It is a well-known truism of the rabbinic/Jewish approach to reading the Torah that this text is of such a level of holiness and significance that every word and sentence must carry meaning. Finding that meaning, however, isn't always an easy task. Sometimes a text is full of strange details and vocabulary and events that are hard to comprehend. Sometimes a text challenges us ethically or seems difficult to relate to the radically changed circumstances of our lives and societies compared to those of our biblical ancestors.
And then sometimes, a text just seems too mundane to be of ultimate significance.
The opening of Parashat Masei (Numbers 33), the second of our doubled parshiot that we read this week, seems to be just such a case:
¹These were the marches of the Israelite who started out from the land of Egypt, troop by troop, in the charge of Moses and Aaron. ²Moses recorded the starting points of their various marches, as directed by the Lord. Their marches, by starting points, were as follows:
³They set out from Ramses in the first month, on the fifteenth day of the first month. It was on the morrow of the Passover offering that the Israelites out defiantly, in the plain view of all the Egyptians.
Verse 4 pauses to note that the Egyptians were at that time burying their dead from the last, most terrible plague, the slaying of the first born. But then, from verse 5 through 49, what follows is an extended enumeration of the places the Israelites travelled and camped during their sojourn in the desert: "They left Place A and camped in Place B; they left Place B, and travelled for 3 days and came to Place C..." Occasionally some details about the various places are added. But mostly it's just a long list, forty-two stations of the journey in all.
Even to this day, biblical scholars aren't sure where all these places are; the JPS Bible Commentary volume on Numbers has maps with two very different possibilities in its opening pages (lvii and lviii). It is no surprise, then, that commentators throughout Jewish history have attempted to provide explanations for the presence of this list here, and for its larger spiritual meaning. Why was it of importance that Moses record this information, so much so that it is God who directs him to do so?
Of course, Jewish readers being Jewish readers, there is no single, agreed upon answer that emerges. Rashi observes that of the forty-two stages of travel, stretched out over forty years, fourteen took place in the first year after the Exodus and eight in the last year before entering the land of Israel, leaving twenty journeys in a thirty eight year period; this, he says, therefore demonstrates "the lovingkindness of the Omnipresent One, for even though He decreed upon them to wander and move about in the wilderness, you should not say that they were on the move and wandering from way-station to way-station all forty years and they never had rest..." Maimonides suggests that the list is meant to emphasize the Divine protection that sustained the Israelites during their period of wandering:
...they [later readers of the biblical text] might think that the Israelites stayed in the wilderness in a place not far from inhabited land, where it was possible for man to live in the ordinary way; that it was like those deserts in which Arabs live at present; or that they dwelt in such places in which they could plow, sow and reap or live on some vegetable that was growing there; or that manna always came down in those places as an ordinary natural product; or that there were wells of water in those places. In order to remove all these doubts, and to establish firmly the accuracy of the account of those miracles, the Torah enumerates all the stations, so that coming generations may see them, and learn the greatness of the miracle which enabled human beings to live in those places forty years. (Guide, 3, 50)
Even in one midrashic collection, we can find two related but subtly different explanations, again related to the theme of memory of what happened at those way stations, and the relationship between the people and God during the journey. Both appear in Chapter 23 of Numbers Rabbah. First, section 1 of the chapter notes that several biblical characters (Jacob, Moses, David) at certain times in their lives had to flee from their enemies. But not so for the Israelites in the desert; God defeated their enemies and even protected them from natural hazards such as snakes and scorpions:
For this reason the Holy One, blessed be He, said to Moses: "Write down the stages by which Israel journeyed in the wilderness, in order that they shall know what miracles I wrought for them." (emphasis added)
But section 3 has a different perspective:
It is like the case of a king whose son was ill. He took him to a certain place to cure him. On their return journey his father began to recount all the stages, saying: "Here we slept; here we cooled ourselves; here you had a headache." So the Holy One, blessed be He, said to Moses: "Recount to them all the places where they provoked Me." (again, emphasis added)
In one version, we remember the miracles that sustained us, in another we are to recall our history of rebellion and disobedience and ingratitude towards God. Or, since both appear so close by each other in one anthology, perhaps we are meant to remember both.
But finally, I want to add (if I may be so bold) a personal reflection. The parable in the second passage from Numbers Rabbah strikes a personal cord, because it makes me think of a personal behavioral quirk. My husband and I just returned recently from a trip to celebrate our twenty-fifth anniversary (and I also attended several days of the Rabbinical Assembly Convention in Jerusalem). Traveling abroad means, of course, carrying my passport with me at all times, showing it not only when I enter and exit countries, but at hotels when I check in and to enter government buildings with my colleagues while in Israel. And each time I have to take out and open that passport, I can see the stamps that are in it. I am blessed that I have been able to travel a great deal in my lifetime: professional trips to conferences and speaking engagements in Israel, Canada, Germany; a family trip to a resort in the Dominican Republic to celebrate my father's seventieth birthday. And more than anything, trips with my most frequent traveling companion, my husband, to explore the world. Like the father in the parable of Numbers Rabbah, I open my passport and say to my husband: "Remember when we ate gelato near the cathedral? Remember when we climbed the pyramids outside Mexico City (another RA Convention...)? Remember when we saw ‘As You Like It' at the Globe Theatre?"
So where Numbers Rabbah invokes one frequent rabbinic metaphor for the relationship between God and Israel, that of father and child (and more particularly, a King and his princely son), I see here the potential to bring in another that begins with the prophets and permeates Jewish thought: one which compares the relationship between God and Israel to a marriage. Now, I know that historically this metaphor is fraught with problems, most notably gendered assumptions about the power that the husband (God) wields over the wife (Israel) that are quite troubling to us today. But if I may, at least for a moment, put a modern spin on the metaphor, this is what my own experience of marriage and traveling with my spouse brings to my understanding of the biblical list of Numbers 33:
After twenty-five years together as a married couple, and more that we have known each other and been in relationship with each other, it is certain that who each of us is has been deeply shaped by the other. And yet we are still, and always, two distinct people, two distinct personalities. This is, of course, true for all couples. And travel together is an experience that often brings those differences in a couple to the fore. For example, I am the kind of traveler who wants to see as much as possible of the place we visit. Vacationing with me is far more likely to be an educational than a relaxing experience. My husband, meanwhile, is an advance planner. He needs to establish where we are going on what day, how we will get from here to there, where we will stay on arrival. Our different emphases and styles can make for conflicts ("Why are you asking me to make a decision this minute about where we're going to stay 6 months from now? Can't you see I have a drash to write for tomorrow?!" vs. "You want to go to another museum/castle/hiking trail? Can't you see I am about to fall over from jet-lag and exhaustion?!"). But the experiences we build together are precious, the shared memories invaluable. And so it is with God and Israel. The time in the desert can be understood as a time in which the two parties must learn and negotiate how to travel together - for the long-term. Some memories are difficult, memories of conflict and hurtful moments. But many are the moments that make partners remember why they chose each other in the first place, why each is the other's most treasured companion on the journey.
This Shabbat, may we and God continue to set out on new journeys of discovery with one another, carrying our passports, and saying "Remember when we..."
Shabbat Shalom.