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D'VAR
TORAH | 
Paradox and Faith: The Art of Holiness
Elyse
Frishman
"In
the beginning, God created . . . B’reishit bara Elohim et . . ."
(Genesis 1:1). Et is the fourth word of Torah and it has no
meaning. It’s a grammatical Hebrew term marking the direct object
hashamayim, "the heavens."The purpose of et appears to be to
draw attention to exactly what God is creating.
Yet, how could the fourth
word of Torah have as little significance as to serve only as a marker . . . to
mean nothing? As humans, when we imagine we form a picture—and that isn’t
"nothing." It’s impossible to see nothing.
Alternatively, consider the
composition of et, with the two letters alef and tav:
alef is the beginning and tav the end of the "alphabet," the
alef-bet. Perhaps et, which is nothing, suggests the
full alef-bet, which is everything. It is as if to teach: from
nothing God will create everything.
That is the first paradox in
the Torah.
Our double parashah
Chukat/Balak begins with another paradox; the strange ritual of
burning the red heifer, whose ashes were to be mixed with water and then used to
purify the unclean Israelite. The ashes were a paradox: they made an unclean
person clean, but the clean priest preparing those ashes became
unclean.
What sin did the ashes
cleanse? "The Holy Blessed One said, 'Let the heifer come and atone for the
incident of the calf,’" (B’midbar Rabbah 19:8). Thirty-eight years had
passed since the Israelites had left Sinai; a new generation had arisen. Perhaps
the ashes, stored within the Ark, were to remind these younger Israelites of the
catastrophe of the Golden Calf. They knew only what had been passed down to them
by their parents and grandparents. Would the heifer remind them of God’s
potential wrath? Or would it signal forgiveness, washing away the stains of the
past so the new generation could begin anew?
Yet these Israelites did not
seem very different from their parents, complaining bitterly and
antagonistically toward Moses and God. "The people grew restive on the journey,
and the people spoke against God and against Moses, 'Why did you make us leave
Egypt to die in the wilderness? There is no bread and water, and we have come to
loathe this miserable food,’ " (Numbers 21:4–5). What was the basis for their
comparison? They’d had no experience of anything else. What was bread to them?
Perhaps the memories that were passed to them were toxic. Since the punishment
to wander was for utter faithlessness, we have to wonder: as the new generation
of Israelites drew close to the Promised Land, were they
ready?
"The Eternal sent
seraph serpents against the people. They bit the people and many of the
Israelites died. The people came to Moses and said, 'We sinned by speaking
against the Eternal and against you. Intercede with the Eternal to take away the
serpents from us!’ And Moses interceded for the people. Then the Eternal One
said to Moses, 'Make a seraph figure and mount it on a standard. And
anyone who was bitten who then looks at it shall recover.’ Moses made a copper
serpent and mounted it on the standard; and when bitten by a serpent, anyone who
looked at the copper serpent would recover," (Numbers 21:6–9).
This is another paradox. The
serpent’s bite would kill; but gazing upon the copper serpent would heal. The
midrash observes that the Israelites had to look upward to see the
standard, that is, to look to God, (B’midbar Rabbah 19:23). Thus the
Israelites would learn: the very things that would harm them if they only looked
at one another would bring healing if they looked up to God. Just as God had
promised success when they entered the Promised Land, they needed to realize
that they would fail utterly without faith.
The people’s physical
landscape was unchanged: desert wilderness. But what was their spiritual
landscape? Were they able to see beyond the desert of their fears? Soon enough
they would arrive at the Promised Land—would they have the spiritual courage to
make the land Promised? Had the people acquired faith?
For Moses and Aaron, faith
came easily. For the people, it was entirely less so. Over and again, God needed
to perform wonders, from the initial plagues to this latest: a healing copper
serpent to garner the people’s attention and belief.
In Hebrew, the word for
"copper" is n’choshet (nun-chet-shin-tav); the word for "serpent" is
nachash (nun-chet-shin). The difference between them is the
tav in the word for copper. Consider the shape of a tav—it is
like a sukkah, a shelter of God’s protection. Gazing up at the copper serpent
staff would draw the wounded into God’s shelter of healing.
Rabbi Yitzchak Ginsburgh
teaches that the letter tav symbolizes God’s seal or imprint—almost
like a fingerprint, (The Alef-Beit, [Northvale, NJ: Jason Aronson
Press, 1991, pp. 324ff). Perhaps the addition of the tav to
nachash, turning theserpent into copper, teaches that when God’s
imprint is visible, anything, anyone, can be transformed. Just as at the Burning
Bush, Moses—finding God—shifted from shepherd to redeemer.
Yet the Israelites were
shallow; despite redemption and revelation, punishment and wandering, they could
not mature into a people of faith. They were literalists, seeing only serpent
and copper standard, punishment and forgiveness. They couldn’t appreciate the
privilege God had offered them: to become "a kingdom of priests" (Exodus
19:6).
Moses and Aaron were deeply
faithful, understanding their roles as God’s agents. They didn’t merely guide
the people from one location to another; they struggled to help them evolve and
mature into a people ready to own the Promised Land.
Do you remember
paint-by-numbers—a kit containing a pre-drawn cardboard canvas, fully outlined
with numbers designating which color paint to apply? Included was a brush and
paint set, each color identified by number. The task was to apply the right
number paint to its spot on the canvas, and take care to keep within the lines.
The Israelites were paint-by-number Jews. They were incapable of doing more than
following specific instructions, and often they did much less than that.
Following the mitzvot didn’t change their character because they lacked
kavanah, "spiritual intention." But Judaism is an art, transforming the
ordinary into the holy. We learn to paint from paradox rather than from
certainty, to reveal the beauty, the meaningful, the good and holy that
emerge from our challenges. An artist takes responsibility for interpreting
and creating anew. When God’s imprint is truly impressed on our souls, anything
can be transformed. Thus, what wounds can also heal. The profane can become
holy. We can become a kingdom of priests.
Rabbi Elyse
Frishman is the spiritual leader of The Barnert Temple in
Franklin Lakes, New Jersey. She is the editor of Mishkan T'filah, A Reform
Siddur.
DAVAR ACHER
| 
Seeing Our Blessings
Kim S. Ettlinger
Numbers 22:12, "But God said
to Balaam, 'Do not go with them. You must not curse that people, for they are
blessed.’ "
When God says these words to
Balaam, God tells him that the Israelite people are blessed and that no matter
the curse that Balaam utters, it is in vain. This begins another paradox like
those Rabbi Frishman discussed: can an eternally blessed people truly be cursed?
For another interpretation of these words, we might consider who has asked for
the curse and who is meant to be the recipient of the curse? We know Balak asked
that the Israelites be cursed and so we ask, why? There are two reasons: first,
because of fear and second, because of jealously. Balak was scared of the
Israelites as they were numerous, strong, and victorious. He was jealous for the
same reason: they were so numerous, the earth could not be seen (Number 22:5),
and they were strong and victorious. Things were going well for the Israelites
and this scared Balak.
All too easily does this
relate to our lives! When things don’t seem to be going the way we envision or
if, quite simply, we are having a tough time with work, our family, or our
community, we tend to see the negative, we may see ourselves as cursed. Our
mindset changes from seeing the good and the beauty in life to seeing only the
difficulty and the darkness or the pain. And recently, this is very true for
many of us. We may not see the blessings in our own lives, our world view may
have become skewed. We may find that we become jealous of others’ successes,
their wealth, and relationships. We may criticize them rather than praising them
and "patting them on the back" because we feel insecure and unsure of ourselves.
At times, we may feel lost and find it difficult to espouse a positive attitude.
The antidote can be relatively simple if we stop for a moment and reflect on our
lives and open ourselves to look inward and to see our blessings. Then it won’t
be long till we will see our successes, the goodness within our lives and our
relationships. It won’t be long till we find ways to mend what is broken. We all
have our share of blessings; let’s see them, for they are most-certainly
present. Rabbi Kim S.
Ettlinger is a rabbi at Peninsula Temple Sholom in Burlingame,
California. |
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