Parasha Insights: The Great and Fearsome Desert Behaalotecha (Rav Moshe Shapiro zt"l)

(35) When the Ark was to set out, Moses would say:

Advance, O יהוה !

May Your enemies be scattered,

And may Your foes flee before You! (36) And when it halted, he would say:

Return, O יהוה,

You who are Israel’s myriads of thousands!

§ Rav Ketina says: Six thousand years is the duration of the world, and it is in ruins for one thousand years. The duration of the period during which the world is in ruins is derived from a verse, as it is stated: “And the Lord alone shall be exalted on that day” (Isaiah 2:11), and the day of God lasts one thousand years.

Know that in the word la’asoth (to make, to do) is also included a hint that the six days of creation represent all the days of the world, i.e., that its existence will be six thousand years. For this reason the Rabbis have said: “A day of the Holy One, blessed be He, is a thousand years.”

Thus on the first two days the world was all water, and nothing was perfected during them. They allude to the first two thousand years when there was no one to call on the name of the Eternal. And so the Rabbis said: “The first two thousand years there was desolation.”

1) However, there was the creation of light on the first day corresponding to the thousand years of Adam who was the light of the world and who recognized his Creator. Perhaps Enosh did not worship idols until the death of the first man.

2) On the second day G-d said, ‘Let there be a firmament… and let it divide,’ for on that “day” [i.e., the second thousand-year period] Noah and his sons — the righteous ones — were separated from the wicked, who were punished in water.

3) On the third day, the dry land appeared; plants and trees began growing, and fruits ripened. This corresponds to the third thousand-year period which begins when Abraham...began to call the name of the Eternal...

4) On the fourth day the luminaries — the large and the small and the stars — were created. Its “day,” in the fourth thousand-year period, began seventy-two years after the First Sanctuary was built and continued until one hundred seventy-two years after the destruction of the Second Sanctuary. Now on this “day,” the children of Israel had light, for the glory of the Eternal filled the house of the Eternal, and the light of Israel became the fire upon the altar in the Sanctuary, resting there like a lion consuming the offerings. Afterwards their light diminished and they were exiled to Babylon just as the light of the moon disappears before the birth of the new moon. Then the moon shone for them all the days of the Second Sanctuary, and the fire upon the altar rested on it like a dog. And then the two luminaries disappeared towards eventide and the Sanctuary was destroyed.

5) On the fifth day the waters swarmed with living creatures and fowl flying above the earth. This was a reference to the fifth thousand-year period which began one hundred seventy-two years after the destruction of the Second Sanctuary since, during this millennium, the nations will have dominion, and man will be made as the fishes of the sea, as the creeping things, that have no ruler over them; they take up all of them with the angle, catch them in their net and gather in their drag, and no one seeks the Eternal.

6) On the sixth day in the morning, G-d said: ‘Let the earth bring forth the living creature after its kind, cattle and creeping thing, and beast of the earth after its kind.’ Their creation took place before sunrise, even as it is written, The sun ariseth, they withdraw, and crouch in their dens. Then man was created in the image of G-d, and this is the time of his dominion, as it is written, Man goeth forth unto his work and to his labor until the evening. All this is an indication of the sixth thousand-year period in the beginning of which the “beasts,” symbolizing the kingdoms that knew not the Eternal, will rule...It would appear from the change of days — from the swarms of the waters and the fowl created on the fifth day to the beasts of the earth created on the sixth day — that in the beginning of the sixth thousand-year period a new ruling kingdom will arise, dreadful and terrible, and strong exceedingly, and approaching the truth more than the preceding ones.

7) The seventh day which is the Sabbath alludes to the World to Come, “which will be wholly a Sabbath and will bring rest for life everlasting.”

And may God guard us during all the days and set our portion with His servants, the blameless ones.

This substance, which the Greeks called hyly, is called in the sacred language tohu, the word being derived from the expression of the Sages: “betohei (when the wicked bethinks himself) of his doings in the past.” If a person wants to decide a name for it [this primordial matter], he may bethink himself, change his mind and call it by another name since it has taken on no form to which the name should be attached.

"G-d said to Abram, 'Go forth from your land…'" (Genesis 12:1)

Rabbi Yitzchak said: this may be compared to a man who was traveling from place to place when he saw a castle aglow. He said, "Is it possible that this castle lacks a person to look after it?" The owner of the building looked at him and said to him, 'I am the master of the castle.'" What happened with Abraham our father was similar. He said, “Is it possible that this universe lacks a person to look after it?," the Holy Blessed One looked at him and said to him, 'I am the Master of the Universe.'"

The term “at night” indicates that in the case of anyone who cries at night, one who hears his voice is touched by his suffering and cries with him.

Hadrian said to R. Joshua: “Mighty is the lamb that can survive among seventy wolves.” And he replied: “Mighty is the shepherd who can save and protect the lamb, and destroy the wolves surrounding her.”