Numbers Cycle Five Chukoth

Chukoth

There are so many miracles in this parsha…and wild stories in midrash. Sad things happen.  Miriam dies.  Aaron dies. Moses gets the horrendous decree that after all his work…he will not enter the Promised Land.  Oh yes, the nasty snakes enter the picture….I think of the serpents in the science fiction film Prometheus… and drive the Israelites mad. And there is never (it seems) enough bread or water.  And there is war. So, imagine, our people are dying of thirst,  watching two of their beloved leaders die and dealing with monsters in the mind. It’s hot. It’s the desert.  Then the kings will not let us cross their land and it seems we decimate them, completely wipe them out. But there isn’t any celebration. There’s only us again faced with our constant wanderings. After each terrific and dramatic battle we simply lift camp again and move on.

It all begins with a decree that we are not expected to understand but just to follow. It’s the decree of the red heifer. This is what we are to do: First, find a red heifer. Then burn it. Into the fire we are to throw a strip of scarlet material, a branch of hyssop, and some cedar wood. Then we are to collect the ashes and put them in a safe clean place.  Later we are to let water run through the ashes and place it in a vessel. Then we are to dip some hyssop into the water and sprinkle it on anything that has become unclean through contact with the dead, the dying, a grave, or a bone.  The person or thing that is unclean shall be sprinkled with this water (Rashi calls it the water of lustration) on the third and seventh day. Anyone involved with this process must wash his skin and clothes. Anyone who has had contact with the dead in any of the above ways and does not enter into this process will be cut off from the community.

 This is quite a ritual. We have been around such symbolic and primal actions when it comes to prayer. We only need to look at Leviticus for that.  This though isn’t about prayer. It’s about how we as a people can deal with a universe that often contradicts our sense of normal, the rational, the force of gravity, the regular beating of a human heart…and somehow connect both worlds (the esoteric and the rational)  in a way that won’t hurt us individually or as a people.  That won’t confuse or frighten us.

I think of a ritual that has become quite common in my home town of Ashland. When something negative has happened …or we are moving into a new home…we do something called smudge it. We burn sage. We  carry it around the house, make sure the fumes waft in every corner, up towards  the ceiling, down on  the floor.  I don’t know if it helps to dissipate the human pain still present in the space. I do know though that action…doing something conscious to lift-out any negativity…is healing in itself.  Our own action stabilizes and solidifies intent and desire.  Our fears and needs stop being esoteric and intangible. They become heal-able through our personal involvement.

And what about the Shabbat candles? Does the light of Hashem really honestly without a doubt or even a moment of scientific questioning collect in the Shabbat flames?  Or, in the doing of the mitzvah are we solidifying and making real the very belief?

I think we can understand it this way: Ritual demands action and even if we don’t know whether the belief-system around the ritual is real, our action makes it real.

There’s a great midrash around the red heifer. I will consolidate it. It has to do with Rabbi Johanon ben Zakkai. I discussed him last week. What we need to remember is how he left Jerusalem when it was under Roman siege in the first century CE.  He pretended he was dead. The dead were the only bodies allowed out of Jerusalem at that time. Now, if we compare the Roman Coliseum to the internet…we can certainly say that the internet is the Roman Coliseum of today…then we as well have the chance to be like Rabbi Ben Zakkai. In order to leave the insanity of war and destruction, the culture of violent entertainment, he literally had to fake a transformation.  We as well can bring about that transformation within ourselves in order to leave our day-to-day expectations and habits. We can keep the soul safe but be open to changes of normal appearance to enter a whole new way-of-life and way-of-consciousness.  I think it’s important to be able to do this. In terms of the internet, we can move beyond computer-controlled connection.  We can reach out simply through our minds.  In my opinion, this kind of adaptability on the physical level will give us the Entrance sign to the Promised Land. My ideas are certainly supported by great thinkers such as Alan Watts and Joseph Campbell, not to mention a myriad of poets and prophets of both ancient times and modern.

 

So let’s get to the midrash I refer to above. Quickly, a non-Jew approaches Rabbi b. Zakkai. He says that the rites of the red heifer seem like a form of witchcraft. Rabbi b. Zakkai (after an extended conversation) more or less agrees with him..He says that the waters of purification are sprinkled on the unclean and the (evil) spirit flees. When the non-Jew goes away the disciples understand that their teacher was just putting off this man with some “make-shift” response. But then they want to know the same thing…for real… Rabbi b Zakkai says this: By your life! It is not the dead that defiles nor the water that purifies! The Holy One, blessed be He, merely says “I have laid down a statute. I have issued a decree”; as it is written “This is the statute of the law” (Numbers 19:2).

Is Rabbi b Zakkai saying we should just follow blindly? I think not. He is encouraging us all to get to a place in our minds that connects the heavenly and miraculous with the quotidian.  We can accept God and create the holy here on earth simply through the way we think, the way we view each other, the way we see, the light we shine. Our thoughts alone can create the body-transformation that can save us from the plagues of war, the poisonous snakes,  drought and starvation.  Our minds can recreate the well that travels with the Israelites, the one that the prophetess Miriam creates and therefore dries up when she dies. Our minds can create the cloud that rises from us when we are supposed to move forward, the one that disappears at the death of Aaron. Our minds can bring forth water from a rock.

It is not only what we say. It is not only what practices and ancient rituals we embrace. It is not only what we do to help others. Though all of this…as we all know…is extremely important. If we really want to bring the miracle of God to earth in a strong and consistent way, in a way that creates everlasting peace, then that loving-kindness must go beyond the immediacy and moment of action and speech into the infinity of our minds.  As Rav Nachman has said, our words travel to a certain point and then are no longer heard. The ball we throw with our hands can only go so far and then it stops. But the light and energy we emit from our minds can move through infinite space. In my personal opinion, it can cut through solar systems as well as linear time.  It can connect all moments and spots on its line into one point.  It can heal the past as well as the future.

The objective therefore is to learn how to transform ourselves….because the dead to not contaminate nor does the water purify…to a place that gives us the ability to discern that which does contaminate (which would be the doubt of our  ability)…and to bring our minds to a place of vision and transmission. And meanwhile, we take part actively in the rituals and statutes spoken by God.  Because we are, as a society, in that place of “meanwhile”.  And there is nothing harmful about the statute. We just need to know it’s not the final stop in our wanderings…just one stop along the way…as we bring ourselves carefully and lovingly into the full embrace of God.

I think our potential is limitless as we begin to understand this.  As we chant in our prayers every morning…we bless God who brings life to the dead….As Rabbi Kook says…In order to remove every barrier between the divine good and the individual person who thirsts for it, it is necessary to shed every moral defect, in the broadest connotation of the term..…. Rome wasn’t built in a day though and until then, we are gifted with rites of passage, the miracle of  us ourselves here and now…and a red heifer.