Parshat Chukah: Numbers 19:1 – 22:1 By: Rabbi Denise L. Eger
We learn about Miriam and Aaron’s death in this week portion. The council of leadership –the three siblings, Moses and Miriam and Aaron is no more. Miriam’s death is reported first in this week’s portion. The people mourn for her as befits a leader. But soon after her death the people complain about their thirst. They cry out for water. How ironic that soon after the death of Miriam that the people thirst so greatly! Miriam has long been associated by the rabbis with water. First her name comes from the word for bitter waters. It was Miriam who arranged to have baby Moses floating in the Nile discovered by Pharoah’s daughter. It was Miriam who celebrated so freely leading the people in song and dance after the crossing of the Yam Suf-the Sea of Reeds.
One midrash teaches us that Miriam’s association with water is even deeper than these. Miriam had a magical well that followed her and watered the people of Israel. She was the protector and guardian of this Divine and holy and mystical well. The Midrash teaches us that this well was one of the special items created even before the creation of the universe itself. And Miriam’s leadership brought this well to the generation of the desert wanderings. Rashi, the great Torah commentator, noted this connection between Miriam’s death and the people crying out for water in our Torah portion. The rabbis teach us that upon Miriam’s death the well went dry. Thus the Children of Israel are worried and anxious and complain to Moses and Aaron. How will their thirst be quenched?
Moses and Aaron must be saddened and filled with grief at the death of their sister. But our portion is silent as to their feelings of loss. But we get a glimmer of their confusion. In an effort to stop the complaints of the Children of Israel—Moses and Aaron go before God. God tells them to speak to the rock and out of it will come water and provide drink for the community. This is reminiscent of the story early in Exodus after they have crossed the Red Sea. In Chapter 17 of Exodus, the people were thirsty and God tells Moses to strike a rock and water will come forth. And so he did.
But now in this chapter in the book of Numbers, God tells Moses to speak to the rock. Instead he strikes the rock twice as he did once before. The water still comes pouring forth—but God is displeased by the violation of the directive. Could Moses have just been so tired and so filled with grief about the death of his sister that he was distracted from his duties? Miriam had always been there to protect him. But now she was gone. Could his response and failure to follow the sacred details have been the response of a brother who was wishing and missing his sister? He was missing her because this had been her job to bring water to the people.
How human! How frail is Moses and his brother Aaron! They have led the children of Israel for now some forty years through many trials and tribulations. But the hardest work is yet ahead as they come to fulfill the covenantal promise of settling in the Promised Land. But God will deny both of them, Aaron and Moses the chance to see this part of the promise fulfilled. The complaints of the people annoy them. Perhaps their own grief overwhelmed them and they are tired.
God tells Moses to take Aaron to the top of Mt. Hor and there he will die. And so Aaron and his son Eleazar who will inherit the mantle of the High Priest from his father along with Moses ascend Mt. Hor and their Moses takes the High Priest’s vestments from Aaron and installs Eleazar as the High Priest and their on Mt. Hor Aaron dies. Again we know the people mourn Aaron. For thirty days, they give voice to their grief. But Moses is silent about the death of his brother. His true partner, his voice when words would not come forth is gone. And Moses is silent.
And soon it will be Moses’ time as well. Parshat Chukat is the beginning of the major transition to a new generation of leadership for the Children of Israel and a major transition from wandering people and tribes to an army and force to be reckoned with.
We begin to understand with Parshat Chukat- that the tasks before this nation is about to undergo a great shift and with that will come the necessity for new leadership to lead the People safely to the Promised Land. Moses and Aaron and Miriam have led well. There have been difficult moments for each of them but they have brought God’s message of holiness to the people. But now the people need transformed into a fighting force filled with faith in the Eternal. New leaders like Eleazar and Joshua will emerge to transform this people and the nation.
For each generation—leaders are called to service. What is the task in our own generation? This is a week to consider the idea of sacred leadership and what it takes to lead and to know when to step aside as a leader. For Moses and Aaron and Miriam, they led so long, it would only be through their own deaths that the leadership transition would take place. And so we mourn Aaron and Miriam this week. Grateful for the leadership and their abilities to bring God’s Divine Presence into the midst of the people.
Posted by Jimmy at June 30, 2008 03:09 PM
