Parashat Naso, Numbers 4:21-7:89

Haftarah Judges 13:2-25

Last Shabbat, the parsha-reading calendars in the diaspora on the one hand and Israel as well as Reform congregations on the other hand diverged. And they diverge again this Shabbat.

Wait, what does that mean?

In Israel and the Reform world, the pilgrimage festivals are observed only one-day, or seven-days, while the remaining denominations in the diaspora observe two-days, or eight days: Sukkot, Passover, Shavuot. There usually is one Shabbat that falls out during the second day of a festival. Like this year: Last week, Shavuot began on Thursday evening and lasted until Friday evening in Israel and for most Reform congregations, while everyone else added another day. That meant that the Torah readings differed – and they will now continue to differ until the end of the Book of Numbers, when everyone will be literally on the same page again. Hazak!

So last week, some congregations read specific Shavuot Torah readings, while others already moved along through the desert and read Parashat Naso. Now, there’s another layer of confusion: American Reform congregations will wait for their diaspora friends to catch up this week and thus read Naso twice: Naso I (last week) and Naso II (this week), whereas European Reform congregations keep the pace with Israel and read Beha’alotecha this week.

Oy Vey! This is truly one of those instances when the saying: “Two Jews, three opinions” rings so true!

I decided to write about Shavuot last week, since by the time the newsletter reached your inboxes, it was still Shavuot, and we were gathering at Ner Tamid for a Shavuot learning in the evening, and we read a Shavuot related Torah portion on Confirmation Shabbat, even though technically, for Reform, it was no longer Shavuot. Applied rabbinics, right?! No one can say I didn’t put enough thought into this J

So now, today, this Shabbat: Naso. Not Naso I or II, just Naso.

Not that this parasha doesn’t offer enough material to write about twice in a row. But I thought it’s simpler that way. And I knew that the passage I wanted to write about technically falls into what American Reform congregations call Naso II: Birkat Kohanim, the Priestly Blessing.

Before we dive in, let’s zoom out for a moment. In the past, I have quoted Abraham Joshua Heschel writing about the land of Israel, and it fits here again:

The land of Israel—biblical chapters hovering everywhere. Places like Hebrew letters, waiting to be vocalized, waiting for crowns with which to be adorned. The land is a text. Here you are illiterate unless you remember words of Scripture. Wherever you stand you are at the frontier of biblical moments.[1]

While that is undoubtedly and mind-blowingly true, it is also true that archaeological findings that directly and univocally connect the land, the Jewish people and particular events recorded in Torah / Tanakh are rare. Of course, there are many tels and ruins and graves and pottery shards and shrines and excavation layers, and a few coins, and nobody will seriously dispute that Israelites, Judahites, Jews have lived on that Levantine soil for thousands of years, but there aren’t many artifacts that specifically support especially older Biblical narrative.

But when they exist, they are staggeringly and powerfully unambiguous. Or unambiguously powerful.

In 1979, two tiny silver scrolls containing fragments of the Priestly Blessing were found during an excavation at the Ketef Hinnom site in Jerusalem. Ketef Hinnom is an ancient burial site southwest of the Old City of Jerusalem, near today’s Begin Center, not far from the First Station. Ketef means shoulder, and the site sits on the ridge that runs somewhat parallel to Hebron Road there, overlooking that deep cut into the landscape below, the Valley of Hinnom, the steep ravine we know as Valley of deepest Darkness from Psalm 23.

The age of the miniature scrolls, worn as amulets, was dated to around 600 BCE, making them the oldest surviving texts from the Hebrew Bible currently known. Just think about it – this was just before the destruction of the first Temple!

More than 2600 years ago, people were buried in a cave in Jerusalem, overlooking the Hinnom Valley, wearing silver amulets containing this powerful evocation of the Divine Presence, that is recorded in this week’s parasha, Numbers 6:24-26, and that we say to this day:

יְבָרֶכְךָ יְהֹוָה וְיִשְׁמְרֶךָ׃ 

May God bless you and protect you!

יָאֵר יְהֹוָה פָּנָיו אֵלֶיךָ וִיחֻנֶּךָּ׃ 

May God deal kindly and graciously with you!

יִשָּׂא יְהֹוָה פָּנָיו אֵלֶיךָ וְיָשֵׂם לְךָ שָׁלוֹם׃ 

May God bestow favor upon you and grant you peace!

And that is the power of archaeology, of biblical studies, of our liturgy, our texts – and of Jerusalem: Jerusalem, like Judaism, is a vacuum. Like Torah, it preserves and recalls prayers and blessings lost and anchored in time and place. Abraham Joshua Heschel was right: Wherever you stand, you are at the frontier of biblical moments. The land is text.

[1] Abraham Joshua Heschel: An Echo of Eternity, Jewish Lights 1995, 119

Shabbat Shalom,
Rabbi Julia Knobloch