Fire Pans

 Korach

Num. 16:1 - 18:32

 

Précis: Korach foments a rebellion, claiming that Moses and Aaron have taken too much power for themselves. Datan and Abiram also attack Moses’ leadership, claiming that Moses has brought them from a land of milk and honey (Egypt!) only to let them die in the wilderness. A test of fire offerings (in pans) is arranged, and Korach and his followers are destroyed as the earth opens and swallows them. The People continue to complain, God threatens to destroy them once again, but Moses and Aaron intercede. A plague takes the lives of 14,000 people. A final test, that of staffs, is performed, and when Aaron’s staff miraculously blossoms on the following morning, it is clear that his status as High Priest is secure.

 

Num. 17:3 “Remove the fire pans of those who have sinned at the cost of their lives, and let them be made into hammered sheets as plating for the altar - for once they have been used for offering to the Lord, they have become sacred - and let them serve as a warning to the people of Israel.”

 

The test of the fire offerings has been completed, and the followers of Korach have been defeated. Their pans have lost the contest, and yet, somehow, the pans have become sacred. Is it not remarkable that something used to challenge authority becomes part of a holy object? 

The first Chief Rabbi of Israel, Rav Kook, has a suggestion (quoted in Etz Chayim): Plating the altar with the defeated pans is meant to remind us of the legitimacy and necessary to rebel against stagnation and complacency. The holiness of the fire pans used by the rebels shows the necessity of skeptics and agnostics to keep religion honest and healthy. 

The fire pans remind us that we are strugglers, and that rebellion is part of who we are. 

Grasshoppers

 Sh’lach

Num. 13:1-15:41

 

Précis: Moses is ordered to “send out” (sh’lach l’cha) spies to examine the land. Representatives of each tribe go out, report on its bounty, but also report about its fearsome inhabitants. The People are frightened, and their “murmuring” turns into something close to panic. God tells Moses that He will destroy the People, but Moses intercedes; the People are sentenced to spend 40 years in the wilderness. The parasha then returns to matters concerning the Tabernacle, with a discussion of the offering for unintentional sins. Near its end, the parasha discusses the wearing of tzitzit, a paragraph which is part of the traditional recitation of the Sh’ma. This is the 27th of 54 parshiot, marking the half-way point in the yearly reading.

 

Num. 13:33 “We looked like grasshoppers to ourselves, and so we must have looked to them.”

            Those of us of a certain age remember the television show “Kung Fu” from the early 1970’s starring David Carradine as a half-Asian student, Kwai Chang Caine, learning the martial arts in China and becoming a Shaolin priest under the tutelage of his beloved teacher, Master Po. Master Po frequently tells him “patience, grasshopper” when he is too eager to advance his knowledge.

            The Israelites we read about this week certainly display an epic lack of patience, let alone a lack of belief in God’s promises (despite the miracles they had witnessed). This was the breaking point for God: these people were doomed to wander in the wilderness for 40 years and would never see the Promised Land.

            But Master Po’s advice for patience can be just as destructive as the lack thereof by the Israelites. Indeed, while patience may be a virtue, excessive patience is the enemy of action.

            This week, for the first time in history, a former President of the United States has been indicted for serious felonies. While patience dictates that we allow the legal process to be fulfilled in an orderly manner, we cannot abide the threats of violence some of his cultish followers have issued, and we can have no patience for his lies, his attacks on the Justice Department and rule of law,  for his what-aboutism, or for his narcissistic declarations designed to cover up his failures and illegal activities, so many of which are self-declared.

              There are indeed grasshoppers galore, in the form of Trump-adoring (or fearing) Republicans who are rushing to his defense, claiming that the Justice Department has been "weaponized" against Trump (when in fact if he was not the past president, he would have signed a plea deal and been in jail, as so many others with history of misuse of classified documents like him have done).

              We cannot be fearful grasshoppers.  Joshua and Caleb displayed firm resolve. We, too, must be firm in our resolve to see justice prevail.