Contrast: In Bamidbar it's starts right off with "Vayechel Haam" without giving a background of why they started sinning, However, in Shemot it gives an introduction and talks about the desire of bnei yisrael to have someone new to look up to.
Compare: In Bamidbar we see Bnei Yisrael losing there connection with Hashem so they decide to built altars to and pray to other Gods, similarly in Shemot we see Aaron building an altar in front of the egel hazahav symbolizing that they're straying off the path of God.
Compare and Contrast:
Compare: The pesukim both say that God says the nation should be destroyed for their sins.
Contrast: In Bamidbar Hashem tells Moshe to kill the nation while in Shemot Hashem says straight to bnei yisrael straight that they should kill themselves.
Contrast: The situation's were different because In Shemot they felt like they were without Hashem because Moshe was gone for a long time, while in Bamidbar they had Moshe who gave them the feeling of Hashem's Sechina that they were missing in the 40 days Moshe was up on Har Sinai.
Contrast: In Shemot they're coming from 40 years in the Desert and they are just developing their beliefs in Hashem and his Torah, while in Bamidbar they're already settled in Shitim and have been through a lot with Hashem so they understand his power.
Contrast: In Bamidbar they were invited to do the sin and were just following the majority of the people around them. It was easier for them to sin because the nation's around them invited them to sin. BUT, in Shemot it was everyone's own choice to do the sin because there were no nations around them to convince them to do Avodah Zara. Also, they took their own jewelry and sacrificed it in order to make the Egel which means that they cared enough to value the Egel more than their personal possessions.
Comparing and Contrasting Mepharshim:
(ח) וישתחוו לו ויזבחו. דרך הספור להוסיף ולהגדיל האשמה זה אחר זה. מש״ה החל ה׳ וישתחוו לו. ולא עוד גם ויזבחו לו. שהוא חמור מהשתחואה שישנו גם בהיתר למלכים ושרים משא״כ זביחה שאינו אלא עבודת אלוה. כן בפנים כן בחוץ:
The pasuk says they bow down to it and then they offer sacrificies to it. It's like a way to tell a story- you build up their guilt because it's so bad and you don't want it to seem so bad right away.
It says bow down first because obviously it's bad but it's not the worst possible thing because it can be a decent thing when it was to a king like it's generally bad but sometimes acceptable and then offering sacrifices is the worst possible thing. It was even acceptable when there were kings.
These two commentaries on the words וישתחוו are similar because they both start with bowing down and then lead to something awful. In Bamidbar the Jews bow down to the Baal Peor and then they have sex with a whore. As well in Shemot, they bow down to the Egel and then bring sacrifices to it. In both situations they bow down and then totally cross the line.
The Rashi on Bamidbar 25:3 says that Hashem sent a plague upon Bnei Yisroel, showing that they deserve it, but in the Seforno on Shemot 32:11 it talks about how Moshe doesn't think that all of Bnei Yisroel deserve a plague for the sin there, so this comparison shows that the second generation sin was worse. However they are similar because they both compare Vayachar Af to Hashems anger and they both say that Hashems anger on Bnei Yisroel would lead to plagues
We couldn't find any parshanim that compare both texts but we combined the parshanim that focus on the same words in each perek so we can't complete b of step 2
What are the major differences between the generations?
The first generation only sinned because they wanted to make their connection with hashem stronger. They had no intentions of doing avodah zarah for their own personal good and only wanted to do it to benefit their relationship with Hashem. However, in generation two they sinned not because they wanted to have a better relationship with Hashem, but they sinned for their own personal good. They sin here because they are influenced by the other nations, and are either doing it out of “peer” pressure, or out of wanting to be more like them.
Do you feel the second generation is better than their parent’s generation? Why or why not?
In our opinion the second generation is actually worse than the first generation. As stated above, the first generation sinned because they wanted to strengthen their connection with Hashem while the second generation sinned because they wanted to strengthen their connection with the other nations and to improve how they looked in the other nations eye’s.
Also for the first generation sin, Moshe asked hashem to not punish the whole nation for the sin of cheit haegel. However, in the second generation sin Moshe never asked Hashem not to punish everyone, he just followed hashem’s orders. So this clearly shows that the Generation two sin was worse.
how does his approach relate to your texts?
This relates to our text because we see in generation 1 that they still have faith in hashem but like the Ibn Ezra says, they have slave mentality. This slave mentality causes them to always want to worship someone, so when they couldn’t worship Hashem they had to worship a golden calf. Even though in generation 2 they don’t have slave mentality, they still do bad things because they are influenced by the outside world unlike generation 1.
Do you agree or disagree with his approach?
We disagree with his approach because we think that Generation two’s sin was worse. Even though Generation 1 did have slave mentality, they still believed in Hashem but they also wanted to worship someone like they did in Egypt. However Generation 2 didn’t have slave mentality, although it was bad because they felt that they could do everything on their own which lead to them committing even worse sins (having sex with a whore and bowing down to their gods). So even though having slave mentality is bad because you shouldn’t always rely on someone, you still need to remember that you are hashem's slave and that you aren’t greater than him and lastly that he is the only thing to worship.
This project is similar to the project at the beginning of the year- what skills did you utilize in both projects?
In both of these projects we were able to utilize the skills needed to compare and to contrast and we were also able to read two texts that were seemingly not alike and find similarities and differences between the two.
How do you feel your textual and analytical skills have changed from the beginning of the year to now?
In the beginning of the year we were all lacking basic skills that would have made a project like this a lot harder, but from the way we learned how to compare texts we were able to gain those skills and now we are able to comprehend how to do something like this.
Do you think online Torah text resources like Sefaria and Alhatorah will impact how you learn in the future- why or why not?
Yes because they give us translations of the texts in all different languages and they bring the Tanach in a different way. With all the resources it has, it really enhances our learning and helps us understand better.