The Midrash and the Izhbitzer Rebbe see the camping orders in the desert as a model for the balance between order and chaos, borders and transgressions.
The book of Bamidbar opens with the description of the administrative organization of the camp of Israel: first, the public should be counted with the help of the tribal leaders; the Levites are then appointed to handle the Tabernacle; the position of camping for each tribe and camp is then described in detail; afterwards, the focus shifts to the complex internal organization of the tribe of Levi and its various functions; and finally, the matter is sealed with the command to remove the impure (טמאים) from the camp. The feeling is that of a huge camp planned in great detail: a meticulous space where every detail is placed in its proper manner. It seems that Parashot Bamidbar and Nasso allow us to paint the full picture of the camp, to identify the place and function of each of its details, and to delineate the boundaries and limitations that distinguish between the different spaces, functions and levels of importance.
Although the camp seems to be well-built, its name still hints that it is only a temporarily encampment and that the time of journey will come again. Hence, there may be surprise at the large investment in the planning and organization of parking arrangements. But perhaps we should see things the other way around: a community that is in motion and in a state of instability, needs rigid and distinct orders at times when it is possible. The encamping (חנייה) arrangements do not correspond to the simple white lines that distinguish the place of each car in the parking lot (חניון); rather they are similar to an organized parking lot where each vehicle receives exactly its rightful place, reflecting the entire social structure - with its internal divisions. And yet, behind all resides instability and temporality, these obviously undermining the rigid structures.
The Midrash in Parashat Nasso (Bamidbar Rabbah 7:8) parallels the arrangement of encampment in the desert with the ranking of the sanctities and the organization of the space in Eretz Israel and Jerusalem. Here there is a fundamental difference between a roaming camp created as encampment for an unknown time in a random place, and the setting of boundaries and areas that divide the country in a way that penetrates deep into the earth. Determination of the holy sites in Israel is perceived as essential and eternal, as opposed to the arrangement of the camp, which remains only superficially on the surface. At the end of this Midrash this point is brought up:
Just as there was a camp in the wilderness… so too, there is a corresponding camp in Jerusalem… and the Temple courtyard has the same status as the area within the curtains surrounding the courtyard of the Tabernacle in the wilderness. And during travel, they do not have any sanctity and they cannot render one liable for rendering them impure.
The Midrash states that the distribution of the camps and the restrictions involved are valid only during encampment, but the moment they leave, when the curtains are removed, the separations are broken and everything interferes with each other. The Midrash seems to be taking a side in the dispute presented in Tractate Menahot (דף צה ע”א.), while ruling according to the baraita stating that when the curtains were rolled in the Tabernacle, the zavim and the lepers were allowed to enter areas forbidden to them in times of encampment. Society’s need for structure, order and ranking seems easy to understand; but what is the meaning of this transition from order to chaos, from setting up partitions to breaking them, from a systemic diagram to a wild mix – and so forth?
These contrasts invite a drasha of the Izhbitzer Rebbe, and it can indeed be found on Parshat Behaalotcha (מי השלוח חלק ב, פרשת בהעלותך), describing the transition from encampment to travel:
“On the day that the Tabernacle was set up, the cloud covered the Tabernacle”. With this Parasha one can sustain himself throughout his life, for all the bodies of Torah depend upon it. For the purpose of the journeys of Israel in the desert, going from one journey to another, is that they will go outside their borders, to the desolate and mischievous places, to subjugate all the mischievous forces called the “seraph serpents and scorpions, a parched land with no water in it” (Devarim 8:15), and extract the holiness from there. And so to Man in his soul does he have the naughty powers that want to mischief him, powers that come from the destroyed worlds that preceded our world, And Man needs to bring these worlds to holiness, and this is called journey.
And encampment (חניה) means for the times when God’s desire is for Israel not to spread beyond their borders, but to limit themselves in all sorts of ways, like “Stay home and enjoy your glory” (II Kings 14:10). And from this encampment came all the suffering that Israel suffered, thereby it is written “the cloud covered the Tabernacle”. Tabernacle is the deep point in the hearts of Israel. And “the cloud covered the Tabernacle” meaning that a person should not spread holiness outside his borders. And thereby they had to suffer concealment (הסתרה) a day or two or a month or a year, as the will of God. And therefore, it is written “And at such times as the cloud stayed from evening until morning” (Bamidbar 9:21), meaning that God controls in a gradual manner, just like He created day and night, so too man is created in tranquillity… so that the concealment should not be prolonged, only there must be a bit of concealment in order that the light might be revealed… And sometimes it was even more hidden until it was His will that they should journey to hear news. Just as it is stated in the Midrash that all the borders and sanctification of camps was only during times of encampment, but from the moment that the curtains were rolled zavim and the lepers were allowed to enter.
What is written “When the cloud lingered over the Tabernacle many days” (Bamidbar 9:19), it is referred to in the Midrash that every place where it is stated “many days” signifies that those were days of sorrow. And then it is said “the Israelites observed the Lord’s mandate and did not journey on” (ibid.) meaning that they had to force themselves to observe so that the end should not be pushed off, and that the hour may come, and for this reason will God salvage us.
The delicate balance between movement and stoppage, between order and turmoil, is what makes this topic, in the eyes of the Izhbitzer Rebbe, a parasha from which all of life can be sustained. His words can illuminate the meaning of the orderly structure that fills our parasha, precisely because he focuses mainly on the times of the journeys that cancel this structure: the departure to the journey, the deviation of man from his border, is a movement of conquering new territories in the world and soul. But although it is directed towards the seraph serpents and scorpions, it is not presented as a violent war movement but as a search for the “naughty powers” in order to bring them back into the sacred realm of holiness. It seems that in this movement the profit is double: the forces that wish to mischief the person surrender to him and furthermore, the desolate and threatening spaces around him are captured, while at the same time it leads to the revelation of new lights, to the enrichment and deepening of the existence inside the house.
Faced with such a description of the journey, it is understandable why encampment is presented as such suffering. There are times in which God does not wish for the deviation, but rather the rest, not in conquest and renewal, but in seclusion and fixation . As long as life takes place in a fixed cycle of day and night, traveling and stopping, there is satisfaction and relaxation - after all, no one wants only to travel and renew all the time. But what happens when there are repeated pauses, there is no knowing for how long each time, and when the cloud covers the depth of the heart for many days - in such a shallow and tired situation who would venture out of the house and look for new places? The needed patience becomes suffering, but this should not be seen as merely the closure imposed from the outside. The heart itself is sealed, the fatigue takes over, and the night’s rest goes on for days. In such a situation any break in the rhythm of the ordinary has no inspiration or depth to back it up. In such times, it becomes clear that the ability to leave and conquer the wilderness was always dependent on depth and a heartily security.
These tight-hearted times are the right time to converge into the home, but also to organize and arrange it in such a way as to provide the necessary security. When the heart does not pulse freely in space, there is a need for a multiplicity of partitions and limitations that will delimit and limit the external world, thereby giving it meaning. Then the barriers that determine each person’s place are created and they should not be deviated from them or mixed together; then curtains are spread out, separating between the sacred and the profane, between pure and impure, regulating the various degrees and relationships between them. It seems that these boundaries have more than a bit of arbitrariness: as mentioned above, the desert encampment was set in a meaningless place; the partitions are erected in the moment and suddenly a sand surface becomes a camp for the Shekhina, and some of those who have walked upon it are removed from it in disgrace. We are speaking of an organization for the purpose of organization, segregation for the sake of segregation, precisely because of this there is a need for a multiplicity of partitions, drawings and detailed descriptions that will determine the identity of the place, without reason. It seems that the management of life in times of encampment is generally justified in the need to manage life while encamped, the drawn map does not refer to any external reality but rather determines it in the name of the need to operate by a map.
Indeed, after reading the Rebbe’s words, there is a sense of suffering that fills the clouded heart with the reading of our Parasha, especially by equating it to the social structure in which we live. However, one should note the optimism by which he ends his words - the knowledge that all this is only a temporary existence of concealment of the face and the heart, and belief that the day will come when the barriers will be removed, the hearts will open, and thanks to our patience and sufferings we will be allowed to “journey to hear news”.
