Thoughts
on The Parsha
Parshas
Beha'aloscha
613
Problems
By:
Daniel Listhaus
וְהָאסַפְסֻף
אֲשֶׁר בְּקִרְבּוֹ הִתְאַוּוּ תַּאֲוָה
וַיָּשֻׁבוּ וַיִּבְכּוּ גַּם בְּנֵי
יִשְׂרָאֵל וַיֹּאמְרוּ מִי יַאֲכִלֵנוּ
בָּשָׂר:
זָכַרְנוּ
אֶת הַדָּגָה אֲשֶׁר נֹאכַל בְּמִצְרַיִם
חִנָּם אֵת הַקִּשֻּׁאִים וְאֵת
הָאֲבַטִּחִים וְאֶת הֶחָצִיר וְאֶת
הַבְּצָלִים וְאֶת הַשּׁוּמִים
“The
crowd that was among them cultivated a craving, and the Children of
Israel also turned, and they wept, and said, “Who will feed us
meat? We remember the fish that we would eat in Egypt free of charge;
the cucumbers, and the melons, the leeks, the onions, and the garlic.
But now our life is parched, there is nothing; we have nothing before
our eyes but the manna!”
-Beha'aloscha
11:4-6
This
week's parsha
relates
the first couple of what will be a sequence of disastrous events
which occurred in the desert. The Torah1
tells us that the people started complaining that they wanted meat.
They recalled how they used to get free fish while in Mitzrayim
and how good life was there, whereas now they complained how they had
nothing but the manna.
When
reading through these passukim
(verses),
a couple of questions immediately come to mind. First-of-all, life in
Egypt was horrible. As a matter of fact, many of the things we do by
the Pesach
Seder are
done to remind us of what life was like in Mitzrayim.
We dip the karpas
in
saltwater and eat maror
specifically to recall the bitter lives of the exile at that point in
time. So, how could it be that the Jews in the desert complained that
their lives in Egypt were better? These were the same people who were
forced to do back-breaking labor. Did they have short-term memory
loss? Did they forget what it meant to be a Jew in Egypt?
Furthermore,
their complaint was not even accurate, as Rashi2
points out. The Egyptians did not even give the Jews straw with which
to build, so certainly the Egyptians would not go out of their way to
offer delicacies to their slaves.
If
all of this does not weaken the complaint of the B'nei
Yisroel
in the desert enough, let us now also recall a well known fact about
the manna
– it could taste like anything!
Whatever
the eater had in mind for it to taste like, it would taste exactly
like, as Dovid HaMelech
alludes to in Tehillim3.
If so, what exactly was the complaint of the B'nei
Yisroel?
Things were not better in Egypt, they never
got free fish or meat. And they did in fact have access in the desert
to whatever food they wanted, because the manna
tasted
however the eater desired.
Based
on the above issues, Rashi4
as well as the Medrash5
explain that the Jews wanted to rid themselves of the mitzvos.
After Kabbalas
HaTorah (the
receiving of the Torah),
and
living for a while with the obligation of the mitzvos
hanging
over their heads, they desired “other meat” and other things
which the Torah had commanded them not to do. They remembered the
“good old days” back in Mitzrayim
when
these things were permitted to them; when they were able to live a
“free” life, and not one controlled by the Torah. This is what
the B'nei
Yisroel
really wanted in the midbar
(desert).
What
was the catalyst of this sudden change in attitude? What changed that
created such a negative relationship between the Jews and the Torah?
Perhaps
the answer to this question lies within what the Jews actually said
to Moshe: “We have nothing before our eyes but the manna”.
The manna
came
each day from heaven and provided each person with exactly the right
amount to satisfy them. There are two approaches one could have had,
though, regarding this situation in the desert. One approach could be
to view the manna
as
a tremendous opportunity. One could sit down each day to a repast of
unparalleled diversity. For lunch, one could have pizza on Mondays,
falafel on Tuesdays, spaghetti on Wednesdays, knishes on Thursdays,
and fish on Fridays – what better menu could one ask for! I
do not know what the calorie count was for the manna,
but regardless, it sounds like a great deal.
The
other approach one could have regarding the manna,
however, is quite different. One could wake up each morning and see
the same manna
over
and over again and get sick of it. As Rashi6
describes,
the B'nei
Yisroel just
looked at the manna
and
said,“The same thing again? We have manna
every
morning and manna
every
evening!” This latter approach was the one of the Jews in the
desert. They saw the manna
as
the same monotonous diet, instead of viewing each meal as a totally
new opportunity, and making the best of it by imagining the manna
to
be the most delicious foods.
Just
as there are two approaches how to view the manna,
there are the same two approaches regarding how one views the mitzvos
of
Hashem. Every day in shema
we
recite, in both the first paragraph ( where we accept on ourselves
the yoke of Hashem) and in the second paragraph (where we accept on
ourselves the yoke of the mitzvos),
“...And these matters/my commandments that I command you today...”
Rashi7
explains that the reason the verse says “today” is to teach us
that the Torah and the mitzvos
should
be new in our eyes every day, as if never seen them before. Instead
of being the kid with the PlayStation game who uses it for a week or
two and gets tired of it, we must view each day as a new opportunity
to live a day of mitzvos
in
the way of Hashem.
In
order to live the proper life of a Jew, we must stop ourselves from
living an auto-pilot life of habit and routine. The daily going to
davening,
putting on tallis
and tefillin,
these are all things that if done out of habit, lose their taste
faster than the worst gum. Even the mitzvos
which
occur less often, such as shabbos
and yom
tov,
become part of an ongoing cycle8.
With this approach towards mitzvos,
we are no better than the Jews in the desert complaining, “...We
have nothing before our eyes but the manna!...Manna
in
the morning and manna
in
the evening”.
The
Yomim
Tovim (Jewish
Holidays) are not merely a remembrance of past events, but rather a
re-creation of the same atmosphere which existed during the original
event. Two weeks ago we experienced Shavuos
-
a time of yearly re-accepting of the Torah upon ourselves. The
question is – have we already fallen off our spiritual high and are
now sunk back in the routine of the life as a Jew, or have we held
onto the realization that each mitzva
represents
a unique opportunity to become closer to Hashem? This second
perspective is really the only option.
The
B'nei
Yisroel in
the desert were mistaken when they exclaimed that they missed the
freedom of Mitzrayim.
As a matter of fact this is something we declare by the Pesach
Seder each
year, “This year we are slaves, next year we will be free.” When
we do the mitzvos
with
love, and use each of them as new opportunity and means to become
closer to Hashem, then we experience true freedom.
Only
with this approach
will
we rid ourselves of the 613 problems, and instead adopt the 613
mitzvos.
1Bamidbar
11:4-6
2Bamidbar
11:5
3Tehillim
78:18 and 106:15
4Bamidbar
11:5
5Tanchuma
11:22
6Babidbar
11:6
7Rashi
in both places: Devarim 6:6 and Devarim 11:6
8I
have heard a couple of times before that the reason why the Rambam
groups all the daily mitzvos in
the section of Ahava (love)
is because one could only do something properly on a constant basis
if it is being done with love.
Photo Credit: based on http://scheinerman.net/judaism/_images/ashk-torah.jpg
