"Torah Lights"
 
Video Insights on the Parsha
 
 by Rabbi Shlomo Riskin

Efrat, Israel: “G-d will purify our dross… and Jerusalem shall be called the City of Righteousness” (Isaiah 1:22,23) 

We begin reading the fourth book of the Pentateuch, BaMidbar, during the week in which we celebrate the Six Day War’s miraculous liberation of Jerusalem, the 28^th day of the Hebrew month Iyar 1967, which falls out towards the end of the sefirah count of the days leading up to Shavuot. Does this joyous festival, which we mark with the recitation of the full Hallel psalms of praise, just happen to fall out when it does by happenstance, both with respect to our Biblical weekly portion as well as to its place in the count of the days between our Festival of Freedom (Pesach) and the Festival of the first fruits (Shavuot)? Or is the history-directing finger of G-d very much in evidence here, teaching us a lesson which we can only ignore at the peril of our souls and our future existence as a nation?

The Biblical book of Exodus dramatically details the events leading up to, and immediately following, our exodus from Egyptian slavery, our emergence as a nation and our birth into freedom. We are soon elevated with the gift of the Revelation at Sinai, pledging to uphold the “ten moral words” which G-d bequeathed -- through us-- to humanity, the ethical teachings which add responsibility (aharayut) to freedom (herut), protecting His creation from descending into wanton debauchery and licentiousness (hefkerut). And, with the Israelite encampment arranged in a way so that the twelve tribes surround the Sanctuary of Sanctity in whose midst are sequestered the Sacred Ark with its precious tablets of stone, the nation is poised to enter the Promised Land and celebrate the Shavuot Feast of the First Fruits in the Temple to be established in Jerusalem. Indeed, the third book of Leviticus which we just completed reading, detailed the Sanctuary ritual and the Priestly Code, epicenter of what was scheduled to be a perfected world.

But alas, if it only took forty days for the Israelites to exit from Egypt, it would take forty years for Egypt to exit from the Israelites! Apparently freedom is a process, a journey, and the road from freedom promised (Festival of Matzot) to freedom achieved (Festival of the First Fruits) will not allow for any shortcuts. The book of BaMidbar documents this journey, serves as the bridge and segue between a Divine promise and its human realization, the Book of Leviticus establishing the vision with which to forge an enslaved nation into a sacred people, and the Book of Joshua a complete generation later, which documents Israel’s actual entry into the sacred land itself where our destiny would become manifest. The midbar, with its difficult climate and alien environment, serves as an excellent testing ground for the Divine Word (davar) to take root, for leadership (dabar) to develop and for sanctity (dvir) to emerge.  And until that happens, redemption will remain a far-off dream, and the vision of our covenant will not yet be realized. 

The deeds of the ancestors etched in the Bible foreshadow the experience of the descendants throughout the ages (ma’asei avot siman labanim). Yom Ha’atzmaut, Israeli Independence Day, echoes the Biblical Passover, our emergence as an alt-neu people after almost 2000 years of exile and enslavement; Yom Yerushalayim is our mandatory dream of the elusive goal of a City of Peace, a City of Righteousness which will influence the whole world to accept the morality of the Ten Commandments.  However, it is no wonder that the Temple Mount is not yet in our hands and the Third Temple is still a dream.

Now, just as in Biblical times, we apparently require a gestation period, a process of advance and retreat, a desert-like period of exorcizing the exile from the nation even after we have presumably returned home. And so, even while we take legitimate pride in our six decades plus of growth and accomplishment, economic development and high-tech expertise, an ingathering of millions of exiles who established a color continuum rather than a color divide, a network of unparalleled Torah Academies and Universities of Higher learning, an IDF which is our pride not only because of its Military power but also because of its moral sensitivity, its commitment to avoid collateral damage, I must admit that we also have reason to be ashamed.  

I am ashamed of past political leaders in the highest offices who have clouds of indictment for moral turpitude hovering over their heads; I am ashamed of a Chief Rabbinate judicial system which can summarily nullify the conversions of thousands of Israelis (even though they were performed by a Court of Torah Scholars), demonstrating crass indifference to the lives they are thereby destroying, utterly disregarding the manifold Biblical directives of how we are to love the stranger, the proselyte; I am ashamed of the Religious Court Judges who, in the name of the “purity” of Israel, are impervious to the cries of abused women who are forced captives to husbands who either refuse to grant their wives a divorce or hold up a high ransom for granting these ‘enslaved’ women their freedom; I am ashamed that our political and religious leaders answer to a Party rather than a constituency, that too many of our politicians are motivated by personal profit rather than the words of the prophets, and that so many religious Judges seek grace in the eyes of those to their religious right rather than in the eyes of the Almighty G-d Above who hears the cries of the strangers and the grass widows. Most of all, I am ashamed that these “leaders” are not ashamed.

So what then gives my heart a spring of optimistic faith for our future? Thank G-d I’m not a politician but an educator in constant contact with our magnificent and idealistic youth still ready to sacrifice their lives for a miracle country which stands up to terrorism as it reaches for the elusive dream of a holy and united Jerusalem celebrating the Festival of the First Fruits in total peace. On Yom Yerushalayim we have the privilege to be inspired by what uplifts us and not daunted by what shames us.

And I believe in our prophets, specifically the prophet Isaiah, who railed against backsliding “ministers” who loved bribes and self-righteous judges who refused to take up the cause of the oppressed but who nevertheless promised that at the end of the process, on the other side of the desert, G-d will “return His hand upon us and purify our dross…, restore our judges as they were of old,” and then Jerusalem shall be called City of the Righteousness, a Municipality of Faithfulness…” Zion shall be redeemed by justice and those who return to her by righteousness (Isaiah 1:22,23,26,27).  And we must make that happen as soon as possible!

Shabbat Shalom and Yom Yerushalayim Sameach!

 

 

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