Parshat Naso
This week's question:
The last section of the parsha goes through the donation of korbanot the nesiim gave at the dedication of the mishkan. All 12 gave the same exact donation.
Rashi tells us why the nesiim were so quick to be the first to participate with a donation at the dedication ceremony. he tells us that for the building of the mishkan the nesiim had said they would let the people give first and they would give whatever was lacking afterwards. It turned out the people gave so much there was nothing left for the mesiim to give. They were upset they missed the opportunity to participate, so now they jumped forward right away.
But why and how did they all give the same exact thing? This was not base don a commandment that they had to bring a specific korban, so how did all 12 individually think of the same exact korban?
I think they must have gotten together and decided what to bring. That way it would not "get out of hand".
Think of it similar to the "wedding takkanos" of Agudas Yisrael in America. Weddings were getting out of hand as each person needed to outdo the one before him. So Aguda made rules and now nobody should feel the need to outdo the other guy and spend beyond his means.
The same here. If they each would bring their own thing, the first guy would bring, let's say, one cow. The second guy would say,"That's all he brought? I will bring 2 cows." The next guy would then bring 5 cows and 2 sheep. The next would bring 10 cows and 15 sheep. etc.
It would get out of hand, so they agreed that they would each bring the same exact set of korbanos.
I did see a pshat that despite the fact that they each brought their own korbano, they were still brought with the individual style and "kavanos" of the specific tribe.
Saturday, May 26, 2007
Naso: not getting out of hand
Parshat Naso
This week's question:
The last section of the parsha goes through the donation of korbanot the nesiim gave at the dedication of the mishkan. All 12 gave the same exact donation.
Rashi tells us why the nesiim were so quick to be the first to participate with a donation at the dedication ceremony. he tells us that for the building of the mishkan the nesiim had said they would let the people give first and they would give whatever was lacking afterwards. It turned out the people gave so much there was nothing left for the mesiim to give. They were upset they missed the opportunity to participate, so now they jumped forward right away.
But why and how did they all give the same exact thing? This was not base don a commandment that they had to bring a specific korban, so how did all 12 individually think of the same exact korban?
I think they must have gotten together and decided what to bring. That way it would not "get out of hand".
Think of it similar to the "wedding takkanos" of Agudas Yisrael in America. Weddings were getting out of hand as each person needed to outdo the one before him. So Aguda made rules and now nobody should feel the need to outdo the other guy and spend beyond his means.
The same here. If they each would bring their own thing, the first guy would bring, let's say, one cow. The second guy would say,"That's all he brought? I will bring 2 cows." The next guy would then bring 5 cows and 2 sheep. The next would bring 10 cows and 15 sheep. etc.
It would get out of hand, so they agreed that they would each bring the same exact set of korbanos.
I did see a pshat that despite the fact that they each brought their own korbano, they were still brought with the individual style and "kavanos" of the specific tribe.
This week's question:
The last section of the parsha goes through the donation of korbanot the nesiim gave at the dedication of the mishkan. All 12 gave the same exact donation.
Rashi tells us why the nesiim were so quick to be the first to participate with a donation at the dedication ceremony. he tells us that for the building of the mishkan the nesiim had said they would let the people give first and they would give whatever was lacking afterwards. It turned out the people gave so much there was nothing left for the mesiim to give. They were upset they missed the opportunity to participate, so now they jumped forward right away.
But why and how did they all give the same exact thing? This was not base don a commandment that they had to bring a specific korban, so how did all 12 individually think of the same exact korban?
I think they must have gotten together and decided what to bring. That way it would not "get out of hand".
Think of it similar to the "wedding takkanos" of Agudas Yisrael in America. Weddings were getting out of hand as each person needed to outdo the one before him. So Aguda made rules and now nobody should feel the need to outdo the other guy and spend beyond his means.
The same here. If they each would bring their own thing, the first guy would bring, let's say, one cow. The second guy would say,"That's all he brought? I will bring 2 cows." The next guy would then bring 5 cows and 2 sheep. The next would bring 10 cows and 15 sheep. etc.
It would get out of hand, so they agreed that they would each bring the same exact set of korbanos.
I did see a pshat that despite the fact that they each brought their own korbano, they were still brought with the individual style and "kavanos" of the specific tribe.
Saturday, May 19, 2007
Bamidbar: Moshe's children
Parshat Bamidbar
I have not posted my questions here in a while. I am going to try to get back to it...
This week's question was... during the lineage of the family of Levi, it says "These are the generations (children) of Aharon and Moshe..." and it goes on to list the children of Aharon, and not the children of Moshe.
Rashi tells us that we learn from the fact that it calls the children of Aharon as being also the children of Moshe that one who teaches someone else Torah, it is as if that person is his child. So the children of Aharon were also the children of Moshe, because Moshe taught them Torah.
That is very nice, but what about the actual children of Moshe? Why do they not get mentioned at all? It is listing the children of all the Levite families, so why not list Moshe's children as well?
We did not have an answer for this. I saw one answer about how Moshe's children had stayed behind with Yisro in Midian. I do nto remember why, but I did not like that answer, as they are still Moshe's children and should have been mentioned...
I have not posted my questions here in a while. I am going to try to get back to it...
This week's question was... during the lineage of the family of Levi, it says "These are the generations (children) of Aharon and Moshe..." and it goes on to list the children of Aharon, and not the children of Moshe.
Rashi tells us that we learn from the fact that it calls the children of Aharon as being also the children of Moshe that one who teaches someone else Torah, it is as if that person is his child. So the children of Aharon were also the children of Moshe, because Moshe taught them Torah.
That is very nice, but what about the actual children of Moshe? Why do they not get mentioned at all? It is listing the children of all the Levite families, so why not list Moshe's children as well?
We did not have an answer for this. I saw one answer about how Moshe's children had stayed behind with Yisro in Midian. I do nto remember why, but I did not like that answer, as they are still Moshe's children and should have been mentioned...
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