Aiming High: Holy Nation and Resurrection

Since God is understood to be aware of our thoughts and feelings, and “probe the inner recesses of our heart”, it is not surprising that Judaism places great value on thoughts and aspirations – not just on a person’s actions. However noble and praiseworthy our spiritual ambitions may be, however, we must be extremely careful not to confuse them with our reality and consider ourselves more worthy than we really are. This, writes Rabbi S. R. Hirsch was the critical error of Korach and his assembly.

Focusing on Korach's statement: "the entire congregation are all holy and have God in their midst, and why have you elevated yourself over the community of God?" Rav Hirsch suggests that Korach's error was to confuse destiny with reality. The Jewish people had certainly been accorded the title of “holy nation”, but this meant only that they had been set aside for a holy purpose, to aspire and raise themselves towards holiness by dedicating themselves to God and His Torah (“tiheyun li” – you SHALL be to Me). The presence of God's Mishkan in their midst gave this holy ideal a symbolic expression, but there remained clearly defined boundaries and rules governing who could enter the Mishkan and when such entry would be permitted.

The danger posed by Korach's claims of equality of holiness and status for each Jew, and universal qualification to interpret the Torah, represented a threat to the entire system and process of expounding halachah. This is because those claims suggested that the nation had collectively arrived at a level of holiness and understanding that obviated any need for religious leadership or guidance in interpreting the Torah. Korach’s assertions drew an emphatic response from God, a miraculous phenomenon to demonstrate unambiguously the fallacy of such claims. This phenomenon was thus intended to make it clear that the nation designated to be holy must rely on the religious guidance of its members who have already succeeded in refining their character and relationship with God.

But while it’s important to have the clarity to distinguish one’s ambitions and goals from one’s reality, there are some scenarios in which Judaism certainly does place strong emphasis on aspirations. One possible example of this is the closing chapter of Rambam’s Hilchot Teshuvah which describes a level of religious worship – out of love and pure motive – that it recognizes are only practically attainable by a small minority of people. It would seem that there is religious value when one approaches the process of repentance in being aware and accepting the nature of higher levels of Judaism even if they are always likely to lie beyond one’s personal reality. On a more practical level, this may also explain the widespread custom that people have of striving to higher levels of observance during the Ten Days of Repentance despite the knowledge that this is a short-term effort that is unlikely to be sustained.

Finally, Judaism Reclaimed dedicates several chapters to the difficult subject of Resurrection of the Dead in Rambam’s thought. One possibility explored is the interpretation of Rambam offered by Rabbi Yosef Albo’s Sefer Ha’Ikkarim. Briefly stated, Rabbi Albo suggests that Resurrection represents an opportunity for those who were honest and righteous Jews yet lacked the life opportunities to develop the sort of spiritual connection to God necessary for an enhanced portion in the World to Come. Techiyat Hameitim, in a future idyllic Messianic era, affords such pious individuals the chance to pursue religious and spiritual perfection under optimum conditions.

Which attributes or merits does one require in order to qualify for this techiyah? Various Talmudic sources appear to support this understanding of Rambam’s approach to techiyah. One Gemara in Kiddushin (39b) identifies two mitzvot upon which techiyat hametim depends: sending away the mother bird and the honouring of one’s parents. These two mitzvot involve basic human character traits and attitudes regarding sensitivity to the feelings of others. This therefore makes them suitable determinants of whether a person deserves to receive another opportunity to maximise his Olam Haba under more favourable conditions. Arrogance, by contrast, is seen as a destructive trait that can prevent a person from receiving a second opportunity of techiya (Sotah 8b).

Another Gemara, in Ketubot (111b), mentions the merit of Torah study being connected to qualifying for techiyah. Crucially, however, it is not specifically the study of Torah which makes one worthy of resurrection: even seeking a connection to Torah study (such as by supporting Torah scholars) will achieve that result. The common denominator of these Gemaras is that what is most crucial in meriting techiyah is one’s attitude and effort. What one is aspiring towards not necessarily what has already been achieved. This can be contrasted, in Rambam’s line of thought, with qualification for Olam Haba itself, which focuses on the reality of a person having achieved an intellectual perception of divine truths.

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Korach and source criticism: arguing about an argument

By Daniel Abraham and Shmuli Phillips

Parashat Korach is traditionally taught as an episode involving a challenge by a coalition of disputants to Moshe’s supreme authority over the Israelites in the desert. There is, however, a widely held belief within academic source criticism of the Torah that the story of Dathan, Abiram, and Korach is comprised of two independent narratives that were later combined. Typically, the first of these stories involves Dathan and Abiram, who challenge Moses for failing to bring them to the promised land. This story concludes with them and their households being swallowed into the ground. The second story tells of Korach and 250 men challenging Moses and Aaron’s positions of authority, and results in their being consumed by a fire from God. A close reading of this section of the Torah reveals that not only that the evidence for this supposed division is weak, but that there are in fact a number of strong counter-indications which point instead to the unity of the text.

Right: The Argument (here)

As is often the case with critical theories that attempt to separate the text into distinct narratives, there is a great deal of disagreement among the source critics themselves as to how such a separation might be performed. Some, such as David Carr , simply divide the story between P (priestly authorship) and unspecified non-P sources. Others, such as Richard Elliot Friedman divide Numbers 16 between “J” and “P”. A third group, including Joel Baden, divide the text up as “E” and “P”. Carr notes that “Baden diverges from many prior source-critics in assigning all of the non-P story of Dathan and Abiram's rebellion in Numbers 16 to E”. A further group of opinions, such as that held by David Frankel, breaks the story up into seven redactional layers. If such claims, in the absence of any actual material evidence, sound incredulous Carr comments, “Some have found evidence of eight to fifteen (or more) layers of sources and redactional expansions in a single chapter or set of verses. Yet I suggest that these more complicated reconstructions of textual prehistory have not stood and will not stand the test of time.” Like Moshe’s challengers, it would appear that these fractious critics stand together only in their opposition to the traditional notion of a single biblical Author.

One of the main arguments for this division involves the subsequent retelling of these events in Deuteronomy. There at verse 11:6 Moses recounts,

“and what He did to Dathan and Abiram, sons of Eliab son of Reuben, when the earth opened her mouth and swallowed them, along with their households, their tents, and every living thing in their train, from amidst all Israel.”

While Moshe mentions Dathan and Abiram he fails to mention Korach. Source critics will often assume that any possible discrepancies in the Torah must be a contradiction (except of course when such discrepancies are harmful to their source divisions, in which cases the critics develop some very creative, complex resolutions). In this case, the omission of Korach from the retelling of the narrative can be attributed to Moses wanting to strengthen the status of the loyal Levites – many of whom would have survived the desert years – as future leaders and teachers of the people, rather than running the risk of reigniting bygone grievances. The more personal challenges of Dathan, Abiram and the other protagonists, by contrast, are likely to have perished along with those who advanced them. Moses, in reminding the people of the results of such this earlier unsuccessful uprising, would have been considered as having administered an effective warning against future insurrections. Additionally, as Rabbi David Tzvi Hoffman suggests, Moses may have wanted to spare the sons of Korach, whom we are told survived the rebellion, from any embarrassment.

Rabbi Dr. Joshua Berman addresses the claims of source critics that relate to apparently inconsistent recounting of earlier episodes from a different perspective. Berman draws on examples of Ancient Near-Eastern texts such as Hittite treaties from the 13-14th century BCE to show how ancient literary style regularly included a retelling of history that involved omission of certain facts and a retelling of others. In many instances, such inconsistent retelling occurs within a text which is known to be the unified work of a single author, and is understood as a literary tool to emphasize and convey particular messages.

Another important source in the context of this discussion is Psalm 106:17,18, where we see a similar omission of Korach:

“The earth opened up and swallowed Dathan, closed over the party of Abir׃ A fire blazed among their party, a flame that consumed the wicked.”

Once again we see a recounting of the story that only mentions Dathan and Abiram. Yet crucially we also find the author of this Psalm describing a fire burning up their congregation – an element of the episode that source critics relate specifically to Korach and not to Dathan and Abiram. Why would this passage also choose to omit any explicit reference to Korach? Perhaps again, to avoid embarrassment of the Levites, including the sons of Korah (some of them being authors of the Psalms) whom we know from archaeological finds were still around in Arad, 8th century BCE.

Dr. Ben Zion Katz demonstrates the textual unity of the Korach episode from a subsequent passage in the Book of Numbers, which clearly regards both Korach’s rebellion and that of the non-Levites as being part of a single challenge to Moshe’s position:

“when the daughters of Zelofchad complain to Moses about their lack of ability to inherit because of their gender (Numbers 27; P) they mention that their father was not a part of Korah’s rebellion (27:3). Yet Zelofchad was from the tribe of Menashe. He would not have been part of the rebellion of the Levite Korah against Aaron; he would have been in the rebellion of Datan and Abiram against Moses, and it would be extremely odd for source P to make this mistake.”

In response to those who question why the tribe of Reuben would have been associated with Korach and drawn into his alliance, it must be borne in mind that when camping in the desert, Korach and the Kohathites dwelt to the South of the Mishkan, as did the tribes of Reuben, Simeon, and Gad. This consistent close proximity would have allowed for such an alliance to form over time and thereby exposed these tribes to the complaints of Korach.

In conclusion, while the Korach narrative has gained acceptance and popularity among source critics as an important example of how individual stories were later combined in the Torah, persistent disagreement among critics themselves indicates that such theories are not at all self-evident. The counter-indications that we have offered from other biblical sources point strongly towards reading the rebellion as the action of a broad umbrella of malcontents, unified by their wish to unseat Moses, rather than as a carefully combined collection of independent challengers to Moses.

First posted on Facebook 13 June 2021, here.

Holy nation and biblical interpretation

The episode of Korach’s insurrection against Moshe and his authority provides a platform for Rabbi S. R. Hirsch to analyse the concept of the Israelites as a “holy nation” – a point emphasised by Korach:

"the entire congregation are all holy and have God in their midst, and why have you elevated yourself over the community of God?"

Rav Hirsch suggests that it was an unwillingness to submit to the authority of Moshe and his hierarchical structure that lay at the heart of Korach’s rebellion. Korach’s error was to confuse destiny with reality. The Jewish people had certainly been spoken of as “anshei kodesh” – a holy nation, but this meant only that they had been set aside for a holy purpose, to aspire and raise themselves towards holiness by dedicating themselves to God and His Torah. In this light it is important that the Torah writes “anshei kodesh tiheyun li” and kedoshim tiheyu – you shall be holy rather than are (kedoshim atem). Judaism represents a mission and instruction to use the tools which we have been granted to become holy rather than being a statement of fact that we are automatically and inherently superior.

As well as the implications of this teaching for the question of how the Torah views the differential between Jews and non-Jews (a topic I plan to return to next week), the claim that the entire nation is equally qualified as holy represented a serious threat. Midrashim hint to this by depicting Korach as challenging Moshe on details of commandments such as tsitsit and mezuzah:

Korach sprang forth and said to Moshe: ‘if a garment is entirely colored with sky-blue tekhelet dye, is it or is it not exempt from the obligation of tzitzit?’ Said Moshe: ‘it is nevertheless obligated in tzitzit!’ Korach then retorted: ‘if a garment that is colored entirely with sky-blue tekhelet dye cannot exempt itself, shall four small threads then exempt it?!’

As I point out in Judaism Reclaimed, the sort of details chosen by the Midrash are those which do not appear in the simple peshat reading of the passage. Moshe has already been promised at Sinai that “they will believe you forever” so it is unlikely that Korach is challenging the authenticity of the basic laws taught by Moshe.

Rather they belong to the second, interpretative layer based on logic of the interpreter and hermeneutic tools. The sort of details that, as Rambam teaches in his introduction to the Mishneh, were delegated to the sages of each generation to legislate through the Sanhedrin. What Korach is challenging according to this approach is the fundamental question of authority over the oral tradition and legal interpretation of the Torah – a claim which was repeated in different form by the Sadducees centuries later. Asked what would become of the Torah if the Sanhedrin and its sages are destroyed, the Sadducee responds: “‘it is rolled up and lying in the corner: whoever wishes to study. Let him go and study!’” [Kiddushin 66a]

What the author of the midrash may be conveying is that, if Korach were to have his way and the entire congregation viewed as equally holy, this would mean that they are all uniformly entitled to interpret the written Torah to produce laws as they see fit. In this view, Korach’s assertions drew an emphatic response from God: a miraculous phenomenon to demonstrate unambiguously that his claims were unfounded and that, in the words of Moshe “the one chosen by God - "he is the holy one".

First posted on Facebook 26 June 2022, here.