Naso

With God's help, you and I are beginning to study the weekly portion Naso, and we will read from verse 21 of chapter 4. The Most High continues to give Moshe and Aharon instructions about what each family of the Levites must do, as well as the special assignments of each of them for the service.

These were the instructions of the Most High concerning the family of Gershon, and the Most High moves on to another Levite family.

It so happens that a lot of work falls on one person: one person alone will carry five pillars, and someone else will not carry a single one. Since there are many family members and few implements, perhaps not everyone will even get work. And each one will be responsible for some specific part of his own, for some specific element of his own, in every specific move of the people of Israel from place to place. But in this listing of the objects by name, which the Most High commands here, one can also see something else. Every pillar must stand strictly in its own place. The fifth pillar cannot become the sixth, and the sixth pillar cannot become the fourth: despite all the similarity and sameness of the elements and parts, it is quite possible that they are not interchangeable. And once it has become the fourth, the pillar will remain the fourth all the time. If, by analogy, we speak about people of other races, who may seem the same to us, all looking alike, then one might think that for the Creator, too, this is simply a gray mass. But that is not so: all of us, so different and so alike, do not all look alike to the Most High, are not interchangeable, are not faceless cogs in His enormous universe.

So, the Most High has laid out the order by which all the duties in the Levite service are distributed. Each one is a narrow specialist: someone carries the holy vessels, someone carries only the curtains, someone – only the pillars. And, it would seem, someone's service may seem more important, because the person touches the holiest thing of all, and someone else's – less important, because he carries some ropes, cords and pillars. But only all of this together forms a single whole. Without one pillar the courtyard will no longer be a courtyard, and the Mishkan will not be the Mishkan. All of this is part of one service, only all together can it work, therefore one family cannot look down on another. So, a teacher in the synagogue cannot treat with disdain the one who greets the guests, or the one who sets out the chairs when this is needed for study, hands out the sheets and so on. Without this it is impossible to study, without this it is impossible to work, all of this is part of one mechanism. In the same way the brain cannot neglect the kidneys, the kidneys cannot neglect the heart, and they cannot neglect the brain either. The Most High sets everything going together, as a single, well-coordinated organism. On the one hand, there are no jacks-of-all-trades here; just as in the human body, everyone here is a narrow specialist. On the other hand, without the narrow specialization of even one of the specialists, no work at all is possible.

Of course, they do not all carry the implements of the Mishkan at once, because it is not so big that there would be enough objects for everyone. But all of them are in the state of a pioneer who is “always ready,” in a state of full readiness to carry out this narrow specialization of theirs. None of them will say: “Excuse me, the Levite place here is taken, I think I'll go and serve somewhere else, I'll take up something else, where perhaps I'll be more in demand.” Of course, they live and do some other work, but their service to the Most High can in this case consist only in potential: “Here I am ready to carry the holy implements of the Mishkan, here – its pillars and boards. And this readiness, it is with me for my whole life.” And so for each of the families of the Levites. Therefore the Most High lists, lists monotonously all the families separately, stating their number. Everyone is counted, everyone is recorded. And all of them the Most High destined precisely for their own service. Perhaps because the very inner readiness for this service and the ability to carry it out already forms and changes a person, forms and changes a Levite.

In the modern world, believers often tell me: “We are not fulfilling our purpose, I feel that I am not serving the Most High in any way.” The Torah says: “Be watchful, be ready for the fact that at any moment service may knock on your door in the form of a beggar, in the form of a sick person, in the form of a person you need to talk with, whom you need to smile at, in the form of some work that needs to be done; watchfulness is part of service. If you are watchful, if you are ready for this work, ready for this service at any moment, then you are already serving. It is clear that out of many thousands of Levites not all will have the opportunity even to touch the vessels of the Temple some day. But the Levite service itself was possible thanks to their readiness to carry out this service at any moment, thanks to their professional training. They were trained for this service, which perhaps they will never even perform. And the Most High also calls us and says: be ready, be ready for service at any moment. Readiness is already service in itself. If, of course, we are not deceiving ourselves with our readiness.

That is, all of them are called servants of the Tent of Meeting, this whole considerable number of people: “Who are you? I am a soldier. And why do you have so few assault rifles? That is how the Most High decided.” They all go into the host, not all with weapons, but all are ready. And in a certain sense all these two thousand six hundred thirty people will carry what the family of Gershon is assigned to carry.

And, having completed the count of all the families of the Levites, the Torah moves on to the “Total” column.

With God's help, you and I continue to study the weekly portion Naso, and we will read from verse 1 of chapter 5.

We spoke in detail in the book of Vayikra about these kinds of defilement and about the fact that those who have become defiled in this way must be purified outside the camp. Sometimes we cannot process some impurity in us by going to some noisy party, into a crowd of people, to a Torah lesson, or trying in some other way to take our mind off things. There are cases when our purification, our inner work, must take place outside the camp. This is not always a bad state. Perhaps here the person was fulfilling a commandment and washing a dead person, preparing him for burial. And nevertheless this makes him impure and calls him to a certain work outside the community. I will repeat again that this is not bad, it is simply a special kind of work.

Regardless of gender, a person who suffers from tzará'at, or from discharges, or who has become defiled, is sent outside the camp. He does not live there in a ravine, does not spend the night there among the rocks. There are some equipped places there, there is a possibility to exist there. But it is a kind of quarantine, where a person is placed for purification.

We know that there is a camp of the Levites. There is a holy place there, and one must enter it after special preparation, in a special state. But even simply to be in the camp of Israel, when the Most High is present in Israel, a special state is needed, purity is needed. When a person becomes tamé (impure), and there is an obstacle to the Divine light penetrating him, he goes outside the camp.

What was previously a theoretical law comes into force from this moment, from the moment when the movement begins, when the people set out on the way. And Israel sends the impure outside the camp.

What is meant here is that a person has committed robbery. Robbery is not necessarily taking something from someone by putting a knife to his throat. Robbery can be, for example, that a person took a pledge and does not give it back, or does not pay someone the wages due, or does not give back money borrowed. And then either he may be caught red-handed, or some witnesses of his deed may appear, or something started itching in his own soul, and he decided to give himself up and clear his conscience. This is the situation being spoken about. But why does this become a sin before the Most High? Because the person swears by the name of the Most High, and that means he calls on the Most High to be a witness that he did not take this pledge, or already returned it, or paid the wages, or did not hire the person – in a word, he swears by the name of the Most High in such a situation in order to get out of it.

For example, I deliberately took something from someone, do not give it back, and am caught red-handed or changed my mind. In that case I must return what I took and add a fifth part to it. We have spoken several times about the fact that a fifth part can mean 20%, if 100% is divided into five parts, or 25%, when 100% is divided into 4 parts, that is, 120% or 125% of the value. One way or another, I am obliged to add a fifth part as compensation for that in which I am guilty.

It so happened that the person before whom I am guilty has no family, has no relatives, and he himself is no longer alive, that happens. Most likely what is meant here is a proselyte. The children of a proselyte who dies do not inherit from him, as we know. He is like a dry tree, so the prophets say, and there is no one to return what was stolen from him to.

Let us try to understand what this is about. Suppose a ger, a proselyte, became the victim of robbery, and there is no longer anyone to return the loot to, he has no heirs. In this case the loot is returned to the kohen. Why so? Because the ger is in some way akin to him. Just as the kohen has no allotment in the land of Israel, so too the proselyte has no allotment in the land of Israel. To some degree he is a stranger in the camp of Israel in the physical sense, while belonging to it in the spiritual sense. And this too makes the proselyte close to the kohen. He did not join Israel because of kinship by blood, because of physical kinship. He is in Israel for purely spiritual reasons. Therefore the reverence and respect for the ger is greater than the respect for a Jew: love for the ger is a separate commandment. Therefore what is due to be returned to him is returned to the kohen. And the person who sinned, besides bringing a ram to the kohen in atonement for his sin, returns to him the value of what was stolen from the proselyte plus a fifth part of this value.

If we have decided to dedicate something to the LORD, from a bucket of apples to a crust of bread, then how can we give it to Him? The Most High says: “If you want to give to Me – give to the kohanim, give to my servants on earth.”

If you want to give to the Most High – give to His servant. The Most High Himself, of course, needs neither apples, nor bread, nor lambs. To Him belongs everything that is on the earth, whatever it may be.

From verse 11 a new theme begins, an amazing theme.

There are cases when a woman has secluded herself somewhere with another man, who is not her husband. And although in this case we cannot know whether something happened between them, the seclusion itself is already not good, and there is a reason for jealousy. And nevertheless we cannot know whether there were some closer relations between them. The husband can say to the woman: “I am jealous of you with this man, I do not like that you seclude yourself with this particular man.” From this moment the woman, as it were, receives a warning. If, however, she secludes herself with this man a second time, then everything will happen according to a different scenario, which will be described further on.

Or again, a spirit of jealousy came upon him, and he is jealous of his wife, but she has not been unfaithful to him. How can one know? Jealousy is a terrible feeling, jealousy eats people up, it gives people no peace, it often becomes the cause of quarrels, it even becomes the cause of the destruction of a family. A jealous husband or a jealous wife breaks every kind of trust in the family. Jealousy can be very destructive, with a reason or without a reason.

What happens next, then?

There is no nobility in it, in this offering. The very state of the husband and the wife is a state that is spiritually and emotionally unhealthy for both. This is precisely the reason for both of them to go to the kohen, even if the wife has not been unfaithful, and the husband is jealous without a reason. This is not easy for the married couple: it is not easy for the wife, who is accused of what she did not do; it is not easy for the husband either, whom jealousy simply eats up, and he constantly treats his wife with suspicion. So both of them have a reason to go to the kohen, to go and talk with the kohen. And the kohen here will also give psychological help, among other things.

Of course, first the kohen talks with the husband, talks with the wife, asks what happened and how. How much patience, care and love the kohen must have in order to have the ability to sort out some new problem each time, to go into a new situation each time. And how much care the Most High has for a person! The Most High did not say to the husband: “You are jealous – overcome it, step on the throat of your jealousy, stop being jealous, and if you cannot, if you do not like it – get divorced.” But the Most High shows care not only for preserving the married couple, but also for restoring peace in the heart of the person on whom a not very pure spirit of jealousy comes. We do not see this in the text of the Torah, in the text of the MishnaiThe Russian literally says “We do not see this in the text of the Torah, in the text of the Mishna.” It is unclear whether the humiliating procedures are missing from both texts or are found in the Mishna but not in the Torah, so the sentence is translated word for word., which describes how everything took place, in particular in the Second Temple. A whole series of humiliating procedures is described, when this woman, not entirely covered, is put on display at the Gate of Nikanor. And all who pass by look at her, standing in this unsightly appearance and in this unsightly position. And she goes through a whole series of unpleasant, completely humiliating, I would say, procedures, into the details of which I do not want to go here. According to the law, as it operated, as the sages established it, the woman could say to her husband: “I will not go to be tested.” From that moment she was considered innocent, the marriage ended, but she did not receive the money under her ketuba (marriage contract), she left her husband as she was.

Let me explain for those who do not know. According to Jewish laws, when a girl is taken as a wife before witnesses, the groom, the future husband, promises that he will support her in decent conditions and feed the children. She and the children will have a roof, clothing, food, and all this will be decent. And if he suddenly decides to send her away, that is, to divorce her, then he will give her such-and-such a sum of money. He gives her a promise that he will not just abandon her, that she will not be left with nothing. But if there are some reasons that make one doubt her “oblico morale,” or her own wish to leave in such a described situation, if she said: “With such a jealous man as you, I will not live,” then she left without this divorce money. And if she declared her readiness to undergo the test with the kohen, if she agreed to this, it means she wanted to preserve the family, wanted to be permitted to her husband, wanted their marriage to be allowed. And again a very, probably, important qualification: if the husband is jealous of her, if they are in such a quarrel, in such a situation, then, naturally, intimacy is forbidden to them. At a time of quarrel, when the spouses are in spiritual discord, physical intimacy is always forbidden to them. It is forbidden to be intimate with a wife whom you have not appeased, with whom you have not reconciled. And jealousy is one of such barriers. It was in this state that the husband and wife came to the kohen.

So, the kohen sets the woman before the Most High.

It is precisely from this place in the Torah that they teach that a woman must cover her head either with something or with braiding of the hair. Among the Eastern Jews it was customary that married women tie their hair into braids, tightly tie the braids on the head, weaving ribbons into the braids. One way or another, a woman goes about with covered or braided (not loose) hair. And at the moment of the test the kohen dishevels her hair.

This affects the organs with which the wife sinned: the bones of her pelvis will be wrenched out and her womb will swell, if these waters work as cursing waters.

And here the Talmud, discussing this theme, says that this very belly that is mentioned here – it is not the belly of the woman, not your belly, but a belly in general. That is, this is an indication that the husband too, if he is mixed up in something not good, is also subject to the test, and his belly too can swell. Although only the woman drinks the water, her husband also undergoes the trial. And again: it does not say your thigh, but simply thigh, and here again they see a hint that it is not only the wife who is tested.

That is, the kohen takes a little piece of parchment, writes these curses on it with the name of the Most High, and washes off, erases this parchment in the cursing waters, so that the name of the Most High is also erased. The commentators say that the care of the Most High for peace in the family is so great that He goes so far as to have His name erased – for the sake of establishing peace in the family, for the sake of reconciling the husband and the wife, for the sake of this spirit of jealousy calming down.

Further on, the Torah begins to describe how the kohen will give her this water.

We remember how grain offerings are brought. The Torah repeats it here once more.

That is, the woman holds the vessel with the water while the kohen brings the offering, after which the kohen gives her this water to drink, which has already become bitter.

Here and he shall make her drink water is repeated a second time. Some commentators see in this an element meaning that from this moment, if the woman says: “I don't want to drink, I'm afraid, I will not drink!”, she is told: “Drink!” and is made to drink by force, even if she no longer wants to drink.

That is, it will become easier for her to bear children, and if she had some problems that did not allow her to become pregnant, they will disappear. In a word, her maternal powers will increase from this.

A complicated procedure, and one we little understand. It is unclear how this husband and wife will go on living after the trials that the woman, accused in vain, went through. And here the husband will not get off with a little flower. On the other hand, a person who is jealous can be asked: “Do you really want to go through all of this together with your wife?” After all, there is what I actually started with: come to the kohen, talk with the kohen. If problems such as jealousy arise in a family, then a possible reason is that the family has not talked with a kohen for a long time, that the family is immersed in some other problems and has not seen a kohen for a long time.

Tradition tells many different stories about how women tried to deceive their husbands. For example, there is a story about twin sisters. When her husband wanted to bring one of the sisters to the test, she came to her twin and asked: “Go through the test instead of me.” And the twin agreed (a sister, after all) to go instead of her. And when she returned from this test, her sister was waiting for her at her home, and they embraced and kissed. And while they were kissing, a little of the water that had perhaps remained on the lips of the sister who had gone through the test got onto the sinful twin, and she died, and what was supposed to happen, happened.

There are also many stories from modern history that are connected in one way or another with the testing of a woman. But on the whole the sages see in this a concession to human weakness, a concession to human hard-heartedness. The command of the Most High – to go to the kohen, to speak about your problems with the kohen (of course, when the kohen is really a kohen). And I have already said, and will repeat once more, a very important addition that the sages speak about: these bitter waters test not only the woman, they test the man too, although only the woman drinks these waters. But if the man turns out to be guilty in that he too had some unworthy relations, then the man too undergoes the same punishment as the woman. It may happen that the woman turns out to be innocent, and the man suffers, and that happens too.

When in Israel infidelity became not something out of the ordinary, but a phenomenon that, though not widespread, was an everyday one, Rabban Yochanan ben Zakkai (the head of the sages in the period after the destruction of the Second Temple) ruled that the waters could no longer work. Such caution, which the sages showed toward this law when they stopped this procedure, is connected with the fact that a miracle lies at the basis of this law. We turn to the Most High, the family turns to the Most High and asks for a miracle, asks for something supernatural. This is perhaps the only law in the Torah that is based on a miracle. And in order to ask for such a miracle, the situation itself must be unusual, something out of the ordinary must have happened and the husband must have stopped trusting his wife, God forbid. When the situation itself was something unique, a miracle, then the answer to it was a miracle too. But when this situation became an everyday thing, the sages judged that a miracle cannot be an everyday thing. And when debauchery multiplied in the people of Israel, the waters of the unfaithful wife stopped working. They ceased to be healing and became simply something like a private detective who gathers evidence in order to present it in court, to become a cause for divorces, for quarrels, for proving guilt and for destroying the family. The spiritual level of the people changed, and the sages decided to stop using this method of testing.

If distrust has won out after all, it means one must stand before the LORD. But one must remember that when a person tries to set his wife before the LORD, he too appears before the LORD.

On the other hand, if the wife suffers from this water, if she is punished, then let the man not say: “It is my fault that I tested her.” The wife stands up and gives an account no longer to her husband but to the Most High; this whole proceeding is no longer between husband and wife, but between the wife and the Most High. In just the same way the husband too stands before the Most High and, together with his wife, gives an account for his life, for his relations with the opposite sex. Is he clean in this or not clean? And it may turn out that he should not have started up with his jealousy.

With God's help, we continue to study the weekly portion Naso, and we will read chapter 6 of the book of Bemidbar.

The root cell of the word nazír (zayin-reish) has the meaning estrangement, removal, the word zar means stranger, lehinazer – to abstain, to deprive oneself of something. Because in other religions, among other peoples, monks are called by the word nazír, the impression may arise that in Judaism too it is about a person who lives outside a family, a kind of hermit, but this is not so at all. It is true that the person withdraws from certain human pleasures, but at the same time he goes on living in his family. And the holiness by which he sets himself apart he must nevertheless preserve in the world, living a real worldly life. To separate oneself from the world and strive toward God, to take such a vow upon oneself, to perform such a heroic deed – and yet to remain in the world, to be a citizen, a full-fledged resident taking part in all worldly activity. The verb lehaflí (yaflí, one of its meanings is will make a vow) has the root pei-lámed-álef, the very same root as the word péle (miracle). And one could translate it like this: if someone pulls a miracleiThe Russian uses a colloquial verb that means roughly “to do something odd or outlandish” and is built on the word for “miracle.” “Pull a miracle” tries to keep both the link to “miracle” and the slightly negative shade. and gives an oath. But the expression pull a miracle has a not very good shade to it, and it would be more correct to say: if someone resolves on a heroic deed, someone resolves to create a small miracle in his own inner world and makes such a vow. The word is used not only with regard to the vow of naziriteship, but in general for many of the promises a person makes to the Most High. Some mark that a person places on the map of his life, thereby working a small miracle.

So then, a person, if he resolves on the heroic deed of naziriteship:

That is, not just wine is forbidden to the person, but everything connected with grapes. These are not so much exercises for purity of mind (although purity of mind is also at issue) as exercises in discipline. Grapes, grape juice, any product derived from grapes – this is such worldly, everyday merriment, bodily merriment, and the person decides to keep away from it. If he really decides so, then he decides to keep away from everything, that is, in this case we do not look for any legal loopholes. One cannot say: “I promised that I would not eat grapes – but this is grape juice. I promised that I would not eat grapes – but this is not grapes, this is raisins” or: “This is churchkhela, which is made from grape juice and does not look like grapes at all.” No, if there is a prohibition, it is a complete prohibition, that is, an honest, conscientious renunciation of everything from grapes, without any legal tricks.

“One can be a capable man and think about the beauty of one's nails,” Pushkin remarked. But being a nazir and thinking about the beauty of one's hair does not quite work. It is not necessary to breed lice there, and one may, of course, comb one's hair, but cutting the hair is no longer permitted, a person no longer has the right to have his hair cut, to put his head in order in this way. Hair is an amazing human organ. In some way its nature is associated with the command of the Most High: “Let the earth bring forth grass!” as if a breakthrough of the inner into the outer takes place, an exit of the inner potential outward, of the inner light outward. The nazir (nazirite) in all the days of his naziriteship has no right to hold back this potential. During his quest for holiness the nazirite in no way holds back the breakthrough of his inner strength to the outside, he opens himself completely to the world of holiness. Then a complete renewal of this inner part will take place, and before returning to earth from the cosmos of holiness, the nazir passes a razor over his body and completely removes the hair. The Levites perform a similar procedure when they complete their preparation and begin their service: for purification they must shave their whole body. And in the same way a healed leper returns to the camp, who also must shave his body. This is like a reset to zero, a renewal of the connection between the inner and the outer, a switch from one mode to another. Growing the hair is a very important element of naziriteship, it is a symbol of an open dialogue of the inner with the outer world, when the path in the outer world is enveloped in holiness, toward which, in fact, the nazirite strives. On the whole, during this quest of a person for holiness, the restrictions that are imposed on him, as we see, are not all that terrible, but rather strict. And a person is obliged to observe these restrictions.

That is, if one of his relatives dies, this person will not be able to take part in the washing or in the carrying of the body of the deceased. He cannot do anything that would lead him to impurity through contact with the body of the deceased, even if it is a very close relative of his.

The words nazír and nézer (crown) – these are very similar words. What is this about? A person who touches the dead, as we know, becomes defiled. In this case the nazirite is forbidden to defile himself by touching the dead, even if these dead are people close to him, as close as can be: father, mother, brother and sister, blood relatives. This is the degree of kinship for which even a kohen may defile himself, but for the nazir this is forbidden. He rises to a completely different level of holiness. One can say that in the state of a nazirite he is a new creation, and in this state he has no relatives. He is an extraterrestrial.

כֹּל יְמֵי נִזְרוֹ קָדֹשׁ הוּא לַיהוָה׃
kol yemé nizró kadósh hu ladonáy

8. All the days of his naziriteship he is holy to the LORD.

Holiness is what gives life, it is the power that gives life to everything living, it is precisely external holiness that brings this world to life. If a person comes into contact with death, then this is the opposite of holiness, this is something that in no way gets along with holiness. Therefore, whoever dies, the nazir cannot touch the dead without violating holiness; in his world death does not even exist. And as soon as it appears there, he ceases to be a nazirite.

When a nazir touches a dead person, he becomes impure. Here, as with any person, whether a nazir or not, one and the same rule applies: he becomes impure. The period of his purification lasts seven days, and at the end of his purification he must shave his head on the seventh day.

For what will the kohen atone for him? There are two ways of understanding this. The first: the kohen will atone for him because he touched the impure, made himself impure, despite having been sanctified. The other understanding: this is atonement for the sin of taking naziriteship upon oneself. Why is this a sin, why does it require a purification offering? Because for the sake of his path to holiness a person turns aside from the common path of all living things, he disregards the world. Therefore the Torah requires a purification offering from a person who has taken upon himself the vow of naziriteship. In order to practice this level of holiness, he swore an oath, and he needs to restrain himself, to keep away from what there is in the world. It is precisely for this, that a person renounces the simple pleasures of the world for the sake of some goals of his own, that he brings a purification offering.

The lamb is brought as a guilt offering because the person defiled his naziriteship. He defiled no longer himself, but that special status of a holy one which he had. And only after restoring it by the previous offerings (chatát and olá) can he now bring the offering ashám (guilt offering): when the holy is restored, only then is the guilt offering accepted; first reconciliation, and then – the offering.

And even if he became defiled on the very last day of the whole term that he had set for himself for naziriteship – let us say, he took it upon himself for a year, and on the three hundred and sixty-fifth day, one day before the end of the term, he became defiled – he must count a whole year anew. The whole term is accepted precisely as one single whole, it cannot be counted in parts.

The Talmud tells about Helena, queen of Adiabene, a state in northern Mesopotamia, who converted to Judaism. And one day she made a vow to the Most High: “If my son returns from the war, I will be in naziriteship for seven years.” And she spent seven years in naziriteship, and at the end of these seven years she rose up and moved to the land of Israel. The sages of the school of Hillel said that since she had been in naziriteship in a foreign land, she must count seven years of naziriteship anew. She again began to count seven years of naziriteship, and in the last year of her second term of naziriteship she became defiled, and she again had to count seven years. And in this way, as the Talmud tells, she spent twenty-one years in naziriteship. Such things happen too. The count here is strict, nobody forces a person to take the oath of naziriteship, but if you took it – keep it. If a person simply said: “I will be a nazirite,” then it is considered that he took this oath for a month. If he said: “I will be a nazirite until the coming of Christ,” then he will be a nazirite until the Mashiach returns. If someone took an oath for some term, then for this term he will be a nazirite.

In general, the sages did not much approve of naziriteship, because whenever there is an opportunity to raise the bar high for oneself, there is the temptation to do it not for the sake of serving the Most High, but out of false pride, out of a desire to be better than others, to stand out against the background of others, to seem good to oneself, and to be tempted by all sorts of similar things. Because of this the sages were often skeptical of people who take upon themselves the vow of naziriteship. The Talmud tells a story about Shimon the Righteous, high priest in the times preceding the appearance of the tannaim: as a kohen he never ate of a nazirite's offering, because he did not know for sure whether it was naziriteship, and each time he doubted whether the vow of naziriteship had truly been taken by the person in the name of Heaven. Except for one case, when a young man came to him, beautiful in appearance, with beautiful blue eyes, with beautiful curly hair. Shimon said to him: “And this you want to destroy? Why?” And the young man answered him: “I am a shepherd, and once I was pasturing sheep, I came out to a pool of water, looked, saw myself and was seduced, and thought: ‘What a handsome man I am after all!’ And immediately I said to myself: ‘You value earthly beauty, which later will become food for worms anyway. I swear by the Temple that I will bring this hair as an offering!’ And so I took upon myself the vow of naziriteship.” And when the young man told this to Shimon the Righteous, he kissed him all over and said: “May those like you multiply in Israel!”

Sometimes it is very easy to take upon oneself some supernatural vow or practice, or status, some supernatural functions, some that exceed my abilities. And, on the contrary, it is hard to be simply Alex, it is hard to be a simple person who simply lives and serves. And the sages warned people against such naziriteship. Perhaps the sin offering too is brought by the nazirite partly precisely for this reason. Far from all really become nazirites out of a desire to serve the Most High.

Under the pot in which his peace offering is cooking he throws this hair; it becomes fuel. His hair is all his inner self that was not held back and broke out to the outside. But now, when he returns to this world and takes off his spacesuit of holiness, this inner essence of his, which broke through, becomes fuel for preparing the offering. In part, this essence itself is thus also offered as a sacrifice. This is a very good way of purification, when a person removes, shaves off the hair on his body.

We have more than once dwelt on this gesture, when the kohen and the one who brings it raise up the peace offering. Usually the kohen receives the thigh and the breast; here he also receives the foreleg from this offering. This is the special feature of the offering of the nazirite.

Besides all the offerings that the nazir is obliged to bring, he may promise that at the end of his naziriteship he will bring the Most High some further offerings. Many nazirites said: “And at the end I will bring Him a whole flock of rams, 20–30 rams,” they swore to bring a large, some very serious offering. Remember, Paul was asked to pay for the offering of nazirites who could not pay for those offerings of theirs that they had pledged by vow. And Paul paid for these offerings (Acts of the Apostles 21:23–26). This is that very situation when a person has promised too much but cannot fulfill his promise. Or perhaps these poor people did not have enough money even for an ordinary offering. But most likely it is precisely the first option that is probable, that they promised a great deal.

With verse 22 a completely new topic begins. Since I myself am a kohen, and I often have to bless the people of Israel, this is one of my favorite topics in the Torah. Of course, the whole Torah is sweet, but there are things in it to which you somehow become especially attached.

May the LORD bless you and keep you. This is a blessing that is perceived in the material world, so that you lack nothing and fear nothing. The very first blessing is material, because well-being, health, the absence of fears give a person the possibility to move on, to concentrate on the Torah.

May the LORD turn His shining face to you and have mercy on you. May the LORD give you of His light, of the light of His face to your face, so that your face shines with His light. When you are freed from material cares and devote yourself to the Torah, you can become so filled with light that your face will shine, like Moshe's. And this is not the limit.

May the LORD turn His face to you and give you peaceiIn Russian, the word for “peace” in this verse is the same as the word for “world,” so the author goes straight from “give you peace” to “the world to come.” English needs two different words here.. This is the promise of the world to come. A person who becomes a conductor of the Divine light does not come to judgment. He is granted that God turns His countenance toward him, and he passes into eternal life already in this life, passes into a world in which rest and peace are endless. His rest, which was in his heart, is the rest of eternity.

The midrash tells that this blessing of the kohanim is a kind of protection. The Most High is likened to a king whose daughter died on the day of her wedding. This is a parable about the fall of the people of Israel, who made the golden calf at the time of the giving of the Torah. And when the king was giving his second daughter in marriage, he took care to bless her and to protect her. And at the time of the building of the Tent of Meeting the Most High says: “So that a similar sin does not happen, bless the people of Israel.” A special providence over the people of Israel is needed, and this special providence is embodied in the blessing of the kohanim, which will protect Israel from sin. Very great importance is attached to the blessing of the kohanim. The kohanim bless the people in the synagogue at every morning prayer, and I think that this is a very joyful kohen's work. Although blessing the people of Israel is entrusted to Aharon, the LORD Himself promises to bless the sons of Israel according to the blessing of the kohanim.

Concluding the talk about the blessing of Aharon, I would like to say a few important words about translations in general. Often in the Russian language, when one or another biblical blessing, one or another biblical wish is translated, you can see such phrases: “May bless…,” “May make…,” “Let there be…” So then, the Most High never said: “Let there be light!” He said: “Be, light!” or: “There will be light!” And here one must read not “May bless you,” but simply “Will bless you,” not a wish, but a promise: “Will bless, be sure of it.” We translate this with the particle “may,” but in reality in the text it is given as a direct promise.

And the last verse of our chapter, a command to the kohanim:

Some researchers, commentators say that perhaps Israel drew the name of the Most High on themselves with some special ink. One way or another, through this blessing the people of Israel receive the naming with the name of the Most High. All the instructions that were given to the kohen and to the people, everything we have read, all of this is connected with keeping holiness, with the necessity to abide in holiness in order to bear upon oneself the name of the Most High and to be blessed by the Most High. And here the Most High gives a promise: “Give the people My name, call the people by My name, and I will bless them.” This blessing will come upon all of us too.

With God's help we continue to study the weekly portion Naso, and we will read chapter 7, from verse 1.

How many are left? None at all are left, we counted correctly.

They need neither wagons nor oxen, they carry everything on themselves; this is the special feature of the service of the sons of Kehat in the Tent of Meeting. One might think that whoever is closer to the holy would get special vehicles and government cars, but nothing of the sort.

One chief a day, one chief a day – this repetition (I have already explained it) means: one chief each day, in turn.

Starting with verse 12, we read stories that repeat one another about how the leader of each of the tribes brought offerings. Only the name changes here. And, naturally, the reader may ask: why not write in the Torah, “And each of those bringing, in such-and-such an order, brought such-and-such offerings”? Why repeat all this twelve times, what is it needed for? It is like some family photograph, or like a picture when people are photographed as a whole class, as a whole assembly of some kind. It is interesting only for those who are inside this group, only for those who can say: “And we are from the tribe of Re'uven, here it is, here it is, the paragraph about us!” – “And we are from the tribe of Binyamin, here, here it is, the paragraph about us too!” This is only for those who belong to this group, for the people who can recognize the names and say: “And here, right here, we were mentioned too! Again we did not get lost in the lists! We are not number such-and-such, we are mentioned here by name!” And this is the approach of the Torah, the approach of the Most High, His care for the people of Israel, where everyone has a name.

Therefore, to someone from the outside it may seem that this is, once again, a monotonous, superfluous enumeration. But imagine that you belong to this family, and you look at this as a family photograph.

So, Nachshon ben Amminadav brought as a mincha offering: one silver dish weighing 130 shekels and one sprinkling basin weighing 70 shekels, filled with solet flour with oil; one ladle of gold weighing 10 shekels, filled with incense. As a burnt offering he brought one young bull, one ram, one lamb. As a cleansing offering – one goat, and as a peace offering he brought five rams, five goats, five lambs. This is his offering.

And further on we will see that this paragraph is repeated, and repeated, and repeated with regard to all the other tribes.

With this the Torah concludes the listing of all the offerings brought by all the heads of the twelve tribes, which may seem monotonous. And one could skip this whole text and leave only the next paragraph, in which the total amount of what each of them brought is listed. But imagine that in your community or in some group of people, everyone chips in some sum: 10 dollars each, 500 rubles each, it doesn’t matter. And in this case those 500 rubles that you bring are different from those 500 rubles that your neighbor brought. They are different, they have a different history. And that is why the Torah lists each tribe with its offering separately. Nothing merges into one gray mass: neither the donations nor the heads of the tribes. This must be repeated again and again.

There is an important detail here that can be missed behind this whole list. Moshe, even though he is not a kohen (but not an outsider either), unlike Aharon, can every day, whenever he wants, enter the Holy of Holies, speak there with the Most High and hear His voice. Moshe is higher in status than Aharon and closer to holiness than Aharon: it is he who can enter behind the curtain at any moment when it is needed. He is the house manager of the Most High, and this is an entirely special status.

If we look at the whole weekly portion Naso as a whole and try to understand its logic, we will be surprised at how different the things, how different the topics are that ended up in this portion. Here there is the consecration of the Tent of Meeting with solemn offerings, and the blessing of the kohanim, and a section about a special kind of Jewish asceticism (nazirite-hood), and the law of the sota, of the so-called bitter waters. Here there is the command that the ritually impure must leave the camp in order to be purified outside the camp, there is also the census of the Levites, and much else. Our weekly portion seems to be some kind of complex dish cooking in one pot. If you ask a person whether he has ever eaten rice with grapes or meat with grapes, then perhaps the answer will be “no.” But if you think about it, the person may very well have eaten pilaf with raisins, and that is the very same grape, only dried. Some foods are combined in dishes in a strange way. And our portion Naso is a complex combination of different components in one spiritual dish. And in this talk we will try to understand the essence of this dish by breaking it down into its components.

So, we will begin with verse 2 of chapter 5.

2. Command the sons of Israel, and they shall send out (send away) from the camp everyone stricken with tzara'at, and everyone suffering from discharges, and everyone who has become defiled.

 That is, those people who turn out to be impure, unfit for performing a certain service inside the camp, are moved out beyond the camp. Again I will repeat once more that the translation of the word tame (impure) from Hebrew into Russian means, as it were, an absence of purity, and this is not a very correct translation. In fact, the word tame does not contain any negation, it is not the absence of something, it is the presence of something. And therefore it would probably be more correct to translate the word tum'a with the word defilement, that is, tame – this is not an impure but a defiled person, and such a person is moved out beyond the bounds of the camp. What, then, is this defiled person, why is he in such a state? This is a person who has had some discharges, or someone sick with tzara'at, or someone who has touched a dead person, and so on. And this person is in a state that cannot be hidden and that forces him to begin dealing with himself, to do a certain inner work.

When we have some illness, some sorrow, some suffering, we sometimes want to take our mind off it, to dissolve in society, to go somewhere, to talk with someone, to forget ourselves, to meet with friends. And in certain cases, of course, this is a good, and useful, and healing opportunity. But when there is some impurity, you cannot run away from it into the company of people; sinfulness will not allow you to get lost in the crowd. More precisely, the Torah does not allow sinfulness to get lost in the crowd. And therefore the defiled person goes out of the camp.

We encounter in the New Testament many cases where Yeshua in his mercy heals lepers, heals people who are outside the camp, who must (as we have already said) deal with their problem themselves. In connection with this, let us recall the amazing phrase of Yeshua that was spoken in his Sermon on the Mount (Gospel of Matthew 5:17). He says: “Do not think that I came to break the law or the prophets: I did not come to break, but to fulfill.” Let us imagine Israel of the 1st century AD. The teacher Yeshua walks about, teaches, heals. And once five thousand people gather around him who want to listen to the teacher. To which of them could it occur, God forbid, that this man came to break the law? After all, this is a teacher of Torah, He came, of course, to teach Torah. Where, then, could the thought arise that He came to give them, for example, recipes for fried eggs with bacon or to tell them how to make a hookah on the Sabbath? Of course, there was no such thought. But the very possibility of healing those sick with tzara'at, the defiled, of going down to their level and lifting them up from there – that is what was unusual, that is what was an amazing breach of the habitual course of the law. Precisely the natural course of things, when the sinner must work with his sin himself, precisely this is what Yeshua changed, and this was not a breaking of the law, but a fulfillment of the law.

In exactly the same way, the exodus from Egypt was not a breach of the natural course of things. Yes, slavery was provided for by the Most High, but the way out of it was also provided for by the Most High. And in exactly the same way, a way out of the state of impurity is provided for, when all the prisoners, including all the prisoners of this impurity, will be set free. And the prototype of this liberation of the prisoners of sin, the prisoners of impurity, is the cleansing of the lepers, when Yeshua touches them and heals them.

There is a midrash that tells why the Most High Himself went down into Egypt and Himself began to lead the people out of slavery. And the midrash says that the Most High understood, knew, that even an angel, if he went down into this Egyptian impurity, even an angel could be harmed. So strong is the impurity there that even an angel might not have withstood it; only the Most High Himself was able to lead out his people. It takes an enormous revelation of divinity to go down into impurity, into defilement, and not become impure, not be defiled. And therefore the special manifestation of God's mercy and the perfect fulfillment of the law lies in this: that those who went out beyond the camp can return back.

I am very often asked various questions connected with impurity. May a woman, for example, in a state of women's impurity partake of Pesach or partake of seudat Adon (communion), the meal of the LORD? How should one deal with this? And here I want to say that, from the point of view of Judaism, today every person is impure. Why is that? Because there is the impurity of the dead, and all of us have touched someone who touched a dead person, and so on; everyone is stricken with this impurity. In order to be purified from it, the ashes of the red heifer are needed, and a red heifer is not planned yet, it simply does not exist, and therefore no one can be purified. Everyone is impure. As of today, no one can, in essence, touch the Pesach at the Pesach seder. There are people who slaughter the korban (sacrifice) and say that it does not have to be eaten in purity. But we, who believe in Yeshua Mashiach, have such a purification, and only through purification in Him can we, let us put it this way, eat the korban (sacrifice) of Pesach. And we are blessed in that we have a High Priest who stands behind the curtain, and therefore we can be purified through Him and return through Him into the camp. However, this does not change that instruction of the Torah in which it is said that a person must do a certain spiritual work in solitude. Let this solitude be a solitude in the company of the Most High, in standing with the High Priest. And still, a person needs to do this work alone. Yes, we have a wonderful purification, Yeshua healed lepers, but this does not cancel the spiritual work itself, faith itself.

Next we will talk about another topic. Let us read a verse from chapter 5:

14. And a spirit of jealousy came upon him (passed over him), and he became jealous of his wife, and she has indeed been defiled, or a spirit of jealousy came upon him, and he became jealous of his wife, and she has not been defiled…

Once upon a time there lived an old man and an old woman, a grandpa and a grandma, a husband and a wife – a classic plot of all times and peoples. And in married life all kinds of situations happen; love can be wicked. And so it happened that the husband began to burn with a spirit of jealousy. For a person who is not jealous it is hard to imagine how strongly this spirit can overwhelm a man (or a woman), how strongly it takes possession of him. And suspicion toward the wife grows.

The mere presence of this spirit of jealousy is not necessarily a bad quality (although in this case, of course, it is bad). But there is jealousy for God, there is a jealousy that leads to competition in a good sense, to the striving to become better. Jealousy, as they say, comes in different kinds. When Moshe was told about Eldad and Meidad, who were prophesying in the camp, Moshe said (to Yehoshua ben Nun): “Are you jealous for my sake? Oh, if only all the people of the LORD were prophets…” (Bemidbar 11:27–29). And Yosef's brothers not only hated him, but were also jealous of him, envied him. And there are many such examples in Tanach where jealousy is condemned. However, rarely, but still, there is a situation when jealousy is positive. The prophet Yeshayahu in verse 6 of chapter 9 speaks of the jealousy of God; there is also jealousy for the knowledge of Torah. Yes, moreover, the hardening in Israel itself, according to the words of Paul, is also meant to arouse jealousy in people: “… But from their fall, salvation to the Gentiles, to arouse jealousy in them,” that is, to arouse the desire to return and again take some important place in the life of another person or in the plan of the Most High. Jealousy is envy of some place, the desire to obtain or to regain some place.

And it so happened that everything in the family went to dust, everything went awry, everything went wrong, and the husband began to be jealous of his wife. And so he proposes to her that they go to the kohen and perform the ceremony that is called bitter waters, or mei sota. The word sota means one who has been led astray, who has gone off the path. The woman has two options in this situation. According to the first option, she can say: “I won't go. I won't go to any Jerusalem, I won't go to the kohen; if you're jealous of me, let me go.” In this situation the husband must let his wife go; she will be considered an honest woman, she is not found guilty. But she cannot marry either the one who was her husband (again), or the one with whom she was suspected of adultery.

In general, here we need to make a small but important digression and recall the phrase of Yeshua: “Whoever marries a divorced woman commits adultery.” In the context of all of Judaism, in the context of all the views of that time on divorce, what is meant is that even when she gets divorced, the one with whom she was unfaithful to her husband will not be able to marry her. It will still be adultery. Moreover, if a man said to her: “My dear, I love you, but you are forbidden to me, because you are married. Go and get a divorce, and then you will marry me.” But in this case too he commits adultery. And if people did not plan to marry while the woman was married, if they met after her divorce and under other circumstances, then this is not quite what is meant in the Jewish text. Of course, in the church, in the Christian milieu, a certain law has already taken shape, and one should not reject this law unequivocally right away. But, as Yeshua himself said: “In the beginning it was not so.”

So, let us repeat what we have been talking about. The woman can refuse and say: “I will not drink this water, I don't want to go anywhere, let me go even without money, I will leave you, I'm already pretty fed up with you and your jealousy.” Or more tactfully, that does not matter. In this case she leaves and no one suspects her of anything. But let us imagine another situation. She did go to Jerusalem after all and came to the kohen. And here we must recall the Mishna, the Jewish Code of laws, a legislative treatise. Although it was written at the end of the 2nd century AD, it contains a great deal of useful information for us about the traditions of that time. And this treatise tells what happened to a woman sota (who had turned off the path) who was brought to the kohen (in addition to what the Torah says). The kohen first unbraided (or uncovered) her hair. All jewelry was taken off her, if she had any on, and she was changed into simple clothing. After that the kohen tore her clothing in the area of the heart, that is, he almost bared her breast. Then her breast was tied with a rope in a special way, and so, half in rags, with her breast half-bared or completely bared, she was put on display in the Temple at the Gate of Nikanor. And it is said that anyone passing by may see her, and all the women may see her. This is how the Mishna describes it in tractate Sota. And why is all this done? So that other women would see and be afraid. Such is this difficult situation.

Then she drank the bitter water, and as she drank (so the Mishna tells, so the Jewish sources tell), her body could change, that is, death did not come instantly. The water did not act the way, say, potassium cyanide acts, the way other fast poisons act; she could die gradually, various signs could appear on her. The Mishna describes all this in detail, but we will not go into it. So, she drinks this water. If she had sinned, she would die. And again, according to the Mishna, her lover would also die, would also die in suffering. And if she turned out to be pure, then God blessed her womb and a son was born to her. But it must be noted that this whole procedure worked only if the husband himself was not guilty of anything, if the husband himself kept the purity of family life; otherwise the husband too could suffer.

So, let us imagine the outcome of this test. Once upon a time there lived a woman. I don't know whether she gave her husband some reason to suspect her or did not, but the husband began to be terribly jealous of her and took her to Jerusalem. Half-undressed, she was put on display at one of the central gates of Jerusalem. Everyone looked at her, and some even gawked. And then it turned out that all this was for nothing, that she was not guilty: God Himself testified that she was not guilty. What will it be like for the husband, who now has to smooth all this over, to set it right, and how will their family relationship change? It is not hard to imagine a woman who after all this will agree to stay with her husband, but it is hard to imagine how much the husband will need to do in order to smooth over, to atone for his guilt, to pacify, to win over the woman. And most likely, all these procedures, all this was done so that a person would go for such a thing as rarely as possible, so that it would not become a habit to take one's wife to Jerusalem to the kohen on every occasion. The service, financially speaking, is free, but in terms of vital strength, the woman's nerves and possibly the man's nerves (well, he's not a block of wood!), it is very costly; this is not a simple topic.

Next the Torah switches to a new topic and speaks of a person who makes a certain vow to the Most High, the vow of nazirite-hood. On the one hand, this word shares a root with the word nezer (wreath, crown), and one can say that nazir means crowned. On the other hand, a nazir – this is a person who withdraws from the world for the sake of the LORD, a sort of Jewish monk. That is, a person, as in an old fairy tale, in an old legend, drew a circle around himself and said: “I will not go beyond the bounds of this circle, I do not want to come into contact with anything that brings me down to earth.” And here there are two options. Either a person senses the possibility of some spiritual fall of his own and, in order to prevent some temptation, wants to restrict himself in something (of course, this does not apply to restrictions on intimacy with his wife, since Judaism categorically does not welcome distancing from one's wife, and a husband has obligations toward his wife that he must keep). Or, on the contrary, this is a person who feels that at the spiritual level at which he is, he has already fulfilled himself and wants to rise a level higher.

What, then, does our Jewish monk renounce? He does not touch a dead body, does not come into contact with what can make him defiled. He does not cut his hair and does not use intoxicating substances. Thus, first, he does not engage in everyday labor, does not engage in earthly things. This can conventionally be connected with defilement by a dead body. Second, he does not occupy himself with himself, does not concentrate on his outward appearance. Of course, he may and should wash, take care of himself, and so on. But what is meant, again symbolically, is that he does not spend his strength on himself. Third, he may not consume intoxicating drinks, may not use alcohol and drugs, because he must act consciously, he must himself dedicate his whole self to the Most High. And he needs to keep a balance, to keep this interconnection of the bodily and the soul.

This vow was taken very seriously. If a person suddenly decided to renounce it, such a vow could be annulled before a court. And the sages strongly advised against taking such a vow. In general, as regards any spiritual asceticism, any spiritual heroism, you need to understand what spiritual level you are at. Because sometimes not from above, but from some initiative of one's own, a desire comes, a proud desire to say: “And I am the coolest of all, and I am the strongest of all, I will give up this and I will give up that.” And it is not always love for the Most High; often it is being in love with oneself or a desire to show oneself off. And therefore one should treat this kind of asceticism very carefully, and the sages spoke about this. If someone wants to take some vows upon himself, there is no need to rush with this; it is better to consult with spiritual people, with knowledgeable people, and still to refuse if there is even the slightest suspicion that the very taking of such a vow is impure.

There is one more interesting thing that the Torah speaks about next. In chapter 7 a whole list is given of people from each tribe and of everything they brought for the consecration of the Mishkan and the altar. The same list is repeated twelve times. And naturally, the commentators have an important, necessary question: “Why wouldn't the Torah write that each man from the twelve tribes came and brought such-and-such, such-and-such and such-and-such, and did such-and-such, such-and-such and such-and-such; why repeat the same thing twelve times?” It would seem that we know that the Torah is not guilty of an abundance of superfluous, unimportant words. Unlike human speech, where there are filler words, where there are harmful words and simply useless verbosity, in the Torah we do not encounter anything like this. But here one must understand that in fact the offering of Zevulun, and the offering of Yissachar, and the offering of Yehuda are not one and the same offering. The offering for each person, for each tribe, for each clan, although it is the same, is its own. If one person brought a silver dish and another person brought a silver dish, their path to this silver dish is different. Even if they ordered this silver dish from the same craftsman, they came to it by different paths. Every person who comes into a community, comes into a synagogue, came there by his own path. And the Torah gives us such a repeating list here precisely in order to show that each tribe, despite outward sameness, in the inner sense brings its offerings by a different path, and different offerings. And this is worth remembering.

Let us note that the entire counting of the people of Israel (and of the Levites as well) is done by family lineage, by tribes, by their fathers' house; the Torah constantly mentions houses, tribes and clans. This is done precisely in order to point to the whole spiritual diversity of the people. But we must also remember that the Most High wants more, the Most High wants all the peoples of the world – the Albanians, and the Norwegians, and the Zulus, and the Pygmies, and the Yakuts – each people in its own diversity to worship the Most High and to come to the Most High. It is precisely this diversity that the Torah reflects here.

Probably one of the most famous passages of the Torah, and we also encounter it in our weekly portion, is the blessing of the kohanim. This is chapter 6, from verse 24:

24. May the LORD bless you and keep you,

25. May the LORD turn His bright face toward you and have mercy on you,

26. May the LORD turn His face toward you (be at your right hand, beside your shoulder) and give you peace (shalom)!

So, the kohanim received the commandment to bless the people of Israel with these words.

There are people for whom simply blessing and protection are enough, for whom the first part of the blessing is enough. These are the righteous. What does a righteous person need? He already has some inner righteousness, has some inner knowledge of the Most High, and therefore he needs the Most High only to bless and keep him; he needs to remain joined to the Most High and to thank Him.

The second part of the blessing already speaks of a person who needs teshuva (repentance). Not the whole people is holy; there are people who need teshuva, and such a person must be brought near to the Most High. He cannot always approach by himself; he needs to be called. And in this case favor and mercy are needed. Therefore here this blessing provides for the forgiveness of sins.

The third part of the blessing is for those among your people who need the close gaze of the Most High, the personal intervention of the Most High in your affairs and the favor of the Most High. The Most High will help you in your inner work, will stand beside you shoulder to shoulder, will give you the opportunity to clothe yourself in what is on high, and will grant you shalom (peace). And we know that in Tehillim 29:11 it is also said: “The LORD will give strength to his people and will bless the people with his peace.”

What, then, is this very shalom with which the Most High blesses the people? The midrash says that the Most High searched for a long time for a vessel with which one could bless, which would hold the blessing for the people of Israel. And this vessel is shalom (peace). The word shalom has many words with the same root and different meanings: shlemut – wholeness, shalem – whole, full, complete, leshalem – this also means to pay.

Wholeness, spiritual wholeness leads a person to peace. Two spiritually whole people cannot be at enmity with each other, because they are filled with God, they are fully in a state of adoption. When we are at peace with God, we will not be at enmity with another person who is also at peace with God. That is, two people, each of whom is at peace with the Most High, will not be at enmity with each other. If all Israel, from the woodcutter and the water carrier to the high priest, all stand before the Most High, then peace arises between them, they unite into one whole. In our weekly portion Naso we have seen that there is the sending of a sick person out of the camp and his return to the camp, the breaking of relations in the family and the restoration of relations in the family, the restoration of peace in the people of Israel for the sake of Israel, and this too is very important. And thus we can say that the recipe for this complex spiritual food, this spiritual pilaf, which we see in our weekly portion, is separation and joining. Our portion is devoted to the restoration of the people of Israel, the restoration of wholeness in the family, in the Temple, in the home, in the camp and so on. Preserving unity is a very important topic for Messianic believers too, because, as we remember, Yeshua's last prayer with the disciples was that the disciples would be one, as He is one with the Most High. Unity with the Most High gives us unity among ourselves; this is rich soil for reflection, there is something to reflect on here.

See also the talk on the portion Naso, Aharon's blessing, the stenogram of the portion Bemidbar and the weekly Torah portions.