Thoughts
on The Parsha
Parshas
Korach
Seeing
is Believing, but Believing is Seeing
וַיֹּאמֶר
משֶׁה בְּזֹאת תֵּדְעוּן כִּי ה'
שְׁלָחַנִי
לַעֲשׂוֹת אֵת כָּל הַמַּעֲשִׂים הָאֵלֶּה
כִּי לֹא מִלִּבִּי:
אִם
כְּמוֹת כָּל הָאָדָם יְמֻתוּן אֵלֶּה
וּפְקֻדַּת כָּל הָאָדָם יִפָּקֵד
עֲלֵיהֶם לֹא ה'
שְׁלָחָנִי:
וְאִם
בְּרִיאָה יִבְרָא ה'
וּפָצְתָה
הָאֲדָמָה אֶת פִּיהָ וּבָלְעָה אֹתָם
וְאֶת כָּל אֲשֶׁר לָהֶם וְיָרְדוּ
חַיִּים שְׁאֹלָה וִידַעְתֶּם כִּי
נִאֲצוּ הָאֲנָשִׁים הָאֵלֶּה אֶת ה':
וַיְהִי
כְּכַלֹּתוֹ לְדַבֵּר אֵת כָּל הַדְּבָרִים
הָאֵלֶּה וַתִּבָּקַע הָאֲדָמָה אֲשֶׁר
תַּחְתֵּיהֶם
“Moshe said, 'Through
this shall you know that Hashem has sent me to perform all these
acts, for it was not from my heart. If these die like the death of
all men, and the destiny of all men is visited upon them, [then] it
is not Hashem Who has sent me. But if Hashem will create a new
creation and the earth opens its mouth and swallows them and all that
is theirs, and they will descend alive to the pit, then you shall
know that these men have provoked Hashem!' When he finished speaking
all these words, the ground that was under them split open.”
-Korach 16:28-31
Continuing
in the series of unfortunate events throughout the B'nei
Yisroel's travels in the midbar
(desert) is the story of Korah
v'adaso (Korach and
his assembly) who gathered together to challenge the authority of
Moshe and Aharon. However, the truth is that Korach's arrogance was
one which challenged the authority of Hashem. After all, everything
Moshe did and said was a fulfillment of what Hashem commanded him.
Indeed, Moshe's response to Korach and his assembly was that Korach's
fight was with Hashem and therefore it will become clear from Hashem
what happens to those who dare challenge His authority. Moshe
declared that an unprecedented cause of death be what kills Korach
and his wicked assembly. It was at that precise moment that the mouth
of the earth opened and swallowed Korach and the men who were with
him.
Now,
although it is true that the Moshe davened
that it be a new creation which devours Korach, we know from the
gemara1
which cites the passuk (verse)
from Koheles2
that there is nothing new under the sun. As a matter of fact, the
mishna3
itself states that there were ten things created on the eve of
Shabbos at twilight –
during the last moments of the six days of creation – and the first
one mentioned on the list is “the mouth of the earth”. The
commentaries4
on the mishna all
agree that this refers to the ground which was destined to swallow
Korach and his assembly. So, the creation was not new in the sense
that it was created at the time that Korach rebelled, but rather new
in the sense that despite being conceptualized during sheishes
y'mei Beraishis with everything
else in the world, it was reserved to be used at this point in time.
New, no; unprecedented, yes. Based on this mishna
It would seem as if the hole that swallowed Korach was created with a
built in timer-clock waiting precisely for the predetermined time
moment for it to wipe out Korach v'adaso. If so, the classic question
which could be asked here is that if the foundation and purpose of
the creation of the world is all for man to have free choice and to
choose correctly, how could Hashem know what Korach would do before
he did it? If Hashem knew in advance the path that Korach was going
to choose then to an extent, Korach's decision was predetermined. It
would have been impossible for Korach to choose good, because Hashem
already knew he would choose evil and already conceptualized the
punishment. How does the concept of Hashem knowing all fit with the
necessity of free choice in this world?5
We
have all traveled through time before. In fact, contrary to popular
belief, it is quite easy and we do so all the time. Let us begin by
explaining this simply: If one merely travels west faster than the
sun, one is sort of going back in time. Nowadays, with faster means
of transportation such as trains and planes, it is quite often that
one finds himself to have arrived at a destination before he even
left. One could leave at 11am from an hour away and arrive just in
time as you cross over a time zone. This is because the world is
divided into 24 sections, each one by definition representing an hour
of the day at every possible angle the sun could hit it from its
stationary point. As the world revolves, time advances. However,
truth be told, this is a fairly recent innovation established in the
late 1800's and early 1900's in order to make a standardized time for
everyone to use.6
The reason this became necessary was because reality is that every
single spot on earth has its own unique timezone. The sun does not
simultaneously hit earth in 24 zones, but rather from every single
slightly different angle possible. For example, despite being in the
same timezone, there is about an eight minute difference between New
York and Boston. The millions of different times, however, became
impractical with the surge of travel when trains became a popular
means of transportation. However, the reality of their being slight
differences in time is something very relevant to us and is reflected
of course in our zemanim (such
as for determining sunrise, sunset, candle-lighting for Shabbos,
etc.). We cannot depend on a universal time frame within a zone to
set our times for davening and Shabbos,
because that is not accurate. We must depend on real time based on
the latitude and longitude lines of each individual city.
However,
of course even as a person changes time zones, he is not really
traveling through time, just as an astronaut in space cannot see
past, present, and future simultaneously. Time is linear and
continues forward, despite the fact that some parts in the world got
a “head start” depending on where they were positioned when time
was set in motion during sheishes y'mei bereishis.
It is impossible for us to understand what it would mean to be
external to time because we were programmed to be bound by space and
time.
When
it comes to science the general rule is seeing is believing.
Hypotheses and theories remain as such until they are proven
absolutely. Hashem created this world with teva (nature).
The natural world is extremely complex and intricate and indeed
allows Hashem to work the world in many ways and yet remain hidden.
One could choose to see Hashem from teva or
one could choose to attribute everything to teva and
ignore Hashem completely.
A
couple of years ago, a team at Ultra Tech International, inc. made
UltraEverDry, a super-hydrophobic and uleophobic coating which repels
almost all water-based and even oil-based liquids. The way that it
works is that it changes the form of molecules at the nano-level.
Nanotechnology refers to the manipulation of matter on an atomic and
molecular scale. Just to get a visualization of how small we are
dealing with: the way to measure nano-tech is in nanometers, which is
one-billionth of a meter. The width of a human hair is about 50,000
nanometers; so one could imagine that when it comes to
nano-technology, we are dealing with things which until recently have
been invisible. If someone would have come to you twenty years ago
claiming to have a magic solution which could make any surface
unbelievably water repellent, you would have disregarded him
completely. However now that science and technology has advanced, we
are able to see more and therefore the impossible is suddenly
possible, the unbelievable is suddenly believable.
The
relatively recent change in human perception regarding how the teva
of the world works is not
something which just advanced our insight into the tiny physical
world around us, but the truly invisible one as well. The fact that
we live in a world now which revolves around invisible forces: phone
service, Internet, WiFi, GPS tracking, bluetooth, and radiowaves is
something so remarkable but yet something we have become so
accustomed to. There is a constant invisible electric buzz in the
air. For example, the other day at a concert, the lead singer brought
his microphone too close to someone's iPad and suddenly there was a
loud shrieking sound. Some sort of interference between the invisible
forces at play caused a fight between the two electronic pieces. Yet,
even this invisible world is one which we are able comprehend because
as people we were programmed with software capable of comprehending
the rules and applications of the teva of
this world. When it comes to things outside of teva,
there is no program we have to understand it other then from what the
Torah offers or from what we could perhaps glean from mosholim
(parables) that we could apply from the world we know.
We
cannot understand what it would mean to be external to time and being
able to be every place and every time simultaneously. However,
perhaps the following moshol (parable) could help.
Imagine you take a full length movie and you are able to spread it
out on a table, beginning to end, one film segment after another.
You, being in a different dimension from the characters in the movie
could see the entire time-line of the movie simultaneously, while the
characters have to live through it to get to the end point. The
perspective changes as one enters a larger dimension and it is unfair
to use the same terminology from the limited dimension. To say that
you, who is watching the video, know the future, would be inaccurate.
A later point in the film is something that is only a relevant term
to those bound to the film. You who live outside it could access any
point at any time. For you it is all the past.
So
too perhaps we could understand Hashem's relationship with the world.
Hashem is not bound by the confines of the world He created. Rather
the world and everything contained is bound by the structure and
rules Hashem set. Therefore, it is not accurate to say that Hashem
knows the future, because that is a limiting term relevant only to a
dimension bound by time. Hashem is timeless and therefore takes the
position – so to speak – of the onlooker of film segments spread
across the table.
Nowadays,
with all the technology advancements, there are two approaches one
could take. One person could choose to ignore Hashem and be brazen
and arrogant to say that there is a scientific explanation behind
everything. However, a different approach would be to learn from the
access we now have to the invisible world of teva of
nanotechnology and waves and think to ourselves that just as hidden
intricacies exist in the science of the world, so too do hidden
intricacies and complexities exist in the spiritual realm of the
world. The fact that the way we speak has the ability to bring in
positive or negative forces into this world should not faze us. The
concepts of tahor and
tumah and their
effects on the foods, objects, and people should certainly be easier
for us to visualize. However to use science as anything more than a
moshol and instead use
it as a standard of not believing until it is fully exposed, is
incorrect; that would be a scientific approach to a spiritual idea.
The
reality is that it is only us with our minute levels of bitachon
(belief) that these questions
even need to be asked and answered so delicately. The gemara7
discusses a number of people such as the Romans who challenged the
chochomim of the time
with questions such as “How do you know t'chiyas
ha'meisim (resurrection of the
dead) is true? The answers that the chochomim responded
with do not include long proofs, rather simple passukim
alluding to a time when the
deceased will join us again. This is because really, we have it all
backwards. Our Torah contains all the secrets of the world, and
everything in it is by definition the ultimate proof of something
being real. Everything else is an allusion. Science is what needs to
keep up with reality, the Torah is already there. Raindrops stick to
windshields so a fact is stated regarding the effect of water on
glass, until a new development is made or a stronger microscope is
created and one sees that all it has to do with is how hydrophobic a
surface is – which depends on its molecular structure. In a few
more years, more developments will be made and the facts of today
will be thrown out and new ones will take their place. One day
certain foods are cancerous and others help lose weight, and the next
day it turns out the exact opposites are found to be true. Science is
always struggling to keep up with the times finding explanations,
while the timeless Torah is already there. In the end of the day
things exist and have the properties they do because Hashem willed
them as such. Teva is
all an allusion, and therefore the rules behind them can never be
facts. They will have guidelines to human eyes, but those who cling
to the Torah, will experience a world where believing is seeing
instead of having to depend on the constant changing and inaccurate
lifestyle of seeing is believing.
In
the end of the day, questions such as this have little application to
us because our job is not to fill the role of G-d and therefore it is
irrelevant to us how to be able to explain wonders He is capable of
doing such as being outside of time and space. In fact we are
encouraged to not even think of such things because they have little
to do with helping us perform mitzvos and
accomplish what we are here to do. However, to those of us who have
the questions we must be honest with ourselves why we have them.
Rabbi
Shafier, in a shmuz, relates a story about Rav Chaim Volozhin who was
once approached by a student who had left his Yeshiva during the time
of the Enlightenment. This student said to Rav Chaim that he
wanted to return to yeshiva but had many questions he needed answers
to first. Rav Chaim asked him to clarify if these were questions he
had before he even left yeshiva or ones he thought of after leaving.
The student asked back that he does not understand what difference it
would make – they were questions he had regardless. Rav Chaim
explained, “If these questions bothered you before you left
yeshiva, then they are questions and for questions there are answers.
However, if these questions only began troubling you after you left
yeshiva then they are not questions, they are answers. and answers do
not have answers.
We
must be honest with ourselves when asking these questions if we are
doing so out of curiosity and a love for appreciating how Hashem
interacts on such a personal level with this world, or if we are
asking them as answers – excuses we make for ourselves to feel more
comfortable with decisions we made or things we would like to do
which go against the Torah.
The
mishna8
lists the 48 necessary middos to
acquire Torah. Two of them are anavah
and yirah. Living
correctly in this world and being a proper recipient of Torah
requires one to have an approach of humility and fear. Humility in
recognizing Hashem's fantastic and intricate role in the world, as
well as fear that even the things we cannot see or perhaps even
understand are not only a
reality, but the only
reality. Seeing is a very basic and wavering form of believing; but
believing fully in the Torah is the truest form of seeing.
1Nedarim
39b
2Koheles
1:9-10
3Avos
5:8
4For
example, Rashi
5See
Emes L'Yaakov on Pirkei
Avos who brings from the Ralbag
in Malachim 1
22:38 in toeles 24,
that it is not so that the mouth of the earth had a preset timer
from the time of Bereishis,
rather the mouth of the world was created in general to be reserved
for a time when it would be necessary. It did not have to be Korach
to be swallowed by it, but because of Korach's personal decisions,
he fit the bill and activated it.
6In
America this was finalized on March 19, 1918 when US Congress
adopted Standard Zone Time in the Standard Time Act.
7Sanhedrin
90a-90b
8Avos
6:5
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