This week, we read the parsha (weekly Torah portion) called Korach.  This is a very strange parsha.  Korach, by-the-way, is the name of a leader of the tribe of Levi who has an issue with the way Moshe (Moses) was delegating authority.

Now, for those of you who, like me, like to translate names, Korach comes from the root that means to make bald.  It also can mean ice when given a different set of vowels.  I say this to remind you that the Torah is written without vowels (which is actually quite common for written Hebrew, even in modern times).

So, what do we have in this parsha?  Well, we begin with Korach, along with two brothers from the tribe of Reuvan, leading an entourage of 250 men who go up against Moshe and Aharon.  According to our parsha, their main beef is that the whole nation is holy, and since this is so, it does not make sense that Moshe and Aharon should lift themselves above the congregation.

Moshe, responds by falling on his face and telling them that the next morning haShem (god) will let everybody know who she chooses to come close to him.  We then read of what the challengers need to do to be in the running for the top spot, along with a plea from Moshe to the children of Levi to just accept the honor that haShem has already given them.  Moshe then calls for an audience with the two brothers from Reuvan who refuse to come forward.  This distresses Moshe for he feels he has never taken anything from them.

The next morning the challengers come to the entrance of the tent of meeting with the hope of being chosen.  God then tells Moshe and Aharon to remove themselves from these people so he can kill them.  Moshe convinces god not to.

God then tells Moshe to move away from the three leaders’ tents.  Moshe goes to the brothers of the tribe of Reuvan, Datan and Aviram, followed by the elders of Yisrael.  Moshe then says that if the earth opens up and swallows them, this is a proof that he is following god’s orders.  If they have a normal death, then it is all his doing.  HaShem proceeds to create a mouth in the earth which opens and swallows the three leaders and all their possessions.

At the same time, a fire comes down and burns up the 250 men who wanted to be chosen – all that is left is their fire-pans. God tells Moshe to have these made into an overlay for the altar because they are now holy and they will also be a sign for the children of Yisrael.

The next day, the people start to complain against Moshe and Aharon for killing all these people.  The cloud of god shows up and god tells Moshe to separate from the community so god can destroy them.  Moshe tells Aharon to take a fire-pan and incense to stop the plague that has now begin amongst the people.

Once the plague is stopped, god tells Moshe to collect a signed staff from one leader from each of the 12 tribes, and the staff from the tribe of Levi is to have Aharon’s name on it.  These are to be placed into the tent of meeting and the next day god will make one of the staffs bloom.  The owner of that staff is the one god has chosen.  The next day, not only has Aharon’s staff bloomed, but it is also producing almonds.

The children of Yisrael now start to cry that they will die because no-one is allowed to approach the mishcan (tabernacle).  God then tells Aharon that he and his sons will carry the iniquity of the mishcan and of the priesthood, and that the rest of the tribe of Levi has the task to keep everyone but Aharon and his sons away from the holy parts of the mishcan.  The Levis also are to do the work of the mishcan and all this will prevent anyone else from dying.

The parsha ends by telling us about the tithes that are given to the tribe of Levi and to Aharon and his sons and that this is their inheritance since they do not get to inherit any of the promised land.

So, what do you think of this parsha?

I think there are a lot of things we can learn from it.  Two years ago, for example, I talked about what a parent can learn.

Today I want to talk about what we can learn from listening to a person’s speech.

A person’s speech can tell us what that person’s view of reality is.  For example, in the family tradition of Yaakov (Jacob), we talk about going up to the land of Israel.  Why do we say that?  Because there is an implicit belief that one goes up towards holiness, and down when one goes away from holiness.

We also see this in the Torah.  For example, the Torah says that Avraham went down to Egypt.  Why does it say this?  Because he was starting in the land that was promised to his descendants, land that is considered to be holy.

“This is all very interesting,” I hear some of you say, “But what does this have to do with our parsha?”  A good question, and well timed, I might add.  The answer lies in verse 16:13 (of our current book, Bmeedbar/Numbers).  In this verse, we read the beginning of Datan and Aviram’s answer to Moshe’s request for them to come to him.

Their response begins by saying, “It is so little that you brought us up from a land flowing with milk and honey to cause our death in the wilderness, that you also will rule over us?”

The key phrase I want to look at here is the first clause.  They say that Moshe brought them from a land flowing with milk and honey.  The phrase, “A land flowing with milk and honey,” is used in reference to the promised land which is holy land.  One goes UP TO such a land.

These two are saying that they were brought up FROM such a land.

It would appear that Datan and Aviram have a reality that does not agree with the reality of the Torah.  The continuation of the verse reinforced this idea.  The Torah has made it plain and obvious that Moshe is simply following the orders of haShem and that he has no desire to lead the people.  The people have not entered the land and because of their actions/attitude; a generation of men will die in the wilderness because of their actions/attitudes.

According to our verse, Datan and Aviram think that since the people wanted to go into the land, it was as if they were in the land.  Further, they hold that it was Moshe who then took them out of the promised land, not only to die, but also so he could rule over them.  Clearly these two are living in a reality that is not the Torah’s.

Ok, so I have now shown that we can determine how a person sees the world based on how they talk.  So what?

Another good question, and another question that I see our parsha try to answer.

Our Torah needed to show us we can see a person’s reality through their speech to show us that it is possible to have different realities, and how we can get a glimpse of these realities.

This, however, is not the main teaching.  Rather, we needed to know this in order to understand the real lesson here.  The real lesson the Torah wants us to know is that while we all have differences in the way we see/understand/believe reality, if we want to interact and live together in this world, we had better keep our realities from becoming too skewed.

I already hear some laughter in the audience.  This is good; it means you are listening.  I also hear the doubts that I will be able to demonstrate this from our parsha.

And, yes, that is a smile you see on my face.

The reason for the smile is because the proof is really quite simple.  It is all contained in verses 16:31-33.  In these verses we read how a mouth opened in the earth and swallowed Korach and his household and his possession; that they all fell alive and the earth covered them over.

These seemingly simple sentences are really telling us something very deep.  To understand what is being said, you need to first ask the question, “Why did god create a mouth to open in the earth? God could have chosen a myriad of ways to take Korach out.  Why a mouth in the earth to swallow them?”

The answer that I came up with goes like this.  Korach had lost his belief in god.  We know this by his words. H e claims that Moshe and Aharon have put themselves on top of the congregation.  The reality of the Torah says that haShem put them there.  Korach has denied the reality of the Torah and denied the existence of god.

God’s response to this is to, “Say,” to Korach that if you don’t believe in me, you can’t believe in the very ground that is beneath your feet, because it is a given that god made the earth.

Hence, god removed the ground from beneath his feet and what we see is that the earth now has a mouth.  Down goes Korach and the ground covers him over.  Why does the ground reappear?  Because that is the true reality that exists in the Torah.

The bottom line of all this is that Korach has gone from the world, from this reality.  The reason he is gone is because he has lost touch with this reality.  His reality is so different from the reality of the Torah, that he just isn’t in this world and the world he is in is not the world of the Torah.  He is completely cut off because there is nothing to connect him to this world.  That this can happen, I think, is what our parsha really wanted us to see.

Now we come to verse 34.  Here we see the people running in fear.  What are they afraid of?

A better question is why are they afraid?  The reason for their fear is that they are not strong enough in their belief of god to trust that they won’t also get swallowed.  I personally find this amazing considering all that they have seen and gone through.  It makes me wonder why or how can they be lacking the strength.

The only reason I can think for this, is that the Torah wants to let us know how hard it really is to believe in something that is unrecognized in the physical world.  Perhaps it is to let us know that we are not alone when we doubt the reality of the Torah and of god.

Now, please understand that I don’t think this is giving us a license to doubt.  Rather, I think it is telling us not to beat ourselves up if and when our belief lags in the face of the world.  And it is also here to tell us not to give in to this doubt, because if we do, we just might find ourselves swallowed out of this world that haShem made for us to be in.

If you care to read what I wrote about this parsha last year, click here.

About the Author

Shmuel Shalom Cohen spent 10 years studying Torah in Jerusalem. Six years ago, he started Conscious Torah to help Jews connect to their tradition in ways they didn’t think possible. Shmuel also started, and is the executive directory of Jewish Events Willamette-valley, a non-profit whose mission is to build Jewish community, pride, and learning. In his free time, Shmuel likes walks in nature, playing music, writing poetry, and time with good friends.