Parshat Beha'alotecha
Beha’alotecha - Hidden Agendas
There is an
old adage that one can describe Jewish History in three sentences:
1. They
tried to kill us.
2. We won.
3. Let's eat.
On the face of it, an episode in this week's Parsha seems to suggest our love of food is as ancient as our Nation itself. However, with a little investigation, this is not as straightforward as it may appear in the Torah.
|
(4) The
rabble that was among them felt a gluttonous craving; and then the Israelites
wept and said, “Who will feed us meat? (5) We
remember the fish that we used to eat for free in Egypt, the cucumbers, the
melons, the leeks, the onions, and the garlic. (6) Now
our life is parched. There is nothing at all! We have nothing to anticipate
but the manna! |
(ד) וְהָֽאסַפְסֻף֙ אֲשֶׁ֣ר בְּקִרְבּ֔וֹ הִתְאַוּ֖וּ תַּאֲוָ֑ה
וַיָּשֻׁ֣בוּ וַיִּבְכּ֗וּ גַּ֚ם בְּנֵ֣י יִשְׂרָאֵ֔ל וַיֹּ֣אמְר֔וּ מִ֥י
יַאֲכִלֵ֖נוּ בָּשָֽׂר׃ (ה) זָכַ֙רְנוּ֙ אֶת־הַדָּגָ֔ה אֲשֶׁר־נֹאכַ֥ל בְּמִצְרַ֖יִם
חִנָּ֑ם אֵ֣ת הַקִּשֻּׁאִ֗ים וְאֵת֙ הָֽאֲבַטִּחִ֔ים וְאֶת־הֶחָצִ֥יר
וְאֶת־הַבְּצָלִ֖ים וְאֶת־הַשּׁוּמִֽים׃ (ו) וְעַתָּ֛ה
נַפְשֵׁ֥נוּ יְבֵשָׁ֖ה אֵ֣ין כֹּ֑ל בִּלְתִּ֖י אֶל־הַמָּ֥ן עֵינֵֽינוּ׃ |
The
Israelites have been wandering around the desert for over a year. They have
been fed with the manna, which the midrash tells us could taste of anything
they desired, watered through the miracle of Miriam's well, protected from the
sun, sand, scorpions and snakes by the Ananei Hakavod, the Divine Clouds of
Glory and had their every whim answered.
So why are they complaining and looking at the complaint, why do there seem to be some strange anomalies? Firstly, they are asking for meat and then immediately, they talk about the fish that they describe as eating 'for free' in Egypt. As far as I recall, they didn't get anything gratis there. They even had to make their own bricks!
Even if you
can appreciate their complaints, the entire paragraph is quite puzzling…and who
is this ‘rabble’? Our Sages were also troubled by this passage
and their first priority was to identify the rabble.
We have met these people before. Let's look at the Exodus from Egypt:
|
(38)
Moreover, a mixed multitude (‘erev-rav’)
went up with them, and very much livestock, both flocks and herds. |
(לח) וְגַם־עֵ֥רֶב רַ֖ב
עָלָ֣ה אִתָּ֑ם וְצֹ֣אן וּבָקָ֔ר מִקְנֶ֖ה כָּבֵ֥ד מְאֹֽד׃ |
Rashi
explains whom the 'mixed multitude' were:
ערב רב - A mixed multitude/erev-rav were a mingling of various nations who had become proselytes.
When do we meet these people next? When Gd tells Moses to go back to the Israelites who are encamped at the foot of Mount Sinai.
(7) The LORD spoke to Moses, “Hurry down, for your people, whom you brought out of the land of Egypt, have acted basely.
Rashi, quoting the Midrash (Shemot/Exodus Rabbah 42:6) informs us that:
‘Your people have corrupted themselves’. It does not say the people have corrupted but [it says] your people — "the mixed multitude whom you received of your own accord and accepted as proselytes without consulting Me. You thought it a good thing that proselytes should be attached to the Shechina/Holy Spirit — now they have corrupted themselves and have corrupted others"
If we look
back at Beha’alotecha, we read the following:
|
(4) The rabble
in their midst felt a gluttonous craving; and
then the Israelites wept
and said, “If only we had meat to eat! |
(ד) וְהָֽאסַפְסֻף֙ אֲשֶׁ֣ר בְּקִרְבּ֔וֹ הִתְאַוּ֖וּ
תַּאֲוָ֑ה וַיָּשֻׁ֣בוּ וַיִּבְכּ֗וּ גַּ֚ם
בְּנֵ֣י יִשְׂרָאֵ֔ל
וַיֹּ֣אמְר֔וּ מִ֥י יַאֲכִלֵ֖נוּ בָּשָֽׂר׃ |
Rashi writes the following:
והאספסף/and the rabble: This was the mixed multitude that had gathered themselves to them (i.e. the Israelites) when they left Egypt (the word is from the root אסף, “to gather”) (Midrash Sifrei Bamidbar 86). The next words of the Biblical text must be inverted to read: 'and the children of Israel also wept together with them.'
Rashi has
presented a watertight case for the prosecution against the erev-rav, the
'mixed multitude' whose constant desire was to cause the Israelites to rebel
against Gd and Moses.
It wasn't enough for them to initiate the construction, idolatrous and immoral worship of the Golden Calf. They had seen the way Gd and Moses dealt with that situation. Now, they were actively causing the people to complain again, this time through the medium of food.
The eminent Medieval Sephardic commentator, Sforno (d.1150) tells us something revealing about their request for meat:
מי יאכלנו בשר? (who will feed us meat?), They said this
to test if He would permit incestuous relations to His people...
So, according to the Sforno, the request for 'meat' was never really about the food. It was in addressing their lustful desires. He refers back to the first verse of this chapter:
|
(1) The
people took to complaining bitterly
before the LORD... |
(א) וַיְהִ֤י הָעָם֙ כְּמִתְאֹ֣נְנִ֔ים
רַ֖ע בְּאָזְנֵ֣י ה' |
‘Complaining’, on account of the difficulties of the journey. They did not actually complain in their hearts as they had nothing to complain about. They only voiced complaints as a form of testing Gd.
If we add up all the pieces, we can see that the erev-rav are not interested in the food per se. They are actively inciting the Israelites to test Gd and at the same time influence them to return to their idolatrous Egyptian ways. After all, these troublemakers were never really interested in converting - as Rashi quoting the Midrash writes about Gd's comments to Moses: "You thought it a good thing that proselytes should be attached to the Shechina — now they have corrupted themselves and have corrupted others."
And if we examine the strange comment about receiving "free fish" in Egypt, Rashi rounds off his argument by adding:
We remember the fish which we did eat in Egypt for free: If you say that they meant that the Egyptians gave them fish for nothing (without payment), then I ask, “But does it not state in Exodus 5:18: [Go, therefore, now, and work], for there shall no straw be given you”? Now, if they did not give them straw for nothing, would they have given them fish for nothing! — What then is the force of the word חנם? It means: free from (i.e. without us having been burdened with) heavenly commands (Midrash Sifrei Bamidbar 87).
Along with
testing Gd and attempting to entice the Israelites, the 'coup-de-grace' were
their attempts to wrest the Israelites away from the Torah and its
commandments. Their grumblings were simply a calculated way to attack the very
soul of the nascent Israelite Nation and how did they go about it? By appealing
to their most basic instincts. Witness the continuation of the verse:
.....the cucumbers, the melons, the leeks, the onions, and the garlic.
The best way to influence people is to appeal to their basic desires. By focusing on the various foods and mentioning them by name, they have succeeded in diverting the Israelites' attention away from the manna. Not only that, you make the food itself seem as unappetizing as possible. The Torah proves this by telling us in the next verse that:
(6) Now our
gullets are shrivelled. There is nothing at all! Nothing but this manna to look to!” (7) Now the manna was like coriander
seed, and in colour it was like bdellium [a fragrant resin related to myrrh
which is used in perfumes].
(8) The people would go about and gather it, grind it between millstones or pound it in a mortar, boil it in a pot, and make it into cakes. It tasted like rich cream.
The Torah is reminding us of the miracle of the manna as a counterpoint against the argument presented by the erev-rav.
Gd was providing everything the Israelites could wish for, but they were trying desperately to deny the existence of Gd, His Torah and his ability to sustain the entire Nation, which underscores the commentators' explanations proving that this battle of wills never was focused on the food. At the heart of the conflict was a struggle for the very soul of the Israelites between Gd and the erev-rav.
These last few weeks have witnessed a similar situation in our times. Following the brutal and racist killing of George Floyd in Minneapolis, the grassroots Black Lives Matter (hereafter referred to as 'BLM') movement have justifiably vented their anger and disappointment at their treatment by a number of Police Officers.
Anyone who cares about equality and fairness can empathize with their feelings of resentment and frustration, particularly considering Mr Floyd's barbaric detention and murder. However, the modern-day equivalent of the erev-rav have attached themselves to the movement and in doing so, have deliberately and cynically used this discontent as an excuse to commit crimes. These include the burning of shops and looting; daubing a synagogue in Los Angeles; breaking the window of another in Richmond, Virginia along with cynically linking the murder of Mr Floyd to Israel by accusing the country of training the US Police Force in using in the kind of tactics that were employed against Mr Floyd. This is nothing short of a blood libel, the type employed frequently against Jews in the past.
Other branches of this contemporary erev-rav have used the death of Mr Floyd as an excuse to deface and destroy statues in this country. This includes daubing the statue of Winston Churchill in Parliament Square and covering a statue of Queen Victoria in pink paint in Leeds. In doing so, they are bringing the cause espoused by BLM campaigners into disrepute and flooding the fields as it were, instead of building the bridges that are so needed to heal our communities. It is therefore extremely gratifying to see that members of the BLM movement are doing their best to repair the damage and make amends for actions that took place in their name without their consent.
The Israelites of the past should have sent the erev-rav back to Egypt. Had they done this, the episode described in this week's Parsha could have been easily avoided. With the beautiful gift of manna provided by Gd Himself, they really had nothing to complain about.
In a similar vein, BLM possesses a genuine desire to improve the lives of the people they represent. If they wish to succeed, they must work stringently to distance themselves from those who seek to harm their cause.
Whilst we let these members of the erev-rav 'take over the show' in whichever guise they present themselves, we compromise the advances that we have made and set our agenda back significantly. A movement as important as BLM cannot afford to host those of its 'members' who have a hidden agenda. Not in the Arabian deserts described in Torah nor in any of our modern cities.
Shabbat
Shalom.
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