Parshat Hukas
Andrea Luna
1. Num. 19:1-22: The Red Heifer and the preparation of what is often translated as the “water of sprinkling” or “the water of lustration”. The Hebrew actually reads as the “water of nidah/separation (Num 19:13). Commentators call this a classic example of a HUKKAH, a commandment for which there is no rational explanation, observed because it is divinely commanded. It may have reference to other, older pre-Mosaic rituals and cult practices.
- the nearly- impossible-to-perform commandment: according to Rabbi Meir, “in all of Jewish history only seven heifers were burned” but according to Parah, a treatise in the Mishneh and the Tosefeta (included in the order Tohorot ), one was prepared by Moses, five in the time after Ezra,, and one more, the last, will be prepared by the Messiah (Yad, Para Adumah 3:4, EJ, and JE). Although it was impossible to prepare the ashes of the red heifer after the destruction of the temple, its use didn’t stop, since there was a supply of the ashes, containing, it is said, ashes from Moses time, used until the Amoraic period. (Nid. 6b, EJ)
- a paradox: the red heifer purifies the defiled and defiles the pure that perform the ritual.
- the ritual parts that are burnt are symbols that have an archetypal potency and resonance in extant older cultic traditions:
- the purely red virgin cow
- aromatic cedar wood
- hyssop, “ezeb”, an herb used for purifying, tonic, inflammation, infections, a wide range of conditions; used by the Israelites to daub the blood of the sacrificed lamb to keep away the Angel of Death before leaving Egypt.
- crimson thread : sacred thread/ umbilicus to the ancestors; red/ blood of the mother, now presented as representing sin…
These ashes are combined with spring water (mayim hayim). The ashes are kept and used for ritual washing and purification for those who have touched dead bodies.
2. Num 20:1: Miriam the Prophetess Dies : N’VIAH: See “An Overview:Tanach, “Textbook of the Soul”, II Prophecy– “Essential to understanding to Tanach is the concept of prophecy…. Prophets did not necessarily predict the future…their greatness was personal. Indeed, prophets were known as ‘seers’ (I Samuel 9:9), because they were people to whom God had given insight far beyond that of ordinary people…and, the prophets elevated the nation simply by being role models of holiness, scholarship and closeness to God”. (Tanach, Art Scroll, Mesorah, NY, 2000).
Upon first reading of the text, there appears to be no mourning period for Miriam, which could be seen as a glaring omission, because of her relationship to Moses, and as a Prophetess and spiritual leader of her tribe. She was a powerful active force in the destiny of Moses and the Israelite people. I discovered that at least one commentator (Josephus, “Antiquities” 1v.4, ref JE) says that Moses instituted the rite of the Red Heifer on the death of Miriam, the ashes of the first sacrifice being used to purify the people at the expiration of thirty days mourning.”
As I read this Parsha, I was struck again about the brevity of detail about Miriam. To fill in the blank spaces in the Torah story I looked to Midrash, and modern midrash, to the larger cultural context of the time, and within myself, for my “portion of Torah” as we pray for in the Amidah. Arthur Wascow, in “Making Midrash Anew in Our Time “ sees the process of making modern midrash is “what keeps Judaism alive.” He says that “for the Rabbis, the alternative to making midrash (in their time) would have been throwing out the text entirely. Same for us. …the rabbis are able to use the ancient texts as a screen through which they examine themselves and learn new wisdom---including new possibilities hidden within the text….just as the rabbis represented a new psycho-social character type come to the leadership of Israel, so what is happening right now, with women especially, but not only, is a new group of people with a new life-approach shaped by the heavy hand of Modernity, coming to a share of leadership and visibility--- in the people Israel,” (A. Wascow, www.shalom center.org)
Shoshana Weiner, sees Miriam as an “Ancestor Guide” and the “Mayim Hayim” as a name for God’s presence in The Fifty-Eighth Century, A Jewish Renewal Sourcebook (1996, Aronsen, New Jersey). Certainly Miriam, sister of Moses and Aaron, was an important ancestress and religious cult leader from an early age in the Exodus generation. She was undoubtedly a strong presence among the powerful women who sustained the despairing Israelite men in Egypt.
“she is the one who retains a view of the continuity of Israelite history. She maintains a hope and insists that “fate” is never sealed. When she tells her father to remarry her mother, prophesizing that the child that would be born to them would be the liberator of Israel....It is the women’s view which is in tune with the divine perspective, against male resignation, thus enabling the birth of Moses and the exodus.” (“The Handmaiden, “The trickster and the Birth of the Messiah: A Feminist Reading of Midrash”, Charlotte Elisheva Fonbrot, (betdebora.de/2001/Jewish-family/fanbrot.htm).
The story of Miriam is a silent, but powerful, contrapuntal story in Torah.
Num 20:2- The Well of Miriam dries up-
The “miraculous” Well of Miriam that followed the Israelites for the 40 years in the wilderness was said to have been created on the twilight of the eve of the first Shabbat (Avot 5:6 {or 8} EJ), the 7th “day” of creation.
“Wherever the Israelites journeyed in the desert, the magical Well of Miriam emerged from beneath a rock. (Lev. Rabbah 22:4) The Midrash explains that they traveled from one destination to the next, rolling a large cone-shaped rock as part of their caravan of provisions. When they set up camp and erected the Tabernacle, this rock would be placed in the courtyard of the Tent of Meeting (Numbers Rabbah 1:4). Then the leaders and nobles of the tribes would gather around the stone and sing the song that Miriam wove into the consciousness of the people, (Numbers Rabbah 1:2), the same song she sang by the waters of the Red Sea when God said to Moses ( Numbers 21:17), ‘Assemble the people and I will give them water.’ Then Israel sang the song, ”Rise up, oh well, respond to her….’ (Numbers Rabbah 1:4) As the music resonated through the earth, the ground underneath the stone would open and reveal a well of rising water.” ( God, Sex and women of the Bible, Shoni Labowitz, Simon and Schuster, N.Y. 1998) By the time of her death, Miriam’s power was being eclipsed by the lineage being established by Moses who appointed her brother Aaron as head priest and the increasingly empowered the Levite priesthood.
Num 20:5: The people cry out for water
Num: 20:6- Moses and Aaron go to the Tent of Meeting and fall on their faces. God appears
Num 20:7-8: God tells Moses to take a staff, he and Aaron assemble the people, and speak to the rock, and bring forth water for the people.
7. Num 20:10: Moses and Aaron assemble the whole congregation before the rock. Moses says “Listen oh rebels shall we bring water for you from this rock?…”,
Rashi says: “They said this because they could not distinguish it (the rock intended by God), from the rock from which the water had hitherto flowed during these forty years had vanished and taken place amongst the other rocks when the “well” disappeared after Miriam’s death, and Israel said to them, what difference is it to you from which rock you bring water for us?” It was on this account that Moses called them hamoriyam -
Which may mean “refractory”, “foolish people”, “such as would teach their teachers”--- from this rock about which you have received no divine command can we bring forth water for you? (Rashi Num 20: 10)
Num 20:11: Moses raises his arm and struck the rock twice and abundant water came forth…
Rashi : “He smote the rock twice because at the first attempt it did not bring forth more than a few drops for God had not bidden him to smite it, he had told him to speak to it. They (Moses and Aaron) had ,indeed, spoken, but to a different rock (not that which God had intended) (Close, but no cigar! A.L.) and it had not given forth water. They said, “Perhaps it is necessary to smite it as on the former occasion (Ex 27:6 when God told Moses to strike the rock in Horeb, right before the Battle with Amalek, before they camped at Sinai), so they smote it, and it happened to be the rock intended by God, but without the full effect, and they smote it a second time (cf. Tanach.) and water sprang up.” (Rashi Num 20 11)
Rabbi Judy Shanks: “ I believe that Moses, too, neglects to see that he has suppressed his rage, his loss, his hurt, at the loss of his sister. Feeling more alone than ever as the leader of an exasperating people, Moses disobeys god’s instructions, and instead of speaking to the rock, he smashes his stick against it until water gushes out. Finally, an appropriate river of “tears” flows in memory of Miriam.” (Temple Isaiah online, temple-isiah.org)
9. Num 20: 12-13: God punishes Moses “Because you did not believe in me , to sanctify me in the eyes of the children of Israel….? He will not enter the promised land. Edom turns away the Israelites..
10.Num 20: 25-29- following God’s command Moses, Aaron, Elazer ascend Mt. Hor
- His garments (the Cohen Gadol) are passed on to his son Elazer
- Aaron dies on the Mt.; the Israelites spent 30 days in mourning for him.
- Mt Hor is made holy by “the sanctity of Aaron, the first Cohen Gadol, who mediated between God and the people, allowing them to live in conformity with the laws of Torah and the will of God.” (Rabbi Bradley Shavit Artson from the Ziegler School of Rabbinic studies on Parshat Hukkat).
Battles with the Canaanite of Arad, who are conquered at Hormath.
The conquest of Canaan begins…
Num 21:6-9- People complain while traveling through the wilderness by way of the Sea of reeds, God punishes by sending fiery serpents, many are bitten and die.
- Following God’s instructions, Moses makes a copper Cadecus (serpent on a staff) to heal the people bitten. The Cadecus was an ancient power-object used in healing; the snake symbolized (healing) energy / kundalini ascending in a spiral up the Tree of Life/ spinal column. Moses’ cadecus was the Asherah that he placed besides the Ark. It was called “Nehusthan” and remained in the Tabernacle where the Israelites burned incense to it until King Hezekiah destroyed it and all the high places, the pillars and the Asherah-trees. ( II Kings 18:4).
The cadecus is still used as a symbol of healing by doctors and healers.
13. Num 21: 10-35- Israelites journey throughout Canaan, making war and conquering; quotes from The Book of the Wars of Hashem. Not only were miracles wrought at the Red Sea, but also there were miracles in the Valley of the Arnon. See the chilling commentary by Rashi, Numbers, 21: 14-20: “When the Israelites now call to the well, ‘Come up again’, they are summoning the blood and body parts of the slain, by earthquake, being carried by the waters of the well down into the camp, and the Israelites rejoice.” The water is the same water as the water of Miriam’s well, the song sung is Miriam’s song, but the whole scene has changed. Now the stories are not of deliverance and redemption, but of war and conquest…
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The lessons:
1) the need for purification after touching the dead, and after purifying someone who has touched the dead i.e. when we have been drained of energy, deadened by experience, or by an ending of relationship or situation, or has helped someone else go through such a transition. Use aromatic and purifying herbs, fire, water and a symbolic cutting and burning of a sacred red string.
2) Sometimes the healing process is helped by focusing on a symbolic object that represents the psycho-spiritual healing process and resonates with traditional cultural meaning.
3) Miriam’s Cup / Moses Rod: symbols of the two prophets, sister and brother. The disappearance of Miriam’s well when Miriam died symbolizes to me the disappearance, the going underground of gyno-centric religion and spirituality that was happening as Neolithic cultures were on the ascendant. The rise of the patriarchal religion of Hashem was not inclusive of the tradition that Miriam represented. The reclaiming of Miriam as a powerful prophet and leader in Egypt, through the Exodus and during the 40 years in the desert, and as an important voice in our tradition (as evidenced by her cup’s presence on our Seder tables) is, I believe, a sign of a healthy re-balancing of spiritual energy in Judaism.
4) The Sound of Moses striking the rock with the rod is, I believe, a pivotal moment in this Parsha, in the political and social history of the Israelites, and in our culture. It is the sound of the breaking up of the old, and a new order that emerges from the old… contrast it to the sound of the chanting that brings forth the upwelling of Miriam’s Well. It recalls the sound of the First Tablets, the primordial Torah, being dropped and shattering, the pre-eminent Post-Modern symbol.
Moses and Aaron try to find the right rock, bly striking and not speaking, in front of the people, and don’t get to enter Canaan. This dissonance reverberates as the conquest of Canaan begins. I think it is also a continuance of the dissonance around the passing of Miriam and the disappearance of her well, and all she symbolized, her connection to the earth, the loss of her leadership and the change the striking of the rock foretells for the next few thousand years… this is perhaps one of the biggest failings and continuing source of suffering for the earth and it’s inhabitants, striking, rather than speaking. I see that lesson here if the first speaking doesn’t get the desired results, speak again, chant again, sing again, find a harmony until our words manifest the divine instructions, the path of wholeness … Look inside to see what emotions are getting in the way of communicating.
6) The conquest of Canaan is to me, one of the most troubling parts of the Torah, and the struggle with this genocide that is purportedly mandated by God pushes me, each time, into a delving into the big question, “What is Torah? “ Art Wascow’s thoughts on this question helped illuminate this “as the record of the “Jewish family’s” spiritual search, it’s our search for God, over the last 3,500 years. It has within it many voices, and lacks many who should, be included: very few women, the most obvious missing; very few gay people. For about 2,000 years what we call Torah has been dominated by a group of highly verbal men in an intellectual discourse. Very recently, that has begun to open up. More of our voices are not only joining the exploration---surely they were always exploring---but being heard by the whole community, and attended to, and their thoughts encoded as Torah. And seeing Torah as this outpouring of the spiritual search of the Jews, is to me, the living voice of God. Why? Because I think of the spiritual struggle for spiritual enlightenment as itself God breaking through the clouds obscuring the endless universe. The struggle to know God includes ancient Torah, the history of our people, the assumptions and possibilities from before which included the assigning of rigidly different roles to men and women, and the conquest of whole peoples. Now, many of us are trying to honor the essential messages of Torah, but cross traditional gender and national boundaries, striking a balance, not so easy, but crucial to our time.
Or—why conquer Canaan and wipe out those who live there? –I see it as: A deep urge to change the world, to make it decent. The only means that seemed possible: military victory and scouring the land of other cultures, was the biblical model. The Hellenistic/ Roman legion smashed that model. So Rabbinic Judaism gave up on changing the world and focused on making an internally holy and mentschlich Jewish community…livable for 2000 years, despite pogroms and expulsions…the Shoah smashed that model…
Now what??...we must change the worlds, not through military conquest…We can take the prophetic vision of our share in transforming the world ALONGSIDE others. Using non-violence….the New Prophetic Vision.
So that’s how I see the evolution of Torah as an aspect of the evolution of God’s own self, and of our own selves…part of a great surge forward in God-as-human’s self awareness of being God.`( Art Wascow, “What is Torah” ,www.shalomcenter.org)
7) We are like spiritual futurists imagining a future shape for Jewish peoplehood and spiritualty…from a ancient text-bones and lineage , trying to figure out a “new paradigm for Judaism, a paradigm that seeks to renew rather than to restore the ancient religious traditions of Temple and Priesthood. The retro-religious impulse is on a strong surge right now, religious fundamentalism, ours as well as others carry dangerous and hostile threads that can explode into bloodshed and terrorist eruptions. Wascow’s “New Prophetic Vision” speaks of a dimension different from right/left, reactionary/progressive spectrum, allowing different voices while working on a mutual co-existence. “The process and attitude might embody the words of the Talmud when ancient rabbis faced certain dilemmas: ”These AND these are the words of the Living God.”
8) Yehudim : The continuing prayers and kavannah to unite the Yod Hey and Vav He, the Shekhinah and Hashem, the Parts of our Selves, the Shards of our Broken World, the Upper and Lower Worlds, the Healing of the Wounds, the Reconciliation of the Children of Abraham., allowing the song of Miriam to sound in our souls....