Parashas Korach

In this week’s parashah, we find that following Korach’s uprising, the Jews attacked Moshe and Aharon, accusing them of complicity in the deaths of Korach and his followers. Hashem responded to this by bringing a plague that wiped out some 14,700 people. (This is itself a fascinating topic for discussion, but not this week.)

Hashem then commands Moshe: Take 12 staffs, one staff from the prince of each Tribe – including a staff from Aharon for the Tribe of Levi – write the name of each Prince on his staff, and place the staffs in the Mishkan overnight. וְהָיָה הָאִישׁ אֲשֶׁר אֶבְחַר בּוֹ מַטֵּהוּ יִפְרָח וַהֲשִׁכֹּתִי מֵעָלַי אֶת תְּלֻנּוֹת בְּנֵי יִשְׂרָאֵל אֲשֶׁר הֵם מַלִּינִם עֲלֵיכֶם, And it will be that the man who I will choose, his staff will bloom, and I will remove from Myself the complaints of the Children of Israel that they are complaining about you.

First, if Hashem wanted to offer a definitive sign that He had chosen Aharon to be the Kohen gadol, why would the flowering staff be more effective than Hashem’s having miraculously decimated Korach and the subsequent malcontents?

Furthermore, what is meant by the curious phrase “I will remove from Myself the complaints…”? If they were unhappy that He chose Aharon as Kohen, why would this miracle remove that complaint against Hashem?

And, if Hashem’s purpose in performing this miracle was to impress the nation, why were the staffs not left out in the open, so that everyone could see the great event unfold before their eyes?

Simply, we can understand that the episode of Korach had the potential to be quickly forgotten. Since the staff was placed back into the Mishkan as a permanent physical reminder of Aharon’s having been chosen, it served as an ongoing sign to the Jews of Hashem’s having picked Aharon.

As for the second question, we find that when the Jews complained about Moshe, Hashem considered it as though they rebelled against Him (see Sanhedrin 110a). Thus, Hashem was saying that he wanted to fend off further challenges against the legitimacy of Aharon as Kohen Gadol.

Perhaps there is another way to understand this episode, however:

The nation’s complaint was that Moshe was the Leader and Aharon was the Kohen.

Initially, at the time of Korach’s insurrection, they asserted that these positions were not taken legitimately. Hashem’s Presence and His miracles proved that He had, indeed, appointed them to these roles.

Their complaint now became one against Hashem: Why did you give us nothing?!

Hashem’s response was: That isn’t true.

Everyone person and each Tribe has a role. Aharon’s is in the Mishkan, and yours is where I placed you.

As proof, I’ll have Moshe take the staffs of all the Tribes and place them inside the Mishkan, the Machaneh Kehunah, the camp of the Kohanim. What happens? Only Aharon’s staff blooms. That is the place he has to fulfill his role as part of Klal Yisrael.

But part of the message was that in order to bloom, Aharon’s staff had to be there. Perhaps if the staffs would have been left elsewhere, it would not have been Aharon’s staff that blossomed, but that of the Tribe in whose territory it was left.

The message Hashem was sending was not only that Aharon was chosen as Kohen, but that Aharon was chosen only as Kohen (see Rashi 17:25); everyone else had their own role to play. This being the case, Hashem was removing from Himself the complaints of the Children of Israel that they had been disenfranchised by Hashem’s appointment of Aharon.

May Hashem guide us so that we each understand our proper role, and may He assist us so that we fulfill it appropriately.

Gut Shabbos