This week's reading covers the various implements and practices of the priesthood, which is handed down from Aaron to his sons and their descendants (the Cohanim), who still bless Jews today.
There is an extra reading that is linked to the upcoming Jewish holiday of Purim -- a selection from Deuteronomy that exhorts the people to remember the evil done by the nation of Amalek.
The connection to Purim is that Haman, the villain of the Book of Esther who tried to destroy the Jewish people, is thought to be a descendant of Amalek -- whom King Saul declined to eliminate.
The additional reading from the Prophets comes from I Samuel 15:1-34, and recalls the sin committed by Saul when he declined to execute the king of Amalek, perhaps showing mercy as a fellow royal.
On this Sabbath -- the Sabbath preceding Purim -- we are always commanded both to remember Amalek and to remove Amalek from memory. This seemingly contradictory command is hard to reconcile.
As with the Nazis -- who had to be destroyed, even as we remember them in Holocaust museums -- the story of Amalek is a story about the persistence of evil even in a word created by a God who is Good.
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
