The questions that Rabbis are asked at interviews when they seek to be appointed to a community are often very telling about what the community leadership is afraid of. I won’t be sharing anything about my interview for the senior Rabbi position at EHRS eighteen months ago but I remember well one of the questions that was put to me at my interview for my position as Rabbi for the Woodford Progressive Synagogue, my first appointment as Rabbi in 1996.
Presumably with one eye on future unfortunate banner headlines in the Jewish Chronicle, I was asked the question “Do you like to be controversial?” My answer presumably satisfied my interviewers as they decided to choose me to be their Rabbi but I won’t share it with you just yet because our Torah portion perhaps gives guidance on what my answer should have been.
We just heard about two lines of rebellion against the authority of Moses and Aaron. The first was that of Korach the Levite. His complaint was that Moses had taken upon himself complete religious authority over the Children of Israel, a position, which in Korach’s view was incompatible with the people’s status as a holy people. Moses interpreted Korach’s complaint rather differently, accusing Korach of being dis-satisfied with his position as head of a group of Levites and wanting to take to over the priesthood for himself. The second line of rebellion was that led by Datan and Abiram, Korach’s co- conspirators. Their complaint is not recorded in the Torah but appears to be a challenge to Moses’ political power. The Torah tells us that they were members of the tribe of Reuben – a tribe that drew its origins from Jacob’s first born son. Although we are not told this, we might assume that their complaint is that, being the descendants of the first born of Jacob, they should have authority over the other tribes of Israel rather than being of no special status.
Whatever the complaints actually were one thing is clear, the rebels were thoroughly dis-satisfied with Moses’s leadership. But, in their dissatisfaction they were by no means alone. Again and again, in the course of their wanderings, and especially as recorded in the book of Numbers, the children of Israel complained against Moses and Aaron. They blamed them for having taken them out of Egypt and for the discomforts of the nomadic life into which they were led. In last week’s Torah portion the Children of Israel even got as far as calling for a new leader to take them back to Egypt, where they recalled their former living conditions with fondness. Korach, Datan and Abiram and their followers were expressing the resentment of the whole people when they rebelled against Moses.
The people’s resentment stirs God to extreme anger on many occasions and Moses and Aaron find themselves having to dissuade God from exacting terrible revenge on the Children of Israel, despite the bile that is directed at them. As if to compound Korach’s calumny the Rabbis who composed Bemidbar Rabbah (18:3), the midrash on the book of Numbers, added an additional complaint to that recorded in the Torah. Referring to last week’s Torah portion in which the commandment to wear Tzitzit, four blue threads, on garments was given, the Rabbis wrote that Korach argued with Moses as to how this commandment should be put into action. Korach, the Midrash says, argued that a cloak which is altogether dyed blue must be exempt from the requirement to have tzizit attached against Moses’s strict assertion of the original obligation. Then, in a gesture of spite against Moses, Korach, according to the Midrash dressed all two hundred and fifty of his followers in deep blue cloaks without tzitzit. Korach then argued that a house which contains a copy of the Torah should be exempt from having to carry a mezuzah, whilst Moses disagrees. Korach then accuses Moses of making up the commandments himself to suit his own purposes.
Korach’s sin, however, is not that he stands out on his own to challenge the authority of Moses, rather he is following the general trend among the people to complain against their leader. The problem is that his accusations and those of the people appear set to frustrate the grand plan of God. They are aiming to undo the progress of their redemption by going against the guidance provided by God and by challenging the authority of their leader Moses who has been put into his position according to God’s will.
Our Rabbis were not disapproving of controversy in the seeking of God’s will per se. What they were against was controversy that aimed only at the assertion of one human’s will over another’s in the guise of trying to help the people. In none of the accusations which Korach makes does he appeal to the search for God’s will, instead he is rebelling against Moses, the person. Korach and his followers want to take religious power for themselves whilst Datan and Abiram want the political power and privilege for themselves.
This is the background to a well known passage from the Pirke Avot, the Saying of our Sages. “Every controversy that is for the sake of heaven is justified, every controversy that is not for the sake of heaven is not justified”. The passage then calls Korach’s rebellion a cause that was not for the sake of heaven, it was just about the assertion of power, whilst the arguments of the rabbis as to how Judaism should be practised, typified by the disagreements between Hillel and Shammai, are seen as justified as being for the sake of heaven – genuine attempts to find God’s will, to do the right thing.
The Torah comes down firmly on Moses’s side after the Korachite rebellion. Moses’s aim to lead the people in the way of God’s purposes rather than to bow to their immediate wishes prevails. Korach’s willingness to frustrate that aim is vilified both in the Torah and in the Midrashim that commented upon it. In a long passage commenting on Korach’s rebellion in the Talmud (Sanhedrin 110a) the Rabbis Hisda, Hama and Hanina Bar Papa, presumably seeing a parallel in Korach’s action to those of their more rebellious students, stated that whoever contends against, quarrels with or expresses resentment against his teacher is as if he was contending against God. I wonder if they had particular students in mind – literally aiming to put the fear of God into them if they ever answered back again!
Our portion teaches us that Jewish leaders cannot trust only in the will of the people to make their decisions. They must not only follow where the people wish to go. It is their responsibility to try to apply Jewish principles and what they understand as the will of God in the decisions and leadership that they offer. They must not seek controversy in order simply to bolster their own power but must argue the case for the principles of our religion. In our Haftarah portion this Shabbat, the prophet Samuel reminded the people, who had got their will with the appointment of King Saul, that they must not defer to the King rather than aiming to follow the will of God and , similarly, that the King’s power is exercised justly only when he too follows God’s principles. No leadership is effective in Judaism if it forgets the Jewish principles that it is meant to be asserting.
Looking back at my answer to the question at my interview, “Do you like to be controversial?”, I now feel that my answer was acceptable in the light of the guidance which our portion gives us. I answered, “No, I do not aim to be controversial, however if something is happening in the community or in the outside world which is clearly against Progressive Jewish principles then I feel that I would be failing in my duty as a Rabbi if I did not speak out.” My answer satisfied my interviewers. That, however, is only the first stage. Grand aims have to be backed with courage and a willingness to be challenged. I hope that all of us would, whenever we are in a position of influence keep power out but principle in.
