The 42 Steps: D’var Torah for Matot—Mass’ei
July 17, 2020
By Rabbi Boaz D. Heilman
We like to collect mementos, souvenirs of places we’ve been to or experiences that hold meaning for us. Whether it’s a rock found on a hike in the Carmel Mountains or on the hills of Jerusalem, a touristy knick-knack from an exotic location, or a magnet from each State in the Union that we have visited, we all have our collections. Like songs from a particular era, our souvenirs hold memories for us, they take us back to other places and times. They help us keep track of where we are today, and where we’ve been along the way.
With this week’s Torah reading, (the double portion Matot-Mass’ei, Numbers 30:2—36:13), the book of Numbers, the fourth book in the Torah, comes to a close. In this concluding section we are given a list of all the places the Israelites stopped at along their journeys in the Sinai Wilderness—forty-two stops in all—each bringing up memories, some good, others not so much. Still others are a mixed bag. So at Mt. Sinai the Israelites receive the Ten Commandments. But also at this very time and place—the most awesome moment of God’s revelation—they give in to temptation and bow down before the Golden Calf.
Forty years later, as their travels come to a close, right before they ford the Jordan River, with all the hope and jubilation the Israelites might have felt at that moment, they are also about to be thrown into mourning over the loss of their guide and teacher. Mt. Nebo is the spot from which Moses will see the Promised Land—but where he is about to die and be buried.
Yet it’s more than memories that these souvenirs hold for us: It’s lessons, too. The Torah is a roadmap for us, marking not only where we were, but also what we learned there.
For all its grandeur and vision, the Torah is really a microcosm of Jewish existence. We have been wandering not only forty years, but rather thousands of years. We have seen empires come and go, civilizations rise and fall. We have lived through revolutions and civil wars. We witnessed pogroms and crusades. We’ve seen golden ages become dark ages, and back again.
And through all these, our understanding both of life and its meaning has continued to evolve, grow and mature.
As a people, however, we tend to mark the successes of our existence, our miraculous escapes from persecution. What all too often we overlook is our failures. It isn’t only the complaining in the desert, or even the worship of the Golden Calf. It’s the zealotry of Pinchas, whose murderous rage sets an example for all zealots who do not hesitate to kill in the name of their belief. It’s the genocide of the Midianites, the indiscriminate killing of all men, women and children and the looting of all their possessions.
That we have come a long way from these horrific memories does not cancel or erase them from our Torah. They are always there, their purpose to remind us of the dangers and pitfalls we need to circumvent.
Our successes must never blind us to our failings. Our rich contributions to humanity must never cover up mistakes that we also made along our long history.
Today, bitter dialogue is arising between Jews and members of the Black Lives Matter movement. Unwelcome reminders of what has been termed “Jewish privilege” are flung in our faces. And while we can come up with responses to some of these, others are not so easy to excuse. While the African slave trade was neither invented nor financed by the Jews, there were Jewish slave traders. And there has been cultural appropriation. Jewish and non-Jewish musicians, including George Gershwin, Benny Goodman and many others—used blues, jazz and other musical idioms developed by Blacks to their own advantage and gain.
We can always find excuses: these very Jewish musicians also helped popularize black music and bring it to the attention of the white cultural elite, paving the road for eventual recognition of the Black contribution to American—and world—music.
And we can also find excuses for the pawnbrokers and the Jewish merchants who opened up shops in Black neighborhoods—when they couldn’t afford (or weren’t allowed in) other, more expensive locations.
But it’s also vital that we recognize that there were Jews who definitely took advantage of their color and money: absentee slumlords who failed to maintain and upkeep their buildings. Real estate and property developers who conspired to keep people of color segregated. Racism is evident in some of the language we use and even in the beliefs some Jews hold. We are, after all, product of the culture of which we are part, to which we contribute but from which we also absorb and draw sustenance.
But at the same time we must not lose sight of the fact that anti-Semitism is present in many of the statements we hear coming out of the Black Lives Matter movement and certain individuals. Anti-Zionism—the latest form that anti-Semitism has taken in its long evolution—is prevalent on college campuses and in many of the liberal media. A prominent member of the editorial staff on the New York Times—Bari Weiss—resigned a couple of days ago, citing bullying and harassment from other staffers. This, too, is part of the culture we live in today, where Jews more and more are excluded from public debate and representation. And it doesn’t stop only with words. Desecration and vandalism of Jewish cemeteries and synagogues, violent assaults and mass shootings at places easily recognizable as Jewish-owned or catering to Jews have risen in the double digits.
Obviously not all of these acts can be attributed to anti-Semitism among People of Color. The rise of neo-Nazis and other far-right extremists is equally worrying.
We Jews cannot be complacent about any of this. In an interview given two days ago, former NYPD Commissioner Ray Kelly warned that “We are in a dangerous place in history,” and that Jews should “protect our communities.”
And how exactly should we do that? Most synagogues and JCC’s already have armed security guards at their gates. Perhaps we should now learn to build golems, like the famous Golem of Prague?
As we continue to watch events unfolding on city streets; as we continue to follow political debates on the media; whatever position we take, we must always also remember to stand up for ourselves. Supporting the rights of other minorities does not diminish our responsibility to ourselves, to the Jewish community and to the entire Jewish people.
What a timely reminder we find in these concluding portions of the Torah’s Book of Numbers, as Moses chides two of the twelve tribes of Israel who choose to dwell outside the borders of the Promised Land. Does that mean that they won’t come to the aid of the other Israelites as they struggle to establish and defend themselves, Moses inquires with both anger and indignation. To which the members of the tribes of Gad and Reuben answer, we will always be there for our brethren!
The question of what we Jews must do to protect ourselves has always been part of our culture. All along our history, some Jews sought to disappear rather than stand up, to hide rather than fight back.
This is one of the stones I have picked up along my many stops along my path in life, a reminder that I must not be silent when my people are threatened. It’s much more than a magnet on my refrigerator or a song on my playlist: It’s a vow I have taken, one I will not renege on, one which will always be there before my eyes. I will not be pushed aside or silenced.
As a Jew, I will continue to engage in the ongoing struggle to free the oppressed and to integrate the disenfranchised, excluded and subjugated.
But at the same time I will continue to demand for myself and my people the very same freedoms I demand for others—the right to exist, to define myself, to defend myself and my people against all our detractors.
We have learned much since our early days as a civilization. Our accomplishments and our missteps have taught us much about the rights and wrongs of warfare; about civil rights; about justice for all human beings, regardless of color, gender or creed. Our history and culture are always there to remind us that we have come a long way from Sinai to where we stand today.
Today we stand together: One people, one God, one humanity, “with liberty and justice for all.” This is our path, no matter how many steps it will take to get there.
© 2020 by Boaz Heilman
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