I spent much of the day at Hillsdale College in rural Michigan, an institution that has become crucial to the conservative movement. I am involved in some projects there, together with my wife.
We spent an hour in a lecture on political economy. The professor was going over an exam -- a multiple-choice test. Sound boring? It wasn't. The test was about Hayek and Bastiat, two great thinkers.
I attended Harvard College for four years and studied political theory. I never once encountered Hayek or Bastiat, though they are crucial to the classical liberal tradition. I was assigned Marx about five times.
The first time I heard of Hayek was in South Africa, when working for the political opposition. I only read his writing at Harvard Law School, when it was suggested by a friend. I never encountered Bastiat.
I relate this to you at the risk of exposing the deficiencies in my own education to show you just how benighted our elite institutions are. Harvard trains the brightest students to hate liberty, and themselves.
Hillsdale is countering that by offering its students -- who are also among the best -- a true grounding in the thinkers and values that make our society the freest and most successful in the world.
The purpose of education is not to flatter the status quo (Hillsdale teaches about Marx, too). But it ought to transmit society's values while providing the tools to succeed. Hillsdale is in a class of its own.
This week'd portion begins the book of Numbers. Interestingly, the Hebrew name for the book is "In the Desert," not "Numbers." The portion, which happens to be my bar mitzvah portion, focuses almost as much on the names of the princes of each tribe as the number of soldiers it fielded. It also focuses on the configuration of the tribal camps around the central Tabernacle and the Levites.
So why "Numbers" instead of "Names" or "Places"? The numbers are, to be sure, a unique feature of the opening of this Biblical book -- but they are not the focus of the rest of the narrative. The Hebrew focuses on the place where the events in the book take place, because essentially this is the narrative of the Israelites' wanderings from Egypt to Israel, across 40 years. We move from the giving of the Torah and the construction of the Tabernacle in Exodus and Leviticus, to the final valediction of Moses in Deuteronomy -- Bamidbar is the story of wandering that happened in between.
The question of ...
This week's portion begins with the laws of the Sabbath and the Sabbatical year, and the Jubilee year that restores all land to its original (tribal) owners. It also explores laws of property and labor that will apply in the Land of Israel, and the laws of vows and inheritance.
The Israelites are presented -- not for the last time -- with the essential moral choice that they must face, and the rewards for choosing well, along with the consequences for choosing poorly.
We learn that doing good things will earn God's protection from enemies. That does not mean that victims of terror, God forbid, were sinful. But it does mean that we can respond to evil by committing ourselves to a higher path.
This week's portion describes the major sacrifices that are to be offered by the Jewish people, including those that are offered only by the priestly Kohen class, and physical requirements of the people (men) who serve in that role.
Inter alia, there are interesting commandments -- such as an injection to treat animals with respect and care, first, by letting a mother animal nurse her offspring for a week before being offered in any sacrifice; and second, by refraining from slaughtering an animal and its offspring on the same day.
The commandments regarding animals remind us of the purpose of those regarding human beings: to uphold a divine connection, through ritual.
https://www.chabad.org/library/article_cdo/aid/111878/jewish/Rabbi-Isaac-Luria-The-Ari-Hakodosh.htm
