VaEtchanan


Verse per verse: The Weekly Storah

By Lauviticus

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The swan song of Moses continues this week, as the Book of Words rolls on and the aged leader narrates the history of his people, and his own roller coaster of a journey. Standing on a mountaintop overlooking Canaan, he begins chapter 3 with a heart wrenching plea to enter the Promised Land. Access, however, will be denied, and the depth of Moses’ despair is echoed in the first word of this week’s episode, named for this prayer, ‘Va’etchanan’ – ‘And I pleaded’. But there is more to that word in its original Hebrew than this translation, one of many, conveys. A closer look intensifies this moment, and reveals, perhaps, a glimpse at the inner paths of the human soul as it engages in the mysterious act called ‘prayer’.
The Book of Words, chapter 3, verse 27: ‘And I besought the LORD at that time;’ (JPS translation) The Artscroll Stone Torah translates as ‘And I implored’, the Fox translation is ‘pleaded’, others translate as ‘begged’ ‘entreated’, ‘supplicated’, and ‘beseeched.’ The Aramaic translation elaborates: ‘And I prayed and sought mercy in that hour’.
The Hebrew word Va’etchanan, is singular – only appearing in this rare moment, when Moses is literally on the edge, desperate to fulfill his last wish and complete the journey. The word stems from the root of a Hebrew word that describes, poetically, both verbal and physical meanings of this verb: to bend or stoop in kindness to an inferior; to favor, bestow; causatively to implore , and also -to pitch a tent; generally to encamp (for abode or siege)’

The acts of pitching a tent and begging for kindness may seem like two very different actions, but they meet here, portraying a moment of deep devotion and full commitment.
The expression ‘making a pitch’, familiar from sports, business deals, and philanthropic efforts, may be a modern one, but it also applies powerfully to this ancient moment. Moses is making his last pitch, camping in his tent of protest before the Highest Authority.

But the protests and prayers are to no avail. Sometimes, Promised Lands have to remain a desired distance. The hero’s journey, depicted here by the personal story of Moses, ends at the edge of the possible.

Mystical writings discuss Moses’ denied entry as ‘The mystery of the locked garden’, exploring a deeper layer of this story’s spiritual meanings and applications. There’s something about this moment of deep yearning, of fragile impermanence, regardless of the result, that we all know.
Next time you make a pitch, for whatever is your version of a promised land, learn from the old man, and go at it as about to bend reality, pitching a new tent on the summit of possibilities. And, forget about the result, it doesn’t have to end like it did for Moses. And how DOES this story end? Stay tuned for further installments…

Word


Verse per verse: The Weekly Storah

By Lauviticus

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The fifth and last book of Moses opens with his proclamation – THESE ARE THE WORDS… But this, of course, is the inadequate English translation of an original Hebrew concept that means more than merely an abstract verbal notion. In Biblical Hebrew, the same word for ‘words’ – DVARIM - can also mean ‘objects’ or ‘things’. Not terribly surprising in a culture where the world is created by word – by Divine speech. Instant weight is built into these final words of the prophet – words that bear gravity and will be henceforth considered as if ‘written in stone’. In this context, and perhaps in others, we are reminded of the power of words to shape reality, for better or worse.

The official English name of this book – Deuteronomy – meaning ‘the Secondary Torah’ originates from the Latin, and refers to this book’s repetition of the previous two books. But a closer read reveals more than a repetition. Moses’ swan song is a mixture of rant and litany, complete with harsh lashings, pithy poetry and words that mean more than meets the eye.

Take for example the question ‘HOW’, asked by an angry Moses as he recounts his early burn-out days, before delegating an elaborate judicial system that will ease his burden of leadership:

How can I myself alone bear your cumbrance, and your burden, and your strife? Dvarim 1:12

The Hebrew word for ‘how’ is Eycha, at first glance merely a question, but at closer read, a loaded lament. Eycha is the first word of the Scroll of Lamentations – the English name of the Biblical book that is originally named after that first word - The scroll of Eycha. The ‘how’ in that context is a scream in the face of destruction: How lonely sits the destroyed city of Jerusalem, how could this have happened? This coming week, on the Ninth of Av (July 23) , Jews will sit on the floor of their synagogues and read this lament to candlelight. The ‘how’ has extended to include every known calamity in Jewish history, and also to offer each of us time to ponder very personal reckonings of difficult questions about the world and about our lives - big questions that we don’t normally dare ask.

But Eycha is more than an angry or heartbroken question that is perhaps directed towards God – it is in fact an answer to a question asked by God much earlier in the story. Right after Adam & Eve eat from that fruit and hide in the garden, God’s voice calls to them: Ayecha? Where are you? It is the same word, spelled a little differently - and almost the same terrible question.

In some congregations it is customary to chant Moses’ question – only this one verse in the Torah potion of ‘Dvarim’ - in the same sad trope as that of the Eycha Scroll, thus mentally preparing the community for the upcoming 24 hour fast. This quaint custom, highlighting one word in a ritualistic way, links Moses, and us, through the spoken and chanted word, to a destroyed Jerusalem and an Eden left behind.

In his commentary on the first verse of Dvarim, Rashi, the French Torah interpreter wrote: ‘These are the words - all Israel were gathered to hear the repetition from the mouth of Moses himself and make sure there are no contradictions.’

How can we be sure that the words we’ve received, the teachings, laws, and legends are exactly what we need in order to lead the healthy and helpful lives we all yearn for? Rashi paints the picture of a community demanding to see the words formed out of the mouth of the lawmaker – concrete evidence of authority and integrity. Nowadays, all we have are the inherited words – once spoken, now printed, solid artifacts; words truly turned into things, but at the same time - transcending space and time.

Stay tuned to a book full of words that probe and ponder, heal and reveal, reviewing the ongoing journey of a people towards a future where –here’s hoping - the land is a promise, the temple never topples, and every word counts.

Carnal


Verse per verse: The Weekly Storah

By Lauviticus

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For the past few weeks, billboards in NY and LA portray the disturbing image of a young woman’s face, fenced in; smeared mascara, a black tear running down her cheek. ‘CAPTIVITY’ is the only word on the poster, promoting some new movie. Whatever this motion-picture is about, the picture alone is a stark and painful reminder of how many women, worldwide, are held captive by greed, abuse, power and cruelty. In Jerusalem, this past week, the fifth annual conference held by Kolech – An Orthodox Women’s Forum, called for the formation of alternative and more liberal ‘batei din’ –courts of Jewish law. Under Israeli law, marriage and divorce are handled by the rabbinate’s religious courts, where Orthodox and nowadays – Ultra Orthodox – is the Law. In the cases of divorces and marital financial settlements, those laws represent an archaic and problematic system that rarely favors the woman. Backed by an impressive array of moderate Israeli rabbis, this feminist organization is part of a growing movement to free women – and men – from the captivity of notions and norms that belong to the past and prevent us from a freer and just future. Whatever the result of this campaign – the call alone is an important reminder of how the problems must be clearly addressed and the dirty laundry aired in order to clean the slate and implement change.

Similarly, in this week’s Torah Episode, Matot-Massey, the last of the Book of Wilderness, a terrible tale of captivity and violence demands attention – a big pile of very bloody, dirty, laundry. We examine this tale, cautiously, through the various translations of one loaded Hebrew term, describing ‘carnal relations with a male.’

The context: 12,000 Hebrew soldiers launch war on the Midianties – another dark chapter in the long saga of desert politics. They kill all the men, returning triumphant to camp, carrying their booty of property and captive women and children. Moses, himself married to a woman of Midyan, is furious, and demands retribution for the seduction by the women of Midyan several chapters ago. Seemingly of his own mind (God doesn’t intervene), he orders the following:

Chapter 31 verses 17- 18: “Slay every male among the children, and also slay every woman who has known a man carnally. But spare every young woman who has not had carnal relationships with a man." (JPS translation) Richard Friedman translates as ‘known a male for male intercourse’. The Artscroll Stone translation is even worse – expanding the list of executed women to include ‘every woman fit to know a man by lying with a male’. Is it virgins or potential virgins who are guilty of ‘intercourse’ and worthy of death?

The Hebrew term here is MISHKAV ZACHAR - usually discussed in a homosexual context but clearly here separating girls from women, making virginity the critical selection marker. The fulfillment of this terrible decree is not described, but when the booty is tallied up several verses later, 32,000 virgins are accounted for (as well as, among others, 675,000 sheep)

In many of the contemporary editions of the Bible, translators and commentators pause here, sharing shock, insight and indignation. Robert Alter writes: ‘It is painfully evident that this is an instance in which biblical outlook sadly failed to transcend its historical contexts.’

But historical interpreters of Torah, such as Rashi and the Pseudo Jonathan translation don’t express any moral dilemma. They expand the story by quoting a Talmudic narrative from tractate Yevamot that explains how Moses knew which of the Midyanite girls was or wasn’t a virgin: ‘but every female child you shall present before the High Priest, who will be wearing his Crown of Holiness, and he and look upon her: she who is not a virgin will be pallid in the face, but she who is a virgin child will blush in the face, like fire; them you shall spare. ‘

Sometimes dirty laundry is more like many, many skeletons in the ark. This lesser known and somewhat repressed and terrible moment in the career of Moses and the annals of the wanderings of Israel through the wilderness of Sinai is perhaps just another reminder of how much of our present is carried over from our past. How much of the Jewish collective consciousness is still formed and informed by these narratives in which a woman is but seduction, danger, property? Where sex is a threat and ethnic cleansing, human traffic and murder of children is condoned? How many billboards and hostile rabbinic courts still hold us captive to this hostile past?

Perhaps by opening these stories up for new and critical interpretations we expose the wounds and begin a process of healing. As the Orthodox Women’s Forum demonstrated this week – airing dirty laundry is a crucial step towards having clean sheets. We leave this fourth book of Moses behind this week, and with it, hopefully, the continued journey towards the utopian vision of promised lands and new beginnings, wrestling with our mixed bag of memories.

But tell us, how, from now on, do we look Moses in the eyes?

Massacre


Verse per verse: The Weekly Storah

By Lauviticus

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Just when you thought things can’t get wilder in the Book of Wilderness, sex, politics, and fanatic violence tip the scales. What else is new. Last week’s Torah episode ends with a cliff hanger – a bloody ‘coitus interruptus’ between a Hebrew leader and a princess of Midyan. It is likely that this public sex act pushed pious buttons not only for its crossing of boundaries between Hebrew and Heathen but also because it represented an idolatrous moment – the ‘Hieros Gamos’ - symbolic union of Male and Female, as celebrated, often, in the pagan world. The two pay with their lives for this moment of passion and/or devotion. Pinchas, a Levite, the man for whom this weekly Torah portion is named, pierces them both with a spear, instantly stopping what seemed to have been an out of control orgiastic party. The next thing we find out is that 24,000 people are dead – victims of a mysterious ‘plague’.

Wait, what plague? There is no clear explanation in this context, and we wonder if this may be not just a case of odd translation but, possibly, an even older version of a ‘intra-translation’ - a political ‘cover up’, where mass murder is disguised as a disease. Was it an epidemic? Is it Divine retribution? Who were killed and who did the killing? We will probably never know, but what strikes us as relevant is the way some events are named and remembered, and the way that those in power get to tell the story and to title inconvenient tragedies, then and now.

Chapter 26, verse 19 comes in after it is all over, with one of the shortest and most chilling verse in Torah: ‘And it came to pass, after the Plague:’

Every single Biblical translation we’ve checked uses the word ‘Plague”, indicating a ‘force-major’ of some sort. But the Hebrew word MAGEFA could also be translated as ‘affliction’ or ‘calamity’ or any form of ‘fatal interruption’. It could also mean ‘the killing’.

As soon as the plague is done, Moses is instructed to count the people, taking stock, perhaps of losses. Rashi, the 11th century French interpreter of Torah remarks:’ This is like a shepard who counts his sheep after the wolf has attached the flock.’

This is a sad image, especially coming from the pen of a man who has witnessed the horrendous repercussions of the first crusade. Rashi seems to imply that the dead Hebrews are victims of a terrible misfortune, but what is one to do with the preceding two verse in which a revenge on Midyan is ordered, a counter attack to balance out the ‘plague’? Could the dead 24,000 have been the victims of a war, or even an intra tribal civil war, severely repressed? The killing by Pinchas, blessed by God, seems to indicate that some sort of bloodshed took place that day.

In his commentary on this verse, Richard Friedman writes ‘ the plague is a direct, unannounced consequence of the violation of the holy place..’ and as such, whether the bloodthirsty act of fanatics like Pinchas or a mysterious Divinely ordained wiping out of the bad guys – many people died, enough to be noted, counted, and remembered. So, who’s to say? In a world where torture is sometimes referred to as ‘interrogation’ and murdered political prisoners are labeled ‘missing’, this possibly twisted truth, is, sadly, no news. It is likely that more happened here, at this biblical moment in time, than anybody wishes to really remember. This makes us think of Albert Camus, and his book ‘the plague’, where he claims that perseverance in the face of tragedy is a noble struggle even if it ultimately fails to make an appreciable difference.

But can we make a difference, and change the course our story is taking? We believe that we may not be able to alter the inherited, abusive text, but we do have the obligation to ask the hard questions, acknowledge the skeletons in our closet, and make room for a future healed of this abuse. We’d like to walk a path where the Pinchas archetype is not honored anymore. And so we continue to wrestle with the Book of Wilderness, slowly making our way to the Promised Land of high hopes. Stay tuned for next week where more difficult questions arise and an ancient journey takes us one step closer to where we’d really like to be.

Satan


Verse per verse: The Weekly Storah

By Lauviticus

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It doesn’t get much wilder than this in the Book of Wilderness – a talking donkey, a prophetic drama, and the début appearance of one of Western Mythology’s favorites – Satan himself. But you wouldn’t know if from reading any of the English translations of the Bible, where the Lord of Darkness is consistently referred to as ‘the adversary’. To be fair, and with respect to all English translators – this is a valid literal translation of an obscure Hebrew word, but nevertheless, the concept of obstruction on the way towards fulfilling one’s mission in life pops up in this week’s Torah Episode ‘Balak’ - somehow lost (or covered up) in translation.

The book of Wilderness, chapter 22, tells of Balaam, the Prophet of Midyan, a hired gun in the hands of the King of Maob, eager to curse the People Israel. Balaam refuses to cooperate, but at night, while dreaming, he is ordered by God to accompany the messengers of the King and to await further instructions. Balaam, obedient, sets out and quietly rides his donkey on verse 21, when the following happens in verse 22:

"But YHWH's anger flared up because he was going, so YHWH's messenger stationed himself in the way as an adversary to him." This is the Fox translation, while the Stone Artscroll replaces ‘messenger’ with ‘angel’ and ‘adversary’ with ‘impede’: "G-d's wrath flared because he was going, and an angel of HASHEM stood on the road to impede him.’

The word for ‘messenger’ is ‘Malach’ is often translated as either Angelic being OR human messenger, but the word for ‘adversary’ is unique - ‘Satan’, to be later identified as the being also known as the ‘Angel of Death’.

In Hebrew, Satan is derived from the root meaning "to oppose", "to be an adversary" or "to act as an adversary". The image is paradoxical and startling: A mysterious being is blocking the path of a prophet who is sent on this journey by the very Deity that now summons the obstacle – the Satanic. It seems that Satan, in this early incarnation, is an integral, antagonistic part of God. Perhaps, psychologically, this Satan represents a part of the Whole, of Life itself – an allegorical representation of conflicting ‘obstacles’ in one’s life. This type of obstacle, however, has a message to deliver – it’s a roadblock that may seem like an adversary but is actually an important road sign, possibly a blessing in disguise.

Interestingly, it is the donkey (a female), and not the prophet, who recognizes this obstacle, and stubbornly refuses to move on: Satan is standing in a very narrow path, brandishing a drawn sword. The irony of a seeing donkey and a blind visionary has been interpreted by mystical commentaries to represent the dialectics between body and soul, intuition and intellect, matter and spirit. Balaam and his ass are a metaphor for the human journey - conflicted, challenged, confused, and traveling a narrow path sometimes strewn with unseen obstacles. Later on in history and mythlogy this condition will become known as ‘Satan’, a very complex and dark concept, but for now it is simply an invisible force blocking one’s path. Sound familiar? Remember the last time you met IT on your path?

Balaam didn’t see it at first, but finally, when the ass speaks, he gets it, opens his eyes, hears the message: Go on your path, but obey your conscious, your moral code.

And that’s exactly what he does next, turning curses into blessings.

Confused? Welcome to Jewish mythology and to the Book of Wilderness, where the wild things are, and where secrets and great truths hide, as they always do, inside fables, on the road to prophecy. No wonder most English translations remove Satan from this story, it’s complicated enough.. Stay tuned to next week’s exploration of ‘miracles’, as the wild ride continues.

Bards of Battle


Verse per verse: The Weekly Storah

By Lauviticus

Apologies: this week's Verse per Verse will not feature an audio teaching, as Lauviticus is traveling.

War provides plenty of pain for many and plenty of profit for few. You wouldn't think that poetry is one of those profitable by-products of war, but the Bible seems to think so, or at least so do some of the Biblical translators, who offer an odd spin on an odd word popping up in 'Chukat', this week's installment of the Torah. The context is wartime, as the People Israel get closer to the promised land and the locals are less than thrilled. This weekly tale marks two VIP deaths - Miriam and Aaron - but also informs us of countless deaths of nameless men, women, and children - victims of the war on Canaan. One of those battles is the one with the Emorites, which began as a hostile exchange when Moses requested permission to cross through their land and King Sihon refused and launched an attack. The Emorites lost badly, their cities were taken over by the tribes of Israel, and this is where the poets come in. Or are they journalists? Or official spokesmen? Somehow we get a glimpse into the ancient craft of media in action - translating the horrors of the battlefield into poetry and/or propaganda for the masses. How vast - or not - is the difference between poet and reporter? This bloody text perhaps suggests an answer.

Chapter 21 in the book of Wilderness describes the fall of Heshbon, the Emorite capitol city, and goes on to provides us with a quote from the local poetry of the defeated Emorites themselves - devoting six biblical verses to an obscure epic poem (that sounds like a tourism campaign) praising the city that by then lies in ruins. Verse 27, according to the JPS translation frames it thus:
'Therefore the bard would recite: Come to Heshbon, firmly built and well founded is Sihon's city'.

The word for 'bards' is the Hebrew 'MOSHLIM', translated elsewhere as 'parable makers', 'they that speak in proverbs', 'poets', or 'rhapsodes'. The Hebrew stems from the word 'MASHAL' - that could mean parable, proverb, riddle or allegory. In this case, the poem or parable is nothing more than a taunting rhyme glorifying Emorite victory - quoted later by the Hebrews to showcase their own triumph. Maybe this is the poetic justice - the parable implied - every triumph can result in loss - beware. Reading this in the 21st century - aware of what's going on in Gaza, Baghdad or Darfur - to name just a few war torn regions - the ominous message of the parable is perhaps not lost, but certainly not heeded.

The bards were likely killed though their words survived, and their legacy, amazingly, lingers to tell us something about the role of truth telling in the aftermath of war. The word Moshlim can indeed by translated as 'poets' but it can also be translated, with creative license, as 'rulers' or 'governors'. And since history is always written by the winners, we have here a rare usage of biblical irony - the winners using the triumphant poetry of the former winners to glorify their own story of success. The way you tell the story will determine what really happened - the poet (or media) becomes ruler.

And so, onwards the wild wild east of Sinai travel the weary people Israel, battle will follow battle, as the promised land of milk and honey will beckon closer yet. At rare moments poetry will prosper to give perspective, inspire hope, reflect and guide their journey. The fifth book of Moses, coming soon, is one long litany, and next week, the prophet Balaam will provide some of the most memorable poetic lines in the Bible. So what is it about war, strife and the emergence of poetry? And where, in today's reality, where khaki clad media stars report live from the front line, does the poetry linger? And where, in our personal lives, does suffering inspire rhyme and parables of hope? We would like to believe that precisely from the ruins of demolished cities emerge the type of poetry that ignite a new reality in which we will all march to the beat of a different drum.

Phenomenon


Verse per verse: The Weekly Storah

By Lauviticus

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This week in the West Bank and Gaza a bloody war is waged – Hamas Vs. Fatah, and it is not clear who are the rebels and who is in charge. Bloodshed in Gaza may sadly not seem as a new phenomena but this level of civil war is defiantly making front page news. Somewhere between mythology and politics, this week’s Torah Episode ‘Korach’ is a sad nod to the history of political factions shedding blood, as it introduces the first public assault on the Moasic administration, a (some say) valid democratic motion that was fatally squashed with Divine intervention. If one is to take sides on this ancient battle, then the official party line is NOT pro rebels. But alas, underdog fans that we are, and especially in these heating up political days, we are not quite sure whether the Korachites and co. who will be mysteriously killed again this coming Saturday at every synagogue where the story will be repeated were guilty of heresy or simply of bad PR. The Divine, however, had quite a firm opinion on this matter and provided a unique and singular sensation to deal with this political opposition – a form of execution so bizarre it was simply referred to as ‘phenomenon’. But, of course, translations differ, and once again, more is hidden here that beckons the seeker of secrets.

The context: Moses has been challenged by his cousin Korach, another Levite, to share power with the other tribal leaders. Moses is outraged and in chapter 16 of the book of Wilderness delivers a passionate speech. It concludes with the proclamation/warning that Divine judgment will settle this dispute and deal with the rebels, once and for all:

16:30 But if the LORD make a new thing, and the ground open her mouth, and swallow them up, with all that appertain unto them, and they go down alive into the pit, then ye shall understand that these men have despised the LORD.'

According to this translation – the JPS – a ‘new thing’ is to be made by the Lord, looking like the ground opening ‘her mouth’ to swallow up the bad guys. Is this an odd way to describe a local earthquake?

The Hebrew word used here, and ONLY here throughout the Bible, is BRIAA – literally – ‘creation’, translated elsewhere as ‘Novelty’, ‘New creation’, ‘something unheard of’, or ‘phenomenon’.

The tricky thing is that the word BRIAA stems from the same root that describes the very creation of the world back at the beginning of Genesis. SO – is this earthquake an afterthought? Was it ‘created’ just in time for this political crisis? What is the unique feature of this terrible event?

From a mythic point of view, Jewish scholarship has held that indeed Korach was a unique case, swallowed up whole by the ‘mouth of the earth’ – which opened and then closed again - just this once. The earth’s mouth, according to this Talmudic legend, was created on the first Friday of Creation, just before Sunset, and set aside for this and only this occasion. This way, the Talmudic sages solved the problem – it was a NEW creation – but already planned for at the beginning of time.



The Pseudo Jonathan translation however, goes political, not mythic, when translating this verse to his contemporary audience, who then, like now understood the relevant implications of this story: "But if a death which has not been created since the days of the world be now created for them, and if a mouth for the earth, which has not been made from the beginning of the world, be created now, and the earth open her mouth and swallow them and all they have, and they go down alive into Sheol, you will understand that these men have provoked the Lord to anger."



The implication here is clear – some actions deserve similar repercussions, and a rebellion against God’s Authorized Leadership is punishable in mythic proportions.

In today’s political climate one would hope for a more benign method of dealing with opposition, but, we wonder, what IS the modern equivalent of being swallowed up alive by a new and unimagined form of humiliation and/or extinction? Certainly the news from the Middle East leave one hoping for humanity learning from the past, and finding new ways of dealing with opposition and conflict.

As for Korach’s legacy, it lives on. He may have paid with his life and the lives of his followers for challenging Moses, but some say his sons did not die. If you listen closely, you can hear them sing. Open the psalms for a long list of hymns composed by Korach’s lines of Levites. Some rebellions get swallowed up but the music, apparently, lives on, every time a new creation.

Shabbat shalom

Fallen


Verse per verse: The Weekly Storah

By Lauviticus

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About a month ago, three of the Ten Republican candidates for presidency raised their hand in reply to the oddly phrased question – “Is there anyone on the stage who does not believe in evolution?" Meanwhile, the Democratic candidates confessed their ‘journeys of faith’ - especially at difficult times. Faith, creationism, and biblical defined family values are definitely on stage in the current national political arena, more than ever before with the Bible becoming much more than just a book held by those who are sworn into office. What, one wonders, do either camps do with a puzzling verse from this week’s Torah Episode that flaunts reason and describes mythic creatures that are best described as ‘giants’? Yet again, one word, lost in translation, opens up a portal to a complex narrative that challenges the assumption of what is or isn’t ‘real’.

The context: Ready to explore the Promised Land prior to conquest, the People Israel send over a delegation of spies, who, upon return, share a mixed review. 10 of the 12 give it a ‘thumbs down’: the land is good, but the indigenous people are bad news. There are, in fact, giants, waiting in Canaan. Or so, at least some English translations, while most refrain from translating the Hebrew word and retain the original - Nephilim. A closer look at this unique word unfolds a bizarre and obscure legend, where Sinai becomes the roaming ground of creatures as literally ‘fabled’ as Shrek. Well, maybe we don’t get ogres in the Torah, but an extinct species that has been identified and interpreted as either fallen angels, supermen, or aliens (!) - shows up in what biblical scholar E. Cassuto described as ‘one of the most puzzling passages in the Bible.’

The book of Wilderness, chapter 13, verse 23 describes the report of the returning spies – this is the King James Bible version:
‘And there we saw the giants, the sons of Anak, which come of the giants: and we were in our own sight as grasshoppers, and so we were in their sight.’

The Pseudo Jonathan Aramaic translation goes a step further, attributing behavioral ways and racial origins: ‘…and all the people who are in the land are giants, masters of evil ways, of the race of the giants.’

The word ‘Nephhilim’ rarely occurs in the Bible, probably stemming from the primitive Semitic root NFL -‘to fall down’ - in a great variety of applications such as – ‘fallen’, ‘dropped’ or even ‘inferior’, or ‘aborted’.

Where have these giants fallen from? And/or is this a way of saying they are now extinct? Aborted experiments? Genesis 6:2 gives a clue – describing another mythic mystery - the union of the ‘sons of God with the daughters of men’ a union leading to a new race of hybrids – the original Nephillim. The Aramaic translation over there suggests this radical version: ‘the sons of God are the angels known as Shmachzai and Azaael, who have fallen from heaven, and descended in those days upon the earth.’ Fallen angles? They do not show up explicitly in the Torah, but do appear in the Judaic oral tradition, and by the time Christian theology comes around the myth of ‘renegade angels’ that defy God and fall down to earth becomes a very popular story. In fact, it becomes more than just a story – it becomes a way to explain evil on earth – some of us are children of Eve and Adam, but some – according to this narrative – are the children of a different and dark union, the descendents of the Nephillim, who are of the seed of bad angels.

Back to our story: Giants or angels, and according to some conspiracy theorists – aliens who ‘fell’ from the sky – are what the spies see when the view their new reality in Canaan. Either way, they are terrified – and see themselves as insignificant insects in the sight of their potential enemies. Were there real giants there? Sons of evil angels? Giant sculptures that the desert dwellers mistook for people? Or is this an exaggerated report from a group of leaders who are afraid of the future and prefer to cling to the past?
Perhaps this story reflects the way we view ‘other’ and chart our future journeys into unknown territories. When are opponents projected upon to become giant threats when perhaps all they present is simply a new paradigm?

This reminds us of the quote attributed to Bernard of Charters, a 12th century monk - ‘We are like dwarfs standing upon the shoulders of giants, and so able to see more and see farther than the ancients."

As each of us journeys towards our version of a Promised Land – who or what are the giants that await? Or are we sitting on their shoulders??

Shabbat shalom!

Big Mouth

Verse per verse: The Weekly Storah

By Lauviticus

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One of the appealing built-in features of Judaic thought is that the Divine, known colloquially as God, has no corporal form: God is an idea: abstract, meta-physical, impossible for accurate depiction. Funny thing is, if you read the Torah in its original Hebrew, God is very physical: has a hand, a nose, a behind – and very clearly in this week’s Episode ‘B’halot’cha ’ – a mouth, presumably big. But you wouldn’t know this seemingly ‘pagan’ concept from any of the translations into other languages. Consistently, and for thousands of years, translators have worked hard to hide this notion of the literally oral transmission of revelation, opting for abstract terms that mask the original. More is concealed here than just a word.

The Book of ‘In the Wilderness’, chapter nine, verse twenty three, for instance, narrates the procedure by which the people Israel went about the ongoing business of wandering in the desert – this is the King James version: ‘At the commandment of the LORD they rested in the tents, and at the commandment of the LORD they journeyed…’

The word ‘commandment’ translates the original Hebrew word ‘pi’ – ‘mouth’ (pronounced like the letter ‘P’). This translation is too radical for modern translators, as, for instance the Artscroll Torah translates this as ‘According to the word’, or the Fox version is ‘By order’. The classic Aramaic translation Jonathan Ben Uzziel extends the image in a very tantalizing and complex way: ‘By the mouth of the Word of the Lord they encamped’.

How complex the business of transmitting (or translating) the sacred wisdom – so much that such a rich image is concealed to be covered up by veils and metaphors. This is a fascinating example of how evolution is so much part of theology, philosophy – and translations, each influencing the other.

The interesting thing about the word ‘pi’ is that it doesn’t only mean ‘mouth’ but also ‘edge’ as in ‘the edge of a sword’. ‘The mouth of the sword’ is not idiom that exists in English, but it does repeat, dripping with blood, throughout the Torah – and the double edge of this word’s multiple meaning was probably not lost on the original Tellers and listeners of Torah. God’s word = lethal weapon.

Oy. To soften this sharp image, the next passage in the Torah goes musical - linking the divine command not to war – but to the blast of trumpets. Chapter 10 describes how the people Israel knew when to pack and when to park - they heard the blast of two ceremonial sliver trumpets. This ancient and elaborate public-address system was conducted by the Levites who were (supposedly) signaled by Moses – who got the OK from the very mouth of God. And since you gotta use your mouth to blow a trumpet, we like to imagine that good folks of the ancient People Israel, no theolgicans, happily assumed that God sounds like a trumpet, delivering them their marching orders. It’s a stretch – but not really. Surely music, symbolized here by the trumpets, is an element that gets us going on or settling down – markers on our journeys. From shofar to Oboe and all in between - music is one of the more powerful paths we have to savor the sacred, to hear the divine.

‘pi’ as ‘word’, ‘mouth’, or ‘sword’ is merely a portal, yet another opening into a vast wilderness of wandering and wondering, which still goes on, and is to be continued…

Shabbat Shalom

Heal the Zeal

Verse per verse: The Weekly Storah

By Lauviticus

Onwards thru Sinai march the twelve tribes of Israel, to each a flag, an emblem, an appointed leader. This sacred geometry, a conquering army on its way to a promised land, is described in the opening chapters of the fourth book of Torah, made complete by the presence of a unifying center: The Divine, represented by the Ark of the Covenant, the 'black box' of the people. Carrying and maintaining the ark are the hallowed members of the thirteenth tribe – Levi, taking care of business, i.e. the Tabernacle. All seems to be, literally, 'in order' in this new Mosaic theocracy on the move, but as soon as the Book of Wilderness ends its fourth chapter with a detailed description of each Levites' task list, it surprisingly leaves the serene scenes of the sacred center and goes south - right to the frayed fringes of camp, where order limps, and human messiness challenges the conceits of harmony.

Chapter 5, chanted this coming week in synagogues near you as part of the weekly Torah episode 'Naso', reports on four possible social situations that threaten the wellbeing of civilized society. Crudely translated, the four categories include lepers, criminals, monks - and 'wayward' wives. Seemingly random, these four categories reflect different deviations from the 'normal order of things' – through disease, crime, religious zeal, or sexual drive. All four suggest a possible shake-up of the delicate balance between order and chaos, culture and nature- a tension familiar to our modern societies and personal lives as it was to the reality of Moses and his often wayward people.


Our focus this week is, no surprise, the wayward and deviant – that mysterious woman: Did she or did she not have an affair? What's the story? Then there's the husband, suspicious but with no proof, having a 'fit of jealousy'. What to do? Addressing this potential soap opera, Moses, speaking for the Lord, doesn't say 'If this happens' – he says 'when this will happen'. Frank and realistic, he goes on to describe a complex procedure for alleviation of jealousy, addressing the timeless and all too human tensions between the domestic and the erotic. Analyzed through Humanistic and Feminist lenses, this weird text can certainly be seen as an intolerable, archaic relic. But, like many other biblical passages, this text has also been widely read as mythic allegory- the deviant 'feminine' representing the people Israel, the betrayed 'masculine' is Israel's God, and the lover as any of the 'other' idols, identities and foreign cultures favored so by endless generations of assimilating Jews. To read this text as literal legalism upholds a painful patriarchal reality where woman is property and sexuality merely a duty. The allegorical, mythic re-readings, on the other hand, free up some breathing space for a glimpse into deeper-than-surface implied meaning, hinting at our personal and perennial struggles with the boundaries of Eros.

The book says thus:

'Any man whose wife may stray and betray his trust…and it is a secret, and she is defiled, and there are no witnesses, and she is not apprehended - it is then that a spirit of jealousy may come over that man…' (12:14-15)



The English word 'spirit' as in 'spirit of jealousy' is based here on the Hebrew word 'Ruach' – meaning either a physical 'wind' or a metaphysical 'spirit'. Other translators choose 'fit of jealousy', 'a jealous rage', or 'jealous storm' to present this violent picture. Remember Othello? Not unlike an Opera, this imaginary husband's jealousy has larger than life proportions, possibly super human. The word 'Ruach' is loaded - appearing here and previously at the very beginning of Genesis - as the very wind or spirit of God hovering over the nascent planet.



To complicate things further - the Hebrew word used here for 'jealousy', such as that of a jealous lover or husband is 'KINAA ' the very word used in the Torah to describe religious zeal- known today as 'fundamentalism'. Even in English the words 'jealousy' and 'zealotry' come from the same Greek root – meaning 'fermentation', or 'yeast'.



The concept of a 'spirit of jealousy' as a metaphysical, fuming wind is one of the reasons this text is often read as metaphor for divine wrath, or, more significantly, as the type of zealotry assumed and experienced by men on behalf of their God. From the late Jerry Falwell to the new Al Queida forces in Lebanon, and the rising ranks of right wing Zionist rabbis in Israel - zeal as a tool of righteous anger is certainly no obscure phenomena.


So what are we to do, in this age of excessive religious zealotry, with a verse about an allegorical God who is like a jealous husband whose rage festers like rising bread?


Options include: A. avoiding this painful verse and chapter altogether, B. dismissing it as yet another archaic chauvinistic bit of judeo literary history, C. read it as mythic commentary, beckoning a redemptive closer read, or D. Listen closely to the wind as it waves the flags and penetrates the rank and file of the marching tribes; a wild wind of jealousy, zeal, passion and possible, painful, inevitable change, the product of every necessary deviation. Option E. – all of the above. Option F. - anyone??


To be continued.. Shabbat shalom.