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Bamidbar: Is it One or Two? · A Thought for the Week

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  Speaker 1: Welcome to a Thought for the Week, a Torah in
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  Speaker 1: Motion podcast. I'm Jake Hellman, founding director of Torah in Motion,
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  Speaker 1: and it's a pleasure to have you here with us.
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  Speaker 1: We count that which we love. If you love something,
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  Speaker 1: you count it. How much do you have? For some
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  Speaker 1: people that's money, some people maybe it's the same people
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  Speaker 1: days to go on vacation days until the World Cup starts.
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  Speaker 1: So counting is a sign of love. God loves the
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  Speaker 1: Jewish people and he counts as very often, save by
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  Speaker 1: me Bar, which is known which begins names and numbers
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  Speaker 1: counting counting. It's often on a Hebrew as kumushikudin the
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  Speaker 1: Book of count begins with the count of the Jewish people,
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  Speaker 1: and Rushi right off the bat says, we talk the
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  Speaker 1: Fana motel because God loves us, He counts us all
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  Speaker 1: the time. And Rushi lists off a bunch of places
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  Speaker 1: where the Jewish people are counted. This, of course, is
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  Speaker 1: not the first count of the Jewish people. I think
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  Speaker 1: the first time we get a mention of how big
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  Speaker 1: you know? In Egypt they paruba there are a lot,
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  Speaker 1: a lot of people. We don't get any numbers when
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  Speaker 1: the Jewish people leave Egypt. The tour tells us kishe
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  Speaker 1: sho ella like, I guess approximately six hundred thousand varrem
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  Speaker 1: men levadmit not including children. Okay, then we have an
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  Speaker 1: actual census in Parsha Kitisa. When the Torah is describing,
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  Speaker 1: we're about to build the Michigan. So the tour tells
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  Speaker 1: us that everybody over the age of twenty, presumably men.
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  Speaker 1: The tour doesn't explicitly say so, but everybody is to
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  Speaker 1: give half a schechel. That half shako served as the
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  Speaker 1: people's contribution to the Mishigan. The tour also tells us
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  Speaker 1: very interesting that this half sheeka was a cofair like
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  Speaker 1: atonement Jim Kipurim. It's not new eash Kopher love showto Tom,
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  Speaker 1: you know somehow presumably atoning for the sin of the
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  Speaker 1: golden calf. And this idea, of course fits in very
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  Speaker 1: well with the according to the view that the Mishigan
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  Speaker 1: was only a result the idea to build a tabernacle
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  Speaker 1: to God was the result of the sin of the
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  Speaker 1: of the golden calf. So that's the first count of
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  Speaker 1: the Jewish people. Everybody of the age of twenty, every
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  Speaker 1: has to give half a scheko. The torah. Not surprisingly,
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  Speaker 1: maybe it is, but if you think about it, it's obvious.
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  Speaker 1: The toy does not tell us the result of that count,
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  Speaker 1: because that's the instructions to count. The result of that
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  Speaker 1: count happens in i picuta, you know the way that
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  Speaker 1: tore does. All the people will discuss why, But basically
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  Speaker 1: truma and tsava are the instructions, and kithisa so a
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  Speaker 1: little are the instructions to build the michigan and bayaklamkud
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  Speaker 1: is the implementation. So in parsha pekude, which means the count,
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  Speaker 1: the picudin how much pikudin by met bark, the tour
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  Speaker 1: tells us the number. So the tour tells us they
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  Speaker 1: collected a lot of half shekos, So they had one hundred.
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  Speaker 1: They had maya kei kar lf one hundred and one thousands.
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  Speaker 1: The machine themishev ishivim one hundred and one thousand, seven
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  Speaker 1: hundred and seventy five. Now what does that mean? How much?
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  Speaker 1: Is that they had one hundred key kar and seventeen
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  Speaker 1: hundred and seventy five kalem a kikar is three thousand cheko,
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  Speaker 1: so one hundred ki karim is three hundred thousand shekeo
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  Speaker 1: at one thousand, seven hundred and seventy five. That's this
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  Speaker 1: is right black and white in the Torah. So they're
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  Speaker 1: three hundred and one thousand, seven hundred and seventy five
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  Speaker 1: scalem a great formath. He multiplied by two and we
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  Speaker 1: get six hundred in three thousand, five hundred and fifty.
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  Speaker 1: So that's how many Jews there were based on this
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  Speaker 1: count of whoever contributed a half shekel to the mischan
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  Speaker 1: six hundred and three thousand, five hundred and fifty, and
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  Speaker 1: this was the money used to build a Michigan. Now,
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  Speaker 1: this money and the count took place well before rushcottis Nissan.
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  Speaker 1: Rushwottih Nissan is when the temple the Michigan is dedicated,
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  Speaker 1: So assuming if it's the kapara from Yom Kipur, so
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  Speaker 1: the command was given soon after Yum Kipper. So the
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  Speaker 1: Jews gave basically six months earlier they gave a half shakele.
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  Speaker 1: And if you hold like the view that the Mischkan
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  Speaker 1: was before not new great ago, so it's many months
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  Speaker 1: before that the people gave half a shakel. And the
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  Speaker 1: count is as they're constructing the Mischkan is ready to
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  Speaker 1: go on the first of these and we find out,
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  Speaker 1: you know, how much money people gave over the last
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  Speaker 1: number of months. Okay, very nice. That's the main census
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  Speaker 1: we have tour. It doesn't go into details, but that's
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  Speaker 1: the sense of of the Jewish people. But me bar
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  Speaker 1: Wow goes into the huge census, and the Torah tells
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  Speaker 1: us that this census takes place on the first day
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  Speaker 1: of the second month, so it's one month after the
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  Speaker 1: Michigan has been erected, six months, eight months, nine months
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  Speaker 1: later than the previous census. And it's not really clear
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  Speaker 1: why do we need a new count. We just counted
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  Speaker 1: them a few months ago. I mean, I think they
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  Speaker 1: do census every ten years. So this count served a
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  Speaker 1: very different purpose than the count of Kithisa in the Michigan.
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  Speaker 1: And apparently it looks like the Torah wanted exact numbers again,
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  Speaker 1: even though it's six seven months later. And the count
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  Speaker 1: here was for a the army, as it says yod
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  Speaker 1: Say Savah, and it was also for division of the
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  Speaker 1: camp into marching groups. These are related but separate ideas.
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  Speaker 1: That they marched in seat of a rectangular with the
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  Speaker 1: Michigan in the center, so they were divided into four
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  Speaker 1: sized three tribes each, and the Levin were in the middle.
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  Speaker 1: Minasha frime, you know, Joseph gets divided into two. The
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  Speaker 1: Levim go in the middle. And in this count, the
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  Speaker 1: Levim are not counted, and Kitisa, there's no reason to
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  Speaker 1: think the Levites are not counted. They too should contribute
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  Speaker 1: to the Michigan. And as a matter of fact, the
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  Speaker 1: Mishna in in schka Alim, there's a track take that
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  Speaker 1: talks about the laws of being tobacco many other interesting things.
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  Speaker 1: The Mishna quotes that Raviochan and Benzakai, the person just
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  Speaker 1: the end of the second Timber period says call kohen,
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  Speaker 1: say no. Any kohen who doesn't give the matasira shekel
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  Speaker 1: is a sinner. So presumably that count included the Levim.
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  Speaker 1: Discount did not include the Levim. And there it goes
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  Speaker 1: in they needed the seem of each tribe. And it's fascinating,
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  Speaker 1: I said, there are two reasons for the count. The
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  Speaker 1: Torah actually lists the count twice. If this stoff, they
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  Speaker 1: goes through tried by tribe count number two times and
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  Speaker 1: it's like really repetitive, And apparently I would assume each
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  Speaker 1: one is for the it's alluding to the different purposes,
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  Speaker 1: the two different purposes of the count. On only one
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  Speaker 1: does it say, you'd say, sabah, that's for the army count.
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  Speaker 1: We're going to be in the military, and the other
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  Speaker 1: one is for the marching orders. Now, okay, so very nice.
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  Speaker 1: We have two counts. God loves us, He counts us
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  Speaker 1: very often. By the way, victory here doesn't tell us
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  Speaker 1: they use the half of shekel. Maybe they did from there,
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  Speaker 1: maybe we don't really know. Goes into great details. The
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  Speaker 1: tribal held heads help, but we doesn't say anything about
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  Speaker 1: collecting half shekel. They just counted the people. That's what
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  Speaker 1: it looks like in the Kumish. In an amazing coincidence,
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  Speaker 1: it's the exact same number. They're six hundred and three thousand,
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  Speaker 1: five hundred and fifty people men over the age of
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  Speaker 1: twenty being counted. So that's pretty wild. So that leads
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  Speaker 1: to the seeming conclusion that it's really is the same count.
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  Speaker 1: There really only was one count. The Torah mentioned the
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  Speaker 1: count there for its purposes, and then the Tory elaborates
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  Speaker 1: on it here. That's what some say, but many people
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  Speaker 1: don't assume like that it's from Russia. It's a little unclear,
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  Speaker 1: but it appears like it really is a separate count.
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  Speaker 1: Another tour presents it. It's surely presented as a very
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  Speaker 1: different count. So okay, so yeah, it could happen. You know, one,
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  Speaker 1: I guess the chances are one in six hundred and
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  Speaker 1: three thousand and fifty five fifty. I know what the
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  Speaker 1: chances are of having two counts. Okay. Many months later
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  Speaker 1: and the commentaries asked this question, didn't people die? People?
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  Speaker 1: What's going on here? People turn twenty? So okay, then,
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  Speaker 1: well we won't get into that question too much. Just
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  Speaker 1: say that. Some say that's part of the miracle of
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  Speaker 1: the desert. Everything in the desert was miraculous. Some say
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  Speaker 1: there may be more. But the Torah. Once we hit
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  Speaker 1: six though three five fifty, we didn't have to count anymore.
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  Speaker 1: That was sort of you know, the that's it, we
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  Speaker 1: don't have to go any further. But I think the Torah,
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  Speaker 1: I think the answer is rather obvious and whether there's
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  Speaker 1: one or two counts doesn't really matter. The Torah here
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  Speaker 1: is vague, like it's so often is. The Tora is
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  Speaker 1: purposely vague and ambiguous. So the tour can have seventy faces,
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  Speaker 1: so we can interpret it in many different ways. But
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  Speaker 1: I think what the Torah is pretty you know, just
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  Speaker 1: if you think about it, it's pretty obvious. If you
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  Speaker 1: don't think about it, you miss the whole point. But
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  Speaker 1: that two parallel tracks are needed for the Jewish people
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  Speaker 1: to inherit the land of visual. We need a spiritual center.
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  Speaker 1: We need a Michigan, we need a Bayny Medias. We
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  Speaker 1: need a purpose for the land of the visions. We're
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  Speaker 1: not just living in land of visual because it has
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  Speaker 1: a nice fruit. There has to be a spiritual center
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  Speaker 1: where we come closer to God, where the Jewish people
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  Speaker 1: come closer to each other, where we can take care
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  Speaker 1: of the poor. Where we have we can set up
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  Speaker 1: a model society, a holy nation. That's all very nice,
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  Speaker 1: but you can only do that with a physical army.
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  Speaker 1: You can only do that with people fighting. You'd say, sabah,
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  Speaker 1: you can only do that and with the physical and
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  Speaker 1: the spiritual have to go together. In the Taurus, letting
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  Speaker 1: us know that by the six hundred and three thousand
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  Speaker 1: and five fifty the exact count. And of course it's
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  Speaker 1: not just the army. In all aspects of life. This is.
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  Speaker 1: Judaism always teaches the spiritual in general can't exist without
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  Speaker 1: the physical. Our spirit resides within our body. Judaism places
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  Speaker 1: great emphasis on physical well being, our health, but also
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  Speaker 1: on the physical of the world, the beauty of the world, nature,
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  Speaker 1: to conquer nature, to use it to our benefits. On
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  Speaker 1: a very simple level, you know Torah. If there's no money,
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  Speaker 1: you can't have Torah. So I think the Torah by
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  Speaker 1: setting up one in the book of Schmut centered around
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  Speaker 1: the Michigan our spiritual life, and one in the beginning
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  Speaker 1: of a meet bar, which is the march to the
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  Speaker 1: landividual to take to set up a state. The Torah
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  Speaker 1: takes these counts, the torret count, and it's the exact
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  Speaker 1: same number linking these two ideas. Numbers all through the Torah.
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  Speaker 1: But you see it here all over the place. Numbers
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  Speaker 1: have much to teach us. So but you loo. We
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  Speaker 1: hope you enjoyed a thought for the week at Torah
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• 11:58
  Speaker 1: forward to learning with you next. MH.