Bemidbar

By Rabbi Alan Abraham Kay

The fourth book of our Torah is called BeMidbar in Hebrew, meaning, “in the desert,” and Numbers in English, referring to the first parashah (also called BeMidbar) in which we learn the numbers of men of military age who would defend the Israelites in the event of attack. In the second book of our Torah, Exodus, Moses had begun to lead the Israelites “in the desert” on their journey to the Promised Land of Canaan. Here, the journey continues.

The Israelites were a well-ordered people: the numbers of men able to bear arms is determined:the Kohanim, the Levites and Kohathites are given their specific responsibilities with respect to the Tabernacle while the other Israelites would be camped in four groups under their ancestral banners around the Tabernacle. These are a people to be reckoned with: liberated from Read More >

Israel’s ‘New’ Tribes
By Irwin Huberman

This week, as we begin reading Bemidbar, the fourth book of the Torah ‘ Numbers ‘ God commands Moses to conduct a count of males 20 years of age and older.

The parashah (the weekly Torah portion) goes into painstaking detail describing who the leaders of each tribe were, and ultimately how many men were counted in each.

The Torah tells us that, excluding the Levites whose role it was to tend to the Mishkan, Israel’s primary place of worship, there were 603,550 males over 20 years old. The figure inspires us to ‘do the math’ to estimate shortly after the exodus from Egypt, how many children of Israel, including women and children were part of the initial journey from Egypt to the land of Canaan.

The Torah reminds us through the account of the census the importance of our tribes and affiliations. Our tradition tells us that each Read More >

Counting the Models of Religious Leadership in The Book of Numbers
By Rabbi Rena Kieval

I would like to dedicate this dvar Torah about
religious leadership to my fellow graduates, my
teachers, and all the students at AJR, where
individuals are embarked on this path in so many
different ways and bringing a multiplicity of talents
and roles to the holy work.

What makes a religious leader? In Sefer Va-yikra
(Leviticus) we learned in exhaustive detail about
the roles of the kohanim – priests, whom the
Torah refers to as meshuchim – anointed ones
(Num. 3:3). They are God’s elite religious
functionaries who live apart from the people, who
must meet strict standards of taharah ‘ purity – and who strive for, or symbolize, perfection.

In Sefer Bamidbar (Numbers), which
we begin reading this week, God announces the
selection of another group of religious leaders, the
levi’im – levites. The Torah calls Read More >