The Weekly Sicha of the Rebbe – Parshas Mattos-Masei

The Rebbe says:

1. This week’s Torah portion tells us how the Tribes of Re’uvain and Gad had an extraordinarily large amount of livestock and they wished to remain in the lands that the Bnei Yisroel (the children of Israel) had just conquered, rather than crossing the Jordan River with their brothers into the Land of Canaan. They came to Moshe Rabbeinu (Moses our teacher) and said, “This land which G-d defeated in front of the congregation of Israel is a land suitable for livestock and your servants have a lot of livestock. If it finds favor in your eyes, let this land be given to your servants as a heritage. Do not take us across the Jordan”.

Moshe Rabbeinu’s initial answer to this was, “Your brothers should go to war while you stay here?! Why are you discouraging the children of Israel from crossing over to the Land which G-d has given them? This is exactly what your fathers (the spies) did when I sent them from Kadesh-Barne’a to explore the Land. They went up to the Valley of Eshkol, saw the Land, and then they discouraged the children of Israel from crossing into the Land which G-d has given them”.

The Tribes of Re’uvain and Gad responded and said to Moshe Rabbeinu, “We’ll arm ourselves quickly and go ahead of the children of Israel and fight until we’ve brought them to their place. We’ll not return to our homes until each member of the children of Israel has taken possession of his inheritance”.

When Moshe heard this he accepted their request to live on the other side of the Jordan River as long as they kept their promise.

2. The Rebbe now begins the initial stage of analyzing and explaining this interaction:

Let’s think about this for a second; if the entire nation of Israel fought to conquer this land on the other side of the Jordan River, how could the Tribes of Re’uvain and Gad possibly think to take this land for free? Simply from a “business” perspective their original request was totally unfair: Everyone fights for this land, they settle in it, and their brothers go over and fight for their own land in the Land of Canaan? How does that make sense?

The Holy Ohr Hachaim answers that indeed the Tribes of Re’uavin and Gad took this into consideration and this is why they said, “This land which G-d defeated in front of the congregation of Israel…”; they felt that since G-d was anyways fighting the wars for the Jewish people, their presence wouldn’t make a difference either way.

However Moshe Rabbeinu’s response was still, “Your brothers should go to war while you stay here?!”, because Moshe was telling them that even though it’s true that Hashem (G-d) fights the wars of the Jewish people, we still have to do the practical aspect of physically going to war, and therefore it’s not right that your brothers have to go to war while you sit here.

Then, in addition to this principal response, Moshe added, “Why are you discouraging the children of Israel from crossing over to the Land which G-d has given them?”. In other words, Moshe was saying, “If you stay here the children of Israel will think it is because you are afraid to enter the Land of Canaan, and they will think that you are only saying that ‘Hashem fights the wars anyways’ because you are covering up your fear, and this will discourage them from entering the Land”. At this point, as an extension to this theme, Moshe continued and said, “This is exactly what your fathers did when I sent them from Kadesh-Barne’a to explore the Land. They went up to the Valley of Eshkol, saw the Land, and then they discouraged the children of Israel from crossing into the Land which G-d has given them”.

3. The Rebbe now asks two questions on this story:

Question one: As we mentioned earlier, when the Tribes of Re’uvain and Gad said that Hashem fights the wars for the Jewish people, they didn’t just mean that after much hardship the Jewish people would win the war because Hashem is with them; they meant that it would be extremely easy for the Jewish people to win the wars and they wouldn’t have any hardships at all because Hashem was with them. Bearing this in mind, we must wonder how Moshe Rabbeinu could compare them to their fathers the spies (the Miraglim) who said unequivocally, “We are unable to go up against the people of the Land of Canaan”, just because their words could be wrongly interpreted by the rest of the Jewish people to mean that they were really afraid?

Question two: When the Tribes of Re’uvain and Gad came to Moshe, they came with a request; not a demand. They said, “If it finds favor in your eyes…”. This means that even if Moshe would’ve emphatically said, “No. You cannot stay here.”, they would’ve listened to him and settled in the Land of Israel (previously the Land of Canaan), and there would be no issue at all of discouraging the other children of Israel. Therefore, being that Moshe did indeed deny their request (originally), why did he feel the need to rebuke them as well?
4. As a prelude to the final explanation, the Rebbe now asks another question:

Chassidus tells us that the inner reason as to why the Tribes of Re’uvain and Gad wanted to stay on the other side of the Jordan River and shepherd their flocks is because there aren’t many issues and obstacles involved in shepherding which would get in their way of regularly being connected to Hashem. Indeed, this is also the reason our forefathers and their children (the Twelve Tribes, besides for Joseph) chose to be shepherds. They all wanted to be constantly connected to Hashem without anything getting in the way.

Bearing this in mind, we can see the (internal) connection between the Tribes of Re’uvain and Gad and the spies (which Moshe Rabbeinu rebuked them about): As we have explained previously in other talks regarding the spies, their reason for wanting to stay in the desert and not enter the Land of Israel is because they knew that they would lose the miraculous guardianship of Hashem which they had in the desert. In the desert they had water flowing from a rock, they had the manna falling from the sky, and they had the clouds of glory protecting them from any unwanted elements. They did not need to work for anything. They were able to learn Torah and meditate on Hashem’s greatness all day, every day. However in the Land of Israel they knew that they would now have to devote at least some, if not most, of their energy just to maintain their existence. And this is why they didn’t want to enter the Land of Israel.

Moreover, even though our forefathers practiced this type of service to Hashem (as we just explained), this was considered a sin for the spies to want to do this because after the giving of the Torah, when Hashem gave them the strength to bring Holiness into physicality, they were supposed to utilize this strength and fulfill Hashem’s desire of having a dwelling place in this world.

According to all of this we must wonder why Moshe Rabbeinu (eventually) allowed the Tribes of Re’uvain and Gad to settle on the other side of the Jordan if this was considered a terrible sin which their fathers the spies paid dearly for?

5. The Rebbe begins explaining everything:

Bearing in mind that the giving of the Torah gave us the strength to bring Holiness into physicality, it would seem that every single Jew should have been involved in performing good deeds and bringing G-dliness into their mundane activities. Nevertheless, we see that there were still two categories of Jews after the giving of the Torah; there were the ones who sat and learnt Torah all day, and there were those who were involved in bringing G-dliness into their business dealings (for example); there was still Yissachar and Zevulun. However, we must understand why this is so? Isn’t Hashem’s desire to have a dwelling place in this world, which means that He can be comfortable in every aspect of this world- even the mundane? Shouldn’t everybody be active in this?

The answer to this is that when we say that Hashem desires to have a dwelling place in this world, it doesn’t only mean that He rests in every aspect of the world, it also means that His presence in every aspect of the world is revealed. And this is where Torah comes in: Mitzvos, good deeds, bring Hashem’s presence (Etzem) into this world; however Torah reveals His presence (Etzem) which we brought down through Mitzvos.

In other words, the ones who sit and learn Torah all day are also a part of fulfilling Hashem’s ultimate intention of creating the world, which is to have a proper dwelling place in physicality.

However, being that the presence of Hashem is brought down into this world (mainly) through the “workers”, and the service of the “learners” is to light up whatever the “workers” brought down, this is why the majority of Yiddin (Jewish people) are occupied with, “And you shall gather your grain”, and only a minority sit and learn Torah all day. [Translator’s addition: Possibly we could compare this to the ratio of workers needed to dig for diamonds versus those needed to polish those diamonds which were dug up].

6. The Rebbe completes the explanation:

From all of the above we see a clear distinction between the Tribes of Re’uvain and Gad and the spies: The spies wanted every Jew to be detached from the world so that they would sit and learn Torah all day, and this was indeed against Hashem’s desire of having a dwelling place in the physical world, however the Tribes of Re’uvain and Gad only requested that they stay behind and be the minority who needed to constantly learn Torah, and this wasn’t seemingly against Hashem’s intention.

Nevertheless we see that Moshe Rabbeinu told them, “This is exactly what your fathers (the spies) did…”. This is because the point of the “learners” is to light up and infuse life into the service of the “workers”, and therefore the request of the Tribes of Re’uvain and Gad to be totally separated from the “workers” in the Land of Israel was not in line with Hashem’s desire.

However after Moshe Rabbeinu rebuked the Tribes of Re’uvain and Gad, and this caused them to display their Mesiras Nefesh (putting their life on the line) for the service of the “workers” by saying that, “We’ll arm ourselves quickly and go ahead of the children of Israel and fight until we’ve brought them to their place. We’ll not return to our homes until each member of the children of Israel has taken possession of his inheritance”, then Moshe Rabbeinu knew that the Tribes of Re’uvain and Gad held dearly the service of the “workers” however they felt that their part in this vital mission was to be those who learn Torah constantly. And this is why Moshe Rabbeinu agreed to let them settle on the other side of the Jordan.

Translated and adapted by Shalom Goldberg. Taken from Likutei Sichos volume eight, second Sicha.