BS”D
LEVI’S
LEGACY: PARSHAT BAMIDBAR
Shira
Smile shiur 2020/5780
Adapted
by Channie Koplowitz Stein
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Sefer Bamidbar is known as the Book of Numbers
because it begins and ends with numbers, with a census of Bnei Yisroel and
separate censuses of the Tribe of Levi. Interestingly, while Hashem commands
Moshe to count Bnei Yisroel, all who will go out to battle, according to their
families from the age of twenty, Moshe and Aharon should be assisted by a
representative of each tribe. However, the tribe of Levi is not included in the
national count, in the “legions /armies” of Israel. Hashem later does command
Moshe to count Bnei Levi, but from the age of one month rather than from age
twenty.
Between these two countings, of
Bnei Yisroel and of Levi, Hashem lays out the mission of the Tribe of Levi. The
Tribe of Levi are to be appointed to care for the Tabernacle and all its
utensils, and to serve in the Tabernacle of Testimony
Why is Levi singled out for a
separate count, especially with such a difference in age? A major reason
may lie in the mission of Bnei Yisroel in contrast to that of Bnei Levi.
Perhaps by going all the way back to the birth of Levi, the tribal patriarch,
we can gain some insight into what Levi himself and, by extension, his tribe
represents.
With the birth of each of the
tribal ancestors, Rochel or Leah presented an idea or feeling that that son
represented followed by the name she called him. When Levi was born, Leah
indeed provided some insight, “This time my husband yeloveh/will become
attached to me.” But then, the grammar indicates that he, not she, called him
Levi. It is both the rationale behind the name and the possible identities of
the “he” that will help us understand what Levi represents and why he was
counted separately.
According to one medrash, it was
Hashem Himself who named this child Levi, for Levi was the one destined for the
priesthood, the one who would be charged with serving in the Beit Hamikdosh.
When Bnei Yisroel accepted the Torah at Sinai, says the Medrash, angels came
down with two crowns for each member of Bnei Yisroel, one crown for Naaseh/we
will do and another crown for nishma/we will hear. But because of Levi’s
special status and the gifts the kohein is entitled to receive from Bnei
Yisroel, they received a third crown, that of the priesthood.
But priesthood is not just a status
symbol. The priests, and all of the Tribe of Levi, are charged with creating,
maintaining, and reinforcing our connection to Hakodosh Boruch Hu. Indeed, the
very name Levi means connection and attachment.
But it is also reasonable to assume
that Yaakov, the father, named this baby. In that case, the baby’s mother is
extrapolating from the name that her husband, Yaakov, wants to deepen his
connection with her, posits Rabbi Wolbe. In that scenario, the relationship
between the husband and wife is symbolic of the relationship of Hashem with
Bnei Yisroel. As this child brought husband and wife closer to each other, so
would his descendents strengthen the relationship between Hashem and Bnei Yisroel
through his service.
The term levi connotes a
specific kind of attachment. It is not merely a physical connection, but also
an inner connection of emotions and caring. It is the trademark of a Jew who
must always feel that he is never alone. The mitzvoth of escorting a guest to
the door (and a little further), and escorting another on his final journey at
death, literally, a levayah, arise from this concept. From the
beginning of our history, first mankind, and then our Patriarchs walked with
God. [In Gan Eden, God sought to walk with Adam, “searching him out” after Adam
sinned. Why else was Hashem mithalech/walking with Himself in the
Garden? CKS] The second father of mankind, Noach, walked with God/et
Haelokhm hithalech Noach. Finally, When Hashem and Avraham Avinu entered
into an everlasting covenant, and Hashem was about to seal the covenant with
Avraham through circumcision, Hashem begins the dialogue with, I am Hashem, hit-halech
lefoni/walk before Me...” Hashem’s message to Avraham and to all of us,
Avraham’s descendents, is that we are never alone in this world, and we must
always stay and feel the connection, feel Hashem walking beside us.
This emotional connection came into
question when Bnei Yisroel left Egypt and were traveling to Sinai. They
questioned, “Is God within us or not?” When the connection became a detached,
intellectual discussion rather than a deep emotional conviction, when the
connection was weakened, Amalek was able to attack. The coldness Bnei Yisroel
felt toward Hashem was mirrored by the coldness of coincidence that Amalek
introduced, asher korcha baderech. Bnei Yisroel had to do teshuvah for
their emotional detachment and weak hands (refidim = refeh yodayim), and
they had to travel to the fire of Sinai.
The Tribe of Levi represents the
closeness to Hakodosh Boruch Hu. The tribal banners marked off each tribe’s
position in the legions of Hashem, and each banner had upon it a symbol that
represented that tribe’s essence. The emblem on the flag of Levi represented
this relationship between Hashem and Bnei Yisroel, for it was an image of the ephod/breastplate
that the High Priest wore. It was through this breastplate that Hashem would
communicate with the High Priest with the messages for Bnei Yisroel. It was
this relationship that gave Levi direct access and passage to Hakodosh Boruch
Hu without additional red tape, writes Rabbi Ezrachi in Birkat Mordechai.
When Bnei Yisroel are being counted
at the beginning of this Parsha, the Torah names a tribal leader who will
accompany Moshe in the count of his tribe. But the leader and the Tribe of Levi
are omitted. One could easily deduce that Levi would therefore not be included
in this overall census, yet the Torah still makes a point of stating that Levi
should not be counted, writes Rabbi Yaakov Kamenetsky. Further, when Hashem
then commands Moshe to count Levi, the parameters change. Levi is to be counted
from the age of one month, not twenty years, even though an infant could not
yet serve in the Mishkan. What is the significance of this young inclusion in
the census?
Rabbi Chaim Goldstein posits that
there are two aspects to Levi’s mission in Bnei Yisroel. On the one hand, they
were tasked with the service in and for the Tabernacle. While this would
certainly need to wait until the baby was grown, a second level, however, related
to the very essence of Levi. Levi’s essence is connection, and the Levites are
intrinsically connected to Hakodosh Boruch Hu, a connection that begins at
birth. The Leviim are connection itself ; they are not a job. Levi reminds us
that we never walk alone, They are our model in how to connect to Hashem.
In Logic of the Heart, Logic of
the Mind Rabbi Soloveitchik notes that each of the tribes had its unique
character and mission that could generally only be actualized as an adult, upon
reaching the age of twenty. For example, Yehudah was to conquer the land and
establish a government, Zevulun was to establish trade routes and business, and
so on. These were related to Hashem’s initial command and blessing to Adam, to
capture the land. But later, in Gan Eden, Hashem gives Adam another gift and
command, to guard the land and to work/cultivate it. It is through this work
that one gains a chazakah, that one earns possession over the land.
While conquering can only be achieved at some point of maturity, teaching and
building, taking possession through inward toil, begins at birth. In fact,
notes Rabbi Soloveitchik, conquering is generally the realm of men, while women
have the gift of achieving through compassion, love and guidance. In fact,
notes Rabbi Soloveitchik, this is the preferred path that Hashem envisions for
the future, expressed in the woman’s morning blessing, “Who has made me
according to His will.” These two different missions necessitated two different
kinds of census.
To accomplish this goal, Hashem
arranged the path of Levi so that they would not be enslaved in Egypt. They
would then remain the root of Bnei Yisroel to ensure the survival of what
characterized Bnei Yisroel. The “work” of the Levites during the enslavement
was the study of Torah. When their census was taken in the desert, they
numbered 22,000, to mirror the twenty-two letters of the aleph bet through
which the Torah is written, writes the Be’er Moshe, the Ozhorover Rebbe.
The Leviim themselves then
undergo a second census, this time for those actually available for service, a
count of those from age thirty to age fifty. But there is a world of difference
in the one word that differentiates the Leviim from the rest of Bnei Yisroel.
In the census of the other tribes, the men are referred to as all that
yotzei/go out to the legion. In counting the Leviim, the Torah refers to
the men as all who bo/come to, who enter the legion. The Netivot
Shalom points out that while the other tribes went out to war, to veer away
from the evil of the yetzer horo, the Leviim represent peaceful
acquisition after already having subdued this enemy. Their job is to go inward,
to the inner recesses of the Mikdash and reinforce the connection to
Hashem, asei tov. The Leviim were chosen for this task from the
beginning, but any member of Bnei Yisroel can become an honorary member of
Shevet Levi in this respect, in building the connections to Hakodosh Boruch Hu
through partnering with Hashem in His work of caring for people.
When Levi was born, Yaakov foresaw
his future role in connecting all of Bnei Yisroel to Hashem. Therefore,
according to Rabbi Yaakov Kamenetsky, Yaakov named the baby Levi. When Leah
heard the name Yaakov insisted on giving this baby, she interpreted it
personally to mean that Yaakov wanted a closer relationship with her.
Since the Leviim were not enslaved,
their sanctity must have precedes their non involvement in the sin of the
golden calf, writes Rabbi Chaim Shmulevits. Their sanctity arises from Levi’s
ability to create intimacy between husband and wife, and this ability, to bring
closeness between people, and between God and mankind became Levi’s mission,
already included in his name. As such, Yaakov Avinu designated Shevet Levi to
continue the study of Torah in Egypt and perpetuate the legacy of Avraham
Avinu.
The Shvilei Pinchas,
building on the words of the Chasam Sofer and the Vilna Gaon, explores the
significance of Levi and the lineage that continues through Kehat, to Amram,
and then to Moshe and Aharon. Each force in the world has its counter
force, notes Rabbi Friedlander, the Shvilei Pinchas. The counter force
of Bnei Yisroel was Amalek, who rises to power when Bnei Yisroel is weak in
Torah. The Tribe of Levi were the vessels to perpetuate the Torah. This
relationship is alluded to in the names of Levi and these branches, Kehat,
Amram, Mosheh, whose initials form the anagram AMaLeK. The final
letters of these names give us the future destiny of Amalek, MITaH/death.
Then the Shvilei Pinchas
goes further. He explains why the Leviim merited carrying the Tabernacle, and
specifically the Aron Kodesh, on their shoulders. We already know that the
Leviim were exempt from the servitude of enslavement. Yet Levi was not content
to live a leisurely life while his brothers suffered. He therefore gave his
three sons names that would identify them with the suffering of the rest of
Bnei Yisroel, Gershon/Stranger, Kehot/Broken teeth, and Merori/Bitterness. Levi
taught us that even if we ourselves are not personally affected by the
suffering of our fellow Jews, we must nevertheless feel their pain, just as
Hashem hinted to Moshe that He Himself is also suffering with us in our
enslavement. Levi instilled in his descendents this tremendous sense of empathy
for the suffering of others.
And this sense of empathy carried
over to the ensuing generations. When baby Moshe was in the basket in the Nile,
Pharaoh’s daughter heard a child crying. Our Sages hypothesize that Pharaoh’s
daughter heard the child Aaron crying for his baby brother while older sister
Miriam stood by watching and hoping for that baby’s salvation.
Moshe also inherited the empathetic
gene. Although he grew up in Pharaoh’s palace, when he grew up, he went out of
the palace purposely to “see the suffering of his brothers.” But he was not
just observing. He wanted to feel their suffering, and he, a prince of Egypt,
lifted a brick and joined the slaves in their labor. Because Levi/Moshe
shouldered the load with his brother, the Leviim merited carrying the Ark on
their shoulders; because he could cry with his brother, he would sing in the
Beit Hamikdosh. Because one of the ways of acquiring Torah is through
empathetically shouldering your brother’s load with him, Moshe merited carrying
the Torah down to Bnei Yisroel. Even Hakodosh Boruch Hu Himself empathized with
the suffering of Bnei Yisroel, keeping a sapphire brick under His throne as a
constant reminder of the bricks Bnei Yisroel were forced to make, reminds us
Rabbi Wolbe.
We too are called to bear the load
in support of our brothers and thus emulate Hashem’s empathy, writs Rav Zev
Leff. Our empathy is not meant to stop at feeling, but to become action. What
can I do to ease my friend’s burden? Even when there is nothing concrete I can
do, I can still pray for him, adds Rabbi Pliskin. In fact, the sign of a truly
great man and leader is not his erudition, but his ability to feel the pain of
others and try to alleviate it. [I recently heard that Dr. Jonas Salk refused
to patent his vaccine against polio, the disease that ravaged the world and
created social distancing in a previous generation. He claimed the vaccine
belonged to the world. Dr. Salk was Jewish, but I don’t know if he was a
Levite. May we soon find a vaccine for our current scourge. Unfortunately, it
will undoubtedly be patented. CKS]
Moshe continued his empathy even
after taking Israel our of Egypt. Although Moshe did not personally go into
battle with Amalek, he stayed on the sidelines, raising his hands heavenward.
He refused to sit comfortably, but sat on a hard rock so that he too would feel
the discomfort of battle, tells us the Shvilei Pinchas, thereby
reminding Bnei Yisroel of this trait on their way to eliminating the roadblock
to obtaining the Torah.
Moshe sat on a rock, a boulder
during this battle with Amalek. Rav Reiss suggests that this combination was
Moshe’s way of incorporating the attributes of our Patriarchs and
Matriarchs. Our Patriarchs are referred to as rosh tzurim/foundation
stones, imparting the quality of conquest, of strength and logic. Our mothers
represent sitting, slowly nurturing growth through feeling and emotion. For it
was Moshe’s mother, Yocheved, who not only refused to kill the baby boys but
nurtured them to ensure their survival. These traits Moshe kept on his mind and
in his heart as Bnei Yisroel fought Amalek.
May our unity and power of empathy
for others, exhibited so often in the current pandemic, lead us to a full,
speedy redemption.