민수기 25:1의 인용 해설

And the number...shall be What is the connection of retribution and consolation juxtaposed in one speech? Our Rabbis explained in Pesachim (87b): Hosea felt that he had sinned by saying, “Exchange them for another nation.” He stood and begged mercy for them (See above 1:2). And in Sifrei Devei Rav, in the section commencing: “And Israel abode in Shittim” (Num. 25) we learned: Rabbi says: Some sections are close to each other yet as far apart as east is far from west. “For you are not My people... And the number of the children of Israel shall be as the sand of the sea.” What is the connection of one to the other? This can be compared to a king who became angry with his wife. He summoned a scribe to come and write a bill of divorcement. Before the scribe arrived, the king became reconciled with his wife. Said the king, “Is it possible that this scribe should leave here divided?” I.e. his heart should be divided and bewildered, saying, “Why did the king send for me?” He said to him, “Come and write that I am doubling her kethubah.” And according to its simple meaning, this is the reason for its juxtaposition. “For you are not My people, and I will not be yours.” I will show Myself as though I am not yours, and you shall be exiled among the nations, and even there you shall multiply and grow, and there you shall lay it to your heart to return to Me, as it is said through Moses (Deut. 30:1,3): “And you shall lay it to your heart among all the nations where...has exiled you etc. And the Lord your God shall return your captivity.” Here too, “And the children of Judah and the children of Israel shall be gathered together.”

so that you may live for all those who worshiped Por were destroyed.

According to Midrash Tanchuma 1 on our portion, examination of the occurrence of the word וישב throughout the Torah will reveal that this term is always used when some unhappy event was associated with such “settlement.” The following examples illustrate the point. Exodus 32,6 speaks of וישב העם לאכול ושתו ויקומו לצחק, “the people settled down to eat and to drink and they arose to make sport (worship the golden calf).” On that day three thousand of the people were slain on account of this sin). Genesis 37,25 reports that after throwing Joseph into the pit, וישבו לאכול לחם וישאו עיניהם והנה אורחת ישמעלים באה.....וימכרו את יוסף לישמעלים, “when the brothers had settled down to eat their meal they raised their eyes and here a caravan of Ishmaelites arrived,......and they sold Joseph to the Ishmaelites.” In Kings I 5,5 we read וישב יהודה וישראל בטח,...ויקם ה' שטן לישראל, “when Yehudah and Israel had settled safely,...G’d made an adversary against Solomon” (11,14) [as a punishment for transgressing certain commands in the Torah, Ed.] In Numbers 25,1 we read וישב ישראל בשטים ויחל העם לזנות, “when the Israelites settled down at a place called Shittim, the people started debasing themselves by whoring” (with the Moabite women which resulted in G’d killing 24,000 of them). In our instance too Yaakov’s “settling” in the land of Canaan had in its wake his traumatic experience of the loss of Joseph. G’d had said (according to the Midrash) “is Yaakov not satisfied with inheriting the world to come that he must now also inherit this terrestrial world. It is not appropriate for the righteous to enjoy the best of both worlds.” According to Tanchuma when Yaakov became aware of the extent of the kings and chiefs listed in the Torah as descendents of from Esau he became worried about not having anything to counter such physical prowess of the Edomites. The matter may be explained in the form of a parable. A caravan of camels was heavily laden with straw. The onlookers could not imagine that there were storage facilities large enough to accommodate all this straw and they were worried that the owners would demand their own (the onlookers’) facilities to accommodate all that excess straw. An old man amongst the onlookers told his compatriots not to worry seeing that it would require only a single match to set fire to the entire mass of straw carried by the camels. Similarly, G’d put Yaakov’s mind at rest telling him that Esau would go up in flames just as straw would go up in flames. This is what the prophet Ovadiah 18 described when he compared the fate of the house of Esau and the fate of the house of Joseph in the future. The “match” in our instance would be Joseph, whose descendants would vanquish the descendants of Esau.

Return, O Israel You, who are in the land of Judah, lest what happens to Samaria happens to you. Therefore, the topics are juxtaposed. This can be compared to a king against whom a province rebelled. The king sent a general and commanded him to destroy it. That general was expert and deliberate. He said to them, “Take for yourselves days (sic); otherwise, I will do to you as I have done to such-and-such a province and to its allies, and to such-and-such a prefecture and to its allies.” Therefore it says, “Samaria shall be accounted guilty,” and then Scripture says: “Return, O Israel.” As is found in Sifrei in the section commencing. (Num. 25:1), “And Israel abode in Shittim.”

I will remember You from the land of Jordan From what You did for us in the Jordan and the peaks of Hermon; after all the provocation with which we provoked You in Shittim, You dried the Jordan for us.