Chayei Sarah & 1 Kings: Old Age for Scoundrels, Part 2

Both Abraham and King David have motley careers in the bible: brave and magnanimous in one scene, heartless and unscrupulous in the next. But in old age (about age 140-175 for Abraham, 60-70 for David) the two characters take different paths.

And Abraham expired and died in good satiation, old and satisfied, and he was gathered to his people. (Genesis 25:8)

Abraham, who is healthy and virile in extreme old age, takes a new concubine and raises a new family in last week’s Torah portion, Chayei Sarah (Genesis 23:1-25:18). But this time, instead of endangering his women and his sons, he acts responsibly. Abraham makes explicit arrangements for his eight sons so that each will carry on an independent life without internecine struggles. (See last week’s post: Chayei Sarah & 1 Kings: Old Age for Scoundrels, Part 1)

King David, however, is feeble and bitter during his last years. The haftarah reading for Chayei Sarah (1 Kings 1:1-1:31) sets the tone with its opening:

And the king, David, was old, coming on in years. And they covered him with bedclothes, but he never felt warm. (1 Kings 1:1)

This is the man who personally killed 200 Philistines in a single battle,¹ who took at least eight wives and ten concubines,² and who danced and leaped in front of the ark all the way into Jerusalem.³

David’s prime

As a young man, David is such a charismatic and popular military commander that King Saul is afraid David will steal his kingdom. Saul makes four attempts to kill him.⁴David flees and becomes the leader of an outlaw band. At one point he seems to be running a protection racket.⁵

Later David defects to the Philistines, Israel’s longtime enemies, with his 600 men. The Philistine king of Gat welcomes the mercenaries and gives David the town of Ziklag. For over a year David and his men raid villages, kill the residents, and bring back booty (presumably sharing it with the king of Gat). This kind of raiding was common in the Ancient Near East, and the Hebrew Bible does not censure David; the text merely indicates that David lied to the king of Gat in order to avoid raiding Israelite villages.⁶

After King Saul and his son and heir Jonathan die in a battle with Philistines, David and his men relocate to Hebron, where David is proclaimed king of Judah, his own tribe. Meanwhile, Saul’s general Abner makes one of Saul’s sons⁷ the king of the northern Israelite territory.⁸ Right after David and Abner have made a truce, Joab, David’s army commander and nephew, assassinates Abner.⁹ Two other supporters of David assassinate Saul’s son in the north, and David becomes the king of all Israel—when he is only 30.

He captures the part of Jerusalem and turns it into his capitol, the City of David. One spring King David stays home while Joab leads a fight against the kingdom of Ammon. Walking on his rooftop in the evening, David sees a beautiful woman bathing on her rooftop. He finds out that she is Bathsheba (Batsheva), the wife of one of his own soldiers, Uriyah.

King David Sees Bathsheba, by Jean-Leon Gerome, 1889

Adultery is a sin in the Torah, a crime punishable by death.¹⁰ Nevertheless, David has Bathsheba brought to him. When she tells David she has become pregnant, he calls Uriyah home from the front so it will look as if she is pregnant by her husband. Uriyah, however, refuses to spend even one night in his own house at a time of war.

So David compounds his crime.

And it was in the morning when David wrote a letter to Joab, and he sent it by the hand of Uriyah. And the letter he wrote said: “Put Uriyah in the front of the hardest battle, then draw back from him, so he will be struck down and die.” (2 Samuel 11:15)

Joab obeys. The innocent Uriyah dies. As soon as Bathsheba finishes the mourning rituals for her husband, David marries her.

And the thing that David had done was evil in the eyes of God. (2 Samuel 11:27)

The prophet Natan transmits the words of God’s curse to the king:

“And now the sword will never swerve away from your house again, because you have despised me and have taken the wife of Uriyah the Hittite to be your wife. Thus says God: Here I am, raising up against you evil from within your own house…” (2 Samuel 12:10-11)

The death of Bathsheba’s infant conceived in adultery is only the beginning. Amnon, who is David’s firstborn son by his wife Achinoam, rapes Tamar, David’s daughter by his wife Ma-akhah. David is responsible for justice, in both his household and his kingdom, but he does nothing about the rape. So Tamar’s full brother, Absalom (Avshalom), kills Amnon and goes into exile.

King David grieves over Amnon’s death for three years, then lets Absalom return to Jerusalem. Absalom usurps David’s throne after a long misinformation campaign, and King David leaves Jerusalem with his supporters. They camp at Machanayim on the other side of the Jordan River. On the way, a fellow named Shimi throws stones, dirt, and insults at David, but David is feeling either defeated or philosophical, and he tells his men to leave Shimi alone, since this, too, is God’s doing.¹¹

David’s Grief over Absalom, Bible card, Providence Lithograph Co., 19th century

When Absalom’s army clashes with David’s army, David orders Joab and his other two commanders to go easy on Absalom. David’s troops win the battle, and Absalom is left dangling from a tree branch by his own long hair. Joab disregards David’s order and kills Absalom. David is heartbroken. His grief demoralizes his troops, until Joab persuades David to come down from his bedroom and act like a king.¹² Shortly after that, David replaces Joab with Amasa, who was Absalom’s general.¹³

When David and his followers cross the Jordan back into Jerusalem, Shimi prostrates himself and apologizes for insulting the king and throwing rocks at him. Joab’s brother Avishai says:

“Shouldn’t Shimi be put to death instead, since he cursed God’s anointed?” (2 Samuel 19:22)

But David scolds Avishai and says no man of Israel should be killed on a day of national reconciliation.

And the king said to Shimi: “You will not be put to death.” And the king swore to him. (2 Samuel 19:24)

With David back on the throne, life continues as usual for ancient Israel, full of battles against neighboring countries. During one of them, Joab kills General Amasa, hides his bloody corpse with a cloak, and takes charge of the king’s troops. He defeats the enemy and returns to Jerusalem as the king’s general once more. King David takes no action.

Unlike Abraham, David is punished during his lifetime for his worst sin (committing adultery and then having the woman’s husband killed). But his woes only make him more passive, not more ethical.

David’s old age

The first book of Kings begins:

And the king, David, was old, coming on in years. And they covered him with bedclothes, but he never felt warm. Then his courtiers said to him: “Let them seek for my lord the king a virgin young woman, and she will wait on the king, and she will be an administrator for him, and she will lie in your bosom and my lord the king will be warm.” (1 Kings 1:1)

David and Abishag, Bible Illustration Cycle, 1432-35

They bring King David a beautiful young woman named Avishag.

And she became an attendant to the king and waited on him, but the king lo yeda-ah. (1 Kings 1:4)

lo yeda-ah (לֺא יְדָעָהּ) =he was not intimately acquainted with her. (lo, לֺא = not + yeda-ah, יְדָעָהּ = he was intimately acquainted with her. From the verb yada, יָדָע = he found out by experience,was acquainted with, had sexual relations with, understood, knew.)

Poor David! Even though Avishag is young and beautiful and lies down right next to him, he is too feeble to take advantage of the situation. And he used to be a man who loved spreading his seed around.

Unlike Abraham, David has not named his heir or distributed his property. His three oldest sons were Amnon (murdered by Absalom), Khiliav (Avigail’s son, who has disappeared from the story), and Absalom (killed in battle). Next in birth order is Adoniyah.

And Adoniyah, son of Chagit, was exalting himself, thinking: I myself will be king! … And his father had not found fault with him, or said “Why did you do that?” And also he was very good-looking … (1 Kings 1:5-6)

Adoniyah, the son whom David spoiled, gets support from General Joab and one of the top priests. He holds a coronation feast at on the southeast side of the City of David, and he invites everyone except his half-brother Solomon (a later son of David and Bathsheba) and Solomon’s supporters (the prophet Natan, the priest Tzadok, and King David’s personal guard, headed by Beneyahu).

Then Natan said to Solomon’s mother, Bathsheba: “Haven’t you heard that Adoniyah son of Chagit rules, and our lord David lo yada? And now, please take my advice, and save your life and the life of your son Solomon!” (1 Kings 1:11-12)

lo yada (לֺא יָדָע) = he does not know, does not understand.

King David, once an active and decisive leader, seems to have slipped into a state of passive ignorance. Perhaps he has become senile.

Following Natan’s script, Bathsheba comes to David’s bedchamber and bows.

And she said to him: “My lord, you yourself swore by God, your God, to your servant about Solomon, your son, ‘He will rule after me and he will sit on my throne.’ Yet now, hey! Adoniyah is king, and now, my lord the king, lo yadata! And he has slaughtered oxen and fatlings and many sheep, and he has invited all the king’s sons and Avyatar the priest and Joab commander of the army, but he has not sent for your servant Solomon. And you, my lord the king, the eyes of all Israel are upon you, to tell them who will sit on the throne of my lord the king after him. And it will happen when my lord the king lies down with his fathers, that I and my son Solomon will be considered guilty!” (1 Kings 1:18-21)

lo yadata (לֺא יָדָעתָּ) = you do not know; you do not understand. (Also from the verb yada.)

Natan comes in and corroborates. Then King David pulls himself together and issues orders for Solomon’s anointment as king.

The Solomon faction immediately holds a ceremony just east of Jerusalem, with shofar-blowing and music so loud that Adoniyah’s people hear it on the other side of the city. Solomon sits on the king’s throne before Adoniyah can get there.

Thus David, who had forgotten to take care of his most important business, makes Solomon his heir at the last minute. Adoniyah submits to his younger brother, and Solomon spares his life.

David’s last words to Solomon come right after last week’s haftarah reading, in the second chapter of 1 Kings. David opens with a formulaic directive to be strong and walk in God’s ways, but then he orders Solomon to take care of some unfinished business. Apparently David was too weak—politically, physically, or psychologically—to mete out rewards and punishments before he took to his bed. After his introduction, David tells Solomon:

“And also yadata yourself what Joab son of Tzeruyah did to me, what he did to the two commanders of the army of Israel, to Abner son of Neir and to Amasa son of Yeter. He killed them, and he put the bloodshed of war into a time of peace … So you must act in your wisdom, and his gray head will not go down in peace to Sheol. (1 Kings 2:5)

David reminds Solomon of what Joab did to Abner and Amasa, but does not say what Joab did to David. The obvious answer is that Joab killed David’s son Absalom, but David chooses not to go into that on his deathbed. He just wants Solomon to execute Joab, something David himself could not manage to do.

“But to the sons of Barzilai the Gileadite you must do loyal-kindness, and let them eat at your table, since [Barzilai] came close to me with blessings when I fled from the face of Absalom, your brother.” (1 Kings 2:7)

Here David is merely asking Solomon to continue the reward he set up for one of Barzilai’s sons after Barzilai had provided provisions for David and all his men during their exile from Jerusalem after Absalom usurped the kingship. But then David remembers someone who did not treat him well when he left Jerusalem.

“And hey! With you is Shimi son of Geira … and he, he insulted me with scathing insults on the day I went to Machanayim. Then he went down to meet me at the Jordan, and I swore to him by God, saying ‘I will not put you to death by the sword”. But now, do not hold him guiltless, because you are a wise man, veyadata what you should do to him. And you must bring his gray head down in blood to Sheol!” (1 Kings 2:8-9)

veyadata (וְיָדַעְתָּ) = and you will know. (Also from the verb yada.)

After David has laid these orders on Solomon, reminding him that he knows what to do, David dies—cold, ineffective, unforgiving, and bitter.

Abraham has a good and satisfied old age; David has the opposite. Abraham starts taking care of his family, instead of using them for his own selfish desires. David becomes so passive it takes both Natan and Bathsheba to get him to give orders to prevent a civil war, and on his deathbed he orders his son and heir to take revenge for him.

Why are the two characters so different?

Now, when I remember my mother’s suffering, senile incomprehension, and verbal sniping during her long journey toward death, I think that what matters most in the last part of life is autonomy and agency. During Abraham’s last years he is sound of mind; he gives thoughtful orders, and he continues to be obeyed. David retreats from thinking during the last half of his life. Instead of seeking more knowledge and understanding, he continues to make impulsive decisions that disregard both other people’s point of view and the good of his own kingdom. First Joab, and then Natan, manipulate him for the good of the kingdom. At the end, David takes no responsibility for anything, and asks his son Solomon to avenge him after he dies.

May each of us take responsibility while we still have autonomy and agency, and may we act in order to improve the situation for those who survive us. Even if we have a past record of misdeeds, may we be more like Abraham in old age, and less like King David.

David killed 200 Philistines and harvested their foreskins (1 Samuel 18:25-27).
The foreskins were the bride-price for marrying King Saul’s daughter Mikhal. David was leading an outlaw band when he married Avigail (1 Samuel 25:39-42) and Achinoam (1 Samuel 25:43). As king of Judah, he married Ma-akhah, Chagit, Avital, and Eglah (2 Samuel 3: 3-6); and as king of all Israel he took “more concubines and wives” (2 Samuel 5:13). He married Batsheva in 2 Samuel 11:27. We learn he had ten concubines in 2 Samuel 15:16.
David danced in front of the ark, whirling and leaping, in 2 Samuel 6:13-16.
King Saul tries to thrust a spear through David himself in 1 Samuel 18:8-2 and 19:10. He sends David into a difficult battle in the hope that Philistines will kill him in 1 Samuel 18:25-26. And Saul sends assassins to David’s house in 1 Samuel 19:11.
1 Samuel 25:2-44.
1 Samuel 27:10-13.
The Hebrew Bible calls this son of Saul Ish-Boshet, meaning “Man of Shame”; we never learn his actual name.
2 Samuel 2:1-10.
2 Samuel 2:12-3:39.
Leviticus 20:20.
2 Samuel 16:5-14.
2 Samuel 18:1-19:15.
2 Samuel 19:12-15. Amasa is another nephew of David’s, and a cousin of Absalom’s.

Shoftim: Is Magic Abominable? Part 2

(If you would like to read one of my posts on this week’s Torah portion, click on “Categories” in the sidebar, then select “Deuteronomy” and “Ki Teitzei”.)

In last week’s Torah portion, Shoftim, Moses warns the Israelites:

When you enter the land that God, your god, is giving to you, you must not learn to act according to the to-avot of those nations. (Deuteronomy/Devarim 18:9)

to-avot (תּוֹעֲבֺת) = plural of to-eivah (תּוֹעֵבָה) = taboo; an abomination, a foreign perversion, a custom in one culture that is prohibited in another culture.

Then Moses lists nine abominable occult practices:

There shall not be found among you one who makes his son or his daughter go across through the fire; a koseim kesomim, a meonein, or a menacheish; a mekhasheif or a choveir chaver,or one who inquires of ov or yidoni, or one who seeks the dead. Because anyone who does these things is to-avot; and on account of these to-avot, God, your god, is dispossessing them [the Canaanite nations] before you. (Deuteronomy 18:10-12)

What are all these procedures?

I examined the first four practices in last week’s post, Shoftim: Is Magic Abominable? Part 1, and concluded that the first, making offspring cross the fire, is to-eivah because it involves worshiping a foreign god; and the next three, which all types of divining, are to-avot because they are not sanctioned ways to get information from God. Divining itself is acceptable, as long as the diviner consults the God of Israel (usually through casting lots).

This week we will look at the remaining five kinds of forbidden magic: two types of sorcery, and three ways to get information from people who have died.

A sorcerer: Mekhasheif

A mekhasheif (מְכַשֵּׁף) is someone who does sorcery or witchcraft: khisheif (כִּשֵּׁף) = practice sorcery. The Hebrew Bible does not specify what actions a mekhasheif performs, but in related Semitic languages the root of the word refers to cutting off, or to praying by cutting one’s skin.¹ No one called a mekhasheif is included in any biblical story. Instead, the word usually appears in lists with other types of occult practitioners, as in the Torah portion Shoftim.²

One notable exception is the bald statement in the book of Exodus:

You must not let a mekhasheifah live. (Exodus 22:17)

(Mekhasheifah, מְכַשֵׁפָה, is the feminine form of the word, corresponding to the English “sorceress”.)

This injunction appears between a law giving the financial penalty for seducing a virgin, and a law giving the death penalty to anyone who lies with a beast. Perhaps a female’s sorcery also had a sexual element, but there is no corroboration elsewhere in the Hebrew Bible.

The bible mentions four people by name who employ a mekhasheif. One is the idol-worshiper King Menashe of Judah.³The other three are thoroughly reviled foreigners: a pharaoh, Queen Jezebel, and Nebuchadnezzar.⁴ Perhaps a mekhasheif or mekhasheifah is taboo, to-eivah, because the profession is associated with foreign religions.

A sorcerer: : Choveir chaver

Both choveir and chaver come from the root verb chaver (חָבַר) = join. Normally, a choveir (חֺבֵר) is “one who joins”, and a chaver (חָבֶר) or chever (חֶבֶר) is a group of comrades, a company, a band, or a gang.

But lexicons give alternate meanings for words from that root when the context indicates magic, suggesting that the magic involves conjuring, or tying knots, or chanting spells, or charming animals who act as familiars. Only one biblical passage provides more definite information:

The Snake Charmer, by Charles Wilda, 1883

The wicked are alienated from the womb;

The liars go astray from birth.

They have venom like the venom of a snake,

Like a deaf cobra who closes its ears

So it will not hear the voice of a whisperer,

An expert choveir chavarim. (Psalm 58:4-5)

In this simile, a choveir is a snake charmer who fails—because the snake is so fixated on biting its victim that it turns a deaf ear to the spells the charmer is whispering. Wicked people, particularly liars, also turn a deaf ear to any instruction.

Why would snake charmers be taboo in Deuteronomy? Maybe they were associated with the snake in the Garden of Eden, who encourages the first woman to eat from the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil. Or maybe the problem was that other religions in the Ancient near East had snake-gods and religious symbols of snakes. Or maybe the bible discourages consulting any animal, because only humans are made in the image of God.

A necromancer: One who inquires of an ov or yidoni, or seeks the dead

The terms ov (אוֹב) and yidoni (יִדְּעֺנִי) usually appear together as synonyms.⁶ Both mean either a spirit of a dead person, or a necromancer who summons that spirit. The word yidoni comes from the verb yada (יָדַע) = know; and a dead spirit is assumed to know things that the living do not. The three references to ghosts in Leviticus are revealing.

Do not turn to the ovot or to the yidonim; do not seek them out, to become impure; I am God, your God. (Leviticus 19:31)

ovot (אוֹבוֹת) = plural of ov. Yidonim (יִדְּעֺנִים) = plural of yidoni.

Thus summoning a ghost makes people ritually impure, unable to serve God until they have been purified.

And the soul who turns to the ovot or to the yidonim to have illicit intercourse with them: I [God] will set my face against that soul and I will cut it off from among its people. (Leviticus 20:6)

The Hebrew Bible often calls worshiping other gods a act of prostitution, being unfaithful to the God of Israel. In this verse, consulting a ghost is also an act of infidelity.

And a man or a woman who has an ov or a yidoni must definitely be put to death by stoning; their bloodguilt is upon them. (Leviticus 20:27)

This sounds like a medium who calls up the same ghost repeatedly.

But in the one biblical story about someone who summons an ov, the identity of the ghost depends not on the medium, but on her employer.

And [the prophet] Samuel had died, and all Israel mourned for him, and he was buried in Ramah in his own town. And Saul had banished the ovot and the yidonim from the land. (1 Samuel 28:3)

When King Saul is facing a major battle with the Philistines, he sees the size of the Philistine camp and becomes afraid. At first he sticks to God’s rules, and asks for information only from God-approved sources.

Witch of Endor, by Adam Elsheimer, 17th c.

And Saul put a question to God, but God did not answer him, either by dreams or by the [high priest’s] oracular device or by prophets. Then Saul said to his attendants: “Seek out for me a woman who is a master of ov, and I will go to her and I will inquire through her.” And his attendants said to him: “Hey! A woman who is a master of ov is in Eyn Dor.” Then Saul disguised himself and put on different clothes, and he went, together with two men, and they came to the woman by night. And he said: “Please divine for me through an ov, and bring up for me the one whom I will say to you.” (1 Samuel 28:6-8)

The woman reminds him that King Saul made divination through an ov illegal. The disguised king reassures her. She asks him who to bring up from the dead, and he asks for Samuel.

Then the woman saw Samuel, and she shrieked in a loud voice and … said: “Why did you deceive me? You are Saul!” And the king said to her: “Do not be afraid. But what do you see?” And the woman said to Saul: “I see a god coming up from the ground.” Then he said to her: “What does he look like?” And she said: “An old man is rising up, and he is wrapped in a robe.” Then Saul knew that it was Samuel, and he bowed down to the ground and made obeisance. Then Samuel said to Saul: “Why have you bothered me, bringing me up?” (1 Samuel 28:12-15)

Saul explains. Then Samuel’s ghost says that God is giving the kingship to David, and Saul’s army will lose the battle. He blames Saul’s past disobedience in the war with Amalek for this outcome, and adds:

“And tomorrow you and your sons will be with me!” (1 Samuel 29:19)

In other words, they will be dead in Sheol underground, like Samuel.

Everything Samuel predicts comes true. But we do not know whether that is because he was God’s favorite prophet when he was alive, or because ghosts have secret knowledge.

The list of taboo occult practices in the book of Deuteronomy ends: “or one who seeks the dead”, but that description would cover necromancers who summon ovot or yidonim. Maybe the list ends that way to indicate that divination by speaking to the spirits of dead people is the ultimate insult to God.

Moses concludes:

Because anyone who does these things is to-avot; and on account of these to-avot, God, your god, is dispossessing them [the Canaanites] before you. You must be wholehearted with God, your god. Because these nations that you are taking possession of, they paid attention to meoneinim and to kesomim; but God, your god, did not set this out for you. God, your god, will establish for you a prophet from your midst, from your brothers, like myself. To him you should listen! (Deuteronomy 18:12-15)

To be “wholehearted with God”, the Israelites must avoid worshiping any other gods or engaging in Canaanite magic practices. They must not try to get foreknowledge through any divining practice that does not consult God, or through the familiars of animal charmers, or through consulting the spirits of the dead. If God will not tell you, through a prophet or a dream or a God-dependent oracular practice, then you should not seek to know. Because adopting a foreign occult practice is tantamount to adopting a foreign religious practice. And any substitute for God is taboo, to-eivah.

Humans are by nature anxious about the future. We want to know what will happen so we can make choices that turn out well for us. (Meanwhile, other people are making choices that change the future, but few people think of that.)

What we learn by observation and reason, and what we are told by experts or authority figures, is not enough to satisfy many of us. We want inside information.

Some people today still try to get inside information through magic. The craze for Ouija boards has faded, but there are still mediums for the dead, palm readers, and tarot card readers. Some still look for omens in tea leaves and crystal balls.

Is there any harm in these practices? Perhaps not, if we use them once in a while for entertainment. But if we believe we can use occult practices to manipulate our own futures, we distract ourselves from what we should really be doing with our lives. When we spend time and energy on indirect means to selfish ends, we have less time for the truly good things in life: enjoying creation, being kind to other humans, and improving our world.

The Brown-Driver-Briggs Hebrew and English Lexicon.
Other examples include Exodus 7:11, Isaiah 47:9-13, Jeremiah 27:9, and Daniel 2:2.
2 Chronicles 33:6.
Pharaoh in Exodus 7:11, Queen Jezebel in 2 Kings 9:22, and King Nebuchadnezzar in Daniel 2:2.
The snake “Python” in made oracular pronouncements in ancient Greek mythology. In Egyptian religion, the uraeus, a winged cobra, protects the pharaoh; but the giant snake Apophis attacks the sun-god every night as he sails underground to rise again in the east. And archaeologists have found artifacts suggesting religious roles for snakes and snake-gods throughout Mesopotamia and the region known as Canaan.
The only exception is one reference in Job 32:19 to an ov as a wineskin.

Haftarat Korach—1 Samuel: Is it Tohu?

If you already have a leader chosen by God, what more do you need?

This week’s Torah portion is Korach (Numbers 16:1-18:32), in which Korach and 250 other Levites demand equal power with the high priest, Aaron, on the grounds that they are just as holy. Meanwhile Datan and Aviram, chieftains of the tribe of Reuben, argue that they would be better leaders than Moses. Never mind that God picked Moses and Aaron. The rebels see the responsibilities of their two leaders as privileges, and they want the same privileges. (See my post Korach: Quelling Rebellion, Part 1.) Since God is not on board with this, they all die.

The accompanying haftarah reading is a passage from the first book of Samuel (1 Samuel 11:14-12:22) in which the Israelites get their own king. For years Samuel has served as a prophet and the chief judge for the scattered Israelites communities, and God has sent an ad-hoc general in times of war. (See my post Haftarat Korach—1 Samuel: Ultimate Power.) But when Samuel gets old, and his sons turn out to be bad judges who accept bribes, the Israelites no longer accept this arrangement. They want a king, like every other country.¹

King from Hazor, 15th-13th century BCE (photo by MC)

But the people refused to listen to Samuel’s voice, and they said: “No! Because if a king is over us, then we, too, we be like all the nations. And our king, shefatanu and go out before us and fight our wars.” (1 Samuel 8:19-20)

shefatanu (שְׁפָטָנוּ) = he will make decisions for us, he will judge us, he will arbitrate for us, he will determine the law for us. (From the same root as shofeit, שֺׁפֵט = judge.)

The Israelites have mixed motives for their request for a king. On one hand, they want Samuel’s successor as the chief judge to be someone better than Samuel’s corrupt sons. On the other hand, they view the institution of kingship as a privilege that other nations have, and they lack. Although they do not mention it, the Israelites might also be afraid that the next time there is a war and they need an ad-hoc general, God might not provide one. With a human king, they would have a permanent chief judge and commander-in-chief.

Samuel Anoints Saul, by W. Werthmann, 1873

Samuel checks with God, then inaugurates the first king of Israel: a young Benjaminite named Saul whose only outstanding quality is his height. In this week’s haftarah, Samuel expresses his unhappiness about the new arrangement. Until now, he has been the only one “walking in front of” the Israelites, i.e. their only leader.

Then Samuel said to all Israel: “Hey, I have heeded your voices in everything you said to me, and I have set a king over you. And now, hey! The king will be walking in front of you. And I have grown old … And I have been walking in front of you from my youth until this day.” (1 Samuel 12:1-2)

Samuel reminds the Israelites that God is their true king. Then he cannot resist calling for a miracle before he steps aside as a judge. (He remains a prophet, with power over King Saul, until he dies many years later.) Samuel announces:

“Now station yourselves and see this great thing that God will do before your eyes. Is it not the wheat harvest? I will call to God, and [God] will send thunder and rain. Then you will realize and see that what you did was very wicked in the eyes of God, asking for a king for yourselves.” (1 Samuel 12:16-17)

The time of the wheat harvest is early summer, when it almost never rains. Furthermore, although winter and spring rains are essential, when the wheat is ripe a heavy rain would impede and reduce the harvest.

Then Samuel called to God, and God sent thunder and rain on that day, and all the people were very frightened of God and Samuel. And all the people said to Samuel: “Pray for your servants to God, your God, so we will not die! For we have added to all our offenses the wickedness of asking for a king.” (1 Samuel 12:18-19)

Confronted with divine power, the Israelites panic. This is the effect Samuel wanted, according to the 15^th-century rabbi Isaac Arama:

“The people had to be disabused of the idea … that their troubles were due to their not having a king to lead them, rather than to the fact that they had been disobedient to God. Samuel spelled out to them that a king’s success would be contingent on their being obedient to God’s laws. He added that in the event of disobedience to God by either the king or the nation, they would not only have to suffer the yoke of foreign oppression but also the yoke of their own king.”²

Then Samuel said to the people: “Do not fear. You have done all this evil; however, do not veer away from following God, but serve God with all your heart. And do not veer away toward following the tohu, which cannot do any good nor rescue you, since it is tohu. For God will not abandon [God’s] people, for the sake of [God’s] great name, since God has undertaken to make you [God’s] people.” (1 Samuel 12:21-22)

tohu (תֺהוּ) = nothing, emptiness, void; unreality; chaos; worthlessness.

The noun tohu occurs in 19 verses of the Hebrew Bible. It first appears in the second verse of the book of Genesis, where it is something that existed before God began to create the world: either a primordial undifferentiated substance,³ or a void with potential. According to 16^th-century rabbi Ovadiah Sforno:

“The first raw material was something entirely new. It is described as tohu to indicate that at that point it was merely something which had potential, the potential not yet having been converted to something actual.”⁴

Tohu means a condition of unreality not only in Genesis 1:2, but also in Jeremiah 4:23, Job 26:7, and four places in Isaiah.⁵ Elsewhere in the Hebrew Bible, tohu refers to a desolate trackless waste, either empty or chaotically ruined—the worst sort of desert.⁶

And four times in Isaiah the word tohu means complete worthlessness, a waste of time.⁷ This is probably the meaning of tohu in this week’s haftarah, when Samuel warns: “Do not veer away toward following the tohu, which cannot do any good nor rescue you, since it is tohu.” He is urging the Israelites not to disobey God, and unless otherwise specified, disobeying God usually means idol-worship—which is useless anyway. Samuel also reminds the people that they do not need idols of other gods, because God has adopted them and will not utterly abandon them. Underneath that message is the implication that the king they have requested is also tohu, a waste of time, since the Israelites were doing fine with God as their king and Samuel as their prophet and judge.

Will the king be a shofeit, a judge who enforces order, law, and justice in the land after Samuel has died? Or will the king be tohu whose majesty is an unreal fiction, a worthless leader who makes life more chaotic?

That is the question that confronts everyone facing a big change in the government, in an organization, or in personal circumstances. We all depend on the justice and mercy of other people. How can we know whom to trust, when we are not prophets and cannot get an answer from God?

1 Samuel 8:1-5.
Isaac ben Moses Arama, Akeidat Yitzchak, translation by www.Sefaria.org.
Radak (Rabbi David Kimchi, 1160–1235) equated the tohu in Genesis 1:2 with the water mentioned at the end of the verse: something without definite, solid dimensions.
Translation by www.Sefaria.org.
Isaiah 29:21, 40:17, 40:23, 41:29.
Deuteronomy 32:10; Isaiah 24:10, 34:11, 45:18; Psalm 107:40; Job 6:18, 12:24.
Isaiah 44:9, 45:19, 49:4, 59:4.

Haftarat Shemini—2 Samuel: Consolidation of Power

The Consecration of Aaron, Holman Bible, 1890

Religious and secular authority are combined in a new power structure both in this week’s Torah portion (Shemini, Leviticus 9:1-11:41) as well as in the haftarah reading (2 Samuel 6:1-7:17). In the Torah portion, Moses (the prophet and de facto ruler of the Israelites) consecrates his own brother Aaron as the first high priest. In the haftarah, King David installs the Ark of the Covenant in his new capital and serves as a priest.

Both stories include a reminder that the religion of the Israelites is perilous. After Aaron’s four sons are consecrated as priests, two of them bring incense into the tent-sanctuary without permission, and God kills them. (See my post: Shemini: Fire Meets Fire.) When King David is bringing the ark to Jerusalem and one of the ark’s priestly attendants steadies it with his hand, God kills the man instantly. (See my post: Shemini & 2 Samuel: Segregating the Holy.) Yet the consolidation of religious and secular authority is apparently worth the danger to both Moses and David.

In Leviticus, Moses is following God’s instructions for creating the priesthood and inaugurating the tent-sanctuary. But in 2 Samuel, David figures out what to do on his own.

The king before David

David became the second king of Israel after a career as a musician, a warrior—and a rival of the first king, Saul.

Saul was a tall, handsome young man searching ineffectually for his father’s lost donkeys when the prophet Samuel secretly anointed him king. Samuel then told Saul to walk to a meeting of tribal leaders.

Saul Prophesies with the Prophets, sketch by James Tissot, circa 1900

“And … you should come to the Hill of the Gods, where there is a Philistine outpost. And it will happen as you enter the town there, you will encounter a band of neviyim coming down from the hill-shrine, preceded by lute and drum and flute and lyre. And they will be mitnaviym. And the spirit of Y-H-V-H will come over you powerfully, vehitnaviyta along with them, and you will be transformed into another man.” (1 Samuel 10:5-6)

neviyim (נְוִיאִם) = professional ecstatics; prophets. (Singular נָבִיא.)

mitnaviym (מִתְנאבְּאִים) = speaking in ecstasy, raving, acting like an ecstatic; speaking prophecy.

vehitnaviyta (וְהִתְנַבִּים) = and you will act like an ecstatic.

It happened just as Samuel predicted.

And [Saul] finished meihitnavot, and he entered the hill-shrine. (1 Samuel 10:13)

meihitnavot (מֵהִתְנַבּוֹת) = from raving, from speaking in ecstasy.

The neviyim who came down from the hill-shrine were not prophets like Samuel, but professional ecstatics who were moved by the spirit of a god connected with the hill-shrine.¹ Saul was moved by the spirit of Y-H-V-H, the God of Israel. Religion in the hill-country of Canaan at that time seems to have been a mixture of practices prescribed in the Torah and the customs of indigenous polytheists.

After Saul arrived at the meeting, he was chosen king by lot, and then everyone went home. But the next time a belligerent chieftain attacked an Israelite clan, Saul rallied the disorganized Israelite tribes, led a united army to battle, and won. Apparently his experience of raving and/or dancing in public had indeed transformed him.

Saul began a long campaign against the Philistines, who had been migrating in from the Mediterranean coast and capturing the hill country where the Israelites lived. But he did not follow Samuel’s orders closely enough for the prophet’s satisfaction, and Samuel secretly anointed a new king, a boy named David. Saul began having episodes of mental illness, and he hired David to soothe him at those times by playing the lyre. Then David volunteered for single combat with the Philistine giant Goliath. He became a successful and popular warrior and military leader, and Saul became insanely jealous. Saul ordered David’s murder, and David fled.

After King Saul died in a battle against the Philistines, David became the king—first of Judah, then of all the territory of Israel. He captured the southern part of Jerusalem from the Jebusites and made it his new capital, the City of David.

David as king, ecstatic, and priest

Meanwhile, the prophet Samuel has died, and there is no one in the land with his religious authority. King David, always inventive, figures out in this week’s haftarah how to acquire some religious authority himself.

His first idea is to move the Ark of the Covenant into the City of David. Back when the prophet Samuel was a child, the Philistines had captured the ark in battle. But when they brought it home, it destroyed one of their own idols and caused two plagues, so they returned it to Israelite territory. During all of King Saul’s reign, the ark remained near the border in a private Israelite household at Kiryat Yearim. (See my blog post Pedudei & 1 Kings: Is the Ark an Idol?)

Then David and all the troops that were with him got up and went … to bring up from there the ark of God … And they mounted the ark of God on a new cart. (2 Samuel 6:2-3)

And David and the whole house of Israel were dancing before God with all their might, with lyres and with lutes and with drums and with castanets and with cymbals. (2 Samuel 6:5)

In other words, they were acting like the band of ecstatics that Saul had joined on his way to become king.

19th-century engraving featuring a sedate David with robes instead of eifod

The cart tips, and the attendant walking beside it lays a hand on the ark to steady it. He dies instantly.

And David was afraid of God that day, and he said: “How can the ark of God come to me?” (2 Samuel 6:9)

King David leaves the ark at a nearby house. But three months later he is told that the household has prospered because of the ark. David returns and escorts the ark the rest of the way to the City of David. Once again he behaves like an ecstatic overcome by the spirit of God, “whirling with all his might” (2 Samuel 6:14). This time he wears a priest’s linen tabard (eifod).² King David is deliberately combining a priest’s garment with ecstatic dancing.

And they brought the ark of God, and they set it in its place inside the tent that David had pitched for it. And David brought up rising-offerings and wholeness-offerings in front of God. And David finished bringing up the rising-offering and the wholeness-offering, and he blessed the people in the name of God of Armies. Then he distributed to all the people, to all the multitude of Israel, to every man and woman, one round loaf of break, and one pan cake, and one raisin cake. And all the people left, each to his house. (2 Samuel 6:17-19)

Burning the animals offered to God is a priest’s job. So is blessing the people in the name of God; the high priest Aaron blesses the people in the inauguration in this week’s Torah portion.³

When David first fled from Saul, the priest Ahimelekh gave him and his men some of the priests’ bread.⁴ But King David has more resources than a priest, and distributes largesse like a king.

Thus the crowd at the ceremony in the City of David sees David as an ecstatic and a priest as well as a king. Secular power and the religious power of priest and prophet are consolidated in one person.

It is understandable that David wanted to cement his position as king by becoming a religious authority as well. But in today’s heterogeneous world, that kind of consolidation is dangerous.

The idea of “a wall of separation between church and state”⁵ has been promoted since the 17^th century in northern Europe and America as a means to ensure religious freedom. All citizens must obey the laws of the government, but the rules of a particular religion must not become the law of any government.

This hands-off approach would have been unthinkable in the Ancient Near East, where every city and country had its reigning deity. And according to the Hebrew Bible, religion was inseparable from government in Israelite kingdoms. Many of God’s laws concerned relations between individuals. Citizens were defined by their inherited religion, and even resident aliens were required to refrain from work on Shabbat.⁶ But they were not required to make offerings on Israelite holy days.⁷

Later in the Hebrew Bible, kings sometimes keep tame prophets to say that God supports the government’s position. But God makes other prophets speak out against the policies of kings.

I am an American and a Jew, and I worry about recent calls for making some of the rules of conservative Christian religions (such as those on abortion) the law of the land. When a government and a particular religion are consolidated in the modern world (as in Iran and Saudi Arabia), the result is usually the oppression of minorities and dissenters.

May we all avoid taking King David’s path.

Later in the bible God wants every hill-shrine (bamah, בָּמָה) destroyed (cf. 1 Kings 13:2, 2 Kings 17:9-11, 2 Kings 23:8-20, and Ezekiel 6:1-6). But these shrines pass without comment in the two books of Samuel.
But he apparently omits the linen breeches priests must wear; one of his wives complains later about how he exposed himself (2 Samuel 6:20-22). See my blog post Haftarat Shemini—2 Samuel: a Dangerous Spirit.
Leviticus 9:22.
1 Samuel 21:4-7.
Thomas Jefferson, 1902, on the First Amendment to the United States constitution.
Exodus 20:10, 23:12; Deuteronomy 5:14.
Numbers 9:14.

Pekudei & 1 Kings: Is the Ark an Idol?

The ark and the curtain in front of it are the last two things Moses puts into the new Tent of Meeting in this week’s Torah portion, Pekudei (Exodus 38:21-40:38). Then the portable sanctuary that will be God’s new dwelling place is complete.

Then Moses finished the work. And the cloud covered the Tent of Meeting, and the kavod of God filled the Dwelling Place. And Moses was not able to enter the Tent of Meeting, because the cloud rested on it and the kavod of God filled the Dwelling Place. (Exodus/Shemot 40:33-35)

kavod (כָּבוֹד) = weight, magnificence, honor, glory.

Thus all the Israelites who made things for the portable sanctuary, from the golden ark to the woven walls, did it right. God approved, and manifested inside.

The last thing King Solomon puts into the new permanent temple for God in this week’s haftarah (the reading from the Prophets that accompanies the Torah portion) is the ark. Then the first permanent temple for God in Jerusalem is complete.

Glory fills Solomon’s
temple, artist unknown

And it was when the priests went out of the holy place, and the cloud filled the house of God. And the priests were not able to stand and serve in the presence of the cloud, because the kavod of God filled the house of God. (1 Kings 8:10-11)

Thus all the people who built and furnished the temple for King Solomonalso did it right; God approved, and manifested inside.

In both the tent and the temple, the ark is brought into the Holy of Holies, the innermost chamber in back. In both Exodus and 1 Kings, the ark is a box or chest with a lid and four feet. In both stories, it is carried by means of two poles that run through the rings attached to its feet. And in both stories, the ark contains the two stone tablets Moses brought down from his second forty-day stint on Mount Sinai.

Yet the two stories do not seem to be talking about the same ark.

The ark in Exodus

The master artist Betzaleil makes the lid of the ark in last week’s Torah portion in the book of Exodus, Vayakheil:

Then he made a kaporet of pure gold, two and a half cubits long and a cubit and a half wide. And he made two keruvim of gold; he made them hammered out from the two ends of the kaporet. One keruv out of this end and one keruv out of that end; from the kaporet he made the keruvim, from its two ends. And the keruvim were spreading wings above, screening off [the area] over the kaporet with their wings. And they faced each other, and the faces of the keruvim were toward the kaporet.(Exodus 37:6-9)

kaporet (כַּפֺּרֶת) = the lid of the ark in Exodus and Numbers; the lid of the ark as the seat of reconciliation or atonement with God in Leviticus. (From the root verb kafar, כָּפַר = covered; atoned, made amends.)¹

keruvim (כְּרוּבִים) = plural of kervuv (כְּרוּב) = “cherub” in English; a hybrid supernatural creature with wings and a human face. (Elsewhere in the Hebrew Bible, keruvim are guardians, steeds, or part of God’s heavenly entourage.)²

Moses and Aaron Bowing Before
the Ark, by James Tissot, ca. 1900

The bodies of the gold keruvim in Exodus are never described. Since each keruv sculpture has only one face, which gazes at the lid of the ark, it represents a different sort of hybrid creature from those in Ezekiel’s visions. The book of Ezekiel describes a keruv as having four faces, four wings with human hands under them, a single leg like a calf’s hoof, and eyes covering its whole body.³

The two gold keruvim on the ark in Exodus face one another, but they are looking down at the center of the lid. They might be guarding the stone tablets inside, or they might be guarding the empty space above the lid and below their wings. Earlier in the book of Exodus, God tells Moses:

And I will meet with you there and I will speak with you from above the lid, from between the two keruvim … (Exodus 25:22)

That means the gold keruvim in Exodus are not idols. In the Ancient Near East, an idol was a sculpture of a god that the god sometimes entered and inhabited. At those times, worshiping the idol was the same as worshiping the god.

But Exodus is careful to explain that God will not enter the ark or the keruvim sculptures on top of it; God will only manifest in the empty space between kaporet and the wings of the keruvim.

The ark and its lid are only two and a half cubits long—just under four feet (just over a meter)—so the empty space for God is not large. According to Exodus, God manifests there as a voice, but according to Leviticus 16:2, God appears there as a cloud.

The two small keruvim that Betzaleil hammers out of the extra gold on the ends of the lid of the ark are not mentioned again anywhere in the Hebrew Bible except once in the book of Numbers:

And when Moses came to the Tent of Meeting to speak with [God], then he heard the voice speaking to him from above the kaporet that was on the Ark of the Testimony, from between the two keruvim; thus [God] spoke to him. (Numbers/Bemidbar 7:89)

Here, too, the Torah clarifies that neither the keruvim nor the kaporet nor the ark are idols.

The ark in 1 Kings

Many generations pass before David creates the first kingdom of Israel, and his son Solomon builds the first permanent temple for God. By the time King Solomon brings the ark into his new temple, there do not appear to be any keruvim on its lid. The first book of Kings reports the two large statues of keruvim in the Holy of Holies, and small keruvim decorations carved into the walls of the rest of the temple, but no keruvim on the ark.

Solomon has two colossal wood statues of keruvim brought into the Holy of Holies before the ark is carried in. Each keruv is ten cubits, about 15 feet (four and a half meters) tall, with a ten-cubit span from wingtip to wingtip.⁴

Then he placed the keruvim inside the House, in the innermost [chamber]. And the wings of the keruvim spread out so the wing of one keruv touched the wall, and the wing of the second keruv was touching the second wall, and in the middle of the chamber their wings touched. And he overlaid the keruvim with gold. (1 Kings 6:27-28)

Meanwhile the ark remains in King David’s tent of meeting, in another part of town, until the rest of the temple and its furnishings are completed.

That was when Solomon assembled the elders of Israel—all the heads of the tribes, chiefs of the fathers of the Children of Israel—before King Solomon in Jerusalem, to bring up the Ark of the Covenant from the City of David … And all the elders of Israel came, and the priests lifted the ark. (1 Kings 5:1-3)

Solomon Dedicates the Temple,
by James Tissot, 1902

King Solomon leads the sacrifice of livestock on the altar outside the new temple.

Then the priests brought the Ark of the Covenant of God into its place, into the back chamber of the house, to the Holy of Holies, to underneath the wings of the keruvim. For [each of] the keruvim was spreading a pair of wings toward the place of the ark, so the keruvim screened off the ark and its poles from above. (1 Kings 8:6-7)

Here the empty space reserved for God is larger than in Exodus, since the gap between the lid of the ark and the wings of the colossal statues of keruvim is about 11 feet (three and a half meters). Yet the Hebrew Bible does not mention God speaking from this space. Nor does a cloud appear there after God’s inaugural cloud of kavod has faded.

The contents of the Holy of Holies in Solomon’s temple seem to be merely symbolic. There is no mention of God manifesting in the empty space between the wings of the keruvim and the ark. Neither a statue nor the ark becomes an idol that God inhabits. According to one Talmudic source, ordinary Israelites can see the ark and the keruvim without any harmful consequences.⁵

Perhaps 1 Kings emphasizes that God does not inhabit the ark inside the new temple when it says:There was nothing in the ark but the two stone tablets that Moses set down there at Chorev [a.k.a. Sinai] which God cut … (1 Kings 8:9)

The ark as an idol

Exodus and 1 Kings reflect two different traditions about the relationship of the ark to its guardian keruvim. Current scholarship suggests both books were written in the 6^th century B.C.E., and the descriptions of the Tent of Meeting in Exodus were modeled on the descriptions of Solomon’s temple, with adjustments to make the tent-sanctuary smaller and more portable. The descriptions of the ark in Exodus through Numbers are also more awe-inspiring than the bare mention of the ark in 1 Kings.

Both descriptions of the ark and the pair of keruvim make it clear that these furnishings are not idols. Yet other stories in the Hebrew Bible do treat the ark like an idol inhabited by God.

In the book of Joshua the priests carry the ark across the Jordan River, as the Levites had carried the ark (always covered from view by three layers of fabric)⁶ from Mount Sinai to the eastern bank of the Jordan. But then the priests carry it in a military parade around the walls of Jericho until God destroys the city.⁷

After the Israelites are unexpectedly defeated in a battle later in the book of Joshua, the ark apparently sits on the ground out in the open, rather than inside the tent-sanctuary:

And he fell on his face on the ground in front of the ark of God until evening, he and the elders of Israel, and they put dust on their heads. (Joshua 7:6)

In the first book of Samuel the ark is inside a sanctuary again: the temple at Shiloh, which has solid walls and doors, but a tent roof. However, the sons of the priest Eli take the ark out of the temple and onto the battlefield, where it is captured by the Philistines. In Philistine territory, the ark initiates two plagues and smashes an idol of the Philistine god Dagon.⁸ The God of Israel is working magic through the ark, which functions as an idol.

Ark Sent Away by the Philistines,
by James Tissot, 1902

The Philistines send the ark back into Israelite territory, where its magic power kills at least 70 Israelite men who look inside. The ark is removed to a private house where the owner’s son is consecrated as a priest to guard it.⁹

This version of the ark can be safely seen from outside, but must not be opened—or touched, except by its attached carrying poles. When King David sets out to retrieve the ark and transport it to Jerusalem, its two current priests load it on a cart. Partway to Jerusalem the oxen pulling it stumble, and the priest who touches the ark to steady it dies instantly.

And David was afraid of God that day, and he said: “How could I bring the ark of God to myself!” (2 Samuel 6:9)

Although it is possible to interpret this verse as indicating David’s fear of a remote God who chooses to kill anyone who touches the ark, it makes more sense if David conflates God and the ark, treating the ark as an idol God is inhabiting. Fear of God and fear of the ark are the same thing.

Three months later King David succeeds in bringing the ark the rest of the way to Jerusalem, and installs it in the new tent-sanctuary he has set up there for God.¹⁰ This is the ark that King Solomon brings into the Holy of Holies in his new temple, and positions under the wings of two new statues of keruvim. At that point the ark is no longer an idol, but merely a sacred object, the most sacred object in the temple.

Which version of the ark appeals to you the most:

The holy work of art in Exodus and Numbers, which only a priest is allowed to see?

The idol that travels around naked in Joshua and the two books of Samuel, zapping people right and left?

Or the piece of furniture in 1 Kings, which must be treated as sacred because it contains the two stone tablets, the way an ark in a synagogue today is treated with respect because it contains the Torah scroll?

The only occurrence of the term kaporet in the bible outside Exodus, Leviticus, and Numbers is when 1 Chronicles, written about 200 years later, says King David gave his son Solomon plans for the temple including “the shrine of the kaporet” (1 Chronicles 28:11). This is not a locution used in Exodus through Numbers.
Keruvim are definitely guardians in Genesis 3:24 and Ezekiel 28:14-16. A keruv is a steed for God in 2 Samuel 22:11, Ezekiel 9:3, Psalm 18:11, and 1 Chron. 28:18. Keruvim are part of God’s large supernatural entourage in Ezekiel 1:5-14, 10:1-20, and 11:22.
Ezekiel 10:1-20 and 1:5-14.
1 Kings 6:23-26.
Talmud Bavli, Yoma 54a.
See my post: Bemidbar: Don’t Look!
Joshua 3:3-4:18, 6:4-13.
1 Samuel 4:3-6:12.
1 Samuel 6:19-7:1.
2 Samuel 6:13-17.

Judges, Jeremiah, and 1 Samuel: More Dancing

Dances called mecholot (מְחֺלוֹת) seem like an innocent way to celebrate. In this type of dancing, people form a line behind a leader, with each dancer using one hand to touch the next. The line moves in a circle, a spiral, or some other curving pattern as the dancers copy the steps of the leader. In the Hebrew Bible, the dancers chant and shake tambourines as they dance.

Song of Songs 7:1 celebrates a dancer’s beauty in a double row of mecholot. Chain dancing is cited as the opposite of mourning in Psalms 30:12, 149:3, and 150:4, and in Lamentations 5:15. And when Miriam leads the Israelite women in mecholot on the shore of the Reed Sea in Exodus 15:20-21, they are relieved and grateful to God for saving their lives.

But elsewhere in the Hebrew Bible, mecholot are not as innocent as they appear.

In last week’s post, Beshalach & Ki Tisa: Dancing, we saw that when the Israelites start dancing mecholot in front of the golden calf at Mount Sinai, they think they are celebrating the return of God, but they are actually worshiping an idol.

Thanking God for the grape harvest and celebrating the return of victorious generals by dancing mecholot also turn out to be dubious activities.

Thanking God for grapes in Judges

A traveling Levite and his concubine spend the night in the Benjaminite town of Giveah. The men of the town rape and murder the concubine, and the Levite rallies men from all the other tribes to destroy Giveah. These men assemble at a watchtower in Benjaminite territory, and besides planning the battle, they vow in the name of God that none of them will marry their daughters to a Benjaminite.

The war escalates. Men from throughout the territory of Benjamin join the war on Giveah’s side, but the other tribes defeat them so thoroughly that the only Benjaminite survivors are 600 men who escaped into the wilderness. All the women and children die when the attackers burned down their towns.

Then the victors regret their vow, since it means that one of the twelve tribes of Israel will die out. How can they give the 600 men of Benjamin wives, so they can rebuild their tribe?

The elders point out that it is time for the annual festival in Shiloh in which adolescent girls perform dances to thank God for the grape harvest.

And they directed the Benjaminites, saying: “Go and lie in wait in the vineyards. And you will see them, and hey!—if the daughters of Shiloh go out lachul in the mecholot, then you go out from the vineyards and seize them, each man his wife from the daughters of Shiloh, and go back to the land of Benjamin.” (Judges 21:20-21)

lachul (לָחוּל) = to go around in succession; to dance in a circle. (A form of the verb chal, the root of mecholot.)

And the Benjaminites did so, and they made wives for their number from the dancers who they took away by force… (Judges 21:23)

Who knew that chain dancing could be so dangerous for women?

The book of Judges does not say whether the girls were warned ahead of time about what was going to happen to them. But even if they were told, they had little recourse; the male head of household arranged the marriages of all the females under his control.¹

Thanking God for grapes in Jeremiah

Much later in the history of the Israelites, Jeremiah delivers a divine prophecy that someday God will bring the defeated and exiled people of Israel and Judah back to their lands, and Israelite women will once again dance in the vineyards.

“I will definitely build you up again, maidens of Israel! Your tambourines will be in your hands again, and you will go out in a mechol, playing. Again you will plant vineyards on the hills of Samaria … (Jeremiah 31:4-5)

Jeremiah expands the good news to include men in the dancing.

That is when the maidens will rejoice in a mechol, and young men and old ones together as one. (Jeremiah 31:13)

We do not know whether he means that men will dance with women, or that women will form their own chains, and young and old men will join together in other chains. Either way, everyone will get to dance. And the dancing God promises in the future definitely celebrates a harvest from God, not rape.

Celebrating victory in Judges

A story in the book of Judges about General Yiftach (Jepthah in English translations) shows him swearing a vow to God before he crosses the border to attack the Ammonites:

“If you definitively give the Ammonites into my hand, then whatever happens to go out from the door of my house to meet me upon my safe return from the Ammonites will become God’s, and will be offered up as a burnt offering.” (Judges 11:30-31)

The Torah warns against making rash vows.² But starting with Jacob after his ladder dream³ and continuing to the present day, believers in an anthropomorphic God often try to bargain with their deity, promising to do what they think God wants if God gives them what they want.

When Yiftach makes his rash vow, he forgets that women customarily celebrate the return of victorious soldiers with drumming, singing, and mecholot. He returns home victorious.

And hey! His daughter went out to meet him, with tambourines and with mecholot! (Judges 11:34)

Yiftach’s daughter must be accompanied by some female friends, since the word for tambourine is in the plural. But as the general’s daughter, and his only child, she would lead the chain dance. That means she would come out the door of his house first.

Yiftach tears his clothes (an act of mourning), and tells her he cannot retract his vow.

Celebrating victory in 1 Samuel

In the first book of Samuel, the dancing women have the last word. When King Saul and his general, the future king David, return triumphant from a battle against the Philistines,

… the women went out from all the towns of Israel for song and mecholot, to greet King Saul with tambourines and rejoicing … and they chanted: “Saul struck down his thousands, and David his tens of thousands!” And made Saul very angry, and this matter was bad in his eyes. And he said: “To David they gave tens of thousands, and to me they gave thousands. The only thing he lacks is the kingship!” (1 Samuel 18:6-8)

King Saul takes out his anger on David, not on the women. After Saul makes a number of attempts on his life, David flees into Philistine territory.

… and he came to Akhish, king of Gat. And the servants of Akhish said to him: “Isn’t this David, king of the land? Isn’t he the one they chanted about in the mecholot, saying: Saul struck down his thousands, and David his tens of thousands!” (1 Samuel 21:11-12)

David pretends to be insane, scratching on the door and drooling, so the King of Gat turns him away, and he escapes.

I bet the Israelite women who sang the chant while dancing mecholot gave it a catchy tune, so no one could forget it.

Why is chain dancing—the opposite of mourning—often associated with disaster in the bible?

From my own experience, I know that the form requires attentive cooperation; you have to concentrate to make sure you keep the right space between the dancer in front of you and the dancer behind you, and also do the steps in time to the music. Collaboration, physical energy, concentration, and singing all make the experience of dancing mecholot exhilarating.

Building a tragic tale around a well-known emotional high is good storytelling. And these stories caution us not to take anything for granted. Maybe the golden calf is not such a good idea. Maybe men and women are working at cross purposes; while women are dancing, men are making rash vows or getting jealous.

Today, when men are more thoughtful, we can safely enjoy a dance of celebration.

One tradition based on the betrothal of Rebecca in Genesis 24:58 gives a girl veto power over a particular match, at least if the marriage means leaving her home town. But this tradition does not seem to be in play in the book of Judges.
E.g. Deuteronomy 23:21-23, Proverbs 20:25.
Genesis 28:20-22.

Bemidbar & Naso: Dangerous Duty

Two dangers face the Israelites as they leave Mount Sinai in the book of Numbers/Bemidbar: the risk of attack by an enemy in the wilderness, and the risk of annihilation by God.

They have already experienced both dangers. On their way from Egypt to Sinai the Amalekites attacked them, and the Israelites beat them off with the help of God.¹ When they stood at the foot of Mount Sinai to hear God speak, the earth quaked—and so did the Israelites.

Mount Vesuvius in Eruption, by Jacob More, 18th cent., detail

And all the people were seeing the thunder and the flashes and the sound of the ram’s horn, and the mountain was smoking; and the people saw and they quaked and drew back and stood at a distance. And they said to Moses: “You speak to us and we will listen; but don’t let God speak to us, or else we will die!” (Exodus 20:15-16)

The Jewish day of Shavuot commemorates the revelation at Sinai, when the Israelites were terrified and God uttered the “ten commandments”. This holiday always falls the same week as the Torah reading Bemidbar, the first portion in the book of Bemidbar.

This Torah portion begins with God telling Moses to take a census of the men in all the tribes except Levi.² The purpose of this census is to learn how many troops can be mustered in the event of a battle after the Israelites leave Mount Sinai and resume their journey to Canaan.

Israelite service

Numbering of the Israelites, by Henri F.E. Philippoteaux, 19th cent.

And all the [male] Israelites were mustered from the houses of their forefathers, from the age of twenty years and up, all who were going out in the tzava in Israel. (Numbers 1:45)

tzava (צָבָא) = army, unit of warriors, army service.

The qualifying phrase “all who were going out in the tzava” implies that the census counted only men aged 20 and over who were able to march and wield weapons.

Then God spoke to Moses saying: “However, the tribe of Levi you shall not muster, and you must not make a head count of them among the Israelites.” (Numbers 1:48-49)

In the second Torah portion of Numbers, Naso, there is a census of the three Levite clans.

And Moses and Aaron and the chieftains of the community enrolled the sons of the Kehatites by their families and by the house of their father, from the age of thirty years and over, up to the age of fifty years, all who were entering the tzava for the service of the Tent of Meeting. (Numbers 4:34-35)

The censuses of the Geirshonite and Merarite clans also count men aged 30 to 50, and also add “all who were entering the tzava for the service of the Tent of Meeting”.³

Why does the Torah call the Levites an army?

Levite service

Before telling Moses to take a separate census for the tribe of Levi, God says:

“Assign the Levites over the Sanctuary of the Testimony and over all its equipment and over everything that belongs to it. They themselves shall carry the sanctuary and all its equipment, and they shall attend it, and they shall camp around the sanctuary. And when [it is time for] the sanctuary to pull out, the Levites shall take it down; and when [it is time for] the sanctuary to be pitched, the Levites shall erect it. And any unauthorized person who comes close must be put to death.” (Numbers 1:50-51)

Thus one of the duties of the Levites is to guard the tent-sanctuary and kill any unauthorized person who persists in coming too close to the tent, or even entering it.⁴ That is the military aspect of their service, but it is not the most dangerous.

“And the Israelites shall encamp, each man in his camp and each man at the banner for his troop. But the Levites shall encamp around the Sanctuary of the Testimony, and then there will be no fury against the community of Israelites; and the Levites shall guard the guardianship of the Sanctuary of the Testimony.” (Numbers 1:52-53)

Whose fury? When the Torah portions Bemidbar and Naso describe the duties of the Levites whenever the people break camp, it becomes clear that the fury would come from God.

First the priests (Aaron and his two surviving sons) must go inside the tent and wrap up the most holy items before anyone else can see them, and place them on carrying frames with poles. The holiest items are the ark, lampstand (menorah), the bread table, and the gold incense altar. The priests also wrap up the gold tools used for the rituals inside the tent.⁵

And Aaron and his sons shall finish covering the holy items and all the holy equipment when breaking camp, and after that the Kehatites shall come in to pick them up, so they do not touch the holy objects and die. These things in the Tent of Meeting are the burdens the Kehatites. (Numbers 4:15)

Each of the three clans in the tribe of Levi is responsible for carrying some part of the tent-sanctuary. The Kehatites must carry the most holy items, while the Geirshonites and Merarites carry the outside altar and the disassembled parts of the tent and the wall around it—cloth hangings, posts, planks, bars, pegs, sockets, and cords.

No touching

Certainly Betzaleil touched the holiest items when he hammered them out of gold in the book of Exodus.⁶ But later in the book of Numbers, God tells Aaron that the priests must not touch them, or they will be killed.⁷ Somehow the priests must light the menorah, lay bread on the table, and place coals and incense into the incense altar without touching their gold surfaces. And they must wrap these items in cloths without directly touching them.

In the first book of Samuel the ark sits for twenty years in the house of Avinadav at Kiryat Ye-arim. His son Elazar is consecrated as an ad-hoc priest to look after it.⁸ Then King David decides to move it to his new capital in Jerusalem. The ark is lifted up onto a new cart, and two other sons of Avinadav, Uzah and Achyo (presumably younger replacements for Elazar) walk beside it. Partway to Jerusalem, the oxen pulling cart stumble, and Uzah puts his hand on the ark to steady it.

And God’s anger flared up against Uzah, and God struck him down there … and he died there beside the ark of God. (2 Samuel 6:7)

Uzah’s impulse is good, but nevertheless a divine power zaps him the instant he touches the ark.

No looking

No one in the bible is harmed from carrying the ark by its two poles, but touching the ark itself is deadly. The ark takes a circuitous route to Kiryat Ye-arim in the first book of Samuel. After the Philistines capture the ark in battle they bring it to their town of Ashdod, but everyone there is stricken with a plague. They send it on to Gath, then to Ekron, each time with the same result. So they load the ark onto a cart pulled by two cows and send it back into Israelite territory. The cows stop in a field near the town of Beit Shemesh, where seventy curious Israelites look inside. God strikes down every one of them.⁹

Kehataties carrying ark on a bible card by Providence Lithograph Co., 1907

In the portion Bemidbar: Don’t Look, the priests cover all the holiest items not only to prevent the Kehatites from touching them, but also to prevent these Levites from seeing them, even from the outside.

And God spoke to Moses and to Aaron, saying: “Do not cause the staff of the families of the Kehatites to be cut down from among the Levites! Do this for them, so they will live and not die: when they approach the Holy of Holies, Aaron and his sons shall come in and assign each individual man his service and his burden. And they must not come inside [the tent] to look as the holy things are swallowed [by the wrappings], or they will die.” (Numbers 4:17-20)

I speculated that the Levites are not allowed a glimpse of the holiest items either because it might make them feel as powerful as the priests, or because it might make them treat the holy items (and therefore God) with insufficient reverence.

Transporting the wrapped-up holy things might be nerve-wracking for the Kehatites. They carry them by hand, not on carts. What if they stumble and drop something? What if one of the coverings slips off?

For the “armies” traveling north from Mount Sinai, guard duty is more dangerous than combat duty.

—

Exodus 17:8-13.
In the book of Genesis Jacob has twelve sons; Levi is his third son, and Joseph is his eleventh. In other books of the Torah eleven tribes are named after Jacob’s sons, but there is no tribe of Joseph; instead two tribes are named after Joseph’s two sons, Efrayim and Menashe. That makes thirteen tribes—but even in the Torah, the tradition is that there were twelve tribes of Israel. The solution in the first three portions of Numbers is that there are twelve tribes of Israel plus one tribe of Levi.
Numbers 4:39, 4:43.
See Numbers 25:6-8.
Numbers 4:5-14. See my post Bemidbar: Covering the Sacred.
Exodus 37:1-29.
Numbers 18:3.
1 Samuel 6:21-7:2.
1 Samuel 6:10-20.

Haftarat Korach: 1 Samuel—Ultimate Power

The true king of the Israelites in the Hebrew Bible is the character of God, portrayed as an anthropomorphic being who delivers orders and decrees, metes out rewards and punishments, and determines the winning side in battles. God communicates through “his” prophets. But not everyone is happy with this arrangement.

Parshat Korach–Torah portion in Numbers

When the prophet Moses summons two rebellious leaders from the tribe of Reuben in this week’s Torah portion, Korach, they refuse to come.

Moses sent and called for Datan and for Abiram, sons of Eliav, and they said: “We will not come up! Is it a small thing that you brought us up from a land flowing with milk and honey to make us die in the wilderness? That tistareir over us, actually histareir?” (Numbers/Bemidbar 16:12-13)

tistareir (תִשְׂתָּרֵר) = you play king, you lord it over, you make yourself a ruler. (A form of the verb שׂרר = rule, direct.)

histareir (הִשְׂתָּרֵר) = playing king, usurping authority. (The same verb as tistareir.)

Datan and Aviram express three grievances against Moses. First, Moses has said repeatedly that God will give the Israelites the land of Canaan, “a land flowing with milk and honey”.¹ But now they are stuck in the desert for forty years. By comparison, Egypt was the land of milk and honey.

Second, they blame Moses for making the Israelites die in the wilderness. In last week’s portion, Shelach-Lekha, God decreed that the Israelites must stay in the wilderness for 40 years, during which all the adults except the two scouts who urged the people to enter Canaan would die.² But this decree was not Moses’ fault. The Israelites refused to cross the border into Canaan, and God threatened to kill the whole community until Moses talked God into pardoning them and commuting their sentence. All Moses did was buy them more time to live, and the promise that their children would conquer Canaan.

Third, the Reubenite leaders complain that Moses is hogging all the power and acting like a king, a complaint also lodged by Korach, the leader of 250 rebellious Levites.³ God responds by threatening to annihilate everyone except Moses and Aaron. But Moses talks God into annihilating only the three rebels and their families.⁴

Moses tells the crowd to stand back from the tents of the rebels, and says:

The Death of Korach, Datan, and Abiram, by Gustave Dore

“By this you will know that God sent me to do all these things, that they are not from my heart: if these die like all humankind and the fate of all humankind is decreed for them, God did not send me. But if God creates a new creation and the earth opens up its mouth and gulps them down, and all that is theirs, and they go alive down to Sheol, then you will know that these men scorned God.” (Numbers 16:28-30)

The earth does open and swallow the three families. This miracle proves that Moses tells them the law simply because God chooses him to do it. God is the real king, and Moses is God’s spokesman.

Haftarat Korach–Haftarah in 1 Samuel

When Datan, Aviram, and Korach complain that Moses has too much power, he protests that he has not used his position for any personal gain.

“I have not taken a single donkey from them, and I have not wronged a single one of them.” (Numbers 16:15)

The haftarah reading that accompanies Korach is 1 Samuel 11:14-12:22. Probably the rabbis chose this passage because the prophet and judge Samuel also declares that he has not used his position for personal gain:

“Here I am! Testify against me … Whose ox have I taken, and whose donkey have I taken? And whom have I coerced? Whom have I crushed? And from the hand of whom have I taken a bribe and looked the other way?” (1 Samuel 12:3)

Nobody, the Israelites reply.

It is a moment of transition. Samuel has served his whole life as a circuit judge for the Israelites, but now, at the people’s request, he has just inaugurated Saul as their first king. A king in the Ancient Near East was in charge of law, justice, and foreign affairs. Although the Israelites have no complaints against Samuel as a judge, they want a king to lead them in war and foreign policy.

Samuel reminds them:

“And you saw that Nachash, king of the Ammonites, was coming against you, and you said to me: ‘No, because a king should rule over us!’ Yet God, your God, is your king.” (1 Samuel 12:12)

In the book of Numbers, the rebel leaders do not want a king. They complain that Moses is acting like their king, so Moses demonstrates that God is the king with the ultimate power, and he is only God’s emissary. In the first book of Samuel, the Israelites are afraid that it is not enough to have the prophet Samuel as their judge, and God as their only king. They want a human king.

Samuel says that it is their own fault that the kings of other countries make war on them, because they keep forgetting God and worshiping the Canaanite male and female gods (balim and ashtarot).⁵ So God lets their enemies attack them. They beg God to rescue them, and God obliges by sending an ad-hoc general.⁶

Like Moses in the Torah portion Korach, Samuel demonstrates the truth of his words by asking God for a miracle, and God obliges—in Samuel’s case, by sending thunder and rain at the time of the wheat harvest, when the weather is always dry.⁷

Then the frightened Israelites say they were wrong to ask for a human king, and beg Samuel to intercede for them. But Samuel assures them that as long as they (and their king) serve God instead of those worthless Canaanite gods, God will never abandon them.⁸

The Israelites do not trust God to be their king in either the time of Moses or the time of Samuel. The difference is that in the time of Moses they do not want a king at all. As long as they are stuck in the wilderness, they are isolated from other people and do not need anyone to deal with foreign powers.

In the time of Samuel, the Israelites inhabit part of Canaan, a land that is indeed flowing with milk and honey, not to mention wheat. It is a fertile country worth conquering, and the neighboring kings are tempted to attack. The Israelites do not trust God to send a war leader every time they need one, so they ask for their own human king.

Trusting God is hard for the Israelites, even though the stakes are high. The bible asserts that if the people follow all of God’s laws (especially the one about not serving other gods), God will reward them with prosperity, their own land, and victory in battle. If not, God will punish them with a plague or a military defeat.

But it is a rough justice. The Israelites receive these rewards and punishments collectively, the innocent with the guilty. And thanks to God’s hair-trigger temper, the punishments sometimes happen quickly. In the portion Korach alone, God threatens to wipe out all the Israelites twice.⁹ The second time, God’s instant plague kills 14,700 people before Moses and Aaron stop it. Only after that does God think of a non-lethal demonstration that convinces the surviving Israelites to accept Moses and Aaron as their divinely chosen leaders.¹⁰

What would it be like to have an invisible but easily inflamed king, one whom only Moses could mollify? I suspect that I, too, would rather take my chances with no king at all in the wilderness, or with a human king in a fertile land. If the human king turned out to be irrational, like King Saul, at least he would not live forever.

But the God-character in the Torah is eternal as well as irrational, often flying into a fury without thinking about the consequences. No wonder the Israelites rebel against God.

—

Moses used this expression to describe Canaan in Exodus 3:8, 3:17, 13:5, and 33:3; Leviticus 20:24; and Numbers 13:27 and 14:8. See my post: Ki Tavo: Milk and Honey.
Numbers 14:11-24.
Numbers 16:1-3.
Numbers 16:20-27. After that God’s fire burns up the 250 Levite rebels, and God sends a plague that kills thousands of Israelites who complained about it.
1 Samuel 12:9-10.
In 1 Samuel 12:11, Samuel cites four ad-hoc generals sent by God: Yeruba-al (a.k.a. Gideon, Judges 6:11-17 and 7:1), Bedan (a.k.a. Samson according to the Talmud, Judges 13:24-16:31), Yiftach (Judges 11:1-33), and himself (though he never leads an army in the Torah).
1 Samuel 12:16-18.
1 Samuel 12:20-22.
Numbers 16:21, 17:9.
Numbers 17:13-26. God orders the head of each tribe to place his staff in front of the ark inside the Tent of Meeting. In the morning, Aaron’s staff has sprouted leaves, flowers, and almonds. The people are terrified, but at least they stop rebelling—until after Miriam dies and the water runs out in Numbers 20:2.

Shemini & 2 Samuel: Segregating the Holy

The Two Priests Are Destroyed, by James Tissot, ca.1900

Aaron and his four sons have just finished their eight days of ordination in this week’s Torah portion, Shemini (“Eighth”). Then the two older sons, Nadav and Avihu, bring unauthorized incense into the Tent of Meeting, and the fire of God consumes them. (See my post Shemini: Fire Meets Fire.) After their bodies are dragged out,

hen God spoke to Aaron, saying: “Do not drink wine or strong drink, neither you nor your sons with you, when coming into the Tent of Meeting, and you shall not die. [This is] a decree forever for your generations: to havdil between the holy and the ordinary, and between the ritually-impure and the ritually-pure; and to instruct the children of Israel on all the decrees that God spoke to them through Moses.” (Leviticus/Vayikra 10:10-11)

havdil (הַבְדֹּיל) = make a distinction, separate, segregate, distinguish.

The new priests already know they must officiate at the altar; tend the menorah, bread table, and incense altar inside the Tent of Meeting; and guard the ark in the curtained-off Holy of Holies in back. Now God says they must distinguish between the holy and the ordinary and keep them separate; and teach God’s decrees to the Israelites. (Since a priest would need a clear head to perform both duties, many commentators connect these duties with God’s injunction against drinking on the job.)

Although Nadav and Avihu did not disobey a specific decree, they made a serious error when they brought unauthorized incense into the holy Tent of Meeting, perhaps into the Holy of Holies. A priest must not violate a holy space.

What does it mean to distinguish and segregate the holy from the ordinary?

In the Hebrew Bible, holiness is not a feeling. The holy (hakodesh, הַקֹּדֶשׁ) means whatever is dedicated to God. Objects, places, and days are all holy if they are reserved for serving God.

Levites carry the ark properly, Bible card by Providence Lithograph Co., 1907

The holiest object is the ark, which holds two stone tablets that God gave Moses on top of Mount Sinai. When the ark is inside the innermost chamber of the sanctuary, the Holy of Holies, God’s presence manifests in the empty space right above its lid. No one but Moses and the high priest may see the ark inside the Holy of Holies. When the tent-sanctuary is dismantled and Levites transport the ark to the Israelites’ next camp, priests drape three layers of coverings over it to protect people from seeing it. No one may touch it except for the Levites carrying its poles.¹

The haftarah reading accompanying this week’s Torah portion is a selection from the second book of Samuel which describes how King David transports the ark from a private house near the border of Philistia to his new capital in Jerusalem.² In this story, as in Shemini, someone serving as a priest fails to differentiate between the holy and the ordinary.

The ark resides in a private house near the border because 20 years earlier, in the first book of Samuel, two priests who had a reputation for being derelict in their duties took the ark out of the sanctuary in Shiloh and into battle, where the Philistines captured it.³ After the enemy brought it home, their idol of Dagon fell over and broke, and the Philistines were plagued by mice and hemorrhoids. They sent the ark back across the border into Israelite territory, where the people of Beit-Shemesh rejoiced and make animals offerings on the spot. But then 70 men looked into the ark and died.⁴Frightened, the remaining men of Beit-Shemesh sent the ark to the house of Avinadav in Kiryat-Yarim, where it remained for 20 years.⁵

In the haftarah reading from the second book of Samuel, King David decides to transport the ark to Jerusalem.

They mounted the ark of God on a new cart, and they carried it away from the house of Avinadav, which was on the hill. Uzza and Achio, descendants of Avinadav, were guiding the new cart. (2 Samuel 6:3)

Elazar, Avinidav’s “consecrated son”, had served as the first priest to guard the ark.⁶ But after 20 years there is a new generation of guardians. Achio walks in front of the ox-cart, and Uzza has the honor of walking beside the ark. The procession includes King David and thousands of Israelites dancing to the sound of musical instruments. Then the oxen pulling the cart stumble.

The Chastisement of Uzza, by James Tissot, ca. 1900

They came as far as the threshing-place of Nakhon; then Uzza reached out to the ark of God and grabbed at it, because the cattle had let [the cart] go off by itself. And God’s anger flared up against Uzza, and [God] struck him down there, over the heedless error. And he died there beside the ark of God. (2 Samuel 6:6-7)

While Uzza is accompanying the ark, he is serving as a priest, who must “havdil the holy and the ordinary”. His impulsive action, however well-meant, fails to distinguish between the perilously holy ark and an ordinary ox-cart load.

King David sends the ark to a nearby house, and tries again three months later. This time the ark reaches the tent the king has prepared. As the procession crosses the City of David in Jerusalem,

David was whirling around with all his might before God; and David had belted on a linen efod. (2 Samuel 6:14)

efod (אֵפוֹד) = a tunic or cuirass with the front and back tied together, worn by the high priest as part of his ritual costume.

David is dancing in front of the ark, but the ark is so holy that the Torah says he is dancing before God. His “whirling around with all his might” reminds me of the prophets who speak in ecstasy in Exodus and the two books of Samuel. Although David is wearing a priest’s efod, he acts more like a prophet filled with the spirit of God—until the ark has been placed inside the tent in Jerusalem.

Then King David soberly plays the role of high priest, performing all the rituals without a hitch.

They brought the ark of God and set it up in its place inside the tent that David had pitched for it, and David brought up rising-offerings before God, and the wholeness-offerings. And when David finished bringing up the rising-offerings and the wholeness offerings, then he blessed the people in the name of the God of Armies. (2 Samuel 6:17-18)

David treats the ark as holy in two ways: first as a prophet filled with the spirit of God, second as a high priest conducting ritual. Both responses to holiness are acceptable in the bible, at the appropriate time and place.

The ark was lost with the fall of the first temple in Jerusalem in 586 B.C.E. The innermost chamber of the second temple was empty, but it was still called the Holy of Holies, and treated with awe and reverence. The high priest still entered it only once a year, on Yom Kippur.

Since the fall of the second temple in 70 C.E., Jews have made do with objects and places of lesser holiness. Instead of an ark, we have Torah scrolls, which are unrolled for everyone to see. Instead of a sanctuary with a Holy of Holies, we have the foundation wall of the place where the temple once stood in Jerusalem.

But Jews still have the holy days set out in the Torah: our annual feast and fast days, and Shabbat every week. On Friday night we light candles and say blessings to distinguish the new seventh day, and on Saturday night we make a havdallah, a separation, between the holy day of Shabbat that has ended and the ordinary days of the week to come. The havdallah blessing concludes with words from God’s instructions to Aaron:

Blessed are you, God, [who] hamavdil between the holy and the ordinary.

I find treating a day as holy is harder than treating an object or a place as holy. The sun sets and rises on Shabbat the way it does on any other day; the only difference is in what we do that day. And even if we try to dedicate every moment to serving God on a Shabbat or on an annual holy day, and avoid any activity that counts as labor, we still have to spend some of our time getting dressed, eating, and so forth, just as on an ordinary day.

And Jews who fail to observe Shabbat properly are not struck dead.

Segregating the holy from the ordinary is critically important in the bible, where God is present as the threat of magical annihilation. Today, treating Torah scrolls and other religious objects with reverence, and setting aside certain days for special prayers and actions, serve the purpose of helping humans to approach the whole idea of God with awe and love.

Is that enough? Perhaps today we can serve God more by bringing the holy into the ordinary, by bringing awe and love into more places and more times.

Numbers 4:4-5, 4:15, 4:20.
The haftarah begins with 2 Samuel 6:1. It ends somewhere between 2 Samuel 6:19 and 7:17, depending on whether the community follows the Ashkenazi, Sefardi, Misrachi, or Italian tradition.
1 Samuel 2:12-17, 4:3-11.
And [God’s] hand was on the people of Beit Shemesh, because they looked into the ark of God, and [God’s] hand [struck down] 70 men of Beit Shemesh, 50,000 men. And the people mourned because God had struck a great blow against the people. (1 Samuel 6:19). Rashi (11^th-century Rabbi Shlomoh Yitzchaki) wrote that this passage means each of the 70 men that God smote was the equal of 50,000.
1 Samuel 7:1-2.
1 Samuel 7:1.

Pinchas: New Moon

The moon waxes to a full, bright circle; then it wanes until it disappears. In the Hebrew calendar the new moon is not the invisible one, but the first thin curved line to appear the blue daytime sky. It sets just after the sun sets, and the first day of a month begins.

The book of Leviticus/Vayikra prescribes offerings at the altar for annual holidays, for Shabbat every week, and for morning and evening every day. But the new moon is not singled out for its own monthly celebration until the book of Numbers/Bemidbar.

And on your days of rejoicing, and at your appointed times, and on the beginnings of chadesheykhem, you shall blow trumpets over your rising-offering and over your slaughter-sacrifices of your wholeness offerings. (Numbers/Bemidbar 10:10)

chadesheykhem (חָדְשֵׁיכֶם) = your months. (A form of the noun chodesh, חֺדֶשׁ = month, new moon. From the root verb chadash, חָדַשׁ = renew.)

New moon at the altar

What offerings are prescribed for the new moon? We find out in this week’s Torah portion, Pinchas.

And at the beginnings of chadesheykhem you shall offer a rising-offering for God: two bulls of the herd, and one ram, and seven yearling lambs, unblemished. (Numbers 28:11)

(I refer to an olah (עֺלָה) as a “rising-offering” because the Hebrew word comes from the verb alah (עָלָה) = rose, ascended, went up. What rises in an olah is smoke, when the animal is completely burned up for God.)¹

Each animal is burned with its own measure of fine flour mixed with oil,

…a rising-offering of soothing scent, a fire-offering for God. And their libations² shall be wine, half a hin for a bull, and a third of a hin for the ram, and a quarter of a hin for a lamb. This is the rising-offering of chodesh in chadesho for the chakeshey the year. And one hairy goat for a guilt-release offering³ for God … (Numbers 28:14)

chadesho (חַדְשׁוֹ) = its renewal. (From the root verb chadash.)

chadeshey (חָדְשֵׁי) = months of, new moons of. (Another form of chodesh.)

What we learn about the observance of the new moon in the book of Numbers is that there must be a rising-offering on the altar with a specific combination of animals, grain products, and wine; and that a trumpet is blown when the offering takes place.

New moon at the table

When King Saul becomes insanely jealous of his young general David, he orders David killed. David talks with Jonathan, his best friend and Saul’s son and heir.

And David said to Jonathan: “Hey, chodesh is tomorrow and I should definitely sit with the king to eat. But let me go, and I will hide in the countryside until the third evening.” (1 Samuel 10:5)

Jonathan urges his beloved friend to flee, and the two young men work out the logistics.

This passage is famous for Jonathan’s declaration of love and allegiance to David. But it also shows that at the time of King Saul (around the 11th century BCE) the observance of the new moon included an obligatory feast at the king’s table for his officers.

New moon with a prophet

The woman of Shunem makes a room on the rooftop of her house where the prophet Elisha can stay whenever he visits the town. When her son dies suddenly, she lays him on Elisha’s bed, then goes out and asks her husband for a servant and a donkey so she can hurry to Elisha.

But he said: “Why are you going to him today? It is not chodesh and not Shabbat.” And she said: “Peace!” And she saddled the donkey … (2 Kings 4:23-24)

The woman tells no one that the boy has died, and she talks Elisha into coming back at once with her. The prophet miraculously brings her son back to life.

This story indicates that during the reign of King Yehoram of the northern kingdom of Israel (9^th century BCE), travelling prophets conducted ceremonies for their followers on the sabbath every week, and on the new moon every month.

New moon outdoors

After the Roman army destroyed the second temple in Jerusalem in 70 CE, it was never rebuilt as a Jewish temple, and animal offerings gradually ceased for Jews.⁴ The old method of worship was replaced by prayers and good deeds.

Only a few centuries after the fall of the second temple, Jews were going outside to look at the moon during the week when it grew from a new moon to a half moon, and reciting a blessing. The Talmud says that blessing the new month at the proper time is like greeting the face of the divine presence (Shekhinah), so one should say the blessing while standing. The full blessing, according to the Talmud, is:

Blessed are you God, our God, king of the universe, who by his word created the heavens, and by the breath of his mouth all their hosts. He set for them a law and a time, that they should not deviate from their task. And they are joyous and glad to perform the will of their owner; they are workers of truth whose work is truth. And to the moon he said that it should renew itself as a crown of beauty for those he carried from the womb, as they are destined to be renewed like it, and to praise their Creator for the name of his glorious kingdom. Blessed are you, God, who renews the months. ((Talmud Bavli, Sanhedrin 42a)⁵

This formal prayer (in Aramaic) praises God for the creation of an orderly universe including the moon, the monthly renewal of moonlight, and an undefined renewal of human beings. The focus is on the heavenly bodies, personified.

New moon in the synagogue

For centuries, Jewish congregations were led outside once a month to look at the moon and recite the blessing above. This communal blessing happened right after the havadalah ceremony concluded the Shabbat that fell during those seven days.

But as more and more Jews went home after morning Shabbat services instead of staying with their rabbi all day through havdalah, a new custom arose to observe the new moon.

Now the morning Shabbat services before each new moon include an extra section of prayer and blessing in the Torah service. First the congregation chants the following prayer (in Hebrew):

May it be your will God, our God and God of our forefathers, shetechadeish for us this chodesh for goodness and for blessing. And may it give to us a long life, a life of peace, a life of goodness, a life of blessing, a life of right livelihood, a life of bodily health, a life full of awe of heaven and fear of wrongdoing, a life without shame or disgrace, a life of wealth and honor, a life of love of Torah and awe of heaven, a life of fulfillment by God of all desires of our heart for the good. Amen, selah!

shetechadeish (שֶׁתְּחַדֵּשׁ) = to renew. (A form of the verb chadash in “Prayerbook Hebrew”.)

The focus here is on blessings for humans. In a traditional Jewish prayerbook, prayers that ask God for blessings tend to be thorough.

Next the service leader holds the Torah scroll and announces which day the new moon will appear in the coming week, saying a shorter prayer before and after the announcement.⁶

If the new moon is scheduled to appear at the end of Shabbat, the traditional service adds a reading of the scene between David and Jonathan mentioned above.⁷

New moon in women’s circles

A more recent practice is for a circle of Jewish women to gather on the evening of the new moon, the first day of each Hebrew month, to conduct their own rituals. These have not been codified, but rosh chodesh (“beginning of a month”) groups are increasingly popular in America.

Celebrating the new moon follows the same trajectory as many other Jewish observances in history. In the Torah, the new moon is an occasion for a special offering at the altar, presided over by priests. After temple worship was replaced by communal prayers, rabbis developed different ways of celebrating the new moon, starting with a concrete act (saying a blessing outside while looking at the moon) and changing to a more abstract prayer in the synagogue. Finally, in the last half-century, liberal Jews have been developing their own innovative celebrations.

But is it still worthwhile to devote time and energy to thanking God for each new moon?

The gravity of the moon still creates the tides in our world. The changing moon still strikes many human beings as beautiful and awe-inspiring. Thanking God for the moon helps us to remember that like everything else in nature, it is a gift; we did not make it.

And in Hebrew the new moon, chodesh, also signals renewal, chadash. Something new is possible for all human beings, every month and every minute, from birth to death. We are never as stuck as we think.

—

See my post Vayikra & Tzav: Fire Offerings Without Slaughter, Part 1.
See my post Emor: Libations.
Here chataat (חַטָּאת) means an offering to remove guilt for a misdeed.
Samaritans, descendants of the Israelites in the northern kingdom of Samaria, still sacrifice sheep on Mount Gezirim for Passover.
sefaria.org , translation from Aramaic by William Davidson.
After that, the congregation anywhere outside of Israel recites another blessing.
1 Samuel 20:18-42.