THE MOTHER OF ALL ENIGMAS!
The Torah is replete with enigmas, paradoxes and mysteries. But the enigma of all enigmas is the subject of the Red Heifer, discussed at length in this week’s parsha. The ashes of the Red Heifer were used to purify a person who had come in contact with the dead and, as a result, was considered ritually contaminated and could not enter the Temple or partake of consecrated food.
When the Torah introduces this ritual it states: “This is the statute [more literally: the etched-in-stone, supra-rational dictates] of the Torah,” the connotation of which is that this is not only an enigma but it is the “mother” of all enigmas.
KORACH IS BACK
This parsha comes right after the parsha of Korach who rebelled against Moshe and was swallowed up by the earth.
An enigmatic Midrashic comment connects Korach with the Red Heifer when it says: “What did Korach see that caused him to rebel? He saw the section of the Red Heifer.”
What is it about the Red Heifer that could have motivated him to rebel against Moshe?
HEDGING HIS BETS
One way we can explain how the Red Heifer influenced Korach’s decision to rebel is based on Rashi’s comment (in the name of Rabbi Moshe HaDarshan) that the Red Heifer was intended as atonement for the sin of the Golden Calf. Just as a mother cleans the mess of her child, so too, the Red Heifer (mother) atones for the sin of the Golden Calf (child).
Korach was thus hedging his bets. In case his rebellion was judged to be an egregious sin, Korach was convinced that he would still be able to procure atonement. After all, if the sin of the Golden Calf, the Jewish people’s most heinous crime against G-d, could be atoned for by a Red Heifer, then his action, directed “only” against Moshe, could certainly be atoned for.
This ties in with another Midrashic statement that Korach saw his future descendants, the prophet Shmuel and his children, serve in the Temple. This convinced him that he would be absolved. Just as the Red Heifer can atone for the Golden Calf, so could his righteous descendants atone for him.
Underlying this thought process was the belief that one can invoke the merit of one’s forebears in procuring G-d’s forgiveness. Our liturgy is replete with pleas that G-d should save us in the merit of our Patriarchs and Matriarchs. This concept is metaphorically represented by the Red Heifer atoning for its progeny, the Golden Calf.
Korach pushed this idea a step further. He believed that one could also invoke the righteousness of one’s descendants for protection from punishment.
This thought process is captured in the last words of the Prophet Malachi that, in the end of days, “G-d will restore the hearts of fathers to their children and the children to their fathers.”
Korach’s error was that he used the hope of his children bailing him out to justify his sin. In the words of the Talmud: “A prosecutor cannot become a defender.” The very cause of his sin, i.e., reliance on his children’s merit, could not become the means through which he would be absolved of his sin.
MOSHE’S EXCLUSIVITY
One may explain Korach’s connecting his rebellion with the Red Heifer on yet a deeper level:
Our Sages taught that the Red Heifer was an enigma so abstruse and elusive that even King Shlomo, the wisest of all people, admitted that he could not fathom its reason. However, G-d revealed the reason to Moshe.
This troubled Korach. If Moshe had lacked this knowledge, just as the rest of the nation, Korach would not have been stirred to fight Moshe’s authority. After all, in that case Moshe would be like everyone else with limited understanding, who must accept G-d’s judgments without reservation.
Conversely, if Moshe were able to reveal the reason for the Red Heifer then he would have enjoyed Korach’s respect because he was demonstrating that he was a faithful teacher who imparted all of his knowledge to the masses. That would have demonstrated to Korach that Moshe was a man of the people who did not consider himself head and shoulders above the congregation.
But when Korach saw that Moshe kept this knowledge secret, he became convinced that Moshe was not a worthy leader of the Jewish nation.
UNEQUAL EQUALITY
The foregoing rationale for Korach’s rebellion against Moshe’s leadership can answer another question, how could Korach convince people that he considered everyone equal and there was no need for leaders like Moshe and Aaron, when he himself craved to be the High Priest? (See Likkutei Sichos, volume 4, Parshas Korach, for a different answer).
Following the above explanation of Korach’s displeasure with Moshe it may be suggested that Korach was not against Moshe being their leader. A nation must have leadership and Korach surely appreciated Moshe’s role in liberating them from Egypt, giving them the Torah, providing them with Manna in the desert, etc. What he opposed was Moshe claiming exclusivity when it came to understanding the most mysterious aspect of Judaism. If it was truly supra-rational, how could Moshe comprehend it? And if it were not supra-rational, then why not share it with all?
This led Korach to believe that Moshe was not a legitimate leader since he withheld the knowledge from the rest of the community.
MOSHE, THE SMARTEST PERSON?
We now have to understand why Moshe did not share this knowledge with the entire Jewish nation.
One possible answer is that Moshe’s intellect was much higher than all other human beings. He could fathom that which no other human could.
However, this still does not fully answer the question. Why couldn’t Moshe attempt to condense his knowledge and bring it down to the level of the rest of the nation? Isn’t this the method every teacher uses to teach a deep subject to his or her students? The teacher looks for a good parable or analogy that will help make the deep concepts accessible in some way to the people. Why did Moshe not make that attempt? Instead he states categorically, “This is the statute of the Torah,” as if to say, don’t even try to understand it or expect me to explain it to you.
AN ELEPHANT THROUGH THE EYE OF A NEEDLE!
In truth, as the Rebbe explains (Likkutei Sichos, volume 18, p. 230) Moshe could not explain this commandment because it is truly beyond logic. Logic cannot capture everything just as a cup cannot contain ideas or feelings. Or, as the Alter Rebbe put it, to state that G-d is unfathomable is the equivalent of saying that one cannot touch wisdom with hands. G-d is inherently beyond the realm of logic.
Similarly, the commandment of the Red Heifer exists inherently beyond the realm of logic. The fact that G-d revealed the logic behind it to Moshe was a miracle that only G-d could perform. The miracle was the equivalent of putting an elephant through the eye of a needle without benefit of a crash diet… The elephant is big but still finite. The commandment of the Red Heifer expresses G-d’s infinite will and can certainly not fit into a finite mind; not even that of Moshe.
Only G-d, who transcends both finitude and infinity (for infinity is also a category in that it is not finite), can take something infinite and put it into something finite. As great Jewish philosophers stated: “For G-d, the impossible is impossible.”
G-d’s revelation of the reason for the Red Heifer to Moshe was, therefore, essentially a miracle of the highest order. Moshe could not replicate this miracle and impart this knowledge to others without G-d so desiring. Absent that Divine license, Moshe could not reveal the reason.
WHY NOT EVERYONE?
But why didn’t G-d want us to comprehend the reason for this commandment in particular?
The Rebbe explains that, in essence, all of G-d’s commandments, even the rational ones, are inscrutable because they are expressions of G-d’s will, which must transcend logic. Leaving, at least, one Mitzvah beyond our understanding reminds us of the true nature of all of the commandments.
Our awareness of the fact that even the most logical Mitzvah is essentially Divine and beyond human understanding affects the way we approach a Mitzvah.
Were we to base our mitzva observance on logic, the entire concept of self-sacrifice to perform G-d’s will would be absent. Our observance would be measured by and limited to our mind’s dictates. Knowledge that the essence of Mitzvos is trans-logical propels us into total devotion to G-d’s will, beyond the parameters of our understanding.
(See Likkutei Sichos ibid. for an analysis why the Mitzvah of the Red Heifer was selected to be the paradigm for all Mitzvos and why Moshe was allowed to comprehend it.)
THINGS WILL CHANGE!
In the present day and age it is crucial that we remember that the commandments are Divine and transcend logic. The secular mindset engendered by the “Enlightenment” dictates that we must base everything on logic. In this mindset, religion based on faith is anachronistic and infantile. Now, more than ever, we need the example of the Red Heifer to keep us from succumbing to these pressures. We must recognize that it is the secularists who are the primitive thinkers if they stop at logic and fail to realize that logic itself has a ceiling and the Divine, and all that is attached to the Divine, is beyond that ceiling.
In the imminent Messianic Age, however, there will no longer be any reason for G-d to restrict our ability to understand the unfathomable. This explains the words of the Midrash that in the future, G-d will reveal the reason for the Red Heifer to all. And this is also why we are told that all the Divine mysteries (of the Torah and of life in general, such as the existence of pain and suffering) will be revealed to us. In the coming period of Redemption, we will simultaneously see the supra-rational nature of G-d and His commandments as well as their rational basis without need to compromise either.