It
has been an exciting week in Toronto. For a while, the city was buzzing about
its baseball team. The Blue Jays reeled off 12 straight victories before losing
three games in a row to the N. Y. Mets. The Women’s World Cup began and Canada
and the United States are winning the matches they are supposed to in order to
get to the next round. Hockey enthusiasts were rewarded with 6 close and
exciting even if another year has come and gone without Lord Stanley’s cup
residing with Toronto’s beloved Maple Leafs. Yet for all that excitement, our
home experienced some very real turmoil. My wife comes from San Francisco, and
while she is not at all a sports enthusiast, when her home team is playing for
a championship, well we all get kind of excited. My wife love all things
Israel. She loves the food, loves the music, loves the cities, and loves the
people. Yes, if it was up to her, we would have made Aliyah the day after we were
married. For the past week, my wife’s hometown basketball team, the Golden
State Warriors have been vying for the NBA championship against the Cleveland
Cavaliers. Normally, this should not have caused any turmoil for my wife as she
should have been completely supportive of her hometown team. Always the one to
stir the proverbial pot, I shared some vital information about the Cleveland
coach: David Blatt. First I told her that he went to Princeton University (I
remember him in college). That bit of information certainly did not impress
her. Then I revealed that he is Jewish. My wife’s interest was piqued. Yet she
still could not be swayed about rooting for her Golden State Warriors. Then I shared
the last bits of information. First, he played professional ball in Israel for
several years. Second he coached Maccabi Tel Aviv for many years. Third he
married an Israeli girl and made Aliyah.
Well my wife still cheered for her hometown team but she also was
cheering for the “Israeli” coach. The series was fascinating to watch. One team
had the best player on the planet LeBron James, and otherwise played undermanned as two of
their starters were injured. The other team, Golden State, played as a team and
didn’t rely only upon one player to do everything even though it had the league MVP in Stephen Curry. Needless to say the better team beat the
better individual. As heroic as the individual was in his efforts to carry the
team, he understood that a championship is a collective success and losing the
championship is a collective defeat.
This
week's Parsha is Korach. Korach was a relative of Moshe's. They both came from
the tribe of Levi. Korach questioned Moshe's authority. He did not do this
during a private meeting between individuals. Rather, Korach gathered 250
supporters, and then publicly challenged Moshe. Moshe tried to keep peace
within the community, but to no avail. A divine test is administered, and
Korach and his supporters fail. The earth swallows them up. However God is
angry and a plague falls upon the people. God speaks to Aaron and binds Aaron's
line even closer to the rest of the tribe of Levi, and Korach's family. In a
sense, they now have greater reliance upon one another. "Also your brethren the tribe of Levi, the
tribe of your father, shall you draw near with you, and they shall be joined to
you….. (Num. 18:2-7).
Normally,
as part of our modern perspective, we disapprove of communal punishment. Even B’nai
Yisroel considered it unfair as they raise their concern to God. "Ha'Ish Echad Yechtah v'Al Kol Ha'Edah
Tiktzof- shall one man's sin, and you
be angry with the entire assembly?" (Num. 16:22). The answer is yes,
there are times when communal punishment is most effective. Rabbi Shimon Bar Yochai explained this verse
with the following analogy. "A man on a ship took a drill and began to
drill a hole under his own seat. When his companion asked him 'Why are you
doing this?' he replied, 'Why should it bother you? Am I not drilling only
under my own seat?' His companions look at him incredulously: 'But the water will rise up and flood the
ship for all of us!' (Leviticus Rabbah 4:6). A community is a combination of
symbiotic relationships. For B'nai Israel that symbiotic relationship was
manifest in the role that each tribe played within the community. That
symbiotic relationship was also manifest in Amcha's (the nation's) desire for
God to dwell among it. If anything threatened God's dwelling among the nation,
then the threat must be removed. Such a threat was removed from the camp in the
previous Parsha when the man was corporally punished for violating the Sabbath
when he was picking up sticks during the Sabbath Day. During that episode the
community was not punished because the community did not follow the individual’s
behavior, in fact the “community” was offended by the behavior and brought the
issue to Moshe. However here in the rebellion of Korach, and even in the
narrative of the Twelve Spies, the community stayed silent and passive. Their
silence was condoning the behavior.
What
do we learn from Korach's rebellion, and the ensuing communal punishment?
First, we learn that a community cannot be polarized and hope to survive. That
was the reason Korach was punished in the first place. Second, we learn that a
community and its leadership must share in a common vision. Third, there must
be room for disagreements to take place. There must be room to ask questions.
Questions must be asked, and disagreements must arise and be dealt with in a
way that focuses upon the welfare of the community, the welfare of the team and
not the glory of the individual. Korach's demise demonstrates that questions
and disagreements can never occur under false pretenses, arrogance, or in a
self-serving manner.
Shabbat Shalom,
Rav Yitz
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