In yesterday's parsha (Beha'alotecha, Numbers 8:1-12:16), we read about Pesah Sheni (Numbers 9:1-14). (Based on Joshua 5:2-9, which says that there was no brit mila during the 38 years we were gallivanting around in the wilderness,) O'dox Judaism holds that this was the only Pesah celebrated in the wilderness, until the Pesah mentioned in Joshua 5-10-11. Even before my fascination with the Israelite Samaritans, I always thought that it was kind of weird that God would command us these two supremely important mitzvot (the only two positive mitzvot that carry the penalty of karet) and then prevent us from doing them for 38 years, during such a formative period of our national existence. I don't see where it's written regarding brit mila and Pesah that it's Divinely mandated not to do them in the wilderness. Something doesn't jibe here.
I read in Samaritan Exegesis that Cohen Gadol Jacob son of Aaron writes:
The children of Israel fulfilled all the ordinances which they were commanded in the Torah, among them the Passover ordinance, for it is one of the greatest ordinances. Our fathers used to perform it according to the rules and regulations, and ate with it unleavened bread and bitter herbs throughout the forty years. Our opponents claim that our fathers ceased from celebrating the Passover during the period of forty years which they spent in the wilderness. Against this statement I appeal to God! How could they attend to this ordinance while they were in Egypt, surrounded by the most oppressive conditions, and then neglect it when they entered the wilderness with perfect liberty, and while Moses (upon whom be peace) was with them? How could they cease from performing an ordinance which was given to them as long as the world lasts, being at the time in a place where no one would oppose them...
...Those who claim that those who entered into the wilderness or were born during the forty years were not circumcised make a terrible mistake. What prohibited them from doing so, for they were commanded with this ordinance from the times of our lord Abraham (upon whom be peace). They understood how absolute and definite are the punishments of those who do not perform it. Passages to that effect are numerous, for whosoever is born among the Israelites, and is not circumcised on the eigth day, is not counted with thje people, and that soul is destroyed from the number of the people. What our opponents claim in this matter is unacceptable and irrational, and so much is enough in this brief treatise.
Unacceptable and irrational, indeed. Needless to say that my bringing this up at seudah shlishit yesterday in shul did not impress anybody (all six of us). Once again, to accept the premise of no Pesah & no brit milah in the wilderness, one must needs fall back on the o'dox idea of oral Torah, or Torah Sheba'al Peh, which can be made to mean whatever we want it to mean even if this contravenes reason, logic and/or the plain sense of the written text.
Shavuot, o'dox Jewish Shavuot, was last week, although I can't help but think that the real Shavuot is today. Sigh
I know that I've said, both to myself and in one of my previous posts here somewhere, that as long as I'm bound by this particular code, i.e. o'dox Judaism, I must act according to it. But I really am just going through the motions. I know how I must act, my body knows what it has to do, but my mind & heart are drawn to Mt. Gerizim. Sigh (again) May God forgive me.
I love Jefferson Airplane's "Somebody to Love" (click here, from 3:32). The opening lines are
When the truth is found to be lies and all the joy within you dies...
I don't know if I'm prepared to say that the o'dox Jewish truths I have lived by for the past 30 years or so are outright lies per se, but the joy that they used to give me, the joy I used to feel in living as an orthodox Jew has certainly atrophied if not completely died. I find that the Israelite Samaritan truths appeal to me far more (at the moment?).
I keep telling myself that as long as I'm bound by the o'dox Jewish code as it were I must uphold it. But sometimes it's a struggle.
I counted 27 for the Omer tonight but can't help but feel that it's really 23.
I've rewritten one of my poems from Intro Post, Part Four:
Once the fence inspired awe
now I run atop the posts.
I could very well fall
but at least I'm alive.
I can tell because the fencetop pricks my feet.
Others see green grass
but I see weeds;
hallowed ground for them,
hollow ground for me
where my feet grow heavy on the old familiar paths.
(I had seder in the House of Rimmon
awash in bitter herbs
where hopes are stillborn
and dwindle into fantasies,
that four cups couldn't drown, but not for want of trying.)
I know the world is hollow
but I fear to touch the sky
lest it shatter
and my family be caught in the wreckage.
So on I run, trying to keep my balance, but at least my feet hurt.
Better, I think.
I am immensely enjoying reading The Israelite Samaritan Version of the Torah, parsha (ours) by parsha, and am learning alot (which is why I bought it). Some of the differences appear to be fairly inconsequential (reversed word orders & such) while others are more substantive. Examples of the latter are in Leviticus 17:7 and 18:18. Our English of 17:7 reads:
And they shall no more sacrifice their sacrifices unto the satyrs, after whom
they go astray.
The Israelite Samaritan version reads the first underlined portion as in the gates. Our version of the original Hebrew is l'se'irim; theirs is b'shaa'rim (adjusting the Israelite Samaritan pronunciation to ours). The second underlined portion is zonim in both versions. The z-n-h root is also the root for the word for prostitute/whore, zonah. The Israelite Samaritan read is that we must not offer sacrifices as we were formerly wont to do in profane places such as town gates where prostitutes and whores might gather to trawl for customers.
In 18:18, the read is the same but the interpretation differs.
And you shall not take a woman to her sister, to be a rival to her, to uncover
her nakedness, beside the other in her lifetime
We take to her sister in its literal sense & rule that a man may not marry two biological sisters. The Israelite Samaritans read it more metaphorically and take to her sister to mean any other Israelite woman, i.e. a sister in faith & rule that a man may not take a second wife at all (unless the first wife is barren and unless she agrees).
I have finished the second section of Samaritan Exegesis, by High Priest Jacob son of Aaron (whom the Wikipedia article on Samaritan High Priests lists as having served from 1874-1916), in which he answers 25 questions that were put to him. Those regarding the Passover were utterly fascinating.
In a latter section, the High Priest writes:
Every word of God as given in the revealed Torah through our lord Moses (upon whom be peace) possesses several allusions which are to be applied in their proper places. This is enough for the man who lays aside his prejudice, and is willing to receive guidance and act piously.
What an elegant refutation of the calumny that the Israelite Samaritans are slaves as it were to the narrow, literal meaning of the Torah. The key phrase above, I think, is in their proper places. Our Sages take such flights (of fancy?) away from the plain sense of the text (see Intro Post, Part Four, the paragraph near the bottom beginning "This past Roah Hashanah...") whereas the Israelite Samaritans take things in their proper places.
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I decided that since I have to count with our youngest son I will do a barebones count, i.e. the blessing & the erroneous count and none of the afterprayers that are customarily said after counting; I just can't do it.
The Israelite Samaritans will be bringing the Pesach offering on Mt. Gerizim in a few hours. I think I said in a previous post that I will be glad that I'm not there. To see the Israelite Samaritans doing God's work and to know that all I will ever likely be is a spectator would be heartbreaking. So instead I'll drink my four cups of wine at Rimmon's table tomorrow night (maybe I'll drink a fifth or sixth cup) and wish I could be elsewhere. Whee.
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Something that I hadn't thought of when I wrote my previous post is that my wife might want me to count the omer with our youngest son as she has in previous years. He's now past bar mitzvah so we'll have to see. I suppose I have to set a Jewish example for him but I wonder what values will I be teaching him exactly? Hypocrisy? Doing things just for the sake of appearances? Wheee. How responsible. What fun. (Not.)
It always freaks me out, this year more than in previous years, how so many o'dox Jews get so neurotic when it comes to Passover. Passover is when the obsessive-compulsives among us come out of the woodwork. There are people who weigh and measure out individual portions of matzah and maror so that everyone eats the exact right precise amount. God forbid that you should eat one gram less! Gevalt!! The seder is not supposed to be a mathematics lesson! Just eat some matza; if you eat under the exact, measured, quantifiable amount, it doesn't make any difference! I go nuts over long hair-splitting debates over what exactly constitutes leaning to the left. What if you're more comfortable leaning to the right/?!! It doesn't make any difference! Just sit and be relaxed & comfortable! And, of course, our sedarim go on forever (even though the Torah says that the Passover offering is to be eaten in haste, but the Oral Torah explains that away too).
This past Shabbat I (quite spur of the moment) decided to stop pointing at the Torah when it is held up after the reading and saying, "This is the Torah that Moses placed before the Children of Israel according to God, by the hand of Moses" (which is cobbled together from Deuteronomy 4:44 & Numbers 4:37) as I do not believe anymore that the Torah which we Jews have is indeed, "the Torah that Moses placed before the Children of Israel according to God."
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I read about yet another case in which a recalcitrant (allegedly) o'dox Jewish husband is refusing to give his wife a get & is blackmailing her for alot of money. (See here & here; these are from The Jewish Journal of Greater Los Angles; the second article has a link to a New York Times piece about the same case.)
Ugh. The whole thing is stomach turning. The NYT story quotes Rabbi Jeremy Stern from the Organization for the Resolution of Agunot as saying:
“The rabbinical court system is such an ad hoc system where any man is able to call himself a rabbi and any three rabbis are able to call themselves a court, so that even if it’s not accepted by anyone, he is able to hide behind this,”
Rabbi Stern has alluded to something that bugs the hell out of me about Judaism in general and o'dox/u-o'dox Judaism in particular, namely that we have no unified authority or spiritual leadership and the result (in divorce cases, in conversion, in kashrut, etc., etc.) is chaos in which many good people get hurt and many SOB's get away, in this case, with bigamy. Ugh, ugh and double ugh.
I will say again that one of the many things I admire about the Israelite Samaritans is that they have one spiritual authority that everyone accepts and the result is order, the kind that the Torah calls for, administered by the people whom the Torah calls to administer it (cohanim, i.e. Aaronic priests). I have to admire this. This is but one more instance in which we o'dox Jews have lost our way, lost the Torah's way, and could learn a thing or two from our Israelite Samaritan brothers.
Another issue, related to the upcoming Passover holyday. I do not want to count the Omer, at least not the way we Jews do. The controversy is well-known. Leviticus 23:15 says:
And you shall count unto you from the morrow after the Sabbath [mimacharat haShabbat], from the day that you brought the sheaf of the waving; seven weeks shall there be complete;
We Jews claim that the underlined/Italicized section does not mean what it says and that Shabbat in this case means the first day of Passover, meaning that the second day of Passover is the first day of the Omer. The Israelite Samaritans claim (wonder of wonders) that the Torah here actually means what it says, meaning that the first day of the Omer is the day after the first Sabbath that falls during Passover. I have the read the Jewish arguments in favor of the Jewish (duh) view and quite honestly they seem like so much contrived sophistry designed to prove that the text means something other than what it says (i.e. God doesn't tell it to us straight but rather teases us). I accept the idea of oral traditions (the Israelite Samaritans have them) but I cannot accept the idea that oral traditions can either contradict or add to the concrete, written Torah, such as in the case of counting the Omer or the number of days that a menstruating woman is niddah. As I noted in a previous post, the Torah explicitly says it is seven days. Our sages added five more days; how is this not adding to the Torah?
Back to the Omer. The Israelite Samaritan view takes the text at face value. So...
I do not want to count the Omer. Putting on tefillin every morning doesn't bug me so much (doesn't bug me so much now/yet); it seems harmless enough. But counting the Omer the way we do it seems to contravene the plain meaning of a Torah verse. What do I do? My quandary raises another issue. Do I, as an o'dox Jew, simply fall back on the wiser-men-than-I-have-figured-this-out-and-I-should-act-accordingly thing? This, in turn, raises another issue. Do I put the brain and the heart that God gave me on auto-pilot and just do as I'm told? This seems like mindlessly falling in with the hivemind/herd mentality. Are we so many spiritual lemmings??!!
I do not want to count the Omer; whether I will remains to be seen. I don't know what to do (yet).
I pray that God gives me guidance!
Well, the books (Samaritan Exegesis and The Israelite Samaritan Version of the Torah) have finally arrived! Thank God, at last!
I have read the forewords & introductions to the second book. I think I am going to read the Torah portions that match our weekly readings, to study how they compare and to note the differences.
I have read the first part of Samaritan Exegesis ("Mount Gerizim: The One True Sanctuary" by High Priest Amram Isaac and am about half-way through the second part ("The Book of Enlightenment: For the Instruction of the Inquirer" by High Priest Jacob son of Aaron).
High Priest Amram Isaac writes about Mt. Gerizim:
In the account (to which reference has been made) Jacob (upon whom be peace) is commanded to erect another altar on it, in order that the timid may be well assured that such a place is his refuge, for it is the house of God, the protector, (may He be exalted) who saves the one taking refuge in Him and seeking Him by faith, in this place.
I read this and tears welled up in my eyes. I am timid and the words of High Priest Amram Isaac reassure me. However imperfectly at this time, I take refuge in God and seek Him by faith (however imperfect, may He forgive me) in His place which is Mt. Gerizim. I must go back there and take my books and read and meditate there.
Now, more than ever, I feel that when I go to synagogue I am bowing in the House of Rimmon.
I've got to run. I will write more later.
NB
