Drash Cards for Balak (5758)<\/b><\/p>\n
by Marc Mangel<\/p>\n
\u2022 How do we make sense of the end of this parsha (Ch 25, v1 following) in which we have Baal Peor, idolatry, the murder of Zimri (whose name is given in the midrash) and the Midianite woman, and a plague is averted or ended. And then in the next chapter in v 12, God gives Pinchas his gift of ‘peace’<\/p>\n
\u2022 What is going on? There is no trial, no defense, no respect for the law, no testimony — basically defiance of everything we think about law. \u00a0How should we read it today?<\/p>\n
\u2022 The sages were troubled too, but said “Faith implies no denial of evil, no disregard of danger, no whitewashing of the abominable”.<\/p>\n
\u2022 First point: Pinchas\/Zimri are part of our history and collective memory, on which Jewish spirituality is based.<\/p>\n
\u2022 Second point: Coping with zeal. \u00a0The Jerusalem Talmud writes that Pinchas did not do something that leaders approved of. \u00a0Indeed, Zvi Berlin writes that God’s covenant of peace is protection against the inner demon that Pinchas will have to battle the rest of his life.<\/p>\n
\u2022 Third point: \u00a0Consequences of zeal. \u00a0Pinchas is not chosen as the leader after Moses even though he is in line for it. A leader cannot take the law into his own hands.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Drash Cards for Balak (5758) by Marc Mangel \u2022 How do we make sense of the end of this parsha (Ch 25, v1 following) in which we have Baal Peor, idolatry, the murder of Zimri (whose name is given in the midrash) and the Midianite woman, and a plague is averted or ended. And then … Continue reading