Parashat Chukat

summary

Parashat Chukat (Numbers 19:1 - 22:1) begins with a passage considered one of the most obscure in the Torah. It describes how the Israelites were instructed to take the ashes of an unblemished red heifer to be used to purify anyone who had been in contact with a dead body. The ashes were sprinkled over the person as a cleanser, on the third and seventh days after such contact. Those who handled the ashes were themselves then considered ritually impure until nightfall. The practice seems to be assumed in Numbers 31:19-24 but is mentioned no where else in the Tanakh (Hebrew Bible). It is mentioned in the Christian Scriptures and at great length in rabbinic writings. Josephus records the tradition that those who buried Miriam were cleansed by this rite and as Miriam’s death now follows, this perhaps explains its positioning.

We now approach the opening scene in the last act of the drama that describes Israel’s forty years in the desert. The preceding chapters told of events in the second year after the Children of Israel left Egypt. Now, the end of the wanderings comes into view with no word on the intervening thirty-eight years.

Miriam’s death is recorded in one terse, mechanical verse and followed by a further complaint for water at a place later called, Meribah – meaning that the Israelites quarreled with the Eternal One. Moses strikes a rock to get water from it, an action not commanded by God and one for which he is to be punished by not being allowed to enter the Promised Land. The Edomites then repel the Israelites from their border so that they have to journey around the territory. Arriving at Mount Hor on the perimeter of Edom, Aaron dies and his mantel of High Priest is passed on to his son Eleazar.

This whole passage represents the beginning of the end of the physical journey and those who first set out on it. Little more is now said of the generation who loved the security of slavery more than the uncertainty freedom they were offered. The focus shifts to their children – but not before we learn the fate of the leaders of the previous generation.

Parashat Chukat is then concluded with a further outbreak of discontent and punishment and three military victories over Arad, the Amorites and Bashan. The latter two were significant as they saw the capture of lands on the east of the River Jordan that were to be the permanent possessions and major dwellings places for two and a half tribes. The text seems fragmentary and makes for difficult reading. Of interest is mention of the ‘Book of the Wars of the Eternal One,’ which has been lost to us.

Most of the revolts come in the early years of the journey but significantly, we are told of the last few, 38 years later at the beginning of the journeys of the new generation that would enter the Promised Land. It was a revolt that was not handled at all well by Aaron, who dies soon after or by Moses whose wish to enter the Promised Land disappeared with his angry, frustrated double strike of the rock at Meribah. Why did it all fall apart for them? I do not like to think that it was just that the old guys had no place in the new scheme of things but that perhaps this was the only revolution not faced by the ‘dream team.’

The ‘dream team’ included Jethro, the first management consultant in history who also brought the wisdom of age and the experiences of one who had lived in and learnt from another society. Bezalel the creative spark, the young whipper-snapper who could translate God’s designs into the finest, lasting realities of human capabilities. The physical strength of Joshua. The calm finesse and class, coupled with humility and the caring, sustaining qualities of Miriam. Aaron provided the foundations for spiritual expression. And amongst others whose names and stories I am sure we did not receive, the captain, Moses whose deep, personal relationship with God and vision of a free man provided the conviction that though circuitous, the journey was always worth continuing.

Miriam had just died and with her went – as far as Rabbinic tradition had it – the well that travelled with the Israelites wherever they were in the wilderness.

“R. Yohanan said: The well used to water all kinds of garden herbs, all kinds of seeds for planting and all varieties of trees. You can see for yourself that it  was so, for after Miriam died and the well stopped watering the  plants, the people said, “This is no longer a place  of seed, of figs, or of vines (Num 20:5).”

The lack of water is not a new phenomenon to us – it was the first thing that the Israelites complained about when leaving the Sea of Reeds and their most basic need for survival. Miriam’s death marks the end of the ‘dream team.’ The lack of water sends panic through the leadership and, perhaps lacking a ‘Miriam’ to calm them down, they do not follow God’s orders and they are shown to be no better that the people they lead, consigned to death in the wilderness without glimpsing the Promised Land.

If we all need a ‘dream team’ to get the most out of our lives, who would be / is on your ‘team.’  What do you do when, as time goes on, you are deprived of some of your first-choice players?

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