D’var Torah – July 18

Shabbat Shalom!

I hope this finds you all well.

There’s this classic Ashkenazic tale: a man who, for years, has been committing the sin of lashon hara (“the evil tongue”) i.e. gossip, realizes the error of his ways and goes to the local Rabbi to ask how to begin the process of teshuvah (“atonement and repentance”). The Rabbi tells the man to take a feather pillow, rip it open, and leave the feathers outside overnight, and then come back to him the next day. The man does this and asks his Rabbi what comes next. The Rabbi instructs the man to go and collect all the feathers. The man protests that this is impossible as strong winds have carried all the feathers away. Here comes the lesson…the Rabbi teaches the sinner that just as all the feathers cannot be recovered, so too can the damage to everyone’s reputations that were harmed by his hearsay and slander not be undone either.[1]

The man, the sinner in this story never threw a punch, pulled out a gun or a knife, burned down a building…none of it. But yet, his words dramatically, permanently, and negatively impacted the lives of all those he spoke about.

When we think of one group starting a war, a fight, etc we can point out some very straightforward and clear-cut examples: October 7th, 9/11, Pearl Harbor, and Hitler’s invasion of Poland all come to mind.

But as we know, those seeking to do harm often don’t always take the most direct route when it comes to foul play.

In this week’s parsha of Pinchas (Numbers 25:10-30:1), we see a prime of example of this:

“God spoke to Moses, saying, ‘Assail the Midianites and defeat them— for they assailed you by the trickery they practiced against you—because of the affair of Peor and because of the affair of their kinswoman Cozbi, daughter of the Midianite chieftain, who was killed at the time of the plague on account of Peor.’” (Numbers 25:16-18*)

Think about this. The Midianites never took up a sword or spear against Israel. However, they still sought to destroy our ancestors, first by hiring the prophet Balaam to curse Israel, and then by trying to sexually seduce the people into worshipping their god, Ba’al Pe’or. It is an overt act of subversion. Regardless of the means- whether it was on the battlefield, the altar, or in the tent, the end goal of the Midianites/Moabites was the same…the destruction of Israel. God’s command is that these subversive plots are equal to violence.

History calls what the Midianites/Mabites did with an enduring phrase: “death by a thousand cuts.” This slow, methodical, calculated erosion is not a one-off. President John F. Kennedy (z”l), illustrated this when he told the cadets of the US Military Academy at West Point the following during the Cold War:

“…This is another type of warfare, new in its intensity, ancient in its origins, war by guerrillas, subversives, insurgents, assassins, war by ambush instead of by combat; by infiltration instead of aggression, seeking victory by eroding and exhausting the enemy instead of engaging him. It is a form of warfare uniquely adapted to what has been strangely called “wars of liberation,” to undermine the efforts of new and poor countries to maintain the freedom that they have finally achieved. It preys on economic unrest and ethnic conflicts. It requires in those situations where we must counter it, and these are the kinds of challenges that will be before us in the next decade if freedom is to be saved, a whole new kind of strategy, a wholly different kind of force, and therefore a new and wholly different kind of military training.”[2]

Likewise the prophet Jeremiah tells us:

“Their tongue is a sharpened arrow,
They use their mouths to deceive.
They speak to their fellows in friendship,
But lay an ambush for them in their hearts.” (Jeremiah 9:7*)

In the history of the Jewish people we have been attacked by force (ex: the pogroms, the Rhineland massacres, the Holocaust, etc) and we have also been attacked by word (ex: the Protocols of the Elders of Zion and Mein Kampf). We have even been assailed in other indirect means such as the Russian empire’s Canton system. In recent days, we have even witnessed how the Grok chatbot spewed antisemitic rhetoric and how Elmo’s X account was hacked and festooned with antisemitic content. It goes without saying how words and other so-called “subtle” activities and means can easily and ultimately lead to acts of violence.

Perhaps there are two lessons from this episode of Parsha Pinchas. First, we must condemn and be on guard against all forms and all manners of antisemitism. Second,  just as our people survived the subversive plots of the Midianites and Moabites, Balak and Balaam, the house of bondage and slavery under the Egyptian pharaoh, the exiles of the Babylonians and Romans, the pogroms of Russia, the Holocaust, and the attacks of October 7th, so too can we survive any one who seeks to destroy us.

Bizrat HaShem, with God’s help in our hearts and our souls, may we remember the call that has inspired countless generations of our people: Am Yisrael Chai- the people of Israel live!

Wishing you a Good Shabbos and a great weekend.