Numbers 13:1-15:41 – Joshua 2:1-24 – John 13:1-20

This week's edition of The Set Table contains:

Questions and Commentary on Shabbat Shelach-Lekha
Chayyei Yeshua - A Devotional Commentary on the Besora Reading
In Summary
Looking Ahead

Questions & Commentary on Parashat Shelach-Lekha

1. In this week's Torah portion, we find the key biblical passage concerning the mitzva of tzitzit, ritual fringes (Numbers 15:37-41). Of what is the commandment of tzitzit meant to be a historical reminder? In what way do they point to the Days of Messiah?

Rabbi Jason Sobel

Historically, tzitzit remind us of yetziat mitzrayim, the Exodus from Egypt. As we read in this week's parasha,

They shall make themselves tzitzit on the corner of their garments, throughout their generations . . . I am the LORD, your God, who has removed you from the land of Egypt to be a God to you; I am the LORD your God.

Numbers 15:37-42

Tzitzit are designed to allude to our redemption from Egypt in several ways. First, they are only attached to four corned garments. This hints at the four stages of redemption prophesied in Exodus 6:6-7 which states, "I will bring you fourth, I will free you, I will redeem you, and I will take you as my people." These four "I will's" also correspond to the four cups that are drunk at the Passover Seder.

In addition, the tzitzit are attached to all four "corners" of a garment. The Hebrew word "corner" can also mean "wing" which points to Exodus 19:4, "I carried you on wings of eagles." This Hebrew word also alludes to the redemptive work of Messiah (Malachi 4:2). In addition it points to the promise that God will redeem Israel from every corner of the world (Isaiah 11:12). It is for this reason that we gather the four tzitzit before the recitation of the Shema as we pray, "Bring us in peace from the four corners (kanfot) of the earth and lead us upright to our land."

In fact, remembering our redemption from Egypt is one of the primary reasons why Numbers 15:37-41 is recited as part of the Shema both morning and evening. Commenting upon the reason for the recitation of this passage twice daily, the Jewish sage Ben Zoma comments,

R. Elazar Ben Azariah said: Behold I am like one who is seventy years old, and I have never been worthy to understand why the Exodus from Egypt should be mentioned at nighttime until Ben Zoma expounded it: for it says: "So that you may remember the day of your departure from the land of Egypt all the days of your life" (Deuteronomy 16:3). [Had the text said,] "the days of your life" it would have meant [only] the days; but "all the days of your life" includes the nights as well. The Sages, however, say: "the days of your life" refers to this world; "all the days of your life" is to add the days of the messiah.

It has been taught: Ben Zoma said to the Sages: Will the Exodus from Egypt be mentioned in the days of the messiah? Was it not long ago said: "Therefore, behold the days come, says the Lord, that they shall no more say: ‘As the Lord lives that brought up the children of Israel out of the land of Egypt'; but, ‘As the Lord lives that brought up and that led the seed of the house of Israel out of the north country and from all the countries where I had driven them'?" (Jeremiah 23:7-8). They replied: This does not mean that the mention of the Exodus from Egypt shall be obliterated, but that the [deliverance from] subjection to the other kingdoms shall take the first place and the Exodus from Egypt shall become secondary.

b. Berakhot 12b

As Messianic Jews, Ben Zoma makes a critical point that we need to take to heart. The first Exodus was meant to point to the greater Exodus that would occur through the Messiah. The Brit Chadasha clearly portrays Yeshua as the greater Moses and even speaks of his death on the cross as an "exodus" that brings about spiritual freedom and life. This being the case, we must place as much emphasis on our redemption through the Messiah Yeshua as we do our redemption from Egypt. Practically, this means that every time we remember the Exodus, we must also recall Yeshua's redeeming work on our behalf and make it central to our spiritual lives and service. Our gazing upon our tzitzit should cause to long for and cry out for the geula shlema, the final redemption. May Messiah hear our cries and come speedily and soon in our days.

2. What is the primary reason that the spies gave for not being able to conquer the land? What is the root cause of their sin and God's punishment of them? Do we see this same pattern anywhere else in the Torah?

Rabbi Jason Sobel

This week's Torah portion and a passage from Bemidbar Rabba help us to answer these questions:

And the LORD said to Moses, "How long will this people despise me? And how long will they not believe in me, in spite of all the signs that I have done among them? I will strike them with the pestilence and disinherit them, and I will make of you a nation greater and mightier than they."

Numbers 14:11-12

The truth is that they did not have faith. David, speaking in the same strain, says, "Because they believed not in God" (Psalm 78:22), and it is written, "And they refused to walk in his law" (78:10). At last he said to him: "See her and you will know whether I have lied to you! But because you did not have faith in me, I swear that you will never see her in your own home, and that I will give her to your son!"

Midrash Rabba to Numbers XVI:7

Based on the Torah and Bemidbar Rabba, the obvious reason is that Israel lacked emuna (belief/faith/trust/) in God. At this critical juncture of their journey, Israel failed to have emuna in God and thus broke the first of the Ten Commandments, which according to Judaism is to believe in the LORD (note the connection to the Exodus). This lack of faith/belief in God led them to disobey his commandment and rebel against him twice. First, by refusing to go in and take the land and then by trying to conquer it when clearly commanded otherwise. As a result, God punished Israel by not allowing that generation to enter the land.  Instead, they wandered in the wilderness for forty years until that rebellious generation died out. However, God in his mercy allowed their children to enter the land. 

What happened to Israel is reminiscent to what happened to Adam and Eve.  God commanded them not eat of the Tree, after being tempted by the serpent they disobeyed God's command, ate, and were subsequently expelled from Gan Eden. The parallel between the two accounts seems to be part of the narrative strategy of the author and is meant to teach us an essential lesson. What is it? It is the biblical formula/pattern for blessing and cursing. This pattern of cursing is as follows: disbelief leads to disobedience that leads to dismissal from the God's presence, land, and blessings. Conversely, the pattern of blessing is as follows: belief in the LORD and his Torah leads to obedience that leads to blessing. This seems to be the exact pattern that the writer of Hebrews alludes to when he says,

Therefore, while the promise of entering his rest still stands, let us fear lest any of you should seem to have failed to reach it. For good news came to us just as to them, but the message they heard did not benefit them, because they were not united by faith with those who listened.

Hebrews 4:1-2

Isaac W. Oliver

This part of the Besora opens with a confident Yeshua, fully aware of his coming death: "Now before the festival of the Passover, Yeshua knew that his hour had come to depart from this world and go to the Father. Having loved his own who were in the world, he loved them to the end" (John 13:1). We are also told that Yeshua knew that "the Father had given all things into his hands, and that he had come from God and was going to God" (13:2). Sometimes, the way Yeshua is described in John seems so different from the portraits we find in the other Synoptic Gospels. In John, Yeshua at times seems so confident, so majestic, so divine, and so powerful.

But beyond this superb portrayal of a highly divine Yeshua, we can also discover another side of Yeshua in John; that of a humble servant who disrupts social order through his personality, words, and actions. At the brink of his death, Yeshua tosses on a towel and begins to wash the feet of his Talimidim (13:4). With the high amount of reverence that was paid to one's master or rabbi, the sight of a teacher cleaning the feet of his own students must have appeared odd and even scandalous. But it is precisely this kind of defying action that fits perfectly with the social message of Yeshua we hear elsewhere in the Besorot.

There we find a Yeshua who teaches a message meant to turn the norms of the world upside down. "The last shall be first, and first shall be last" (Matthew 20:16). "Blessed are the poor" (Luke 6:20). "Blessed are you who are hungry now" (Luke 6:21). "Blessed are the persecuted" (Matthew 5:10). "It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for someone who is rich to enter the kingdom of God" (Mark 10:25). Such paradoxical statements also blend in with Yeshua's own lifestyle. He hangs out with sinners, tax collectors, prostitutes, and other outcasts. He associates himself with the sick, the impure, and the demonically possessed. For Yeshua, all of these kinds of actions and declarations were meant to give us a picture of the world to come, the kingdom of heaven, the way the world should be - a world where there are no winners or losers. If we were to translate his message into modern jargon, he may have sounded the way a contemporary artist put it:

Only the losers win, because they have nothing to prove. They'll leave the world with nothing to lose. You can laugh at the weirdoes now. Wait till the wrongs are right. They'll be the ones with nothing to hide. I've been thinking. I've got a plan to lose it all. I've got a contract pending on eternity. If I already haven't given it away. I've got a plan to lose it all.

You call me Teacher and Lord - and you are right, for that is what I am. So if I, your Lord and Teacher, have washed your feet, you also ought to wash one another's feet. For I have set you an example that you also should do as I have done to you.

John 13:13-15

Yeshua's defying words and actions still ring today. His teaching about submission, surrender, and social overturning is ascribed to him in all Besorot, including John. His call for contagious association and open commensality begins among his Talmidim, starting with the washing of their feet.

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