Reflections from Rabbi Ellis

This week’s Parsha starts with a jump forward thirty-eight years. The Children of Israel are now at the end of their sojourn in the desert. Between the end of last week’s Parsha and the beginning of this week’s Parsha what happened? G!d doesn’t bother to tell us. Instead, we are told about a nation that is now ready to enter the land of Israel all of the people condemned to die in the desert are gone and we are ready to move on.

Finally, after fourteen years we are back where we started, ready to enter the land of Israel under the Jewish dream team: Miriam, Aharon and Moshe. Fourteen verses later Miriam is dead and Moshe and Aharon are condemned to die in the desert. Why couldn’t Moshe, Aharon and Miriam lead the Children of Israel into the land of Israel?

Interestingly we never hear the reason for Miriam's death, but then again most of her activity didn’t make it into the Torah. Regarding the reason for the death of Moshe and Aharon, the Torah tells us that they couldn’t enter the Land of Israel because they failed to speak to a rock in front of the Children of Israel in order to get water from it. Instead, they assembled the nation and beat the rock, just as they had done forty years earlier. True, beating something instead of speaking to it is a bad thing, but did Moshe and Aharon really act so horribly as to not be allowed to lead the Children of Israel into the land of Israel?

Forty years have passed since the Children of Israel left slavery and received the Torah. Israel is a new nation with a radically different identity. The nation that left Egypt was physically weak and traumatized, they were not used to providing for their own needs and security. They needed a leader that could protect and guide them through the vast desert of Sinai and provide them with physical security.

Things are different now in our Parsha Israel marches to war three times, without protest and are victorious in all three campaigns. We no longer need a leader to find us food and inspire us in war. We need a leader that can quicken our spirits, to give us meaning and motivate us to unite as a nation. We need a new leader, one who can show us how to get what we need through speech and supplication and not just the application of force of will. G!d asks Moshe and Aharon to display this ability to the nation and they fail, G!d has to leave them behind so a whole new kind of leadership can emerge in Israel.

We all must be prepared to change for the needs of those we love. It’s just about the hardest thing ever, even Moshe and Aharon had problems with it, but if we can’t change, we will only hurt those closest to us. If we can change then we know that we will be rewarded with more need to change. Each change is another chance to express more love for those around us and to leave behind the pain and trauma of the past.

Shabbat Shalom!

Rabbi Yehoshua Ellis