Order is important. When reading the Torah, chronology informs us of how people and a peoplehood develop. We watch as the life of Moses, for example, is first described in the opening chapters of Exodus. We then follow him as he grows, matures and changes through adulthood. Without this order we would have a faulty, sporadic view of how this redeemer/lawgiver came to be.
That is why this Torah parsha is so troubling. It is out of order. The Sages, of blessed memory, universally agreed that the narrative of the census belongs elsewhere in the Torah. They tell us that all the commandments enumerated here were given before the episode of the Golden Calf…yet they are placed after the event.
The Sages were unmoved by the conundrum. They figuratively shrugged their collective shoulders and said, “There is no chronology in the Torah.”
For those who sit and learn in the light of the Torah, carefully scrutinizing the Text for its many meanings, this is a critical issue that demands a response.
The scientific study of Bible yields its answer: the lack of order in the Writ shows bad editorial-ship. The Text, they tell, is actually a series of disparate fragments that were patched together, rather poorly as proven here, in a single volume. Each fragment may tell the story of the same people but each has a dissimilar viewpoint. Sometimes, the authors even lived in different centuries!
To the scientifically oriented the lack of chronology is not troubling. It simply reveals the human artistry and foibles of the biblical authors.
For the faithful, the lack of order is also not disturbing. They look at the world and stand in silent awe of a vast universe that holds secrets that can never be plumbed. The cosmos is too vast. As a tiny pebble on an endless stretch of beach, the believer looks out at the expanse and sees a mystery that will always lie beyond his reach.
For such a religious being the lack of chronology is a spur to study the hoary texts and scour them for clues to its meaning with every available piece of information from the present. And if they still cannot understand why the Bible is out of order? They accept that this is part of the plan of God.
Ultimately, they believe, He will unfurl the mystery when the time is right.
Every person is predisposed to see the world as befits their personality and outlook. Some are optimistic, others are pessimistic. Some are field with bleak despair, others brim with hope. We all search for what our heart yearns to find. Invaiably, we find what we want to find.
We choose the path which best suits our soul. For every student of Torah this question must be confronted: Which voice is stronger inside us? The empiricist who looks for scientific data? Or the person of awe who is in search of God? The answer to these questions is a clue to who we are truly are. More often than otherwaise, we see what we are predisposed to see. We find what we want to find.
Which are you? God centric? Scientifically focused?
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Exodus 30:16 One-half shekel is given by every Israelite as atonement for their soul.
No one was all owed to give more or less than the stated amount. In the final analysis, while some people will accumulate great wealth and others will not raise themselves out of poverty, the value of a soul is the same.
Atonement: the silver that the brothers of Joseph received for selling him was divided between them. Each received one-half shekel as their prize.
For the sin of selling Joseph the Israelites carried the burden of that guilt until now. The half-shekel atoned for Joseph.
D'var Acher: (another approach): Some say the half shekel was a means of taking a census. In collecting one coin from each person, the elders would soon see how many Israelites would becomes the seeds of the new nation.
D'var Acher: after the rebellion of the Golden Calf many of the instigators and participants died. A census was needed to count the survivors.
Dvar Acher: when people are counted it brings on the ayin hara, the evil eye. For example, when King David took a count of his people the nation was afflicted with a terrible plague. 2 Samuel 24
In our time, as the Jews of the Shoah were numbered ad counted the fires of Gehenna were stoked. That is why one coin was given instead of counting heads.
D'var Acher: only men participated in the actual making of the Golden Calf. A man without a woman is termed a peleg gufa, half a person. For the crime of the men making the Calf, one-half shekel was demanded.
D'var Acher: "God does not reject the broken-hearted." Psalms 51:19
A shekel is a reminder that we are all tormented, fragile beings. Broken as we are – like the half-shekel – God desires us.
D'var Acher: Why was the atonement of the shekel required? We all need forgiveness.
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Ki Tissa, this week's parasha, begins with God telling Moses to take a census of the Israelites. The mechanism for doing so is to have each Jew give 1/2 shekel. The shekels would then be counted and Moses would know how many people were part go the nation. Why this convoluted way of counting people? Maybe because, as has been suggested, that when we count people we somehow limit their scope. In reducing them to a number we dehumanize them. Sound familiar? We, who live in the post Holocaust generation, know this far too well when our people were shorn of their names and given numbers engraved on their arms.
Here is that by counting someone, we limit that person by imposing a cap or assigning a number to them. Didn't Haman make the same statement when he reduced people to an intrusion of numbers?
As the holy Zohar points out, in Hebrew lispore means to count or cut. Perhaps when we count people we "cut" them. Even today when we need to ascertain that we have a minyan we avoid counting people by saying "not one, not two...". Some refuse to do even that: they will recite the mah tovu, which has ten words, and say one word for each person.
Always think the best of others and you will bring out the best in them.
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