This week's portion includes the most emotionally poignant moment of the entire Bible (in my view): the reunion of Joseph and his brothers, a moment so intense that Joseph has to banish his courtiers because he cannot restrain his emotions. It is the climactic moment of the greatest story ever told.
Notably, this moment comes about because Judah, the leader of the brothers, shows that they have repented for selling Joseph into slavery -- at Judah's own suggestion -- 22 years before by pleading that he himself be taken as a slave in place of Benjamin, who is also Joseph's fully biological brother.
There is a lovely commentary on the story that notes that Jacob was convinced to believe Joseph was still alive when he saw the wagons that had been sent from Egypt to collect him. In Hebrew, the word for "wagon" and "calf" are similar. The wagons were an allusion to a Jewish law about a calf sacrifice.
This sacrifice was done as an atonement for the community when a dead body was discovered but no killer or cause could be identified. The community itself would hold itself liable for failing to protect the individual. In that sense, though Joseph was not, in fact, dead, it was relevant to the story of his disappearance.
According to the Sages, the law of the "eglah arufah" was the last piece of Torah that Jacob and Joseph had studied together before the latter was sold into slavery (the commentators believe that the Torah was studied by the Patriarchs before it was given at Sinai). Hence Jacob was convinced his son was alive.
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
