Musar do Liczb 9:26

Commandment 380 provides for people who have not been able to observe the Passover on the appropriate date, to do so on the 14th resp. 15th of אייר, instead (9,10).

על פי ה' יסעו, ועל פי ה' יחנו . Immediately after this, we read that the Israelites made camp at the instruction of G–d and that they broke camp at the command of G–d. The reason that the Torah repeats these reports of how the children of Israelites behaved is to teach us that we should not make a move in life without prefacing it with a remark that indicates that we hope that what we are about to do meets with G–d's approval. Whenever we arrive at our destination or complete an undertaking we are to mention that we hope that what we accomplished meets with G–d's approval, and to thank Him for having enabled us to carry out what we set out to do. By doing this our awareness of G–d will be constant, both when we set out to do something, while we are involved in it, and when we have completed it.

The paragraph describing the details of the פסח שני, alludes to the מחנה ישראל camp of Israel in accordance with what I have written earlier in my introduction to these three פרשיות. I had then described "the camp of Israel," as an allusion to the נפש, i.e. "soul," of the Jewish people. This is demonstrated by the introductory verse ויהי אנשים אשר היו טמאים לנפש אדם, "There were some men who had been impure through contact with the soul of a human being (Adam), etc." We have a tradition in the name of the Arizal, that Nadav and Avihu had been part of the נפש of אדם הראשון. These men whom the Torah describes as having been defiled through contact with נפש אדם are Mishael and Eltzafan who had carried the bodies of Nadav and Avihu out of the Sanctuary (Leviticus 10,4). This is the reason the Torah repeats here in 9,10, איש איש כי יהיה טמא לנפש אדם או בדרך רחוקה, וכו' The meaning is that whether someone is impure due to the present state of the נפש, such as Mishael and Eltzafan, or due to causes far distant in time such as the נפש of original "Adam", such as in the case of Mishael and Eltzafan, the result is similar.. The reason there is a dot over the letter ה, in the word רחוקה is that though it is to be understood literally it also alludes to what we have just described.

The paragraph describing the details of the פסח שני, alludes to the מחנה ישראל camp of Israel in accordance with what I have written earlier in my introduction to these three פרשיות. I had then described "the camp of Israel," as an allusion to the נפש, i.e. "soul," of the Jewish people. This is demonstrated by the introductory verse ויהי אנשים אשר היו טמאים לנפש אדם, "There were some men who had been impure through contact with the soul of a human being (Adam), etc." We have a tradition in the name of the Arizal, that Nadav and Avihu had been part of the נפש of אדם הראשון. These men whom the Torah describes as having been defiled through contact with נפש אדם are Mishael and Eltzafan who had carried the bodies of Nadav and Avihu out of the Sanctuary (Leviticus 10,4). This is the reason the Torah repeats here in 9,10, איש איש כי יהיה טמא לנפש אדם או בדרך רחוקה, וכו' The meaning is that whether someone is impure due to the present state of the נפש, such as Mishael and Eltzafan, or due to causes far distant in time such as the נפש of original "Adam", such as in the case of Mishael and Eltzafan, the result is similar.. The reason there is a dot over the letter ה, in the word רחוקה is that though it is to be understood literally it also alludes to what we have just described.

The words הצר הצורר אתכם, in 10,9, are a fairly clear allusion to the evil urge, seeing there is no other foe that bothers us as much as Satan. We have further support for this view in the unusual construction in verse 9, which speaks about וכי תבואו מלחמה בארצכם, "When war will come to your land." Why is the word תבואו in the plural? We would have expected instead וכי תבוא The allusion here is to the ongoing struggle between man and the evil urge. Sometimes man gains the upper hand in this struggle, at other times the forces of Satan gain ascendancy. At any rate both are constantly involved in a state of war. This is why the Torah uses the plural here. Whenever the community is called upon to perform a collective act such as to come to an assembly or to get ready to journey on it is important that they perform those acts by dedicating themselves to fulfil G–d's commands. The sound of the trumpets then is the rallying cry that helps every Israelite concentrate on what is expected of him. Such dedication is required both at the commencement of an activity and at its conclusion, therefore the Torah repeats על פי ה' יסעו, ועל פי ה' יחנו, "they would journey at the command of G–d, and they would make camp at the command of G–d," in 9,18, whereas in 9,23, we have the same instructions in the reverse order, i.e. על פי ה' יחנו, ועל פי ה' יסעו. The Torah informed us that the departure and the arrival at a site were motivated by the same intentions, namely to carry out G–d's will.

Concerning the fourth expression of endearment listed, the use of the word אליו, this too had been used in connection with Abraham (Genesis 22,11), and one cannot answer that it did not represent an expression of fondness since it was not coupled with וידבר לאמור. The absence of the extra word לאמור in Genesis 22,1, is more than compensated for by the repeated use of Abraham's very name! The answer is that Abraham had to personally prepare himself spiritually in order to receive a communication from G–d. Moses did not need such spiritual preparation. He was ready at all times to perform his task as a prophet. We know this from Numbers 9,8 where some of the people asked Moses why people who had been ritually impure through no fault of their own could not perform the Passover sacrifice at the appointed time. Moses told the people: "Stand by and let me hear what G–d will command concerning situations such as yours!" There was no need for Moses to prepare himself to speak to G–d. We now understand the abbreviated form of the קריאה reported at the opening of the book of Leviticus, i.e. why the Torah did not even bother to identify the caller, and immediately wrote: "He called." Had the introduction "G–d called" been used by the Torah, there would not have been room for error, no one could have argued that it was the angel Mattatron who had addressed Moses and invited him to ready himself spiritually, that it was not G–d Who had addressed him directly. Why then did the Torah take a chance and omit defining who called Moses? We are forced to conclude that the Torah used this form of introduction to demonstrate how fond G–d was of Moses, that G–d was both the caller and the speaker, as distinct from Abraham where the fourth endearing term אליו is used in G–d's address (Genesis 22,11). This is the plain meaning of the paragraph in the Midrash.

This statement of the Midrash also deserves further analysis. Why does this Midrash see a connection to the use of the word "שאו" in the Joseph story involving Pharaoh that we have cited? After all, we have a rule בשעת חדוה, חדוה. This means that at a time when joy prevails, no sour note is introduced. Rashi explains this on Genesis 6,6. In our case the restoration of the שכינה, the visible Presence of G–d, was certainly such an occasion; why then look for negative connotations of the word "שאו?"

Adam squeezed out a cluster of grapes and became a heretic at that very moment, as our Rabbis have stated in Sanhedrin 38b. Our sages have expressed this as והיה נעשה אחר, "he turned into someone else." Noach planted a vineyard (Genesis 9,20) and when drunk became spiritually hurt, lost his sanity. Abraham planted an orchard and emerged unscathed. This is the mystical dimension of being the מרכבה, the carrier of the שכינה. The two sons of Aaron, Nadav and Avihu, also had a glimpse of these mysteries but they died in the process. The Talmud described the experiences of the four scholars as being identical with the four people who had tried to probe these mysteries before them. As far as the death of the two sons of Aaron is concerned, it occurred because they had penetrated so deeply into these mystical matters, i.e. they came so close to the purely spiritual dimensions of G–d that their bodies could not keep up the pace. It is significant that the Torah speaks about their coming close to G–d i.e. בקרבתם, not about בהקריבם, their bringing close, i.e. sacrificing something else (Leviticus 16,1). This means that their very death was their coming close to G–d. They had brought themselves to such closeness. They sanctified G–d by their very death because they had achieved an exceptionally high spiritual level. Moses explained this to his brother Aaron in 10,3: בקרובי אקדש ועל פני כל העם אכבד, "Through those near Me I will show Myself holy, and gain glory before all the people." G–d Himself testified to the stature of these two sons of Aaron and to the fact that He felt honoured by their attempt to draw close to Him. These two sons of Aaron rehabilitated their forebear Adam. We have a tradition going back to the Arizal that these two sons of Aaron were the re-incarnation of the soul, נפש, of Adam. These re-incarnations can occur on three levels, נפש, רוח, or נשמה respectively. Nadav and Avihu were re-incarnates of the נפש of Adam as is hinted at in Numbers 9,6: ויהי אנשים אשר היו טמאים לנפש אדם, "There were two men who were impure due to the soul of Adam." Rabbi Akiva believed that the men referred to were Mishael and Eltzafan who carried the bodies of Nadav and Avihu out of the Sanctuary. He appears to have understood the word נפש in our verse as referring to that of first man, Adam (Sukkah 25b). This is supported by Leviticus 10,5 in which Mishael and Eltzafan are described as וישאום בכתנותם, as having carried them in "their tunics," the latter word referring to the כתנות אור, the tunics made of light worn by Adam prior to his sin.