Warning, this is not squeaky clean. There are more explicit references around the discussion of Kozbi. Nonetheless, the Torah chooses her and her activities as a clear example to be aware of.
This week’s Torah reading reflects one of the most fundamental inflections in all of Torah. I thought about sharing my thoughts from year’s past and just adding a bit of commentary. However, our situation today has led me to write something new. Something that brings together many disparate thoughts that have been percolating within me for quite a few years. I hope it will come together well.
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The single most striking thing about this reading is the focus on women. There are eight different women mentioned in the first parts of this reading. Seven of them are mentioned in the context of a military census that explicitly excludes them as they aren’t men of fighting age. And of those six, two aren’t even (by the plain expectation of the text) alive.
To take it even further, every one of these women is mentioned in the context of their father’s houses. This is like the Torah deciding, all at once and in one particular place, to start using maiden names – even for married women. The women are, by order of appearance, Kozbi (who committed the sins of Peor with Zimri), the five daughters of Tzelophchad, Serach and finally Yocheved.
Each of these women has a story – a story with a lesson meant to inform the Jewish people for the rest of their existence.
There is another oddity in the census. There are men included – again, in a military census – who are long-since and explicitly dead. They are explicitly not counted, but they are still called out. This includes the entire generation that left Egypt. And there are men – the sons of Korach – who are especially called out despite them technically being no different than any other person who was counted.
Finally, the census counts all the men – despite the fact that only 12,000 will actually go to war. It seems unnecessary to count the rest of the people in a military census if the strike force is actually quite small.
What is happening here? Why is this census so odd? And how does it explain what comes after – the daughters of Tzelophchad asking Moshe about their inheritance, the rise of Yohoshua (Joshua), the rote rendition of holiday offerings and (in the readings that follow), the restrictions on women’s vows, the war on Midian and the apportionment of land by families.
To begin to solve this question, let’s begin with the first woman: Kozbi. Kozbi’s name could come from a variety of roots, but one suggestion is k’Zav: ‘like flowing’. The way we render the bet, it has a little dot. That means the letter is essentially used in both the prior and following syllable. So, it is even more like k’Zab’bi: ‘like flowing in me.’
The word Zav is used in a variety of situations including the description of the land as ‘flowing’ with milk and honey. In a human context though, it is most often used in relationship to reproductive organs – when reproductive opportunity is missed. A male or a female ‘zav’ is a flowing that represents missed or lost potential. Kozbi’s name, on a number of levels, almost suggests pointless, meaningless, reproductive-like activity.
This falls into line with the practice of Ba’al Peor. Ba’al means god. Peor is exposure. The practice of Peor is to expose yourself – make your most fundamental urges something public and something acted on publicly. The activity described in the Torah is the worship. Just as with the sin of the Calf – the ‘play’ represents self-worship. You elevate your own animal self to a godlike level by worshipping in this way.
Kozbi’s name isn’t the end of her story, though. She’s described as being the son of Tzur (rock) who is the head of אֻמּוֹת (his people). This is pronounced Ummot. An אממה comes from אם. It is translated as ‘nation’ and it is indeed a word for nation. It is not, however, the normal Torah word. The normal word is עם (Am) – which comes from the root for ‘with.’ In many dialects of Hebrew pronunciation, the two root words sound almost identical: Am vs. Am. An עם is quite different though. It represents a people who are with each other. An אממה, the word used here, is a nation defined by their mothers.
The word Umma – used to describe the collected Islamic community – comes from this term. ‘Mother’ in Arabic is أم (Am) while أمة ا-ه (Umma’t Ullah with G-d’s name struck out) is G-d’s people.
Why is Kozbi’s father a head of an Umma? Because, in a people who celebrate public orgies, there was no way to track who the father of a child was. The people were defined by mothers. There is a clear exception though, and it comes right here. Kozbi was Tzur’s daughter. Not only that, but Tzur was beit Av of a father’s house. There are a few possibilities:
- lineage wasn’t critical for belonging to a house – it was a position of respect like being adopted into an industrialist Japanese family.
- The ruler’s got to have families (or harems) and clearly identified children – but this doesn’t line up with essentially royalist activities like Kozbi’s.
- The society had just recently fallen apart.
This last one is the most likely. Why? Because Midian comes up when Moshe is younger. Yitro clearly has seven daughters – they are his. And there is no sign of Ba’al Peor or the practices described here. In fact, all we see at that time is the very first steps in Midian’s social collapse. The daughters of Yitro come to get water and they are driven away. In Eliezer’s time, the women come to draw water. In Yaacov’s time, only Rivka comes, and the well is covered by a rock due to mistrust. There is some decline. However, with Yitro, the women are actively being driven away. The society is beginning to fall apart. But it hasn’t collapsed yet. That comes later.
One last thing, Kozbi is not identified as the wife of Zimri. She does not bind herself to the Jewish people. She remains a part of her father’s house. This reinforces the entire prior image.
Finally (really this time), Pinchas spears Kozbi and Zimri together through their cavity. The symbolism is clear. The word for spear is Romach – a reordering of the word Rechem, which means both mercy and womb. This wording emphasizes that Kozbi and Zimri’s act is turned from something biologically productive to something fundamentally destructive. It represents the effects of cheating on G-d. Pinchas is given a Covenant of Shalom. Shalom can mean peace, but it can also mean ‘complete.’
He keeps the people – defined by proper relationships – whole.
In all of this, Kozbi is set up. Her name, her history and her fate all serve as an archetype to be avoided. Meaningless reproductive-like activity, public exposure, uplifting of animal desires, collapse of society and unclear male lineages lead to destruction.
In the follow up to this, the Torah highlights a series of contrary feminine examples.
The first are the four daughters of Tzelophchad: Machlah, No’a, Chagla, Milkah and Tirzah. There isn’t a clear meaning for Tzelophchad’s name. But his daughters are a different story. Machlah literally means sickness. No’a means to tremble or shake or to be exiled (from the story of Cain). Chagla is less obvious (at least to little old me). It has no dots so we can’t double dip the letters. It could be a contraction of Chag-La or Holiday to Hashem, but that seems like a bit of a stretch. It may be a neutral, largely meaningless, name. But then we have Milkah, which means Queen. And Tirtza means ‘you will desire.’
What we see in these names is a progression in their father’s attitude. He starts off seeing daughters as an illness – a failure on his part to produce sons. Then they are something that makes him feel exiled or weak. Then perhaps he begins to see a bit of G-d’s wonder – or perhaps he gives the girl a neutral name. And then the next daughter is a Queen. And the last is one who is desired. As in, I think, he desired a daughter.
This is a remarkable progression and one that is not often repeated in many cultures – including the history of Judaism. Tzelophchad may start with regret at having daughters, but he grows to love and appreciate them.
The daughters of Tzelophchad are mentioned before they do anything. They represent women who are appreciated and valued as a continuation of their families. These four women are famous for creating the right of inheritance for women in Judaism. But they aren’t protecting their inheritance. They are protecting their father’s legacy. In other words, they repay this appreciation by ensuring that they continue the legacy of their father who learned to respect and cherish them. They will marry (unlike Kozbi) but in a way that protects and represents their father’s house.
So, counter-Kozbi one: valued women who rise beyond queens in their father’s eyes. Women who will carry on their father’s legacy by merging it with the legacy of the men they will marry. And, of course, women whose actual legacy far outstrips any men they are associated with.
Next up is Serach. Serach is only mentioned twice in the whole Torah. In fact, the letters in her name are never used in any other context. She stands alone. In this reading, hundreds of years after the last mention of her name, she is the daughter of Asher (son of Yaacov). Her relationship to her father’s house is brought out explicitly. The only other time she is mentioned is as one of three women named among those who came down to Egypt. She and Dinah are the only daughters who stayed with the Jewish people. Everybody else who came down was a son (or an unnamed woman married to one – Asnat excepted). Not only that, but Serach was a granddaughter. She didn’t have the direct connection to Yaacov (or the other baggage in that culture) that Dinah had. Serach would have chosen to be a part of the Jewish people, even at the cost of having a family of her own.
So, counter-Kozbi two: a dedication to remaining connected to Hashem and continuing her family legacy, even at the cost of one’s own fulfillment.
The final counter-Kozbi is Yocheved. She is identified as Amram’s wife, but also as the daughter of Levi. Again, there is this association with her father. Amram probably means ‘nation is lifted.’ But Yocheved has the great name. It means Glory of G-d. Yocheved chose to have children in the midst of slavery. The Torah strongly suggests others had stopped having children. The people were crying out like those of S’dom. The reason we know the people of S’dom stopped having children was that Lot’s daughters said there was nobody left to reproduce with (וְאִישׁ אֵין בָּאָרֶץ לָבוֹא עָלֵינוּ, כְּדֶרֶךְ כָּל-הָאָרֶץ) ‘there is no man in the land to come upon us in the way of all the land’. This wasn’t because everybody had died, they could see Zoar was spared. It was because the society hated themselves so much, they stopped having children. At the same time, G-d zocher’s the people. That implies a contract that could not be fulfilled if He had not acted. The people stopped having children so G-d had to rescue them to fulfill his covenant. But Yocheved did not.
Her name could mean ‘Glory to G-d’ or it could suggest that G-d glorifies her.
Yocheved is a counter-Kozbi who has children (with a clearly identified husband) in a way that glorifies G-d. This is totally contrary to Kozbi’s model.
If we put these women together, we see valued women who carry legacies forward, women who are dedicated to the relationship with G-d, and women who glorify G-d (and not themselves) through the act of having children and creating the future. All of these women are strong. Then again, so was Kozbi.
What legacies are these women carrying forward? The text explicitly mentions their fathers’ houses. Of course, the women themselves are mentioned in the Torah and are much more prominent than many of their fathers and husbands. It all makes you wonder why the Torah focus on the fathers’ houses in the first place? Why not mother’s houses? Why not skip the father’s names.
First, and most fun, a father who helps raise daughters like these has something to be proud of. He deserves a mention – particularly in a culture where men didn’t seem to often raise women this way.
Second, to have a reliable fathers’ house you have to have parents with faithful relationships. It takes more to pull off than a mother’s house. Even when the Torah basically admits this patrilineal lineage is totally unknowable (see my write-up on Bamidbar) we make-believe that we have a clear lineage back to Avraham and Shait before him.
However, a male lineage is not only about faithful relationships. Each of the genders represents symbolically a particular set of values in the Torah (this is not to say the individuals personify these values, I know lots of people who don’t fit these symbolic archetypes so please don’t be offended!).
Starting back near The Beginning, the Torah does not say Chavah (Eve) was cursed when she kicked out the garden. Adam and the Snake were explicitly cursed, but not Chavah. Instead, she was changed. Instead of sacrificing the timeless relationship with G-d for a taste of something in the here and now, she is willing to put up with a husband and the dangers of childbirth to create the future. Carrying this forward, it is the midwives (long before Moshe) who risk their lives for the future in Egypt. Notably, they are granted houses of their own – not father’s houses. In the Torah, women often represent this dedication to the timeless and to holiness.
On an even more basic biological level, women represent the ability to ‘bear fruit’ while men represent the will. A woman can be raped and impregnated against her will. A man cannot have a child without a woman’s involvement – even if unwilling. This very core idea is in the word Adam (man) and Adama (earth). Adam plants but the Earth yields crops.
In this context, the male represents will while the women represent holiness and actualization. It is only when the two are brought together that an intentional and divinely connected ‘crop’ is created. In other words, the Earth can grow all sorts of food – but it is only when mankind plants in fertile soil that intent is brought to the equation. A few wild grains are replaced with fields. The children of the Jewish people, bringing together will, holiness and actualization, are capable of continuing the relationship with G-d.
The women in this reading thus highlight two archetypes. One dedicated to the meaningless pleasures enjoyed in the here and now. If they yield children, those children lack that patrilineal (symbolic) will and intent. They are wild crops. The other is dedicated to continuing the timeless relationship with G-d. They are the vineyards of the Lord.
Of course, unusual women do not stand alone in this reading. There are also seemingly misplaced men who don’t belong in a military census but are mentioned nonetheless.
Datan, Aviram and Menuel (all dead) kick this off. They are called out for striving against Hashem. Then we have the sons of Korach who are counted because they didn’t strive against Hashem (the daughters of Tzelofchad emphasize that their father wasn’t a part of Korach’s rebellion). Next come Nadav and Avihu who are called out for offering strange fire – they broke the proper relationship with G-d. There are lessons here – follow the proper path and don’t break the relationship with Hashem. Zimri and the others who engaged in Peor are obviously not counted.
The last example, though, is perhaps the most powerful. The Torah makes an explicit point that the entire generation (with 2 exceptions) that left Egypt is not counted. Why? Because G-d said they would die. But there is no judgement built in. There is no reason given for their deaths. In this context, they aren’t accused of being rebels or denying Hashem. Why? I think it is simply because of this: they passed the relationship with G-d on to their children.
They willfully carried on the relationship with G-d – even in the face of a death commanded by G-d. In this context, they deserve no censure.
Throughout the census, both men and women are celebrated for maintaining the relationship with G-d – and using family to do it.
On one level, the ‘why’ behind all of this is obvious. Ba’al Peor threatened the families of Israel. G-d, through the census, is shoring those families up. But this is about more than shoring up the families of Israel. In this Parsha, a fundamental restructuring of the people is afoot.
In the remainder of the reading, we see a few remarkable things that make this transition clear. We’ve already talked about the daughters of Tzelophchad. But there is something remarkable about their case that generally isn’t covered. Their case is the very last case in which Moshe asks G-d a question. G-d tells Moshe what to do one later time (when the 2 and a half tribes want to live on the other side of the river). But never again does Moshe initiate a specific legal question.
What happened?
If we rewind just a bit, we can see. G-d commanded Moshe to string up the leaders of the people in the sun (exposing them as they were exposing themselves). Moshe instead commanded the people to kill those involved in Peor. They, in turn, did nothing. They just wept. What we see is a breakdown in divine rule. G-d’s direct rule failed. Moshe’s rule failed. The leadership failed. So, G-d replaces the whole system.
After Tzelophchad (a remarkable exception made for remarkable women) there are no more questions asked of Him. The great prophet Moshe is told to pass his office to a successor who will communicate only indirectly with G-d. The Torah actually mentions that Yohoshua has to go to Eliezer with questions and the Simon Says-like Urim will light up with potential answers.
There is a new distance from G-d that has been established.
Then, the Chaggim (holidays) are described as rote occasions, without explanation. Rote rules are, in a way, pushing aside explanations and a personal relationship with the divine. In the readings that follow, we see more of a transition.
We’ll save the subject of vows and the attack on Midian for next week, but we do see the land is apportioned to families. This seems crazy. A family unit is tiny and if some have lots of children and some have few, the distribution of the land will become fundamentally unequal. Perhaps even untenable. It would make far more sense to have the land belong to the tribe. But it is given to families. Families are reinforced even at the cost of economic common sense.
This reinforcement is about more than economics, though. Each family has a portion. Each family has a timeless heritage. They have something physical, something tangible, which will unify and connect them throughout time. We might pass on heirloom watches or rings, but those last only a few generations. We have a fifth-generation chair in our living room, but that’s stretching it. But imagine if we had some piece of Israel, some patch of land, that has been a part of our family for millennia? Imagine if we had a piece of land that would belong to our family for millennia to come. And imagine if our inheritance of that land was tied to our relationship to Hashem. This apportionment brings families together in their relationship with G-d. It gives us a heritage, a physical heritage tied inextricably to the spiritual. This network of relationships makes those fortunate enough to be a part of it, part of their people’s forever.
There’s a reason Jeremiah’s redeeming of his land is such a powerful story.
Who apportions the land. The text explicitly assigns the role to the princes of the tribes. But guess what? This is the very last time the word Nasi, or prince, appears.
The families push the leaders of tribes aside.
What we see then is a great dual transition. The rule of G-d is replaced by the rule of G-d’s law and the rule of the great leaders is offset by the elevation of the family. The leadership of the people, who all failed so spectacularly with Peor, are pushed aside or reduced in their roles. In their place, it is the family that is lifted up.
The family, in service of the timeless divine relationship.
When we think about this, practically speaking, it makes a great deal of sense. In a mob, in a mass, people seem to lose their common sense. They are like locusts, pumped up on unreason. The tribes that were defined in Bamidbar (you have to read that writeup) were ideological. Some believed their people were noble, some believed their brothers were evil. Others cut G-d out of the equation entirely. People flocked to the many different banners that might call to them. They formed tribes – large groups mindlessly fighting for their place in the present reality.
We see this today. There are often ideological kernels at the core of our disputes. But increasingly, they come down to personalities and tribes. You hate what somebody does (or love it) because they do it and it represents your tribe. 30% of Democrats in the US thought Trump faked his assassination attempt. I couldn’t find figures, but a similar percentage of Republicans believing Biden or someone in his orbit ordered the hit wouldn’t surprise me. My point isn’t to encourage or refute conspiracy theories – my point is that we live in a time in which our truth is often defined by our tribe. The Internet has supercharged this.
This tribal reality, focused on the here and now, has been further reinforced by cultural changes. Many leaders of Western countries have no children. Many people, across both Asia and the West, have very few children. Children are seen in an economic light (they cost too much to raise, right) and as something meant to give pleasure to their parents. The personal economics are clear even as the societal ones are catastrophic: if you can have other people’s children take care of you in your old age why have your own?
In our story, though children serve a far more fundamental purpose – they are the only way of passing our relationship to G-d on. They are the only way of passing on that intentional peoplehood on. And so, Israelis, unique among all wealthy countries, have a fertility rate that is well above replacement.
It is the family that preserves. It is the family that is resilient. It is the family that does not form a mob. And even more critically, it is the family that can both change and resist change. The Red Heifer, the Nazir and the woman recovering from childbirth all use both cedar and A’Zov. The cedar is the oldest tree in the Old World and has the deepest roots. It represents stability. The A’Zov is like A’dama. It represents Zov – that which flows. Not in a human sense in this case, but a cultural one; a slow process of movement and adjustment. Families have these characteristics. They both have the timeless root and anext generation is always pushing – is always adapting – is always changing.
Families because they bend can endure far longer than rigid civilizations, clans or tribes that form social controls that freeze their development.
We are the Bnei Yisrael, the Children of Israel, for a reason.
In Bilaam’s famous poem he sang:
How Goodly are your tents of Jacob
Your tabernacles, oh Israel
As streams planted,
As gardens by the riverside,
As tents set firmly by the timeless G-d,
As cedars on the water;
Water shall flow from his branches (or doors)
and his seed shall be in many waters
His King shall be higher than Agag
And His Kingdom shall be exalted
The tents are the family – the family of Yaacov. Goodness represents creation (G-d calls things ‘good’ after he creates them). The families, in their privacy, are creating (children). These tents serve as tabernacles, an opportunity to connect with Hashem.
Impossibly, their streams are planted. Water represents spirituality – with two rivers in Eden being physical and two being spiritual. The spiritual rivers flow in ever-rising (or ever-falling) circles. For our part, our spirituality both flows through us and is fixed in Hashem. Our gardens, our places of comfort and safety, are literally on rivers – places of change and connection. How can this be possible? We are so stable in our relationship to G-d that we can rest above the rushing waters. We can endure, embrace, flourish in a world where vast forces flow by us. Why? Because our tents are set beside Hashem. Our families dwell beside G-d – they endure even the mighty waters. Cedars cannot survive on a riverside. Their roots require drainage. They are overwhelmed by water – like the spirituality of Midian washing them. By our cedars, our roots, can flourish in the spirituality of the waters. Our spirituality, our waters, our zocher (our intent and will) can spread throughout the world. They are enhanced by G-d. Because of all of this our King will be higher than the ‘roof’ and His Kingdom will be exalted.
This parable told Balack, presumably through Midianite advisors, to attack through our families. But this parable also laid out G-d’s plan for the future. We start with our tents, our families. They connect us to G-d. And bit by bit, step by step, we do the impossible. Our roots survive change. Our influence spreads. The intent with which we are established spreads through the world. And, in the end Hashem is exalted and our people are redeemed (read the rest of the poem).
We can see the distance from G-d’s rule that is established in this reading as a curse. We can see it as a setback.
But in the vision provided by the women of this parsha, and by the men who rebelled but were not criticized, we can also see something far more powerful than tribes and national leaders.
We can see families.
We can see that it all starts with goodly tents, the tabernacles of Israel.
Our present reality features tribal conflicts, locust-like mob mentalities, here and now thinking (even in the economics of children), breakdowns of leadership, distancing from G-d and the elevation of our most base desires. Too many of our nations are being cast into war for the glory of the collective Russian/Chinese/Persian/Muslim/… people.
Our present reality is not so far from that of this Torah reading.
In these stormy waters, this Torah reading may just give us the redemption we need. That redemption is not through some new great leader. It is not through uplifting our tribes or creating vast new powerful overlords. No, our redemption is realized through retreat. Retreat to family – family dedicated to the relationship with G-d.
Our redemption is through families that preserve their roots and yet, nonetheless, adapt to changing times. Our redemption is built by mothers and daughters and sisters (and even father’s and brothers) who carry forward our timeless relationship with the divine.
Today, our potential is being squandered through our tribalism and our culture – just as Zimri and Kozbi squandered their creative powers.
Perhaps, just maybe, we can redouble the power of our families and perhaps those families that help us realize our true potential.
Shabbat Shalom.
