a consuming snake” for we find something similar [that an adjective implies a subject that is not stated explicitly in the verse] where מאכלו בריא ["his food is healthy"] (Chabakuk 1:16), refers to a healthy sheep.

V. 6. שלח .וישלח ד׳ בעם im קל heißt: schicken, etwas mit Absicht zu einem Ziele hin in Bewegung setzen. שַלֵחַ im פיעל jedoch überwiegend: loslassen, etwas seinem natürlichen Zug, seiner eigenen Bewegung überlassen, es nicht zurückhalten. So וישלח ישלח את היונה ,את העורב (Bereschit 8, 7 u. 8) ושלח את היונה ,וישלח את הערב (daselbst 43, 14), וישלח את אחיכם (Schmot 13, 17) ויהי בשלח פרעה (daselbst 22, 4) und sonst sehr häufig. Auch hier, nicht: Gott schickte Schlangen, sondern: ließ die Schlangen los, hielt sie nicht zurück. Daher auch nicht נחשים שרפים, sondern הנחשים השרפים, sie waren immer in der Wüste vorhanden, allein bis dahin hielt sie Gottes fürsorgende Macht zurück. Jetzt zog Gott diese sie zurückhaltende Macht zurück, und die Schlangen der Wüste folgten ihrem natürlichen Zug, dem das Volk erlag. So schildert Mosche (Dewarim 3, 15) die Wüste, die sie durch Gottes Wundermacht ungefährdet durch wandert hatten: נחשים שרפים .המוליכך במדבר הגדול והנורא נחש שרף ועקרב וצמאון וגו׳ sind daher ein ebenso natürlicher Zubehör der Wüste wie .צמאון ,וינשכו"נשך" lautverwandt mit "נזק" schaden, נשק brennen, נשק Rüstzeug (siehe Bereschit 41, 40).

את הנחשים, “the snakes.” According to Rabbi Yudan, the Torah, by not writing: נחשים, but הנחשים instead, claims that the cloud over the Jewish camp as long as Aaron had been alive, used to burn the snakes, and thus make them harmless, as far as the Jewish people were concerned. Now that Aaron had died there was no remedy against being bitten by snakes. They became frequent sources of harm.

וינשכו את העם AND THEY BIT THE PEOPLE — God said, as it were: Let the serpent which was punished for slanderous statements come and exact punishment from those who utter slander. — Let the serpent to which all kinds of food have one taste (that of earth; cf. Genesis 3:14 and Yoma 75a) come and exact punishment from these ingrates to whom one thing (the manna) had the taste of many different dainties (see Rashi 11:8) (Midrash Tanchuma, Chukat 19).

ויתפלל משה AND MOSES PRAYED — From this we may learn that he of whom one seeks forgiveness should not be so cruel as not to forgive (cf. Midrash Tanchuma, Chukat 19).

התפלל אל השם, "pray to the merciful G'd, etc." In this instance the meaning of the word התפלל is equivalent to a call for forgiveness of the sin. There is a difference in the accessibility of forgiveness if one prays for it before the guilty party has experienced afflictions or if one has waited until after he has experienced afflictions. Once the guilty party has already become the victim of the destructive forces he himself has created and which have come home to roost, he needs to marshall some merit in order for these destructive forces to be called off. Shabbat 32 has this to say on the subject: "A person should make a point of asking for mercy before he falls sick because once he has fallen sick they say to him: 'produce some merit and you will be freed from the sickness.'" This is why the people of the generation of the desert (also known as the דור דעה, the generation blessed with knowledge) were astute enough to ask Moses to pray before asking him to remove the destructive serpents. They wanted Moses to invoke his own merits on their behalf.

הנחש, a collective term meaning many of them.

ויאמרו חטאנו כי דברנו בה' ובך, “they said: ‘we have sinned in that we spoke out against G’d and against you.’” They asked forgiveness from Moses and admitted their guilt. Moses then prayed on their behalf as it says: “Moses prayed on behalf of the people” (verse 7). This episode teaches that if someone asks a person’s forgiveness for insults committed against him the injured party should not be cruel and refuse to accept the apology (compare Tanchuma Chukat 19). We find, for instance that Avraham prayed on behalf of Avimelech who had wronged both him and Sarah (Genesis 20,17); also Job had prayed on behalf of his friends (Job 42,10). If someone refuses to pray on behalf of his fellow when called upon to do so he is called “a sinner.” Samuel explained this to the people when he explained to them why he was prepared to pray on their behalf (Samuel I 12,23).

את הנחש, “the snake;” sometimes the word נחש appears in the singular, and sometimes in the plural mode. This is not unique, as we experienced it with the frogs in Exodus 8,2, also.

ויסר מעלינו את הנחש “so that He will remove the snake (plague of) from us.” Actually, we would have expected the word הנחשים, “the snakes” (pl.), instead of the word הנחש, “snake” (sing.). The reason the Torah uses the singular is to allude to the lethal power of the snake, serpent, mentioned earlier. The Torah refers to the spiritual representative of the snakes whose residence is in the desert. When the Jewish people said מעלינו, instead of ממנו, they meant “the one who is above us,” instead of merely “away from us.” We find a similar expression in Numbers 14,9 where Calev described that the protective force of the Canaanites had already been withdrawn from them as: סר צלם מעליהם, “their protective shadow has departed from above them.” This will also enable you to understand a verse in Zecharyah 6,1 וההרים הרי נחשת, “and the mountains are mountains made of copper” [a comment which appears irrelevant at first glance. Ed.]. The word נחשת is understood as derived from השחתה, “destruction.” Although the mountains mentioned by the prophet are destructible, the four chariots representing the glory of the Lord mentioned in that same verse are indestructible (based on Maimonides Moreh Nevuchim section two 10th chapter). It is a reference to the “great mountain” which features in the vision of Zerubabel as an insurmountable obstacle but which G’d promises will be reduced to level ground (vision of Yehoshua High Priest, Zecharyah 4,7)

את הנחש, the serpent. They wanted that G'd should remove even the relatively minor problem, the deadly bite of the snake that attacked only the bodies. If they had mentioned the שרף or the נחש השרף it would have sounded as if they were only concerned about not having their souls destroyed but would have been content to die a merely physical death, i.e. a normal death. By mentioning only the נחש, the people made it plain that they did not want to die a natural death of the body, and if so, they certainly did not want their souls to die. They were also careful to speak of the נחש in the singular to indicate that they did not want a single snake to remain.

על נס means [SET IT] UPON A POLE which is termed perche in O. F. Similar is, (Isaiah 30:17) “And like a polo (banner) upon the hill”; (Isaiah 49:22) “I will lift up my pole (banner)”; (Isaiah 13:3) “Lift up a banner." Because it is lofty so that it can serve as a sign and as evidence of something it is called נס, something raised on high (cf. Rashi on Exodus 20:17).

עשה לך שרף, the snake should be constructed of material which is associated with שרפה, burning. The association with “burning one’s tongue” should be uppermost in their minds when contemplating their sin which had been that they allowed their tongues to utter thoughts that angered G’d. They would repent when looking at a snake called שרף, something which “burns” (transitively).

עשה לך שרף, "make a fiery snake for yourself, etc." Our sages in Avodah Zarah 44 have this to say on the peculiar word לך, for yourself, in our verse. "The Torah says לך to tell us that Moses was to construct the serpent using his own funds. The reason for this was that a person may not forbid the use of something which is not his." Thus far the Talmud. The meaning of these words is that seeing Moses had made the serpent using his own funds it became his personal property. No one has the right to forbid others something that is not his. [The problem was that in the days of King Chiskiya (Kings II chapter 18) the people appear to have offered incense to this copper snake Moses had made, and to prevent them from doing so King Chiskiyah broke this snake into little pieces. Ed.] Seeing Moses had made this copper snake, the leaders of subsequent generations had been unable to destroy this snake or to forbid the people to worship it in some form. This explanation of the words עשה לך is one that emerged in the course of historical developments. At this time it is hardly likely that G'd meant for Moses to pay for the snake out of his own funds in order that at a later time the kings or religious leaders should be unable to forbid the people to use it as an object of worship. We must understand why G'd would have phrased His instructions so that we could have understood them to mean that Moses pay for the snake. We must also try and understand why G'd called it a שרף, whereas what Moses made is described as נחש (verse 9). Furthermore, we must try and understand why G'd decreed that an object such as this, which resembled a form of idol, had to be made altogether and why looking up to it would heal a person who had sustained a bite. Our sages in Rosh Hashanah 29 claim that as long as the Israelites looked heavenwards this was a demonstration of their faith in G'd, etc. If indeed this was all that G'd had in mind, why did He not order them to look straight at heaven instead of looking at the snake as an intermediary?

ONE WHO SEES IT. Who looks towards heaven above.

וראה אותו וחי, if the afflicted person would look at the copper snake having remorse in his heart he would survive the bite.

עשה לך שרף, “construct for yourself a type of snake called seraph.” In response to this instruction the Torah writes that instead of a seraph, Moses made a נחש נחשת, “a snake of copper.” Moses had understood that what G’d had in mind was that he should make a snake of copper. He did not mean to countermand G’d’s instruction. G’d had refrained from referring to this snake by its proper name so as not to mention the creature (original serpent) by name which had brought mortality into the world. By speaking of seraph, G’d referred only to the adjective associated with the serpent, the result of its bite. When G’d added the word לך, i.e. that Moses should make the seraph for himself, instead of saying simply: make a seraph,” He meant that He had accepted Moses’ prayer on behalf of the people to the extent that He forgave them their trespass against Himself; however Moses had to do something for himself in order for the people’s insult against him, Moses, to be forgiven, in order to demonstrate to the people how seriously G’d takes an insult against His chosen instrument, i.e. Moses.

Because it is [held high] … it is called a banner. Meaning that it is usual for one to signal with a pole by the placement of a signal on it, given that a pole is high, therefore a pole is called a banner.

V. 8. והיה כל הנשוך וגו׳ ,ויאמר ד׳ וגו׳. Der Biss der Schlangen hatte den einzigen Zweck, das Volk die Gefahren sehen zu lassen, die es auf Schritt und Tritt durch die Wüste verfolgten und die nur die Wundermacht Gottes von ihnen bis jetzt fern gehalten hatte, so fern, dass sie nicht einmal eine Ahnung davon hatten. Wer gebissen worden, der hatte sich nur das Bild der Schlange recht fest einzuprägen, damit es ihm gegenwärtig sei, auch wenn Gottes Gnadenmacht die Schlangen wieder fern halten werde, auf dass er des "Vorhandenseins" der Gefahren inne bleibe, an welchen täglich und stündlich der besondere Gottesschutz uns unbewusst vorüberführt, und die jeden Atemzug des Daseins zu einem geretteten, zu einem neuen Geschenke der göttlichen Macht und Güte gestalten. Nichts ist aber also geeignet, uns mit jedem Geschicke, auch der so leicht zu Ungeduld stachelnden, jedes "große Los" der Gottesspenden vermissenden — Alltäglichkeit auszusöhnen und in jeden Augenblick das Hochgefühl gottgewährter Rettung und die Seligkeit neu geschenkten Daseins zu mischen, als die Überzeugung von dem Abgrund, an dessen schmalem Rand unser ganzer Lebenspfad hinzieht, den eine gütige Gotteshand unserem sonst schwindelnden Blick verschleiert und auf Adlerfittichen ihrer Macht und Güte an uns rettend vorüberträgt, nichts also, als die נחשים השרפים zu sehen, die unsichtbar an unseren Wegen lauern, und die nur der allmächtige Gottesschutz in dem Bann der Ohnmacht zu halten weiß. Daher die Strafe dieser כפויי טובה, dieser "Undankbaren", wie das Wort der Weisen diese Verirrung nennt, dass Gott den Schutz und Schleier hinwegzog, der bis dahin die Giftzähne der Schlangen in der Wüste unschädlich machte und verbarg; daher die Heilung, dass sich der Gebissene das Bild der Schlange zum bleibenden Gedächtnis einprägte — והיה כל הנשוך וראה אותו וחי!

עשה לך שרף, “make for yourself a fiery serpent, etc.” the reason why G–d instructed Moses to construct a serpent, the symbol of everything negative since time immemorial, was to demonstrate that this very negative symbol would miraculously heal them from snake bites if used in the proper manner. It is only the Lord Who can use destructive instruments equally well for constructive purposes.

כל הנשוך ANYONE THAT IS BITTEN — even though a dog or ass had bitten him, he felt the effects of the injury and became enfeebled more and more (cf. Tanchuma); only that the bite of a serpent kills more speedily. On this account it is stated here: וראה אתו, “whoever has been bitten, when he seeth it, [shall live]” — a mere glance sufficed to heal him. But in the case of the serpent’s bite it is stated והביט, and he gazed — “and it came to pass that if a serpent had bitten any man, when he gazed [at the brazen serpent, he lived]”, for the serpent’s bite was not so quick to heal unless he gazed intently (cf. Jerusalem Talmud Rosh Hashanah 3:9). — Our Rabbis said: But could the copper serpent cause death or life?! But the explanation is that when the Israelites in gazing at the serpent looked up on high and subjected their hearts to their Father in Heaven, they were healed, but if they did not do this they waste away (Rosh Hashanah 29a).

Even if a dog. For if this were not so, why was it necessary to write כל ["anyone"], surely it should have merely written “one bitten.”

In accordance with what we have explained earlier that the reason that both נחשים as well as שרפים attacked the people was because they had slandered both Moses and G'd, we can understand G'd's instructions as meant to counteract both kinds of sins. G'd told Moses to "make for yourself a snake," meaning that with regards to the slander the people were guilty of against Moses himself he was to make a נחש, whereas with regard to the people having slandered G'd he was to make a שרף. It was important for the people to recognise that their sin was twofold, that they had slandered G'd as well as Moses. I will explain this in detail later on.

Deteriorate. In the sense of becoming ill, meaning that the body progressively shriveled and he did not die immediately. (Bava Kamma 52).

Moses was astute enough to construct a copper snake (נחש נחשת) for had he not made the snake out of copper (the same word as נחש) the Saraph G'd had commanded him to make [without specifying the material it was to be made of, Ed.] would not have symbolised both sins. This is why the Torah described what Moses actually made not as a שרף but as a נחש נחשת. The animal itself symbolised the slander against G'd, whereas the material from which Moses constructed it symbolised the slander against Moses the people were guilty of.

Can a snake bring death … and subjugated their hearts… (Kitzur Mizrochi) You might ask: If so, why did Hashem tell Moshe to make the snake given that it was dependant upon whether they directed [their hearts etc.]? Ramban has already answered that it was a miracle within a miracle, because when one has been injured by something it is normally dangerous for him to see or to gaze at it. Furthermore, doctors are careful not to mention the thing that caused the injury in front of him. However Hashem said that “anyone bitten will look at it and live” which is contrary to nature, to teach that it is not the snake that brings death, rather it is sin that brings death. (Gur Aryeh) writes that He commanded Moshe to place it on the banner in order that they would look upward, for then it would be impossible for one not to direct his heart toward heaven concerning this matter and to see who had brought it about. Accordingly when Hashem said [specifically] to make a snake, this was because when one sees the thing that injured him fear overtakes him. Consequently he concentrates more in prayer over the thing that injured him when he sees it before his eyes.

As to the overall meaning of the whole episode, it remains for us to explain why Moses' prayer did not suffice to remove both kinds of snakes from the Israelites so no one would be bitten and require a cure. Clearly, G'd had found that the people on whose behalf Moses had prayed had not repented, or at least had not not been sufficiently penitent. This is spite of the fact that they did say חטאנו, "we have sinned in having spoken out against the Lord and against you" (verse 7). The most important element of repentance is an undertaking not to again become guilty of the sin one asks G'd to forgive. The people had failed to mention such an undertaking on their part. This is why their affliction had not been removed. G'd in His wisdom and His desire to cure the Israelites, invented the stratagem of the artificial snake placed high above the people to give them a chance to either repent properly and not be bitten or to be bitten to awaken them to the need to repent properly. He commanded them to look up to the snake which would result in their being cured.

Their looking at the snake was meant to symbolise seven different things.

1) Kohelet 10,11 attributes a snake's biting to it having been incited. The incitement for the snake to attack humans are their sins. When there is no such incitment, לחש, the snake remains silent, harmless. We are to learn from this that if we keep our tongues silent and do not whisper (לחש) slanderous remarks, the snake will be as harmless as the reproduction Moses had made and placed on a pole.

2) The Israelites would be prompted to recognise the nature of their sin. We are told in Tikkuney HaZohar chapter 13 concerning a certain serpent found nesting in a tower that this was the angel of death which is compared to a serpent and had seduced original man. Placing this replica of a serpent on a pole was to symbolise the serpent which is found in a high place. The people were to recognise that their slanderous comment had been responsible for placing the serpent in such a high position. They had been guilty of exactly what the original serpent had done when it made slanderous remarks about G'd who is so High. They were also to remember how they had slandered Moses when they realised what material Moses had made the serpent of.

3) They were to realise the difference between a serpent which crawls on earth, which is the lowest of the low and brings death in its wake, and the serpent constructed by Moses and placed high on a pole which brought life in that it revived people who had been bitten by the deadly poison of a snake. This should remind the people that they had spoken out against the mannah and had professed their preference for bread grown in the ground. Concerning such comments the prophet Isaiah exclaimed in Isaiah 5,20 "Ah, all those who call evil good and good evil, etc."

4) The copper snake on the pole was designed to awaken in the Israelites the need to do Teshuvah concerning their complaint that G'd had led them through a desert in which their needs could not be provided instead of leading them on a route where there was grain and regular bread. They were to realise that the reason G'd who dwells in the heavens had done so was to make them totally dependent on Him for their sustenance and all their other needs and that there is no other source on which they could rely. G'd managed to make this point very clear by refusing to heal the people who had been bitten unless they raised their eyes and looked at the copper snake on the pole, i.e. in the direction of their Father in Heaven. This is what the Talmud in Rosh Hashanah 29 meant which we quoted earlier. The Talmud had only omitted to draw the comparison with the nature of the people's slander, etc. and that G'd wanted the people to rely on Him just as a son relies on the table of his father morning, noon, and night. If G'd had led the people through civilised country they would not have experienced this closeness to G'd as they would have bought their supplies. In that event their whole lifestyle would have been one that would have estranged them from realisation that G'd cared for them every step of the way.

5) G'd also wanted to counter the criticism implied in the people's reference to their having been led through inhospitable country which required miracles in order to keep them alive. We have a principle that one does not rely on miracles because miracles have a habit of failing to materialise when one needs them most. It is a fact that people who deny G'd's miracles endeavour to demonstrate by all kinds of deceptive devices that what are claimed to be miracles are in actual fact natural occurrences which had to occur at that particular time and at that particular place. The argument of these heretics is based on the fact that the so-called miracle occurred only once and only in a particular location. Inasmuch that the people might have harboured similar thoughts, G'd determined to demonstrate that He could maintain such miracles on a permanent basis by supplying the Jewish people with all their needs through miraculous means for a period of 40 years. Bamidbar Rabbah 19,23 describes that Moses threw the copper snake into the air and that it remained suspended there without being supported from the ground. Any person, who had been bitten (even if not by a snake) who would look up at it and would acknowledge that he had been wrong in denying miracles and who now believed that the reason that G'd had led the people through the desert had been in order to demonstrate His ability to perform miracles on a regular basis, would be healed.

6) G'd wanted to demonstrate the power of true penitence. Our sages in Yuma 86 have said that if someone is a truly penitent person even his former sins will be accounted as merits for him, i.e. not only will he have his sins forgiven but they will be turned into meritorious deeds. In our situation a person who had been bitten and who looked up at the copper snake observed that the very symbol of death, the snake, now kept silent although by definition every kind of snake is guilty of voicing slander. The fact that this very snake now had turned into a life-giving force rather than the reverse taught the repentant sinner this valuable lesson about the power of repentance.

7) G'd wanted that every individual Jew experience His miracles as something which had happened to him personally. This occurred when the person who had been bitten experienced the cure by looking up at the copper snake.

והיה כל הנשוך, it would be that everyone who had been bitten, etc. When the Torah here used the word והיה which denotes something joyous rather than the word ויהי which suggests something sad, this was to show the positive effect of having been bitten. A person who had to look up at the copper snake because he had been bitten learned seven lessons in faith. This was certainly a joyous experience for him. The reason the Torah wrote כל הנשוך, "everyone who had been bitten" without adding the word "by a snake," is that even people, who had sustained snake bites before the snakes had proliferated and Moses had made the copper snake as a result of the people's slanderous remarks, were healed also if they looked up at the copper snake. The reason the Torah added the conjunctive letter ו at the beginning of the word וחי was to inform us that looking up at the copper snake also cured those people who had been bitten by a שרף by the kind of snake that burned their souls.

נחש נחשת A SERPENT OF COPPER — He had not been told to make it of copper, but Moses said, “The Holy One, blessed be He, terms it נחש; I will therefore make it of נחשת — one term fitting the other term” (Genesis Rabbah 31:8).

AND MOSES MADE ‘NECHASH NECHOSHETH’ (A SERPENT OF BRASS). “He was not told to make it of brass. But Moses said: ‘The Holy One, blessed be He, called it a nachash (serpent); therefore I will make it of nechosheth (brass) — since the one word resembles the other [in sound].” This is Rashi’s language, based upon the words of our Rabbis.²⁵¹Bereshith Rabbah 31:8. But I do not understand this, for the Holy One, blessed be He, did not mention to Moses [the word] nachash, but said to him, Make thee ‘saraf’ (a fiery serpent)!²⁵²Verse 8. But the intention of the Sages is that Moses was guided by the substantive name thereof [which is nachash; and saraf is merely a particular description of a certain kind of serpent — a “fiery” serpent — hence he made the saraf which G-d mentioned to him from nechosheth (brass), corresponding with its substantive name].
It appears to me that the secret of this matter is that this is one of the ways of the Torah, every deed of which is a miracle within a miracle. Thus [the Torah] removes injury by means of the cause of the injury, and heals illness by means of the cause of the sickness, as the Rabbis have mentioned in connection with [the verse], and the Eternal showed him a tree,²⁵³Exodus 15:25. See Vol. II, p. 211. and as occurred with the salt that Elisha [cast] into the water.²⁵⁴II Kings 2:21. See Vol. II, p. 211, Note 259. Now it is a well-known medical principle that all people bitten by poisonous creatures become dangerously ill when they see them, or [even] when they [only] see their likeness, so that if people who have been bitten by a mad dog or other mad animals look into water,²⁵⁵“Or any mirror.” See Vol. I, p. 259. they see there the image of the dog or the attacker, and [this] can [cause them to] die, as is written in medical books and mentioned in the Gemara of Tractate Yoma.²⁵⁶Yoma 84a. Similarly doctors protect them from [people] mentioning in their presence the name of the animal that bit them, [and they forbid people] to mention it at all, because their minds cling to this thought and do not turn away from it altogether until it causes their death. [The doctors] have already mentioned that it is an empirical fact, amongst the wonders of reproduction, that if the urine of a person bitten by a mad dog is put in a glass receptacle after he has become rabidly sick, there will appear in that urine the likeness of the young of small dogs. And if you pass the liquid through a cloth and filter it, you will not find any trace of them at all; but if you return the liquid to the glass bottle, and it remains there for about an hour, you will again clearly see in it the small dogs. This is a true fact, and of the wonders of the powers of the soul. Now in view of all this, it would have been correct that the Israelites, who had been bitten by the fiery serpents, should not look upon a serpent, and should not mention it or bring it to mind at all. But the Holy One, blessed be He, commanded Moses to make for them the likeness of a fiery serpent, which was [the creature] that killed them. And it is well-known that these fiery serpents have red eyes and wide heads, and their bodies at their necks are like brass. Therefore Moses could not fulfill His command to make a fiery serpent except by making a serpent of brass, which appears similar to a fiery serpent. For had he made it of any other material, it would have had the likeness of a serpent, but not that of a saraf (a fiery serpent). And the Rabbis²⁵¹Bereshith Rabbah 31:8. who said [that Moses was to make a brass serpent] because “one word corresponds [in sound] to the other,” [meant to imply] that the mere mention of the name [saraf, which is a particular form of nachash, as explained above] was harmful [for the people who had been bitten, and yet G-d wanted to heal them through it]. The general intention [of this section, then] is that G-d commanded that they should be healed by the harmful agent whose nature is to kill; therefore they made its likeness in form and name, and when a person concentrated his gaze upon the brass serpent which resembled totally the offending agent, he lived. This was to make them realize that it is G-d [alone] Who sendeth death and maketh alive.²⁵⁷I Samuel 2:6.

נחש נחושת, after Moses had understood what G’d had intended with His command, he agreed to make this replica of a snake out of copper and not out of gold. Copper would be more likely to induce thoughts of remorse as they would associate its colour with the sensation of burning.

והביט אל נחש הנחשת וחי, “if he looked up to the copper snake he would live.” The cure was the opposite of the natural process. If the person who had been bitten would look at the snake which bit him he would endanger himself. [The author explains the cure in the same way as the working of inoculation, i.e. injection of the ingredient causing the disease, except that when we use inoculation this is done before the disease has struck. Ed.]. King Chizkiyah (Kings II 20,7) was cured by applying dried figs to the area infected by boils (a procedure which normally intensifies the skin rash he suffered from); the bitter waters at Marah (Exodus 15,25 compare Mechilta) were sweetened by throwing bitter (not sweet) wood into it. Here too, instead of an antidote to the snake and what it looks like the people had to look at an even more deadly looking snake. Red copper, the material Moses’ snake was made of symbolizes the planet Mars associated with war and death. In this instance by looking at “death” the people were cured. In other words, there occurred what our sages describe as “a miracle within a miracle.” It is a well known fact that if someone who has been bitten by a rabid dog subsequently looks into water and sees a reflection of a dog he will surely die. The Talmud Yuma 84 also discusses antidotes for bites by a rabid dog including the need to drink water only from copper vessels. The danger continues for 12 months during which time an appearance of the reflection of the dog may be lethal to the victim of the bite. Physicians warn people not even to mention the word “dog” or “rabid dog” to the victim of such a bite as it brings to mind associations which may prove fatal for the victim. Such people have been known to imagine seeing the image of such a dog even in their urine. At any rate, the reason we mention this is to demonstrate that here the requirement to look at the very symbol of what bit them had therapeutic effects for the victims instead of the reverse. This demonstrates the magnitude of the miracle. G’d’s purpose in commanding Moses to make a snake and for the people to focus on it was to show them that it was not the snake that causes death but the sin (compare Berachot 33).

Snake. Ramban writes: I do not understand this, for surely Hashem only said “Make yourself a שרף ["snake"].” Rather they mean that Moshe followed the essential name. His answer appears to be that since the essential name that Hashem gave to the snake was נחש [nachash]. Why then was it called שרף here? Consequently, Moshe said [to himself] “Hashem is surely hinting to me by referring to it with a descriptive name and not the essential name,” in order to make the snake from copper [nachash nechoshes], so that it [also] alludes to the essential name.

V. 9. לשון נופל על לשון ,ויעש משה נחש נחשת, ein Wortspiel (Raschi). Jeruschalmi 1 ר׳׳ה 3, 9 עשה לך שרף לא פירש אמר משה עיקרה לא נחש הוא לפיכך ויעש משה נחש נחשת, es war Mosche nicht der Stoff angegeben, aus welchem der שרף gebildet werden sollte, allein eben daraus schloss Mosche, dass er ihn aus Kupfer zu gestalten habe, da ja שרף nur ein נחש-Spezies sei und mit diesem Begriff auch der Stoffname gegeben war. Dadurch, dass die Schlange aus Kupfer gebildet war, ruft schon der Stoff durch seinen Namen den Gegenstand in die Seele, der daraus dargestellt war. מכאן היה ר׳׳מ דורש שמות hieraus nahm R. Meir überhaupt Veranlassung, den Namen eine Bedeutsamkeit beizulegen.

נחש נחשת, “a copper snake.” This metal was chosen, as, when polished, it shines and reflects light and therefore is highly visible. We know this from Ezekiel 1,7, where the prophet describes his vision of angels whose hooflike feet were described as sparkling like burnished copper. Even though the area of the Israelites camp was three miles square, anyone who had been bitten by a snake could see the copper snake that Moses had mounted on a pole.

Ist unsere Auffassung nicht irrig, so dürfte der נחשת-Stoff der נחש vielleicht noch näher den Zweck dieser ganzen Veranstaltung vergegenwärtigen. Es sollte fortan diese נחש נחשת nichts als eine "Ahnung" der wirklichen נחשים vermitteln, die überall verborgen in der Wüste am Wege lauern.

והביט אל נחש הנחשת, “and when he looked at this replica of a copper coloured snake (he would live);” looking at this phenomenon automatically would make such a person think of heaven, and that his only hope for surviving the snakebite would come from heaven. (Rashi). The reason that G-d chose this particular phenomenon was to remind the victim that the cure for his ailment had to be found in reversing the source of his affliction.[Just as the original sin by the first woman was described as caused by a snake who had seduced the first woman, so this source had to be discredited in the eyes of the afflicted person as symbolising that he had allowed himself to sin just as the first woman had been guilty of believing the snake, a mere creature, rather than the command of its Creator. Ed.] The miraculous powers of the Creator to heal, would best be demonstrated if it was shown that He could use the source of the affliction as the medicine that would cure it. [I have departed from the author’s use of the “chisel,” which to this Editor is rather meaningless, although it was taken from the commentary of B’chor shor. Ed.]

ויסעו בני ישראל ויחנו באובות, “The Children of Israel journeyed and camped at Ovot.” Tanchuma Chukat 19 proceeds to comment on the significance of these various way-stations mentioned in the verses following, seeing in each of them an allusion to what occurred there. The word אובות is related to אויב, “enemy,” i.e. that the people still suffered from a display of G’d’s anger at that place. The next location mentioned, i.e. עיי העברים, is an allusion to anger, עברה, i.e. G‘d remained angry at the people for 38 years. The name “river זרד,” which is mentioned next as a resting place, is understood to describe such a narrow body of water (זרת, the distance from thumb to the little finger when the hand is extended) that the idea that it took 38 years before the people could cross it was also a source of frustration for them. Moses repeated this theme in Deut. 2,13 where he recalls that G’d finally gave the instruction to the people to cross this “river.” The point is reinforced when the Torah writes in Deut. 2,14 that it took 38 years for the people to travel the distance from Kadesh Barnea to the river zered. When the Torah continues in verse 13 of our chapter to describe that משם נסעו ויחנו מעבר ארנון, “from there they journeyed and camped “beyond” Arnon, the word מעבר is understood by Tanchuma as signifying that finally G’d’s anger at the people i.e. עברה, had passed and they were in G’d’s good graces again. The normal construction in that verse should have been ויחנו ב-עבר ארנון, “they camped on the far side of the river Arnon.” The change from בעבר, to מעבר gave rise to the Midrash’s insight on that verse. We find that immediately after the people crossed the river Arnon G’d addressed Moses once again. [There had been a silence of verbal communication from G’d ever since the decree that the generation of the spies had to die. Ed.]. (Compare Deut. 2,24, that G’d spoke to Moses immediately after the people reached the river Arnon).

ויחנו באובות, “they encamped at a place called Ovot. This was located between almost at the border of Moav, as we know from Numbers 33,44. This is where the plague of snakes had occurred.

ויסעו בני ישראל ויחנו באובות. The Jewish people continued journeying and they encamped at Ovot. Their previous encampment had been at Punan as reported in Numbers 33,43.

בעיי העברים IN IJE-ABARIM (in the עיים of Abarim) — I do not know why the name (that of these places) was called עיים, for the term עי signifies ruins; it is a thing (spot) that has been swept as it were with a broom. Only the single letter ע in it belongs to the root; it is connected in meaning with יעים (Exodus 27:3) and (Isaiah 28:17) “And the hail shall sweep away (יעה).

בעיי העברים, a description of a very parched land as in Jeremiah 26,18 וירושלים עיים תהיה, Jerusalem will become totally dried out. The word occurs in a similar sense also in Michah 1,6.

I do not know. Meaning, I do not know why this place was called “the wasteland passes.” However I do know the meaning of עיי as Rashi explains.

V. 11. עי .בעיי העברים, wie אי von איה einen entlegenen, ringsum isolierten Ort bedeutet und daher אַיֵה, die Frage nach einem dem Fragenden entrückten, d.i, unbekannten Ort ausdrückt, so ist עי, von עיה, eine entlegene unbewohnte Örtlichkeit, eine Einöde.

ויסעו מאובות, “They journeyed on from Ovot;” from this point onwards they turned in a northerly direction. The text proves that this took place here, as the next encampment is described as being at lyyey haavarim which is located facing the territory of Moav which was to the east.

העברים (from עבר to pass) — the road forming a pass for those who at that spot pass by Mount Nebo on their way to the land of Canaan, which mount separates the land of Moab from the land of the Amorites. ...

With a broom. Meaning swept with a broom. This is in the sense of יעים ["scoops"] (Bamidbar 4:14) with which one sweeps out ashes.

ויחנו בעיי העברים, “they made camp at a location known as iyyey haavarim. According to Rashi, this was a place from which it was easy to cross to the land of Canaan, and it was near Mount Nebo, the mountain containing Moses’ unknown grave. Moses viewed the land of Israel from the summit of that Mountain. The author speculates that what is reported here took place before the conquest by the Israelites of the lands of Sichon and Og to the west of this location, reported later in this chapter. It appears as if Mount Nebo is not mentioned until after 3 further encampments as explained in the portion Massey, and as far as Rashi explaining further that Mount Nebo intervened between Moav and the Emorites, perhaps prior to the war between Sichon and the first king of Moav this may have been so. But during that war, Sichon appropriated his whole land from him commencing from Mount Nebo as far as the river Arnon. (compare verse 26) The letter ע in בעיי, may have substituted for the letter א here.

על פני מואב ממזרח השמש [IN THE WILDERNESS WHICH IS] BEFORE MOAB TOWARDS THE SUN-RISING (the East) — i.e., to the East of the land of Moab (not in the East of the world).

For those crossing Mount Nevo. Rashi is answering the question: The term “passes” implies a point they are crossing over to another area, but to where were they crossing over? He answers that “This was the passage route for those crossing Mount Nevo…” because in Parshas Haazinu (Devarim 32:49) it is also written, “This [mountain] pass, Mount Nevo.”

משם נסעו, From there they journeyed, etc. We need to understand why the Torah changed its style in describing the journeys of the Israelites by introducing both this journey and the one following it as משם, "from there." The Torah's normal way of telling us about the Israelites' journeying has always been the word ויסעו. Perhaps the reason is that the two journeys introduced by the word משם נסעו, i.e. the journey from the river Zered and from the river Arnon occurred at the Israelites' own initiative seeing there were no longer any clouds signalling their move. I have seen proof that my estimate is correct by what is written in Deut. 2,13: "now rise up and get over the brook of Zered, etc." These words clearly indicate that the Israelites did not journey at the behest of the clouds of glory. If the journey had started because the clouds moved, why would Moses have to tell the people to get moving? Although the Torah had said in Numbers 9,20 that the Israelites made camp and broke camp at G'd's instructions, this referred to all the other journeys barring these two. The reason was that Aaron had died and the clouds of glory had disappeared. Even though we have been told in Taanit 9 that these clouds re-appeared due to the merit of Moses, it is possible that the particular cloud which signalled to the Israelites that they were to break camp had not returned.

V. 12. נחל ,כנחל זרד ist sowohl der aus der Höhe in die Niedere herabströmende Bach, als die Niederung, welche das Rinnsal des Baches bildet. Der Grundbegriff ist die natürliche Herabbewegung aus der Höhe, verwandt mit נהל. Daher spezifischer Ausdruck für das gesetzliche Erbrecht (siehe zu Kap. 27, 7 f.). Gegensatz davon ist געל schließen, sperren, die natürliche Fortbewegung hemmen.

משם נסעו, “from there they journeyed onwards;” from the place called iyyey havavarim. The next place they encamped was called nachal zered. In Parshat Massey, that place is referred to as divon Gad (Numbers 33,45. According to some commentators the differences in the names of the encampments is due to their sometimes being referred to according to the brooks of water there, and in others according to the names thy had been known as. They are called here as their sources of water, seeing that was most important to them.

משם נסעו, “from there they continued their journeys;” The word “there,” refers to iyyey haavavrim.

ויחנו בנחל זרד, “they encamped in the valley of the river Zered.” In Parshat Massey, however, we read that the Israelites first came to Divon gad, but there only land locations are mentioned, whereas here rivers are mentioned also. The reason may be that the Torah was interested here to report what occurred at Beer. The Israelites are reported as having If the Torah had written בעבר ארנון, “opposite the Arnon river,”

מגבל האמרי The word גבול denotes boundary-line of (marking) the end of their frontier. Similar is the term the גבול of Moab (in this verse): it is an expression for extremity and end.

FOR ARNON IS THE BORDER OF MOAB, BETWEEN MOAB AND THE AMORITES. Arnon was a city which belonged to Moab, [located] near the end of the Amorite border and the beginning of the border of Moab, and it was situated on brooks that flowed through it.²⁵⁸Verse 14: and Arnon among the brooks.

מעבר ארנון...היוצא, in that region where the river Arnon borders the region where the desert starts.

The edge of [their] border. Rashi was obliged to explain that this refers to a border and is not in the sense of a territory [the word גבול ["border"] sometimes includes the territory enclosed by the border]. For if it was the territory of the Emorites then it could not be the territory of the Moavites, and if it was the territory of the Moavites then it could not be the territory of the Emorites. However a border can be a boundary for both.

V. 13. מעבר הארנון אשר וגו׳, das אשר bezieht sich auf עבר. Sie hatten das moabitische Gebiet umgangen und lagerten nun an der Nordseite des Arnon, an jener Seite, die den Wüstenstrich bildet, welcher vom emoritischen Gebiete ausgeht (Raschi). Sie betraten damit zuerst den Boden, der ihr Eigentum werden sollte, wie im Verfolg (V. 21 f.) erzählt wird.

ויחנו מעבר ארנון, “they encamped across the river Arnon. They encamped on the bank that used to belong to King Sichon after having made a detour around the land of Moav. They had not been allowed by G–d to cross the territory belonging to Moav at that time. They were only allowed to straddle its border, without crossing it. (Compare Judges, 11,17) where Yiftach recounts the history of the people’s wanderings. They had approached that spot coming from the east, leaving the land of Moav on their west, bordered by the territory that belonged to King Sichon.

ויחנו מעבר ארנון, “they encamped across from the river Arnon.” If the Torah had written instead: בעבר ארנון, this would have meant that they had had free choice where along the banks of the river Arnon to make camp. The letter מ in stead of the prefix ב, means that they had only been able to make camp on the part of the banks of that river which came from the boundary with the Emorites, as Rashi has explained.

מעבר ארנון ON THE OTHER SIDE OF ARNON — they travelled round the land of Moab along the whole of its southern and eastern sides until they came to the other side of the Arnon into the land of the Amorites on the north of the land of Moab.

כי ארנון גבול מואב, the border between the Emorite and Moav is a joint border only at that point where the river separates the two nations. The area where the Israelites had entered the territory of the Emorite was not anywhere near its boundary with Moav.

כי ארנון גבול מואב בין מואב ובין האמורי, “for the river Arnon was the border between Moav and the Emorite.” In practice this means that the river separated the borders from one another. Originally, both banks of the river were part of the land of Moav, but Sichon had conquered all the land on the north bank of that river. The Israelites took possession of all the formerly Moabite lands that Sichon had conquered from them. That land was no longer considered out of bounds to them when they came out of Egypt. G–d rearranges nations’ boundaries from time to time, as He sees fit. The respective rulers during such warfare who appear as winners or losers are pawns in His hands.

מעבר ארנון, where across from that river? The part in noman’s land, desert, where it had left the boundary of the territory belonging to the Emorites. Apparently, there was a small island in the middle of that river that afforded a relatively easy passage across the river, in a neutral area between the territory of the Emorites and that of Moav. This is what is referred to as Almon divlatayma in Numbers 33, 46. The river Arnon was the boundary between these two kingdoms.

היצא מגבל האמרי [ARNON WHICH IS IN THE WILDERNESS] THAT COMETH OUT OF THE BOUNDARY OF THE AMORITES — a strip of land jutted out from the territory of the Amorites — it belonged to the Amorites — and entered into the territory of Moab extending unto the Arnon which is the boundary of Moab. It was there that the Israelites encamped and thus they did not pass into the territory of Moab, כי ארנון גבול מואב, FOR ARNON IS THE BOUNDARY OF MOAB, and they did not grant them permission to pass through their land. And although Moses did not state this plainly, Jephtha plainly stated it], as Jephtha said, (Judges 11:17) "And in like manner he sent unto the king of Moab, out he would not permit him to pass through his territory”. Moses, however, made an allusion to it when he stated, (Deuteronomy 2:29) “As the children of Esau that dwell in Seir, and the Moabites that dwell in Ar, did unto me”. What was the case with these (the children of Esau)? They did not permit them to pass through their land, but they made them travel right round it! Similarly, too, Moab did!

כי ארנון גבול מואב בין מואב ובין האמורי, “for Arnon was the boundary between the Emorites and the Moabites.” In earlier times, the territory of Moav had extended in a westerly direction to the river Jordan and in a northerly direction as far as Mount Nebo, which used to be the boundary with the Kingdom of Sichon. The latter had conquered a large slice of the original kingdom of Moav, (which due to that fact had no longer been included in the Moabite territory G-d had put out of bounds to the Israelites). This has been documented in verse 26 of our chapter.

על כן יאמר WHEREFORE IT IS SAID (more lit., about this it will be said) — About this encampment and the miracles that were wrought at it, it will be told בספר מלחמות ה׳ IN THE NARRATIVE (lit., THE BOOK) OF THE WARS OF THE LORD — whenever people narrate the miracles that were wrought for our fathers they will declare את והב.

The simple meaning of [the expression] in the book of the wars of the Eternal²⁵⁹Ibid.: Therefore it is said in the book of the wars of the Eternal. is that there were wise men in those generations who used to write down the history of great wars, for such was [the custom] in all generations. These authors were called moshlim (they that speak in parables),²⁶⁰Further, Verse 27. because they wrote in them [their books] by means of proverbs and figures of speech, and when there were victories which they considered wonderful, they ascribed those wars to G-d, to Whom they are in truth [to be attributed]. Now the victory of Sihon over Moab was marvellous in their eyes,²⁶¹See Psalms 118:23. therefore they wrote it down in a book, speaking of it in figurative language, Eth Vahev b’suphah etc.,²⁶²Verse 14. and writing about it in a proverb — Come ye to Heshbon etc.²⁶³Further, Verse 27. Now the name of one city of those that belonged to Moab was Vahev. And the pouring forth of the brooks²⁶⁴Verse 15. — [this refers to] the slope of the brook, because the streams [of water] flow down continuously from the slopes of Pisgah.²⁶⁵Deuteronomy 4:49. Similarly, in the hill-country, and in the lowland, and in the Arabah, and in ‘the slopes.’²⁶⁶Joshua 10:40. B’suphah,²⁶²Verse 14. [this word is] of [the root] ‘b’suphah’ (in the whirlwind) and in the storm.²⁶⁷Nahum 1:3. Thus when Sihon captured the cities of Moab, those who wrote in parables recorded in the book which they called “the Wars of the Eternal”: Eth Vahev b’suphah [meaning: “The city of Vahev He destroyed in a whirlwind”], or they wrote: “G-d warred against Vahev in a whirlwind.” And the slope of the brooks²⁶⁴Verse 15. which belonged to Arnon, and the downpour of the brooks that inclineth toward the seat of Ar,²⁶⁴Verse 15. and the slope that leaneth upon the border of Moab²⁶⁴Verse 15. — all these the Eternal destroyed in the whirlwind and in the storm,²⁶⁷Nahum 1:3. for Sihon came upon them [the Moabites] suddenly, his horses’ hoofs were counted like flint, and his wheels like a whirlwind.²⁶⁸Isaiah 5:28. Similarly those [who spoke in parables] said: For a fire is gone out from Heshbon, a flame from the city of Sihon etc.²⁶⁹Further, Verse 28. Thus Scripture is bringing a proof from the book of “the Wars [of the Eternal”] that Arnon is on the border of Moab, and was forbidden to Israel [to capture],²⁷⁰Deuteronomy 2:9. whereas the brooks and all the slopes as far as Arnon they were allowed [to take], for Sihon had captured from the king of Moab all his land until Arnon, but not Arnon itself. Thus Arnon remained part of Moab, and constituted its border, as it is written, And unto the Reubenites and unto the Gadites I gave from Gilead even unto the valley of Arnon, the middle of the valley for a border.²⁷¹Ibid., 3:16. And so also did Jephthah say, and they [the Israelites] pitched on the other side of the Arnon, but they came not within the border of Moab, for Arnon was the border of Moab.²⁷²Judges 11:18.

בספר מלחמות ה' את והב בסופה, [if I understand the author correctly he suggests that the waters of the rock at Massah Umerivah which he described as flowing upstream, anti gravity like, were the reason why Sichon did not attempt to oppose the Israelites at the time when they first entered territory which was under his sovereignty. Ed.] Some of these miraculous events are recorded in what are known as the book of G’d’s wars. Examples of such miracles were what happened here and how these waters described a turn returning to their origin, i.e. the well that originated at Massah and Merivah. The reason why the Torah is so vague about these miracles is out of consideration for Moses and Aaron. The reason for these miracles was only in order to demonstrate to the Israelites what kind of miracles they had not been shown because Moses and Aaron had decided not to speak to the rock at the time. The people only found out in retrospect that the waters which had come forth from that rock were not natural waters, subject to the laws of nature such as the laws of gravity. These waters also did not behave according to the laws of centrifugality, i.e. of instead displaying a tendency of flowing towards the center. This is why these waters ascended with the Jewish people in their journeys through mountainous regions. [I have summarised the author’s commentary on these verses in order for the reader not to lose track of the main thrust of this commentary. Ed.]

על כן יאמר בספר מלחמות השם, wherefore it is said in the book of the Wars of the Lord, etc. Our sages offer two explanations on this verse, one in Kidushin 30 where they interpret the "wars" as referring to the disagreements between scholars about how to interpret the Torah. Such disagreements are called "a war of G'd," as these people are friendly with one another on a personal basis though opposing each other as Torah scholars. This is supposed to be the meaning of the words את והב בסופה. The second explanation is offered in Berachot 54 where the Talmud says that there were two Jews who had been stricken with Tzoraat one of whom was called את and the other והב. They trailed the remainder of the Israelite camp walking behind the main body seeing they were not allowed into the camp proper as מצורעים, people afflicted with this skin eczema. It was they who informed the others of the collision of the mountains situated on either side of the river Arnon.

על כן יאמר, concerning these journeys which were in fact a reversal of their previous journeys, while they marched around the territory of Edom for many days (compare Deuteronomy 2,1) until they turned again and encountered the well described in 20,11. At that time, as part of the summary of their experiences in which the people thanked the Lord, they mentioned the miracles at the sea of reeds, as well as the miracle experienced at the river Arnon, as well as the song beginning in verse 17 of our chapter. They now acknowledged gratefully the well for the availability of which they had not previously composed a song of thanksgiving. The reason they had neglected to do so at the time was the fact that in order to have the waters of this well Moses and Aaron had been condemned to die before entering the Holy Land. [our author calls the waters emerging from the rock at this juncture a well, as he presumes that it performed henceforth the same function as had the well of Miriam which had ceased to function after her death. Ed.]

על כן יאמר בספר מלחמות ה', “therefore it is said in the Book of the wars of Hashem.” The verse refers to the encampment and the miracles which took place at that place. The words: “in the Book of the wars of the Lord,” is a separate verse not connected to that which preceded it. It is a reference to a Book in which the Israelites had recorded all the wars G’d fought on behalf of those who revere Him. It is entirely possible that this Book as well as many others were lost in the course of our long history and wanderings. The Book’s first entry may well have been Avraham’s campaign to rescue his nephew Lot (Genesis 14,14-24). It is likely that the "Prophecies of Nathan and Ido" (II Chronicles 9,29) and the "Chronicles of the Jewish kings" (II Kings 15,11) and the "songs and parables of King Solomon" (I Kings 5,12) are further examples of historical records which have been lost in the course of time. This is the view of Ibn Ezra on Kings I 5,12.

Concerning this encampment. Meaning, concerning the miracles performed in this encampment. [The Sifsei Chachamim proceeds to explain the somewhat cryptic language used in the next two verses:] The meaning of בספר ["in the book"] is “In the book of stories.” The meaning of והב ["gave"] is יהב which means “gave.” The meaning of בסופה ["at the reeds"] is “at the Reed Sea.” The meaning of ואת הנחלים ["and the valleys"] is “the miracles of the valleys.” The meaning of ארנון ["Arnon"] is “of Arnon.” The meaning of ואשד is “spillage.” The meaning of ואשד הנחלים is that it is a description of “the valleys of Arnon.” The meaning of אשר נטה ["when it turned…"] is that the Mountain at Ar was uprooted from its place.

VV. 14 u. 15. על כן, darum, weil der Arnon die Grenzscheide zwischen Moab und Emori bildet, wird dessen Lauf auch also בספר מלחמות ד׳ beschrieben!

על כן, “This is why, etc,” in G–d’s records of nations’ wars these changes of borders are recorded, just as we find such changes mentioned in the Book of Chronicles of the Bible.

על כן, “this is why concerning the territories forbidden to the Israelites to conquer or harass, “it is stated in the book documenting the wars of the Lord, etc.” There are numerous books dating back to that period which have become lost in the course of the centuries in which more of the accomplishments of the Israelites in warfare had been preserved, including this war. Also numerous of the poems of King Solomon and his many parables have become lost throughout those centuries, though the people had been aware of their existence at one time. The composite title of these books was 'מלחמות ה, “wars conducted with the approval of the Lord.” We recall that Avigayil had said to David in Samuel I 25,28: כי מלחמות ה' אדוני נלחם, “my lord (David) has fought wars for the sake of the reputation of the Lord.”יאמר, “it is said;” the letter א in this word is vocalised with the vowel patach, (not tzeyre).

את והב — is equivalent to את יהב; just as from the root יעד one may say וָעֵד, so from יהב, "to give” one may say והב: the ו is a root-letter. It means to say: they will relate what (את) He gave (והב) to them (i.e. what boons He gave to them) and how He did many miracles at the Red Sea (בים סוף being the equivalent of בסופה in the text).

את והב, the יהב of the Lord as in Psalms 55,23 השלך על ה' יהבך והוא יכלכלך, “cast your burden on the Lord and He will sustain you.” Or, as in Kohelet 2,22 מה הוה לאדם מכל עמלו, “what does man have as a result of all his toil?” Our author quotes a few more verses in which the letter י in a word has been supplanted by the letter ו. Basically, he views the word והב as meaning the same as the word יהב.

We prefer to explain this verse according to its plain meaning. The Torah mentioned in verse 13 that the river Arnon formed the boundary between Moav and the Emorite. It follows that Israel owned no part of it. This is the reason the Torah goes on to say that in the book which is open before G'd and which contains records of the various wars describing which nation G'd disinherited and to which nation He granted additional territory, the river Arnon is recorded as the border between Moav and the Emorite. It is also recorded in that book that eventually, i.e. בסופה, this area will become part of the land of Israel. However, the time had not come for this development. The area in question is part of the three tribes Keyni, Kenizi, and Kadmoni whose territory was included in G'd's promise to Abraham at the covenant of the pieces (Genesis 15,19) but whose territory Israel never conquered to this day.

ספר מלחמת ד׳, ähnlich dem ספר הישר (Josua 10, 13 und Sam. II. 1, 18) beweist, dass zu Mosche Zeiten literarische Tätigkeit im Volke nicht gefehlt, dass vielmehr geisterfüllte Männer, es sind dies wohl die מושלים des V. 27, die erlebten Großtaten für Mit- und Nachwelt besangen und aufzeichneten, beweist aber zugleich, dass das heilige Gottesbuch der תורה nicht aus solchen Aufzeichnungen entstanden, sonst hätte der vermeintliche Kompilator seine Quellen auch sonst genannt, wie er sie hier nicht verschwiegen. Vielmehr dürfte eben durch dieses dem Gottesbuche einverleibte Zitat aus dem ספר מלחמות ד׳ auch den in diesem Buche enthaltenen Aufzeichnungen ein zu beachtender Wert in der Nation haben erteilt werden sollen. את והב בסופה וגו׳ unserem der Epigonen Verständnis entziehen sich die Data dieses Zitats. והב und סופה scheinen geographische Örtlichkeiten zu bezeichnen, an welche sich Erinnerungen großer Erlebnisse knüpfen, wie denn auch Berachot 54 a מעברות נחלי ארנון die Übergänge der Arnonbäche neben מעברות הים und מעברות הירדן als Örtlichkeiten überliefert sind, deren Anblick zu der ברכה ladet: הנחלים ארנון .כרוך שעשה נסים לאבותינו במקום הזה beschreibt wohl den Arnon als aus mehreren Bächen entstanden, daher ja auch V. 15 אשד אשד .הנחלים lautverwandt mit חסד ,חשד (siehe zu Wajikra 20, 17).

את והב בסופה, “the word: “vahav, “ is one word, the letter ו at the beginning is not a conjunctive or prefix. It is similar to Genesis 45,1, where Joseph reveals his true identity to his brothers and we read: בהתודע יוסף, “when Joseph revealed himself.” That word should really have been ואתודע. Here too, the correct word should have been אתיהב למלך מואב בסופה וסערה, meaning that the King of Moav had been defeated by Sichon in battle when he lost this part of his land right up to the banks of the river Arnon.

את והב בסופה, “vahav” is the name of a location at the extreme end of the territory of Moav, a place that the Israelites had crossed and where miracles had been performed for them similar to the ones at the sea of reeds. Compare a reference to this in what Balak told Bileam about the location at that time of the Israelites’ camp. (Numbers22,5.)

ואת הנחלים ארנון AND THE VALLEYS AT ARNON — Just as they relate the miracles at the Red Sea, so there should be related, too, the miracles at the valleys of Arnon, for here, also, great miracles were wrought (Midrash Tanchuma, Chukat 20). And what were those miracles? (the reply is given in the next passage).

The word והב may have either of two meanings. 1) It is an expression of love, אהבה, i.e. that G'd loves to give these lands to Israel also but not at that time. 2) It is an expression denoting נתינה, giving, granting. We find this expression in that sense [aramaic, Ed.] in Daniel 2,23 "You have granted me wisdom." This is not the only time that the Torah employs aramaic words. Some other examples are Genesis 21,7 מי מלל; another example is Deut. 33,2 ואתא מרבבות קדש.

Nach Raschi und ת׳׳א wäre והב Substantiv von יהב geben, gewähren, wie ולד, ועדvon יעד ,ילד und סופה wiese auf ים סוף hin, und man hätte zu übersetzen: das am Schilf Gewährte, das auch bei den den Arnon bildenden Bächen, d. h. die am Schilfmeer erlebten Wunder wiederholten sich an den den Arnon bildenden Bächen.

The Torah continues ואת הנחלים, "and the brooks, etc.," to further describe in detail the borders of Moav which are recorded in the book in which G'd records the various wars. In the future all the tributaries of Arnon will become part of the land of Israel as well as the tributaries which are close to the seat of Or.

ער ,אשד הנחלים אשר נטה לשבת ער ist eine moabitische Stadt (V. 28), אשד הנחלים dies ist der Arnon, der eben durch den Zusammenfluss der Bäche sich bildet; nachdem er sich gebildet, macht er eine Krümmung und in dem von dieser Krümmung eingeschlossenen Gebiete liegt die Stadt Or. Er biegt also seinen graden Lauf ab, לשבת ער damit Or dort angelegt werden konnte. ישב wird ja von den Städten selbst gebraucht: לא תשב לנצח von Babylon (Jes.13, 20), פרזות תשב ירושלם (Secharja 2, 8) und sonst. נטה לשבת ער: er neigte ab, für Ors Wohnen. ונשען לגבול מואב: von da an fließt er längs der Grenze Moabs.

ואשר הנחלים THE DISCHARGE IN THE VALLEYS — The Targum translation of ,שפך “pouring forth”, is אשר. Consequently these words signify “the pouring forth in the valleys”, for at that place there was poured forth the blood of the Amorites who had concealed themselves there. As the mountains were high and the valley deep and narrow, and the mountains were so close to one another, that a man could stand upon the mountain on one side and speak to his fellow on the other mountain, and the road passed through the valley, the Amorites said: When the Israelites are about to enter the land by passing through the valley we will come out of the mountain caves above them and will kill them by arrows and stone missiles. Now those caves were in the mountains on the Moabite side, and on the mountain that was on the Amorite side there were, opposite those caves, projections like horns and breasts jutting out. When Israel were on the point of passing, the mountain that was located in the land of Israel (that on the Amorite side which afterwards came into the possession of the Israelites) was set in tremor as a handmaid that goes forth to receive her mistress, and moved nearer to the mountain of Moab, and these breast-like projections penetrated into the caves and killed them (the Amorites who were hidden in them). And this is the meaning of אשר נטה לשבת ער which inclineth towards the dwelling (location) of Ar (the capital Moab) — which means that the mountain inclined from its place and approached close to the mountain on the Moabite side and affixed itself to it: and this, too, is the meaning of ונשען לגבול מואב, and leaneth towards the boundary of Moab (Midrash Tanchuma, Chukat 20; cf. Berakhot 54b).

When the Israelites came to pass through, the Eretz Yisroel mountain was set in tremor. (Gur Aryeh) You might ask: The mountain should have returned to its place immediately, such that the Israelites would have seen the dead in the valley. Why then did the mountain only return to its place after they had passed through? The answer is that it is not proper for one who receives his master to return to his place until his master passes, therefore [the mountain] did not return to its place until the Israelites had passed. Kitzur Mizrochi raises a difficulty: We need not ask that surely the cloud went before them, flattening any heights and raising any low places, and as a result the mountain should have returned immediately. Here we cannot answer that the cloud had already departed at Aharon’s death, for the Gemara in Maseches Taanis (9a) states that it returned in the merit of Moshe. Nonetheless, this is not a difficulty because the cloud traveled three days journey ahead of them, thus it is possible that at the time of passing through, the mountain had not yet accomplished its task of killing those who gathered there. Consequently the cloud did not level out the mountain.

ואשד הנחלים, “as well as its tributary wadis.” We find the word אשד also in Deuteronomy 3,17, i.e. אשדות (in the plural mode)

ואשד הנחלים, this was another location that the Israelites were not allowed to invade as part of it was overhanging airspace belonging to the Moabite Kingdom.

אשר נטה לשבת ער, “stretched along settled country.” Seeing that these valleys seemed to overhang territory belonging to Moav, that latter began to settle in it. At any rate, at the time of writing these lines both banks of the river Arnon were populated. [The reason why this is all spelled out become clear when we read about how the Jewish people had been saved by an earthquake turning fatal for the Emorites who had planned an ambush in the clefts of the protruding rocks. [Compare the Midrashim on verses 17-19 of this chapter. Ed]

ומשם בארה AND FROM THENCE TO THE WELL — from there the flow of blood ran to the well. How? The Holy One, blessed be He, said: Who will inform my children of those miracles? — The proverb says: If you have given bread to a child let its mother know (i.e., since the mother has, to an extent, benefitted by this, and the child cannot tell her, you should do so) (Shabbat 10b). After they (the Israelites) had passed by, the mountains returned to their original positions, and the well that followed the Israelites flowed down into the valley and brought up from there the blood and the arms and other limbs of those who had been thus killed, and carried them around the camp, so that Israel saw them, and they sang a song of triumph, as follows (Midrash Tanchuma, Chukat 20):

And from thence to B’eir,²⁷³Verse 16. The meaning of this is connected with the previous [Verse 13], saying that they pitched on the other side of the Arnon, and from there they set forth on their journey and went round about B’eir since they did not enter the Arnon or any [area] beyond it, because it continued [to be] the border of Moab. Scripture called here the name of the place [“B’eir”, which means “a well”] on account of the miracle²⁷⁴As stated in the verse: This is the well whereof the Eternal said unto Moses: ‘Gather the people together, and I will give them water.’ [which happened there], but in the [section enumerating the stages of their] journeys [in the wilderness] it is not called by that name.²⁷⁵See further, 33:44-49. It thus shows that B’eir mentioned here was only so called on account of the miracle which happened there, but further on this place is called by a different name.

V. 16. ומשם בארה. Entweder: der Arnon fließt von dort zum Brunnen hin, oder: von dort kommt man zum Brunnen. חיא חבאר. Der Ort wurde באר, Brunnen, genannt, weil dort ihnen der Brunnen wieder gegeben ward, den sie vor vierzig Jahren vom Choreb her erhielten (Schmot 1, 7) und der ihnen mit Mirjams Tod entschwunden war, oder wahrscheinlicher, weil dort der Brunnen zur Ruhe kam, den sie erhalten und wieder erhalten und der sie bis dahin begleitet. באר wäre dann der Name des Gipfels, von welchem V. 20 spricht.

ומשם בארה, “and from there to a place called “Be-er.” The well mentioned here appears to have emanated in the place they came to immediately afterwards. It was water gushing out of a rock.

ומשם, “and from there,“ i.e. from the boundary of Moav; the warning against harassing that nation becomes effective extending as far as the place known as Beer, which is identical with Kadesh, which is part of Edom, where G-d gave them the well.

עלי באר COME UP, WELL from the valley and bring up what you have to bring up! — Whence do we know that it was the well that announced to them these miracles as it is stated above? Because it is said: ומשם בארה “and from there to the well”. For you cannot say that it means: “from that place was (they got) the well”, because was it indeed from there that they got it? Had it not been with them from the beginning of the forty years’ wanderings? But it means that from there it flowed down to the Israelites to proclaim the miracles! Then again, also, the paragraph beginning with the words: אז ישיר … השירה הזאת were spoken at the end of the forty years whilst the well was given them at the beginning of the forty, and what reason then can there be to write it as late as here. But the subject of the song has to be explained in connection with what precedes it (that it was a summons to the well to bring up the bodies of the slain) (Midrash Tanchuma, Chukat 20).

אז ישיר ישראל, Then Israel sang, etc. What precisely was the point of this song? Besides, why had the Israelites not acknowledged the mannah by a song just as they acknowledged the water? The entire paragraph needs explaining. Perhaps the entire song really was an acknowledgement of the Torah. This is why one cannot criticise that generation for not breaking out in a song of thanksgiving when the Torah was described as its מורשה, something precious left to them as an ongoing possession (Deut. 33,4). The reason is that the people had already acknowledged the gift of the Torah in the song recorded here, the song acknowledging "water." After all, Torah has frequently been compared to a well of water. It is called "well" because it originates with G'd the ultimate well from which all springs forth. It is also called "water" as it symbolises water and its life-giving properties. When the people sang עלי באר, "arise o well," this was not a reference to the physical well and the waters beneath the earth's surface, but to a celestial well. The words ענו לה are similar to Exodus 15,23 ותען להם מרים, the responsive nature of the chant.

אז ישיר ישראל את השירה הזאת, “Then Israel sang this song:” According to the plain meaning of the text the principal content of this song is the reference to the Emorites who drowned in the river Arnon and whose blood mingled with the waters from the well which accompanied the Israelites on their journeys (compare Rashi). This might account for the mention of ואת והב בסופה ואת הנחלים ארנון, “and the gift of [the Sea of Reeds and the rivers of Arnon”] (verse 14).
Personally, I believe the meaning of the verse is that what occurred there was also recorded in the Book of the wars G’d fought on behalf of the Israelites, and the word בספר in verse 14 does not mean “book” so much as “enumeration;” i.e. this “war” which the Israelites only learned about after they saw all the blood in the river Arnon was accounted another one of the wars recorded for posterity. G’d had destroyed a town known as והב by means of a tornado or something like it, סופה being a reference to a great storm. The tributaries of the river Arnon were also destroyed by that storm.
A Midrashic approach based on Tanchuma Chukat 20: the words את והב בסופה mean “what He had given to them (the miracles G’d performed, i.e. the assistance He had given) at the Sea of Reeds.” The words ואת הנחלים ארנון mean “and the rivers and the miracles He performed for them at the river Arnon and its tributaries.” What precisely were the miracles performed at Arnon? Answer: אשד נחלים “so much blood was poured into these rivers that they looked red.” Onkelos uses the word שפך here for the spilling of the blood of the Emorites, a similar expression he used in Leviticus 4,12 on the words אל שפך הדשן, which he renders as מישד קיטמא, a place for shedding blood.
The background to all this is the tradition that the Emorites were hiding in the clefts of these high rocks on either side of the river Arnon. The river was narrow but deep, its banks forming a deep canyon. The opposite sides of the rocks were so close together that people on one side could converse with those on the opposite side. However, the only way they could get across to one another was by first descending to the river and then climbing the cliffs on the opposite bank. The Emorites planned to exploit this phenomenon to ambush the Israelites when the latter would attempt to cross the river by bombarding them from above with a hail of all kinds of missives, rocks, burning torches, etc. G’d brought about a storm or earthquake which banged together the two opposing sides of these cliffs squashing he Emorites who had been hiding inside them. The blood of these people drenched the river so that the Israelites did not even become aware of their miraculous escape until hey saw that the river had become red with blood. This was the comparison with what happened at the Sea of Reeds that our verses alluded to in poetical form. The words אשר נטה, “when it veered,” in verse 15, describes the motion of the cliff in the opposite direction toward Moav during this happening. The cliff then stuck to its opposite number across the river.

From within the valley. Rashi says “from within the valley” because one always arises from a low place to a higher place. And because the meaning of the word “arise” was not that it would come up, rather that the limbs would come forth so that Yisroel should be aware of the miracles that were done for them, Rashi added the words “and lift…” Nonetheless, since by arising it would lift up, the Torah wrote עלי ["arise"] rather than העלי ["lift"].

V. 17. אז ישיר, damals, als ihnen der Brunnen wieder gegeben werden sollte, עלי באר, das Volk rief ihn wieder herauf aus der Tiefe, ענו לה, es ist ein Brunnen, den man mit Wettgesang aus seiner Tiefe heben kann; wie er geistig entstanden, horcht er auch auf den ihn wieder weckenden Ruf.

It was then that Yisroel sang. Since it does not say, “It was then that Moshe and Bnei Yisroel sang,” we understand that Yisroel recited this song about Moshe, for the well was returned to them in his merit, after it had ceased with the death of Miriam. For this reason Miriam is not mentioned in this song, and Moshe is mentioned, alluded to in the verse: “The well dug by princes, that the nobles of the nation excavated, through the lawgiver (מחוקק).” The expression “lawmaker” refers to Moshe, as it says (Devarim 33:21), “for there the great scribe’s (מחוקק) burial plot is concealed.” In Taanis (9a), the conclusion is that the well came back in the merit of Moshe.

אז ישיר ישראל, At that point Israel broke out in a song of thanksgiving; when the people took possession of this well their hearts were full of gratitude, as they had previously been afraid of if not dying from thirst themselves, their livestock dying due to a shortage of drinking water. According to Rashi, Moses did not join in that song, seeing that according to Onkelos as well as Targum Yonathan ben Uzziel, Moses and Aaron had dug that well. (Compare verse 20)

Sing to it! The entire song was not recited by the congregation of Yaakov. Rather, it was Yisroel, the great Torah scholars, who sang it. They recited it to the entire nation, and the people answered to each stanza: “Arise, O well.” Such a method was also used for reciting Hallel, as explained in Perek Arvei Pesachim.

אז, “then,” i.e. after G-d had provided them with the well from which to slake their thirst, they broke out in a song of thanksgiving. This song has not been recorded at the time it had been sung because at the same time this location had become the one at which both Moses and Aaron had been punished. When the time came to make a specific reference to that well, the Torah also reported this song that the Israelites had sung. An alternate interpretation about the meaning of the line: 'בספר מלחמות ה, “in the Book recording the wars of the Lord:” This book was comparable to the Book of Chronicles kept by every nation in which a record has been made of all the wars between one nation and its neighbours, in which its victories have been recorded.

ומשם בארה, “and from there to the well;” from there (the river Arnon) the stream of blood flowed all the way to the well which was the source of drinking water for the Israelites. When the people realized their miraculous escape upon seeing this blood, they immediately composed the song of thanksgiving described in verses 17-20.

Was it from there? Meaning: The Torah says (v. 18), “From the wilderness as a gift,” meaning that it was given to them at the time they came into the wilderness.

חפרוה שרים, which the princes dug. Bereshit Rabbah 64, states that by means of Torah study man is able to make repairs to celestial sources called באר, "well." The extent of the "repair" achieved depends on the depth of the Torah study by the individuals concerned and the spiritual level of those scholars. The Patriarchs who were on a very exalted spiritual level dug this "well," and made its waters fit to drink. This is the mystical dimension of Genesis 29,10 והאבן גדולה על פי הבאר, ויגל את האבן העל פי הבאר וישק את הצאן. "The stone was large on the mouth of the well, and he (Jacob) rolled the stone from the mouth of the well and watered the flocks." From that moment on the Torah was fit to be given to the people of Israel although the stage had not yet been reached where Israel could drink from it. This stage was not reached until Moses "dug" in it, i.e. brought it down to the Jewish people from Mount Sinai. The שרים in our verse are the Patriarchs, the נדבי העם is a reference to Moses. Subsequently the Torah was handed from generation to generation through the elders, the prophets, and eventually, through the Men of the Great Assembly. These people explained the Torah and its secrets. The meaning of the words כרוה נדיבי העם is that if we have only the written Torah without the oral Torah we cannot drink from the Torah's waters.

עלי באר ענו לה, “arise O well sing unto it” The verb ענה, is used in a similar manner Deuteronomy 27,14: וענו הלויים, “the Levites responded at the top of their voices.”

The expression: את והב (verse 14) is to be understood as being a single word, just as the word אתיהב, where the letter ו has been exchanged for the letter א. We have a parallel for this in Genesis 45,1 where Joseph is described as misrepresenting himself with the word: בהתודע, a word from the root ידע. Another example of such an unusual construction is found in Genesis 27,29, where Yitzchok in his blessing to Yaakov is quoted as saying: הוה גביר לאחיך, “be senior over your brothers.” We would have expected the word: היה instead of הוה. It, i.e. the word והב is intended as an alternative to נתינה as in “gift,” as in Numbers 26,62, כי לא נתן להם נחלה, “for no ancestral piece of land had been given to to them.” The Targumim, translators into Aramaic, render the word נתן there as אתיהב. Here where we hear about the defeat of the King of Moav against Sichon of the Emorites, the words ואת והב בסופה, mean that that king at the end of that war had had to cede lands to the victor.

במחקק במשענתם refers to the additional insights into Torah the scholars have revealed throughout the generations. These insights are likened to someone who adds decrees to existing decrees, not comparable to the earlier generations who have truly dug to explore primary meanings of the Torah. Even the additional aspects of Torah discovered by scholars in recent generations were discovered only with the help of the earlier generations, i.e. במשענתם, by using them as a crutch. We are not free to innovate new meanings and הלכות unless we can show that our conclusions are the direct continuation of the path in Torah shown us by the earlier generations of scholars.

This included the valley of the river Arnon. The well (through the rock) from which the Israelites were provided with water after Miriam’s death therefore was directly connected to what had once been Moav.

The Torah goes on וממדבר מתנה, "and from the wilderness to Matanah." This is a hint that whatever Torah-scholarship we acquire is due only to our first making ourselves like a wilderness, as we explained on Exodus 19,2 on the words "they camped in the desert." Torah can be acquired only by men who first train themselves to be humble. The Torah goes on in verse 19 וממתנה נחליאל, "and from Matanah to Nachliel." This is an allusion to the fact that G'd inherited us as it were by means of the Torah which He gave to us. This is spelled out in Deut. 32,9 יעקב חבל נחלתו. The words also mean that G'd chose only us as we know from Psalms 135,4: "for the Lord has chosen Jacob for Himself, Israel as His treasured possession." He even left His abode in heaven and took up residence amongst us.

ומנחליאל במות, "and from Nachliel to Bamot." Due to the fact that we have become His inheritance, He has turned us into במות, someone on a high elevation, i.e. higher than the angels. The Torah goes on ומבמות הגיא אשר בשדה מואב, "and from Bamot to the valley which is in the field of Moav." This whole line is a reminder that the principal reward for מצוה--performance is not in this world, "in the valley," but in a higher world and that in this world true spiritual wealth cannot be achieved.

As a result of the foregoing considerations it is essential that man must be removed from this earth in order for him to receive the full reward he is entitled to at the hands of G'd. When it appears to us that death has been caused by sin, this means that but for sin man would live on earth forever. If that were so, how could G'd pay man the reward due to him for his good deeds, etc.? Kabbalists answer that had it not been for sin, man would have ascended to heaven and have been allocated appropriate accomodation there. The prophet Elijah is an example of someone who had not died and who ascended to heaven in order to receive the reward due to him. It is true that the body finds it impossible to survive in those regions even after it has been refined to the highest degree possible so that it is has become comparable to something spiritual. Still, such spirituality is as nothing when compared to the higher degrees of spirituality. Our sages in the Zohar, volume 1, page 209 explain that as soon as Elijah had reached the domain (galaxy) of the sun (in his ascent) he was stripped of his body, leaving it behind in that domain. Whenever he has occasion to descend to earth to fulfil his various assignments, he picks up his body in the גלגל חמה before completing his journey to earth. Our sages have also said that at the moment G'd gave the Torah to the Jewish people they were freed from the need to die and became like original man before the sin. They allude (Exodus 32,16) to this by reading the expression charut al haluchot as cherut al haluchot (compare Shemot Rabbah 41,7). Since this was the new found status of the Israelites, at that time, they too ascended to the domain (galaxy) of the sun and divested themselves of their bodies there, just as Elijah did many years later. When the Torah writes here מבמות הגיא, "from the heights to the valley," this describes the subsequent descent of the Jewish people from their places in the celestial domain to a domain called "valley," i.e. the grave. This valley was in the "field of Moav," i.e. the earth is called "field." The resason the Torah speaks of מואב is a reference to the "Father" who has created the universe.

Alternatively, the word שדה refers to woman who has also been called שדה as we know from Zohar volume 1 page 36. The meaning of the verse then would be as follows: "the valley (grave) which was a state reached due to woman, who had been formed out of the "father" of all mankind, Adam, is the only one who had been created in this fashion, part of the rib of Adam, her husband." She had become the cause of mortality of man so that man's bones (remains) are buried in the grave, i.e. בגיא. This situation can be retrieved only by means of the Torah which is the remedy that can help us be restored to the condition of Adam before the sin. When man achieves that state his body will be of the order of the "valley" in the Celestial Regions, just as it used to be when G'd had created it.

I do not know the precise parameter of the region the Torah describes as ראש הפסגה. Perhaps it is a place in higher Celestial Regions, the area where G'd keeps the souls before they are assigned to bodies or after they have returned from earth. This might be alluded to by the words ונשקפה על פני הישימון, "looking down upon the desert" in verse 20. The word ישימון is connected to שממה, a wasteland, the letter י suggesting a land which is going to be laid waste. It may also be called thus as an allusion to the evil urge as it tries to dominate and lay waste all creatures. The area it looks down upon is the galaxy of the sun where all the people destined for the גיא, the grave, are found. The upshot of the paragraph is that the useful function of the Torah is that it enables both body and soul to remain alive.

באר חפרוה THE WELL, [PRINCES] DIGGED IT means: This is the well which the princes, Moses and Aaron, digged (cf. Targum Jonathan on).

UMIMIDBAR MATANAH.’ The meaning of this is as Onkelos rendered it [“and from the wilderness it was given to them”], this being an elliptical expression that is common in songs. Thus it is saying that “from the wilderness, which is a land of drought and thirst, was this gift [the well] given to us; and from this gift [of the well which descended] unto the brooks, and from these brooks [ascended] to the heights²⁷⁶Verse 19. until Pisgah, which looks down upon the land which is a complete howling wilderness²⁷⁷Deuteronomy 32:10. — Ramban here is thus explaining Verse 20 as well. — there was no other brook, nor any other spring of water except for this one.” This was the Well of Miriam in the opinion of our Rabbis,²⁷⁸Yerushalmi, Kethuboth XII, 3. See also above, Note 154. or a well which came out by word of Moses at the command of the Almighty, which Israel had not asked for. For when G-d told Moses, Gather the people together, and I will give them water,²⁷³Verse 16. streams overflowed²⁷⁹Psalms 78:20. from it [the well], and continued unto distant places.

באר חפרוה שרים, this well was not full to its brim such as wells which are filled by waters emptying into it from above.

שרים, a reference to Moses and Aaron.

באר חפרוה שרים, “a well dug by princes.” A reference to Moses and Aaron. The reason the Torah calls them by the title שרים and נדיבי העם, is because they used their staffs to dig the well. Seeing that the Torah (or the authors of the words of the song) equated Moses and Aaron by referring to them by the same titles, the Torah had to add the word במחקק, “through a lawgiver” (sing.) to teach us that after the death of Miriam the well became reactivated only through the merit of the lawgiver, i.e. Moses.

VV. 18-20. באר חפרוה, ist ja ein Brunnen, der nicht mit mechanischem Werkzeug von mechanischen Werkleuten gegraben worden. Fürsten und Edle des Volkes — Mosche וזקני העם (siehe Schmot daselbst) — hatten ihn mit dem geistigen Griffel ihrer Gesetzesstäbe geschaffen. Vom Choreb, dem Berge des Gesetzes, war er ihnen geworden (siehe daselbst). וממדבר מתנה, und nun ward er ihnen aus der Wüste zum zweitenmale geschenkt und ward zu einem Gottesstrom und begleitete sie Höhen hinan, Täler hinab, in das Moabfeldtal hinein und endlich einen Höhengipfel hinauf und schaut nun von dort auf den Wüstenplan hinab, den er durchwandert — dort, ראש הפסגה kam er zur Ruhe. Fortan bedurften sie des Wunderbrunnens nicht mehr. Sie betraten bewohntes Land und nahmen es in Besitz, wie sofort berichtet wird.

באר חפרהו שרים, “a well dug by princes.” This well was not like other wells in the Bible which had been dug by servants of slaves, as we know from Genesis 26,25, but it was especially honoured through having been dug by Moses, Aaron, as well as the elders of Israel.

The well dug by princes. In the period that they were in the Wilderness, and the well was next to the Tent of Meeting, the princes, i.e., the leaders, would dig somewhat deeply so that a river would flow to their tribe. And afterwards: The nobles of the nation excavated additionally, to make more rivulets, so there would be a lesser burden on the people. The kind hearted people of the nation would make small diggings extending from the large diggings to draw the water to their family.

חפרוה שרים, ”which the princes had dug;” the “princes” mentioned in this poetic song are Moses and Aaron, who had hit the rock. It was they that had been commanded to speak to the rock. (20,8)

במשענתם means WITH THE STAFF.

וממדבר מתנה, this phenomenon demonstrated that its waters originated in the miraculous waters flowing from the rock at Massah and Merivah.

וממדבר מתנה, according to the plain meaning of the text, these are all names of places the Israelites encountered in the course of their journeys and their encampments.

במחוקק במשענותם, “with their scepters and their staffs.” In other words, this well was not dug with ordinary tools like ordinary wells, but by employing a rod given Moses by G–d, something that had served as an instrument of producing miracles repeatedly in the past. This serves as proof, that G–d had never objected to Moses hitting the rock in chapter 20 at the waters of strife. Had He objected to that how could the people have rejoiced jubilantly over something that G–d had shown them that He objected to? According to some commentators the “lawgiver,” referred to here is not Hashem but Moses just as it is in Deuteronomy 33,21. Compare the Targum there.

במחוקק במשענותם, “with the scepter and with their staffs.” By striking the rock they made a deep impression on it, and split it. The expression מחק occurs in this sense in Ezekiel 8,10: מחוקה על הקיר, “depicted (engraved) over the whole wall.”

וממדבר מתנה AND FROM THE WILDERNESS was it given them [as a מתנה, a gift].

וממדבר מתנה, and from a place called Midbar to Matanah. This is a hint that the well just discussed was so powerful that it turned the surrounding desert area into “a gift.”

וממדבר מתנה, “and from the desert to Matanah.” This still refers to the previous phrase, i.e. ויחנו בעבר ארנון אשר במדבר, “they encamped in Ever, which is situated in the desert.”From this Ever in the desert which is identical with Almon divlataymah, they came to Matanah, which is identical with place a called Mount Haavarim in the portion of Massey (Numbers 33,47). The reason why the place was called Matanah, was that it was from here on in that the Israelites began to receive the gift of the land of Israel. The reason that the expression which we have so become used to, i.e. ויסעו ויחחנו, “they journeyed, they encamped,” is not used here, is that the people were still standing in Ever of Arnon in the desert as reported in the Book of Deuteronomy 2,26: ואשלח מלאכים ממדבר קדמות אל סיחון (Moses speaking) “I sent out messengers to Sichon from the desert k’deymot. i.e. from the desert to the east of his land, as opposed to: “from the desert to the south of his land.” In that chapter reference is made to the conquest of the lands of Sichon and Og.

וממתנה נחליאל — Understand this as the Targum does: And after it had been given them, it descended into the valley.

וממתנה נחליאל, in spite of this the waters neither increased nor decreased as a result of their behaving so erratically and having to traverse both depressions in the earth and hilly country.

וממתנה נחליאל, and from Matanah to Nachliel. This well was not like the other wells which supplied a steady amount of water, but it increased as time went on so that it was easily accessible even when the Israelites crossed elevations in the ground on their way.

וממתנה, “and from Matanah;’” they came to Nachaliel, the word being a combination of river and valley. In Numbers 33,48, the Torah refers to this as the Israelites journeying from the chain of mountains known as harey haavarim.” From that point onwards, the Israelites made camp in the wilderness also known as שדה מואב, “the field or fields” of Moav. This was the last place where they made camp before crossing the Jordan river into the Holy Land.

ומנחליאל, “and from Nachaliel;” they spread out from there to bamot, called בית הישימות in Numbers 33,49. The Emorites would refer to places where they worshipped their idols: bamot, “elevated places,” whereas the Israelites called the same sites beyt hayeshimites, “houses of desolation.” Our sages in the Talmud tractate Avodah Zarah, folio 46, go into more detail about all this.

ומבמות הגיא אשר בשדי מואב AND FROM THE HEIGHTS (it descended finally) INTO THE VALLEY THAT IS IN THE FIELD OF MOAB, for there Moses died, and there the well finally ceased to flow. Another explanation is: כרוה נדיבי עם THE NOBLES OF THE PEOPLE HOLLOWED IT — each prince of the tribes when they encamped took his staff and drew a line on the ground from the well to his banner and encampment, and the waters of the well ran by way of that mark and came before the camping place of each tribe (Midrash Tanchuma, Chukat 21).

As there Moshe died. Meaning: Since it mentioned here (v. 19), “The gift [traveled] to the valley” it also mentioned that the well traveled on to the heights, and from the heights to the valley, even though these journeys had not yet happened. Once the well is mentioned here, the Torah relates everything about it. Consequently, once we see that [after the valley] it did not travel any further with them, Rashi gives the reason for this saying “Moshe died there and it was discontinued.” Re’m

ומבמות הגיא, “and from the elevated ground back to the valley.” It continued to flow until it came to the summit which looked down on a district known as the face of the wasteland. Compare chapter 32,10. This was a source of great joy as they could see that even in the distance and in that wasteland there was plenty of water to provide water for their herds and flocks. In the Talmud, tractate Eyruvin, folio 54 the Talmud concluded that the words וממדבר מתנה, the point that the Torah was making is a figure of speech, i.e. that if one allows oneself to be trampled on by others as they trample the ground in the desert, one will be rewarded with acquiring a great deal of Torah knowledge as if it had been given to one as a gift. Seeing that it had been come by as a gift, it will become almost a hereditary gift, and being so that person will eventually attain considerable stature among his peers, i.e. ומנחליאל במות, “and due to gifts from the Lord he hill rise to lofty heights.” On the other hand, if he starts out in life with a haughty attitude, he will ultimately wind up very low, like the גיא, valley, at the bottom of the lofty hills, במות. If he will then change his attitude, the Lord will raise him up again, i.e. כל גיא ינשא, “every valley will be uplifted,” (Isaiah 40,4) [The passage is understood as a synopsis of Jewish history. Ed.]

ומבמות, and from “bamot" the Israelites spread out into the valley referred to in Numbers 33,39, as “avel hashittim.” The word; avel means: valley, steppe.

במחקק THROUGH THE LAWGIVER — by command of Moses who is called the מחוקק, the Lawgiver, as it is said, (Deuteronomy 33:21) “for there is the portion of the lawgiver (Moses’ grave) concealed”. But why is Moses not expressly mentioned by name in this song? Because he was punished through the well! And since Moses’ name is not mentioned, the name of the Holy One, blessed be He, is also not mentioned. A parable! It may be compared to the case of a king whom his subjects invited to a feast. He said: If my friend will be there, I, too, will be there, but if not, I will not go (Midrash Tanchuma, Chukat 21).

And there the well was discontinued. You might ask: Was the well not discontinued when Miriam died, as stated above (20:2)? The answer is that it returned in the merit of Moshe, and when he died, it [permanently] stopped (Taanis 9a).

אשר בשדה מואב ראש הפסגה, “that is in the field of Moav, by the top of the Pissgah; the word ומבמות which introduced this phrase means combined: “the elevation in the field of Moav which is beside the top of summit, which in turn looks down on pney hayeshimon, is the great desert.” Seeing that at one time this tract of land had belonged to Moav, it was still described by the Torah as such, as it had been known as such by the Israelites who were familiar with the region. This is also why the Torah still speaks about ערבות מואב, “the region formerly belonging to Moav, and still referred to by many as such.”A different approach to these verses commencing with וממדבר מתנה. The well of which the Israelites spoke in their song had great significance seeing that in a desert, a place completely devoid of water, they had been provided with ample water completely free of charge, i.e. as a gift, .מתנה

ראש הפסגה — Understand this as the Targum has it: to the top of the height.

Why is Moshe not mentioned… You might ask: Above, immediately in the beginning of the song “It was then that Yisroel sang” (v. 17). Rashi should have asked why Moshe was not mentioned as well. The answer is that one might have thought that it was because he sinned at the well, as it is written above that he struck the rock (20:11). Consequently [one would say that] the Torah did not wish to mention him in this song which refers to the well, as Rashi explains. However now that he explains that במחוקק ["through the lawgiver"] refers to Moshe, [Rashi asks] why Moshe was not mentioned explicitly in the song.

וממתנה נחליאל, “and from the place called Matanah as far as Nachaliel” there could not be found any other wells capable of supplying the water needed for the Israelite nation. Once they had received this gift of water from G-d, the river Arnon swelled way beyond its normal flow. (B’chor shor)

פסגה denotes “high”, just as (Psalms 48:14) פסגו ארמנותיה, which means “make high its palaces”.

That peak. Because we cannot say that it refers to the valley, given that גיא ["valley"] is in the masculine form while ונשקפה ["that overlooks"] is in the feminine form.

The letter י in the word נחליאל, is superfluous, just as it is superfluous in Psalms 123,1 היושבי בשמים, and in Psalms113,5, 113,6. The ending אל in the word expresses strength, as it does in Ezekiel 17,13: ואת אילי הארץ לקח, “and the mighty of the land he took away.”We also find this spelled out in Numbers 20,11 where the Torah stressed that a large amount of water came forth, i.e. far more than was needed. [there was no other reason to emphasize this just as it was not emphasized in Exodus 17, 6, where Moses had struck a rock for that purpose a first time. Ed.]

ונשקפה AND IT LOOKS — this height looks towards the place whose name is ישימון, which word describes the wilderness because that is waste (שמם with which the word ישימון may be linguistically associated). Another explanation is: ונשקפה AND IT LOOKS — the well looks על פני ישימון towards the front of ישימון, the wilderness, for it was hid (emptied) itself in the sea of Tiberias, and anyone who stood by the wilderness may look and see a kind of sieve in the sea, and that was the well!. Thus did R. Tanchuma (Midrash Tanchuma, Chukat 21) expound this passage.

Another interpretation: The well may be seen. Because באר ["well"] is in the feminine form. The other interpretation is necessary because according to the first reason there is the difficulty that the entire passage deals with the well, so how could one explain that ונשקפה ["that overlooks"] refers to the peak? Consequently Rashi brings the other interpretation. However, according to the other interpretation there is the difficulty that it should have said ונשקפה מן הישימון ["that looks out from the wastelands"], but what is the meaning of על פני ["over the wastelands"]? Consequently Rashi brings the first reason also.

וישלח ישראל מלאכים AND ISRAEL SENT MESSENGERS — But in another passage it attributes this embassy to Moses, as it is said, (Deuteronomy 2:26), “And ‘I’ sent messengers from the wilderness of Kedemoth [to Sihon king of Heshbon]”! And so, too, it states, (Numbers 20:14), “And Moses sent messengers to the king of Edom”; whilst in the story of Jephtha, it says, (Judges 11:17) “And Israel sent messengers to the king of Edom, etc.”. Each of these pairs of verses is necessary one to the other (i.e., they supplement each other): one keeps back information and the other discloses it, (more lit., one locks up and the other opens) — you may gather from them that Moses is Israel and Israel is Moses, thus telling you that the prince of any generation is the equal of the whole generation, for the prince is the whole (Midrash Tanchuma, Chukat 23).

AND ISRAEL SENT MESSENGERS UNTO SIHON, KING OF THE AMORITES, SAYING: 22. ‘LET ME PASS THROUGH THY LAND.’ “Although they had not been commanded to send them [a message of] peace, they nonetheless took the initiative in [offering them] peace.” This is Rashi’s language. I will yet explain, with the help of G-d, in its [proper] place,²⁸⁰See Ramban on Deuteronomy 20:10; 23:7, and 2:24, that Ammon and Moab were excluded from terms of peace. that [unlike Rashi’s explanation] they were commanded to offer peace [terms before beginning to fight] all the nations, except for Ammon and Moab. But in truth [we must say] that when Moses said to Sihon, Let me pass through your land, he did this of his own accord by way of conciliation, for the land of Sihon and Og was [part of the] inheritance of Israel, since it had originally belonged to the Amorite, [and was included in the territory promised to Israel]. Thus had Sihon and Og responded peaceably, and opened [their cities] to them, they would have been entitled [to take] all the people that are found therein tributary unto them, and they would serve them.²⁸¹Deuteronomy 20:11. But Moses [who only requested of Sihon, Let me pass through your land, and thus leave him untouched altogether] knew that Israel would not conquer now all ten nations,²⁸²Genesis 15:18-21. and he wanted all their conquests to be on the other side of the Jordan, and forward²⁸³Further, 32:19. [i.e., in Canaan proper, on the western side of the Jordan] so that they should all dwell [concentrated] together, and [also because] it was the good Land²⁸⁴Deuteronomy 8:7. which is flowing with milk and honey.²⁸⁵Above, 13:27. Thus you see, had not the children of Gad and the children of Reuben requested it [the land captured east of the Jordan] from him [Moses] he would not have left anyone [to live] there, but [would have allowed it] to be a wasteland! And similarly the Rabbis have taught in the Sifre:²⁸⁶Sifre, Ki Thavo 229. “To give thee [their land]²⁸⁷Deuteronomy 4:38. In our Sifre this explanation is given on the verse ibid., 26:3, and is the source of the law that the first-fruits are not brought from the land east of the Jordan. — this excludes [the land] beyond the Jordan [eastward], which you took for yourself.” Our Rabbis have furthermore said in connection with the ten [degrees of] holiness,²⁸⁸Keilim 1:6-9. The text quoted by Ramban in connection with the land on the east of the Jordan is in Bamidbar Rabbah 7:8. that the [land on the east] side of the Jordan is not suitable for [building therein] the Sanctuary and for the dwelling therein of the Divine Glory. And so it seems [also] from Scripture, for it says, If, however, the land of your possession [on the eastern side of the Jordan] be unclean etc.²⁸⁹Joshua 22:19. The question there, was the building of an altar by the two and a half tribes on the east side of the Jordan near the river, which the tribes on the western side totally rejected because it was an act of rebellion against G-d. In presenting their arguments against the altar, they said, If, however, the land of your possession be unclean, then pass ye over unto the Land of the possession of the Eternal, wherein the Eternal’s Tabernacle dwelleth. From this it is clear that the land on the east side of the Jordan is not suitable for the building of the Sanctuary etc. Now they did not send to Og a message [offering] peace, because when he saw that the Israelites had defeated Sihon, he [immediately] went forth into battle against them [the Israelites].

וישלח ישראל מלאכים, “Israel sent messengers;” in a different report in Deuteronomy 2,26 we are told that Moses sent messengers. Our sages conclude from this that two letters were sent to Sichon, one by Moses asserting Israel’s peaceful intentions when traversing his territory, the other by Israel, threatening war. (no source quoted). The second certainly sounds very peaceful. Ed.]

אעברה בארצך LET ME PASS THROUGH THY LAND — Although they had not been bidden to open the negotiations with them by an offer of peace yet they first sought peace of them (cf. Midrash Tanchuma, Chukat 22).

Although they were not commanded… Meaning that although they were not commanded to do so, they made this request since they only wished to make a temporary traversal [of the land]. It was not similar to the surrounding cities where the Torah forbade [them to make peace] (see Devarim 20:16-17). Re’m, Nachalas Yaakov, Gur Aryeh and Divrei Dovid all raise the difficulty that surely Sichon was king of the Emorites and thus included among the seven nations. Therefore, why did they offer a peace overture given that in reference to the seven nations the Torah writes, “You shall not allow any soul to live” (ibid.)? The answer is that even in the Land of Israel itself, the prohibition, “You shall not allow any soul to live” only applies once they had already begun the war. Thus when it is taught that Yehoshua sent three messages to the Land of Israel, the first of which was “whoever wishes to make peace, come and make peace” it was before they had begun the war.

עד אשר נעבור גבולך, “until we cross your borders. (on the walk past it).” They had not even asked to traverse Sichon’s territory. They were going to walk around close to the borders. The same was the case with walking around the territory of the land of Edom. This is why they could refer to having had no objections from the Edomites, or for that matter from the Moabites (Compare Deuteronomy 2,29)

Let me pass through your land. They did not say, “Please let me pass” as they did regarding the King of Edom, for they were informing him that they had to pass and were not asking. Moshe informed Sichon because if Sichon would agree, he would not wage war with him. Moshe had no desire to conquer land on the other side of the Jordan River, for the reason stated in Sifei Parshas Eikev: The Holy One became angry at Dovid HaMelech because he conquered Syria before Eretz Yisroel. Furthermore, Moshe had another hidden reason, as explained in Devarim 2:27, that this caused a great evil to another generation.

לא נתן סיחון וגו׳ AND SIHON WOULD NOT SUFFER [ISRAEL TO PASS THROUGH HIS BOUNDARY] — For all the Canaanite kings paid him tribute, because he protected them that no hostile forces should pass through his land against them. As soon as Israel said to him, “Let me pass through they land”, he answered them: “The whole purpose of my dwelling here is to protect them against you, and yet you speak thus!” (Midrash Tanchuma, Chukat 23).

Delivered tribute to him. For if not so, surely they only requested to pass through their land. [Thus it is understandable that] Sichon did not allow them to pass, but why did he go out to fight against them? (Nachalas Yaakov, Gur Aryeh and Kitzur Mizrochi) Rashi needed this answer to explain [a difficulty:] It was understandable that the king of Edom would dispute the inheritance of the Land of Israel, being certain [of his strength] due to the assurance of his ancestor, and also because they sent an appeasing message, “Let us please pass” in terms of a request. However regarding Sichon there is the difficulty as to why he was so confident? Surely it would have been better for him not to wage war with Yisroel. Therefore Rashi answers that “all the Canaanite kings delivered tribute to him.”

לקראת ישראל המדברה “in the direction of the Israelites, toward the desert.” We had been told that they had encamped in the desert at that time in verse 13 of our chapter.

ויצא לקראת ישראל AND HE WENT OUT AGAINST ISRAEL — Even if Heshbon had been full of people as puny as gnats, no human being could have captured it, and if Sihon had been (resided) in a weak village no human being could have overcome him. How much the more was he invincible whilst he dwelt in Heshbon. Therefore the Holy One, blessed be He, said: Why should I trouble My children to all this extent, to besiege each city? He therefore put it into the hearts of all the men of war to go forth from the cities, and they assembled all of them in one spot, and there they fell in battle; from there Israel proceeded to the cities and there were none to resist them, for there were only women and children there (Midrash Tanchuma, Chukat 23).

Why should I inconvenience… Rashi is answering the question: Why did Sichon go out against them to wage war? Surely he had no reason to fear given that even “if the city of Cheshbon had been filled with gnats…” and similarly “if Sichon had been alone in a village…” Furthermore the verse continues, “And he gathered all of his people.” This implies [that he gathered] all of the people in the land, but this was not proper practice. On the contrary he should have brought all his troops into the cities in order to protect them. Thus Rashi explains “The Holy One Blessed Is He said…”

כי עז FOR [THE BOUNDARY OF THE CHILDREN OF AMMON] WAS STRONG — And what constituted its strength? The warning of the Holy One, blessed be He, who had said to them (the Israelites), (Deuteronomy 2:19), Harass them not, etc.”.

כי עז גבול בני עמון, ”for the border (territory) of the Children of Bney Ammon was powerful.” The verse is a simile. It is a reference to G’d’s instructions to the Israelites not to harass either the Bney Ammon or the Moabites (Deut. 2,19). This instruction made the territory of the Bney Ammon inviolate against any assault by the army of the Israelites. When the Torah mentions in verse 26 that Cheshbon was the capital of Sichon who had conquered it from the first king of Moav, this indicates that the reason Israel was allowed to conquer the lands of Sichon was that it was not included in the part of the territory concerning which G’d had warned the Israelites. This is also the meaning of the somewhat enigmatic statement in Chulin 60 עמון ומואב טהרו בסיחון, that “Ammon and Moav were purified through Sichon.” The conquest by Sichon of some of their territories invalidated the injunction to the Jewish people not to harass them. If the Torah saw fit to mention poetry by the local Emorites (verse 28) in which the victory over Moav is celebrated, our sages have reported to us details of the bravery and mighty deeds of Sichon and the power of the city Cheshbon by saying that even if Chesbon had been filled with only flies no ordinary army could have conquered it. They added that even if Sichon had been in the valley (without the added advantage of being on a mountain) no one could have overcome him (Tanchuma Chukat 23). They claim that even his name Sichon meant that his personal strength was tabletalk all over the country (the word סיחון sounding like שיחה). They deduce from the fact that the Torah makes special mention of the Israelites also killing Sichon’s son, [something which is included in the statement that no one escaped. Ed.] that this son was a mighty warrior in his own right already at that time. Possibly this is deduced from the fact that in Deut. 2,32 the Torah writes בנו instead of בניו as here when describing the fate of Sichon’s sons (son). According to Bamidbar Rabbah 19,29 although both Og and Sichon were Emorites they were so sure of themselves that they did not come to each other’s assistance in their fight against Israel. According to Tanchuma end of Chukat, Sichon’s son was even tougher than his father.

V. 24. מארנון עד יבק, vom Arnon bis zum Jabbok im Norden und dem Gebiete der בני עמון im Osten. כי עז גבול בני עמון: wie gleich weiter entwickelt wird, durften Jisraels Söhne das Gebiet von Cheschbon, das ursprünglich zu Moab gehörte, dem gegenüber jede Feindseligkeit (Dewarim 2, 8) untersagt war, nur deshalb erobern, weil es zuvor der Macht Sichons erlegen und in dessen Besitz gekommen war. In demselben Verhältnis stand das Gebiet der Söhne Ammon zu Israel (daselbst 19). So lange und so weit es Ammon gehörte, war es für Jisrael unantastbar; Sichon hat auch das ostwärts liegende Gebiet erobern wollen, und wäre dies geschehen, so wäre jetzt auch dieses in den Besitz Israels übergegangen, allein עז גבול בני עמון, Ammon widerstand dort Sichon, Sichon konnte es nicht erobern, deshalb blieb es auch für Jisrael unantastbar (siehe unten zu V. 30).

עד יבוק עד בני עמון, as far as Yabok (a river) as we know from Genesis 32,23) Sichon had conquered these parts of what was formerly a much larger land of Moav. The river had acted as a boundary.

מארנון עד יבוק, “from Arnon to the river Yabok.” Both the land of Moav and the land of the Bney Ammon are situated east of the land of Canaan (the west bank of the Jordan). The lands of Sichon were in between the land of Moav and Bney Ammon. Just as Sichon had taken land from Moav from the southern region along the river Jordan as far north as the river Arnon, so he had taken land from the Bney Ammon from the north as far as the river Yabok. As a result of this it had become permitted to the Israelites to take away these lands from Sichon, as they no longer were considered as either belonging to Moav or the Bney Ammon. In the words of our sages in the Talmud tractate Chulin folio 60, “Ammon and Moav had been cleansed by Sichon.”

כי עז גבול בני עמון, “for the border between the Bney Ammon was strong; but south of the river Yabok Sichon had not been able to conquer, as that region was easier to defend, the river acting as a formidable obstacle.

בנתיה (lit., its daughters) — the villages adjacent to it.

בכל ערי האמורי בחשבון ובכל בנותיה, for all the cities which Sichon had captured previously had become satellite tows of Cheshbon his capital. We encounter the expression בנות in this sense in Ezekiel 16,61. ונתתי אותם לך לבנות, where the word בנות means “suburbs” according to Rashi.

והוא נלחם AND HE (SIHON) HAD FOUGHT [AGAINST THE FORMER KING OF MOAB] — Why is it necessary that this should be written? Because it is said (Deuteronomy 2:9), “Harass not Moab”, and Heshbon belonged to Moab (and therefore should not have been attacked), it (Scripture) tells us that Sihon had taken it from them, and through him it (Heshbon) became permissible to Israel as an object of attack (Chullin 60b; Gittin 38a).

FOR HESHBON WAS THE CITY OF SIHON THE KING OF THE AMORITES. That is to say, now when Israel waged battle against it, it was the city of Sihon the king of the Amorites, meaning to say the city of the royal residence, for he had fought against ‘melech harishon’ (the first king) of Moab, [meaning the one] who had ruled over them before any king reigned, or harishon [may mean] “the one before Balak,” who was the king of Moab at that time,²⁹⁰Further 22:4. and Sihon had taken all his land out of his hand, even unto the Arnon.²⁹¹As related in Verse 26 here. Now Heshbon marked the border at which this conquest [of Sihon] began; therefore it was considered the Amorites’, and Israel was only prohibited [from capturing] that land of Moab and Ammon which was land that was in their possession at the time of the Divine command [not to capture any of the lands of Moab and Ammon].²⁹²Deuteronomy 2:9; 19. And Scripture brings a proof that Heshbon was the city of Sihon, for those that speak in parables [as explained above in Verse 13] say, come ye to Heshbon etc.,²⁶³Further, Verse 27. for when Sihon fought against the king of Moab, he captured at first the city of Heshbon, and the city was destroyed, and afterwards he rebuilt it as his royal abode. This is the meaning of [the phrase], who dwelleth in Heshbon.²⁹³Further, Verse 34. And similarly it is said in the Book of Joshua, Sihon king of the Amorites, who reigned in Heshbon.²⁹⁴Joshua 13:10. Thus those who spoke in parables would say to the Amorites: “Come to Heshbon, and settle therein; let the city of Sihon, over which he has become king, be built and established²⁶³Further, Verse 27. after its destruction.” And after Sihon had established himself in Heshbon, he assembled his army therein and captured from the border of Moab until Arnon, including Arnon itself.²⁹⁵In the Tur the phrase “including Arnon itself” is not found. Other scholars have also commented that the reading should be: “excluding Arnon itself.” This is undoubtedly correct, as Ramban himself expressly states above in Verse 13. Therefore they that speak in parables said, that a fire is gone out of Heshbon, a flame from the city of Sihon wherein he dwells; and it has devoured Ar of Moab, and the lords of the high places²⁹⁶Verse 28. which belong to Arnon. For Sihon has captured from Moab unto Arnon, and all the high places of the land and the lords of the high places,²⁹⁶Verse 28. this being similar [in meaning to]: even the ancient high places are ours in possession.²⁹⁷Ezekiel 36:2. He [Sihon] also took from the children of Ammon [the territory] from the Arnon to the Jabbok, as it is said in [the Book of] Joshua, And Moses gave unto the tribe of Gad etc. Jazer, and all the cities of Gilead, and half the land of the children of Ammon unto Aroer,²⁹⁸Joshua 13:24-25. this being the land which the king of Ammon claimed from Jephthah, as he said, Because Israel took away my land, when he came up out of Egypt, from the Arnon even unto the Jabbok, and unto the Jordan.²⁹⁹Judges 11:13.

כי חשבון עיר סיחון מלך האמורי היא, the reason why we described all the towns of the Emorite as suburbs of Cheshbon is because Cheshbon had been the capital city of Sichon the King of the Emorite already before he had conquered any of the cities of Moav.

V. 26. כי חשבון עיר סיחון siehe zu V. 24. הראשון, der vor ihm König von Cheschbon war.

כי חשבון עיר סיחון, “for Cheshbon had been Sichon’s city originally, prior to his having conquered large sections of the lands of Moav and the Bney Ammon. His reputation as a mighty warrior was based on those campaigns. When the Israelites are described in verse 31 as settling in the land of the Emorite, this is only to inform us that this is where Sichon had originated as a king. This was long before Balak became king of what remained of the kingdom of Moav.

מידו means FROM HIS POSSESSION (Bava Metzia 56b).

על כן (more lit., about this) — about this war which Sihon waged against Moab,

על כן יאמרו המושלים, the people who reveal the visions they have seen in their dreams and their interpretations of these visions, as did Bileam when his interpretation is introduced with the words וישא משלו (Numbers 23,7).

על כן יאמרו המושלים, on account of the war against Sichon and Og they had prophesied in advance,

Cheshbon under Sichon’s name. “May it be built and established” refers to Cheshbon mentioned above, not to “as the city of Sichon.” For after he had conquered and taken possession of it, what need was there to say “may it be built and established”? Rather, this is what the parable tellers were saying: Sichon and his people come to the city of Cheshbon, for you can overcome it, given that from the beginning when it was built it was established as the city of Sichon. It was built under Sichon’s name, meaning that from then it was already decreed to be the city of Sichon. Thus “May it be built and established” is in the future tense in place of the past tense.

V. 27. על כן יאמרו המושלים siehe zu V. 14. — המושלים siehe Bereschit 4, 7. Wer die Geschehnisse der Zeit nicht als Chronikenschreiber, sondern aus dem höheren Gesichtspunkte auffasst und veranschaulicht, von welchem aus das einzelne Ereignis in der Allgemeinheit der in ihm sich vollziehenden weltgeschichtlichen Gottesgesetze zum Ausspruch kommt, dessen Geschichtswort ist das wahrhaftigste באו חשבון .משל, gehet hin, ihr alle, denen die Lehre von der dynastischen Vergänglichkeit und von dem Wechsel der auf Macht und auf Götterwahn gestützten Macht not tut, sehet, wie das bis dahin moabitisch stolze Cheschbon ausgebaut und befestigt umwandelt wird zu einer Sichonsstadt, ja zu einer Sichonsburg (V. 28), von der aus er die Eroberung eines großen Teils des übrigen moabitischen Gebietes vollbringt!

'על כן יאמרו המושלים וגו, “this is why those who speak in parables used to say: “let the city of Sichon be firmly established.“ Many such people had taken up residence in Cheshbon, where they flattered its King.

על כן יאמרו המושלים, “this is why the people speaking in parables (Bileam and B’or according to Rashi)) would say, etc.” B’or was the father of Bileam whom Sichon had hired to curse Moav. (Tanchuma, Chukat, section 24)

יאמרו המשלים THEY THAT SPEAK IN PARABLES SAY — One of these was Balaam of whom it is said, (Numbers 23:7), "And he took up his parable”.

בואו חשבון, “you the inhabitants of Moav come to Cheshbon and subject yourselves to the rule of Sichon for he will defeat you and rule over you.”

מושלים, Bileam and his colleagues in their predictions. (compare our author’s comment in Baba Batra 78,2 commencing with the words מאי דכתיב where he states that the plain meaning of the words refers to the previous wars conducted by Sichon when he had been successful and conquered large parts of the land of Moav. These conquests had been prophesied by Bileam, etc.)

באו חשבון, “come to Cheshbon to dwell there!” It will be built up now that it has come under the rule of Sichon. As long as it had been under the rule of Moav, people were afraid to settle there as the King of Moav did not offer much in the way of protection to his subjects.

המשלים THEY THAT SPEAK IN PARABLES — The plural המשלים refers to Balaam and his father Beor (see Rashi on Numbers 24:3). They said —

תבנה ותכונן, “let it be rebuilt and firmly established!” More so than previously.

באו חשבון “COME TO HESHBON”, — For Sihon had been unable to capture it, and he went and hired Balaam to curse it, and this is the meaning of what Balak said, (Numbers 22:6) “For I know (by what has already happened) that whomsoever thou blessest is blessed, [and whomsoever thou cursest is cursed]” (Midrash Tanchuma, Chukat 24).

עיר סיחון, “Sichon’s capital!”

תבנה ותכונן IT WILL BE BUILT UP AND ESTABLISHED, [SIHON’S CITY] — Heshbon will be rebuilt under Sihon’s name to be his city.

כי אש יצאה מחשבון FOR A FIRE WILL GO FORTH FROM HESHBON after Sihon captures it,

ער מואב, the capital of the land of Moav was called Or.

כי אש יצאה מחשבון, ”for a fire has come forth from Cheshbon.” This is an allusion to Moabites who had dwelled in Chesbon and commenced a revolution against the local king.

After Sichon conquered it. But not beforehand, for if so, it should have said “A fire came to Cheshbon.”

V. 28. כי אש יצאה וגו׳, denn eben das Kriegesfeuer, dem das ganze frühere von Moab vom Jabbok bis zum Arnon beherrschte Gebiet zur Beute fiel, hatte seinen Herd in dem zur Sichonsburg umwandelten moabitischen Cheschbon. בעלי במות ארנון ist entweder Attribut von מואב als bisherigem Herrn der Arnonhöhen oder von אש und להבה, dem nunmehrigen Beherrscher.

'כי אש יצאה וגו, The entire line is a quotation of how the people speaking in parables flattered the powerful King of Cheshbon. The Torah describes all this in order to show the reader what a tremendous victory Moses had scored when he totally vanquished this empire, annihilating him and his people totally. Yiftach, in the Book of Judges 11,24, refers sarcastically to the claims of the king of Moav in his time, claiming that that the Israelites have to give him back the land that a former king had lost to Sichon.

כי אש יצאה מחשבון, “for a fire has gone out from Cheshbon. The inhabitants of Cheshbon rebelled against your king of Moav.

אכלה ער מואב IT WILL CONSUME AR OF MOAB — The name of that province was called Ar in the Hebrew language and Lechayath (see the Targum Onkelos) in the Aramaic language.

אכלה ער מואב, “it consumed Ar of Moav.” Ar is the name of a place in Moab, just as (Ruth 1,1) מבית לחם יהודה is the name of a place within Judah.

Ar, belonging to Moav. Rashi says this so that you should not think that ער ["Ar"] was in the sense of עיר ["city"]. This would be similar to דם ["blood"] the plural form of which is דמים; so too, the plural form of ער would be ערים ["cities"]. Thus ער would be the general title for all of Moav’s cities. However this would not be possible because Moav still had many cities which they ruled over. Furthermore it cannot refer to one of their cities because if so, Scripture should have mentioned which city, as is its usual practice, given that it does not come to conceal but rather to explain. Rashi brings a proof from the [Onkelos’s] translation which is לחיית [the proper noun "Lechayas"] rather than קרתא ["city"]. Re’m writes: It appears to me that this was Rashi’s intention: The proper name of a city is not normally used in the construct form [semichus, as here where two nouns are juxtaposed indicating possession], and given that Ar is the proper name of a country, it should not have been used in the construct form. Because of this question one might have felt forced to explain that ער is in the sense of עיר ["city"]. However, [Rashi indicates that] one should not explain so, given that it is preferable to explain that it was an individual city which was placed in the construct form, although this is not typical. [This is preferable] rather than explaining that it is in the sense of “city,” due to the difficulties that this would entail.

להבה מקרית סימון, “a flame from the city of Sichon;” i.e. the city that has now become Sichon’s. עיר סימון, “Sichon’s capital!”

ער מואב means AR OF MOAB.

בעלי במות ארנון, “the lords of the high places of Arnon.” Our author, quoting Samuel II 6,2, understands the word בעלי here as referring to a plain or plateau. In other words, the lands described here were all relatively high, though level.

אוי לך מואב WOE TO THEE, MOAB — [These are not the words of the historian but those of Balaam and Beor, for] they cursed the Moabites (as they had been hired to do) so that they should be delivered into his (Sihon’s) hands (Midrash Tanchuma, Chukat 24).

WOE TO THEE, MOAB! THOU ART PERISHED, O PEOPLE OF CHEMOSH. The meaning of this is that [the people of] Moab used to worship Chemosh their deity, and build high places [i.e., altars, to him] and trust in him more than every other people, and in the time of their trouble they would say to him: ‘Arise, and save us.’³⁰⁰See Jeremiah 2:27. Similarly Scripture refers to [this worship of theirs] in all places, as it is written, And it shall come to pass, when it is seen that Moab hath wearied himself upon the high place, that he shall come to his sanctuary to pray; but he shall not prevail;³⁰¹Isaiah 16:12. and it is further stated [of Moab], and Chemosh shall go forth into captivity, his priests and his princes together with him;³⁰²Jeremiah 48:7. Moreover I will cause to cease in Moab, saith the Eternal, him that offereth in the high place, and him that offereth to his gods.³⁰³Ibid., Verse 35. Therefore those who spoke in parables said by way of mockery, that Chemosh hath given ‘his sons’ as fugitives,³⁰⁴Here in Verse 29. refugees who flee [to safety] because of the sword; and ‘his daughters’ into captivity;³⁰⁴Here in Verse 29. [these terms, “sons” and “daughters” are used] because those who believe in him are called “his sons” and “his daughters,” in the same way that they are [here] called “his people” [people of Chemosh]. Similarly [we find the expression], the daughter of a strange god.³⁰⁵Malachi 2:11. The [correct explanation is thus] not like the words of Rashi, who interpreted [the verse as follows]: “He the Giver [i.e., G-d] gave his sons [i.e., those of Moab] as fugitives from the sword.”
Chemosh was also worshipped by the children of Ammon, as Jephthah said [to the king of Ammon], that which Chemosh thy god giveth thee to possess that you will possess.³⁰⁶Judges 11:24. They also had in their country Milcom the detestation of the Ammonites.³⁰⁷I Kings 11:5. Or [it may be that] Jephthah mentioned Chemosh to the king of Ammon because of [the land] which Israel had captured from Moab, just as he [Jephthah] mentioned to them [i.e., to the Ammonites]: Balak king of Moab,³⁰⁸Judges 11:25. And now art thou anything better than Balak … meaning to say that neither Chemosh their god nor Balak their king had saved their land [Moab] from the hand of Israel. It is very fitting that we say, as our Rabbis explained,³⁰⁹Bamidbar Rabbah 19:8. that [the reference in the term] ‘hamoshlim’ (they that speak in parables)²⁶³Further, Verse 27. is to Balaam and those like him, the diviners who spoke in parables about future events.

אוי לך מואב, “woe unto you Moav (the people)!” He cursed it that it should fall into the hands of Sichon. כמוש, a reference to the favorite god of the Moabites. נתן בניו, this is an appeal to the power that be to make fugitives and prisoners out of the Moabites (part of Bileam’s curse at the time).
Alternatively, the words may refer to Kemosh, Moav’s deity. The verse would then tell us that the people of Moav who served the deity Kemosh, built altars for it and had more faith in that deity than any other nation (as we know from Isaiah 16,12), paid the price for their misplaced faith, and the poet writing these lines ridicules the people for having put their trust in that deity. Their deity is the reason that the believers now have to either flee or become prisoners. Malachi 2,11 speaks about the worshippers of idols as his sons and daughters. This is the way Nachmanides explains our verse.

That he be delivered into his hands. Meaning that this verse is related to, “May it be built and established” (v. 27), as if to say that since the city was built for Sichon, ultimately it would be handed over to him.

V. 29. אוי לך וגו׳, in dieser Niederlage hatte sich die Ohnmacht Moabs und seiner Nationalgottheit gezeigt. Subjekt zu נתן ist כמוש.

נתן בניו פליטים, “He has given his sons as fugitives;” the reference is to the minors who were not old enough to fight and had therefore been spared by the sword. The use of the word נתן in our verse is similar to the use of the same word in Song of Songs 1,12: נרדי נתן ריחו, “my aromatic plant gave off its aroma.”

אוי לך מואב, “woe unto you, Moav;” this is all part of the parables referred to earlier.

כמוש CHEMOSH was the name of Moab’s god.

אבדת עם כמוש, “you are undone people who worship Kemosh.” Do not be amazed at the word אבדת which usually means: “you are lost;” in this instance it means the same as in Micah 7,2 אבד חסיד מן הארץ, “the pious have vanished from the earth;” they have not literally disappeared, but have become passive as if they did not exist. The same applies to the Moabites now under the rule of Sichon.

נתן HE HATH GIVEN [HIS SONS] — The subject of the sentence is to be supplied: HE who gave HATH GIVEN HIS SONS i.e. those of Moab,

נתן בניו פליטים, “he has made its sons fugitives;” a reference to the under age male children in Moav who though they escaped his sword have been turned into fugitives. They were allowed to grow up as prisoners in Sichon’s palace, as the Moabites saw no other way to keep them alive.

פלטים — AS FUGITIVES — as men who flee and attempt to escape from the sword, and his daughters into captivity, etc.

ונירם means their sovreignty.

ונירם אבד, and what will be his domain he will lose seeing that after said מושלים, visionaries had predicted his rise to great power they had continued by revealing that they also foresaw his defeat at the hands of the Israelites.

ונירם, they were driven from their places. The word is similar to נחרם, they were banished. The construction is parallel to נטה and ונט. The word is derived from the root ירה, hence וניר, “vanir.” The vocalisation of vanirom means the same as if the Torah had written vanireym. We find a similar construction in Isaiah 56,3 yavdilani, which is the same as yavdileyni. Also in Exodus 14,11 lehotziani is the same as lehotzieyni. If we were to follow Onkelos’ translation, the vocalisation should have been veniram instead of vaniram.

ונירם, “When we overthrew them.” Moses describes that as soon as we overthrew the Emorites in Cheshbon and thereabouts the country was lost, first as far as from Chesbon to Divon, eventually destroying whole country including Nofach-Meydva.
Alternatively, ונירם is from the root ניר meaning "their kingdom", i.e. the kingdom of Cheshbon was lost.

As far as Divon. Rashi explains that עד ["as far as"] is in the sense of סר ["removed"] as if to say “the kingdom was removed from Divon” because one cannot explain אבד חשבון עד דיבון like the simple understanding that the entire area from Cheshbon as far as Divon was uprooted. For if so, the word ונירם, which means “their kingdom,” would not be connected to what comes before or after it. However, according to Rashi’s explanation it is as if it is written “their kingdom in Cheshbon was uprooted and their kingdom in Divon was removed.”

V. 30. ונירם: und nun kamen wir und warfen sie! ונירם Futur קל von ירה mit Waw konversivum. Das Suffix hätte normal ונירם heißen sollen. Allein wir finden das Futur mit der Suffixform des Präteritum, z. B. ילבשם הכהן Schmot 29, 30. Wir haben dort den Grund dieser scheinbaren Anomalie in der Absicht zu finden geglaubt, in dem Zukünftigen eine wesentliche Beziehung zu etwas Vergangenem hervortreten zu lassen. Wenn nun hier dem bereits zur historischen Vergangenheit umwandelten Futur noch durch die Suffixform des Präteritum der Begriff der Vergangenheit noch prägnanter aufgedrückt ist, so dürfte es damit in ein eigentliches Plusquamperfektum umwandelt sein und nicht heißen: nun warfen wir sie, sondern: und wir hatten sie geworfen, d. h. und im Grunde war es nicht Sichon, sondern wir, die Moabs Niederwerfung bewirkt haben. Sichon war nur ein Werkzeug für uns, er warf Moab nieder, damit wir sein Land in Besitz nehmen konnten. Ja, es kann sogar das Suffix ם sich auf Sichon beziehen und ירה in seiner eigentlichen Bedeutung: Pfeilschleudern zu nehmen sein, wir schlenderten Sichon auf Moab, Sichon war unser Pfeil. In diesem Sinne wäre dann auch:

ונירם אבד חשבון, “when we shot at them Cheshbon was laid waste completely;” our author understands the word ונירם as a derivative of the noun ניר, as a reference to their king as their shining light, who had been completely extinguished. He quotes Kings I 11,36, where it has been used in this manner i.e. להיות ניר לדוד עבדי, “to be a lamp for My servant David.”

ונירם אבד חשבון עד דיבון, “in the meantime) we (the Israelites) came and threw over the rule of Sichon, not only Cheshbon has perished but even Divvon.”

אבד חשבון עד דיבן means: the sovreignty and the subjugation which Moab had over Heshbon is destroyed from thence. Similar also is the meaning of עד דיבן because the Targum of סר “it hath departed” is עד, so that this phrase means to say, sovreignty hath departed from Dibon. The word ניר denotes the sovreignty and yoke which result from a person’s rulership, as, (1 Kings 11:36) “that David Thy servant may always have dominion (ניר) before Me”.

ונשים ganz regelmäßig הפעיל von נשה mit Suffix, wie ישיא מות עלימו (Ps. 55, 16) Gott setze den Tod zum Schuldeinforderer über sie. So hier: und wir machten sie zu unseren Schuldeinforderern. Sichon hat gleichsam für uns einkassiert. Sonst kann es auch הפעיל von שמם sein, wie אם לא ישים עליהם נויהם (Jeremija 49, 20), also: wir verwüsteten.

The word ניר, means: ”heir;” in the meantime no heir is left of the original Moabites (Compare Kings I 11,36, for the meaning of the word ניר.) An alternate interpretation. The word ניר, is derived from ירה, “to shoot, to throw,” as in Exodus 15,4: ירה בים, “He tossed into the sea.” In other words, the Israelites are boasting that they had tossed the Emorites, etc., out of their land, or in ordinary Hebrew, ונשליכם. If you were to explain our verse according to the Targum, the letter ו at the beginning should have a short vowel patach, instead of the regular patach. Still another interpretation: the word ניר is a variant of חרישה, “the act of ploughing,” as in Jeremiah 4,3: נירו לכם ניר, “break up the untilled ground!”

ונשים WE HAVE LAID WASTE — The ש has a Dagesh, for the word denotes waste (שמם). Thus say they who speak in parables: ונשים אותם עד נפח which signifies we have laid them waste as far as Nophah.

Diese Tatsache, dass Sichons Eroberungen Israel zu gute kamen, welches sonst die Länderteile in den Händen ihrer früheren Besitzer nicht hätte antasten dürfen, wird Chulin 60b in den Satz gefasst: עמון ומואב טיהרו בסיחון, Ammons und Moabs Gebiet wurden durch Sichon Israel zugänglich. Es ist da Ammon neben Moab genannt, obgleich es oben hieß: כי עז גבול בני עמון; denn in der Tat war in dem durch Israel Sichon abgenommenen Gebiete auch ein Teil eines früher zu Ammon gehörigen Gebietes einbegriffen, das Sichon ebenfalls erobert hatte, wie aus Josua 13, 25 u. 27 und Richter 11, 13 erhellt, aus welcher letzteren Stelle sich ergibt, dass in dem vom Arnon bis zum Jabbok nunmehr Israel zugefallenen Gebiete frühere ammonitische Besitzteile mitbegriffen waren, und kann sich demnach das עז גבול עמון nur auf das Gebiet beziehen, das noch in Händen Ammons geblieben war, weil es von Sichon nicht erobert werden konnte (siehe Raschi zu Chulin daselbst).

ונשים, “we laid waste;” related to שממה, desolation.” The Israelites declare that they plowed over all the structures of the former inhabitants. [unlike what happened on the west bank of the Jordan when they captured all the Canaanite infrastructure 100% intact, and could make immediate use of it. Ed.]

וישב ישראל בארץ האמורי, from all that has been reported here it is clear that the Israelites at that time did not settle in territory under the rule of the Moabites. This is precisely the point made by Yiphtach in Judges 11,15 when he rejected the claims of the Moabites at the time he was judge, saying that Israel had never taken land belonging to either Ammon or Moav

וישלח משה לרגל את יעזר AND MOSES SENT TO SPY OUT JAAZER — The spies captured it (as the text goes on to state, “and they captured it”). They said: We will not do as the former spies, for we have confidence in the power of Moses’ prayer to be able to fight against it (Midrash Tanchuma, Chukat 24).

וילכדו בנותיה, the spies whom Moses had sent captured Bnot Yaazer.

The spies captured it. Since it is written “they captured its surrounding villages” with וילכדו ["they captured"] in the plural form, rather than וילכד ["he captured"] in the singular form, as it does shortly where it is written ויורש ["and he inherited"] in the singular. Rather [this implies that] the spies captured the surrounding villages.

V. 32. וישלח משה. Nach Josua 13, 25 scheint dies eben das früher zu Ammon gehörige Gebiet gewesen zu sein.

ויירש את האמורי, “and drove out the Emorite.” The word is read as if it had been spelled ויורש, “and inherited.”

Afterwards Moses dispossessed the Emorite who was still in Yaazer.

V. 33. ויפנו ויעלו דרך הבשן: nordwärts.

ויפנו ויעלו, “they turned around and ascended;” in a northerly direction. Seeing that anyone who walks from the south of the land of Israel northward must automatically be ascending, [as is due to the topography of the terrain, Ed.] he must ascend via Bashan, the land ruled by King Og. Seeing that the Kingdom of Og has been described as part of the land of Canaan, the commandment to kill anyone from that Kingdom who did not voluntarily leave, man woman or child; the Israelites did not send a letter offering to cross his land peacefully only in transit. (compare Deuteronomy 20,16) [The commandment not to allow survivors also applied to the Emorites, i.e. to Sichon and his country. Og, personally, a survivor of the deluge according to tradition, obviously could not have been a Canaanite, as they did not exist at that time. Ed.] Sichon, on the other hand, ruled over some lands that were not originally Canaanite, such as parts of Moav and Bney Ammon.

ויצא, “he (Og) came forth, provocatively, in a hostile manner.” Our author refers us to his having explained why Og lived as long as he lived, i.e. at least 850 years. (Genesis 14,13)

אל תירא אתו FEAR HIM NOT — God said this concerning Og but not about Sihon (cf v. 23), because Moses feared to wage battle, perhaps the merit of Abraham with whom Og had been associated would stand up (i.e., be an advocate) for him, as it is said, (Genesis 14:13) “And the one who escaped came [and told it to Abraham]” — this was Og who had escaped from the Rephaim whom Chedoladmar and his allies had smitten in Ashoreth Karnaim (Genesis 14:5), as it is said, (Deuteronomy 3:11). "For only Og king of Bashan was left of the remnant of the Rephaim" (cf. Midrash Tanchuma, Chukat 25, Niddah 61a).

FEAR HIM [Og] NOT. “For Moses was afraid [to wage war against Og] in case the merit of Abraham [whom Og had helped] would stand him in stead, for it is said about him, And there came ‘hapalit’ (one that had escaped) and told Abram the Hebrew,³¹⁰Genesis 14:13. this being Og who had escaped from the Rephaim whom Amraphel³¹¹In our Rashi: “Chedarlaomer.” and his allies had defeated at Ashteroth-karnaim.”³¹²Genesis 14:5. This is Rashi’s language, based on the words of our Rabbis.³¹³Tanchuma, Chukath 25; Bamidbar Rabbah 19:19. Here too³¹⁴See Ramban above at the end of Verse 1, where he mentions a similar idea. Hence he writes now: “here too.” the Rabbis were induced to make this comment because they knew that Moses our teacher would not have been afraid of an arm of flesh, for with him was the Eternal our G-d,³¹⁵See II Chronicles 32:8. and all the nations are as nothing before Him; they are accounted by Him as things of nought, and vanity.³¹⁶Isaiah 40:17. [Furthermore], it was he [Moses himself] who admonished Israel: fear not, nor be dismayed on account of them,³¹⁷Deuteronomy 31:6. and who criticized them for being afraid of them, as it is said in connection with the [affair of the] spies, Then I said unto you: ‘Dread not, neither be afraid of them. The Eternal your G-d, Who goeth before you, He shall fight for you.’³¹⁸Ibid., 1:29-30. Therefore [we must say] that Moses was afraid [of Og] because he knew of his merit [in having helped Abraham].
In accordance with the plain meaning of Scripture, Moses had not intended now to give Israel the land of Sihon and Og as an inheritance, as I have explained.³¹⁹Above, Verse 21. But Sihon had gone out against Israel into the wilderness,³²⁰Ibid., Verse 23. and had fought them against their will [in spite of their desire for peace]. Then G-d informed [Moses], Behold, I have begun to deliver up Sihon and his land before thee; begin to possess his land,³²¹Deuteronomy 2:31. for here began the conquest of the seven nations [who inhabited the Land of Israel]. But Og [nonetheless] mobilized all his forces at Edrei,³²²Further, Verse 33. which was a city at the end of his border, and Israel could have turned away from him just as they had turned away from Esau [i.e., Edom].³²³Above, 20:21. Therefore G-d told Moses, “Fear him not; go to him and contend with him in battle, for I have delivered him into thy hand.” And in Bamidbar Sinai Rabbah I have seen [the following text]³²⁴Bamidbar Rabbah, 19:19. “Why was Moses afraid [of Og]? He said: Perhaps Israel committed a trespass in the war against Sihon, [by taking of the spoil for themselves], or maybe they have become defiled by sins.” This is a completely homiletic exposition. And indeed all righteous people have this fear [that they might have sinned in error],³²⁵See Vol. I, p. 195. and this [fear] likewise occurred [in the case] of Joshua [about whom it says that G-d told him, Fear not, neither be thou dismayed].³²⁶Joshua 8:1.
Balak

Moshe was afraid [to do battle] that perhaps the merit… For if not so, why was Og any different from Sichon? Regarding Sichon, Hashem did not say “do not be afraid of him.” You might ask: Surely Og’s intentions were purely evil, [namely] that Avrohom would be killed and he would marry Sarah, as Rashi explains in Parshas Lech Lecha on the verse, “The one who had escaped came…” (Bereishis 14:13). The answer is that nonetheless, since the merit of saving Lot came through his hand, Moshe was afraid that this merit might stand for him, even though his intentions were evil. Similarly we say (Horiyos 10b) that in the merit of the sacrifices that Balak offered, he merited that Rus [Ruth] would come from him, even though his intentions were evil. This was because he offered them in honor of Hashem.

ויאמר ה' אל משה אל תירא אותו, Hashem said to Moses: “do not be afraid of him!” Rashi explains that there was a reason why G–d had to say this to Moses concerning Og, although He had not said this to him before joining battle with Sichon. Moses was afraid that Og had acquired a great merit by warning Avraham at the time that his nephew Lot had been taken prisoner by a King who had thought that he was Avraham, as he had meant to kill or capture Avraham. Compare Genesis 14,13, and the explanation in the Talmud tractate Niddah folio 61 on that verse. If you were to say that according to that statement in the Talmud, Og had actually meant to kill Avraham so that he could marry Sarah, i.e. hardly an intention qualifying for additional merit, the fact that he was instrumental in saving Avraham at that time and in saving Lot by Avraham coming to his rescue, was enough to make Moses fear him. [After all this Og was at least 500 years old if he had been a somebody already at that time. Ed.] The Talmud in tractate Sanhedrin folio 105 tells us that the 42 burnt offerings offered by Balak to Hashem at the direction of Bileam, was enough for him to be rewarded that Ruth the Moabite became descended from him. Balak had also intended only to cause Israel harm at that time, and nonetheless the sages of the Talmud felt that G–d had to reward him. Some sages understand the fact that Og was described –though indirectly- as a fugitive, in Genesis, this means that he had escaped not Nimrod, but that he had escaped the deluge and had managed to survive it somehow. This would be good reason for Moses to feel that he had G–d’s protection even at his time. He is also supposed to have been a brother of Sichon, giving him good reason to attack Moses who had killed his brother. Our author refers to what he had explained in Parshat Noach in the name of Rabbi Yehudah hachassid who had pointed out that the numerical value of the words אך נח in the line: וישאר אך נח, “only Noach survived,” is identical to the numerical value of the word עוג, i.e. 79. (Genesis 7,23) There is also a statement by Rabi Yechiel bar Yoseph, according to whom Og had been born before the onset of the deluge, his mother having been pregnant with him at the time, and having married one of Noach’s sons, her pregnancy having been caused by one of the people whom t*he Torah had described as בני האלוהים, usually understood as “fallen angels.”

אל תירא אותו, “do not fear him!” Rashi explains that the reason why Moses was afraid of Og was that the merit of having alerted Avraham to Lot having been taken prisoner by the armies of Kedorleomer might have protected him. This seems highly unlikely, as Rashi himself explains elsewhere that Og far from having noble intentions, wished Avraham dead, so that he could marry Sarah. We therefore must look for a different reason why Moses would have feared him. In the Talmud Horiot folio 10, we have a statement that a person should engage in Torah study even if his intentions are not wholly religiously motivated. As a proof the Talmud cites that the 42 sacrificial animals that Balak, who had hired Bileam to curse the Jewish people, offered to the Jewish G-d was rewarded by Ruth the Moabite, and ancestor of the Messiah through her great grandson David would be born and be married to Boaz. Moses was similarly concerned that if Og had survived thus far, G-d had had a mission in mind that he must fulfill and that mission had not yet been fulfilled by him. Only after G-d had set Moses’ mind at ease did he cease worrying about the outcome of the military encounter that was imminent. It was only after G-d reassured him that his mind was set to rest about the imminent military encounter involving also such a giant.

ויכו אתו AND THEY SMOTE HIM — Moses slew him, as it is related in Treatise Berakhot, in the chapter beginning הרואה‎ (Berakhot 54b): He tore up a rock covering an area of three Parsang and he hurled it at him.