Rabbi Binyamin Yuhanan - Parshat Bamidbar

good evening we are learningbad and with this we start the new sefer bamid bar we are using the art scroll khumash we're on page 727. and departure begins by telling us the date and the date is the first of the month of ER the Torah says on the first of the second month which is er in the second year after their Exodus from the land of Egypt God spoke to Moshe in the wilderness of Sinai in the tent of meaning so now right away in one sentence Torah tells us a lot of information number one the location it happened in the desert in the wilderness which Wilderness it's called The Wilderness of Sinai which means there is harsinai there is the Mount Sinai and around Mount Sinai is the Sinai desert which is called the Sinai wilderness and God spoke to Moshe from the tent of meaning whereas during the Revelation at harsinai during the giving of the Torah which we will celebrate next um Monday and Tuesday God spoke from a top of the mountain but after the Jewish people built the mishkan when they built the Tabernacle God spoke to them from within the Tabernacle from between the the cherubs but when was the tabernacle built the Tabernacle was assembled finally on the first of Nissan the first day of the first month foreign tells us that now we are in the second month that means exactly one month passed since the Jewish people built the mishkan and it is the second year from The Exodus after the Jewish people came of Egypt a new calendar system was established just for the Jewish people whereas the first month of the year is for the non-jews and the first month is tishire for the Jewish people as well before The Exodus and that's why we celebrate Rosh Hashanah in tishre in somewhere in September why because the world and together with it the entire Humanity was was created on uh the first of tissue Adam the first Man was created on the first of touche and six days early on 25th of elul that's when the whole world was created and we celebrated the first month as tishere and we celebrated Rosh Hashanah the New Year all along throughout the ages Adama Rishon and Noah and avraham it's hak and yankov everyone celebrated Rosh Hashanah foreign however when the Jewish people came out of Egypt God said now I want you to establish a new calendar system no longer will the first month be tishere the first month will be nice son for the Jewish people and therefore if the first month is Nissan is moved to seventh month and from now on when the Torah speaks about uh the holidays it will use Jewish months for example it will say that Yom Kippur and Rosh Hashanah fall out in the seventh month and then you might ask how's that possible that we celebrate Rosh Hashanah the new year in the seventh month how how does that work no other nation has such a strange calendar that you celebrate the New Year in the seventh month and the answer is because we're using two different calendar systems one for the entire world a universal New Year is in September and the Jewish calendar system starts in Nissan that is why Torah here says in the second year after their Exodus we still celebrate because after all that's when the world was created that's when our ancestor Adam the first Man was created but for our internal counting for the counting of the um holidays we use the Jewish calendar starting from Nissan and by the way why do you think the school year starts in September and why do you think Labor Day which marks the beginning of the working year starts in September and that is because it's it's uh commemorating on the same time on the same date as the Jewish New Year which as I said is a universal New Year okay now the Torah says take a census of the entire assembly of the children of Israel which means Hashem says to Moshe I want you to count the entire Jewish Nation but how do we make the senses we count families instead of counting individuals we count Families how do we count families we count the heads of families and that's what it says take a census of the entire assembly of the children of Israel according to their families according to their father's household by the number of the names every male according to their head count why every male because if you want to count families you just count the fathers if you count how many heads or families you have and you'll get the number of families and that's why the verse 3 says from 20 years of age and up from 20 years of age and up you count them which means any man any man that is under 20 we don't count he's still on uh considered in the same household as his father and any man who is over 60 you can say he's already a great grandfather and therefore he already doesn't run his own household he already belongs to the household of one of his children so the total numbers you will see uh in the middle of the the Parsha will be about 600 000 males from 20 until 60. and that means that there were 600 000 Jewish families not counting the condiment living and now if you make a calculation how many Jews were there so if you take an average family in an average family you have the father the mother plus the great grandfather great-grandmother those that are over 16. then you have two sets of them that's already six people the parents plus two sets of grandparents and maybe you'll add to it a great grandparents as well so you'll have uh even eight or ten people and on top of that you have every family has children four six eight ten so when we say there were 600 000 males between ages of 20 and 60. it really means that they were that number times Maybe eight maybe ten so it could be they were all together approximately anywhere between three to six million Jewish people but one of the reasons that we don't count everybody is uh because it's considered not a good sign to count people and therefore we count families according to their families in order to disguise the number of the Jewish people so that the inara will not fall on us now in verse 4 Hashem says to Moshe did to help him in this task of counting the Jews he should appoint one man for each tribe who will be the leader of the entire tribe and these 12 men are listed now we go to page 729 verse 18. they gather together the entire assembly on the first of the second month and they established their genealogy according to their families according to their father's household by number of the names from 20 years of age and up as Hashem had commanded Moshe he counted them in the wilderness of C9 and now Torah gives us the totals for each tribe and in addition to giving us the totals it also tells us the position of each tribe when they uh in Camp and the way they would encamp was that there was a mishkan the mishkan the Tabernacle was in the center and on three sides were living because as we're gonna learn later there were three families of Levites foreign and on the Eastern side were kohanim and Moshe which means on the Eastern side where the tents of aharon his two sons and the tent of motion so now around the mishkan and the the tents of levim and kohanim were the tens of the 12 tribes there were three on each side three on the East three on the west three on the North and three on the south all together Twelve Tribes and as you notice the tribe of Levy is not counted it's it's in camping separately it's counted separately and uh instead we take the tribe of yourself and we divide it in half and we give yourself two tribes Ephraim and Minnesota whenever we exclude Levy from the count we count Ephraim and Menace as part of the 12 tribes and so we always have 12 tribes but if we count Levy among the Jewish tribes then we unite Ephraim in Ministry and we count him as yourself so the number of tribes is always 12. but sometimes split to make 12 and sometimes they're combined and we join Levy and then we make 12. foreign who leads the southern camp you have Reuben shiman and God and the number is given for each tribe for Reuben it's 46 500 families for shiman it is 59 300 families for God it is 45 650 families now we go to the east on the Eastern side Yehuda was the leader and together with him he had the tribes of his Sahar and the volume now for Yehuda we have 74 600 families yudah was the largest tribe is sahad had 54 400 families and the volume had 57 400 families and now we go to the West on the west were the children of Rachel Joseph and the leader of them was the tribe of Ephraim and together with him was minashe and binyamin so Ephraim had 40 500 families now we go to page 731. Menasha had 32 200 families and binyamin had 35 400 40 35 400 families now according to this was the smallest tribe however if you split the crime in Menasha then minashe was the smallest tribe with 32 200 and binyama was 35 400. uh families and now we go to the northern side done the tribe of done was the leader of the northern encampment and together with him were Asher and naftali so Don had 62 700. families I share had 41 000. 500 families and naftali had 53 400 families now the Torah gives us the total if you add up all the numbers we have 600 and three thousand and 550 families and now in verse 47 the Torah tells us that the Levites are not counted in the census Hashem spoke to Moshe saying but you shall not count the tribe of lady why not for two reasons because the Levites do not fight in the army and the census was according to men who fight an army between 20 and 60 years and the reason why they don't fight an army is because they the verse 50 says appoint the Levites over the Tabernacle of the testimony over all of its utensils they shall carry the Tabernacle on all its utensils and judicial minister to it since the Levites had a separate job they were not available to fight Wars foreign 51 says when the Tabernacle Journeys the Levites shall take it down and when the Tabernacle in camps the Levites shall assemble it and the any one who is not a levite may not approach the Tabernacle in its disassembled state otherwise they will die so again the reason the the Levites are not counted is because they don't go to the Army and they don't go to the Army because they are occupied with serving um in the in the Tabernacle and servicing it disassembling and assembling it and therefore when the Jewish people came into the land of Israel they divided the land between the tribes but the Levites did not receive any land because those that received farmland had to be farmers and Levites could not be Farmers because they were committed both Levites and kohanim were committed to the service in the temple and um therefore they had to find other jobs that they could leave for example the Levites uh and kohanim were teachers rabbis and judges and other community jobs so that one Temple when they're turned to serve in the temple comes they can take a vacation and leave and that happened twice a year for one week the kohanimum the Levites would go to betameegdash and to accomplish that they divided all the quanim and all the Levine into 24 families 24 of lots and therefore every levite or kohanik family would go to the temple for one week once in 24 weeks and then that's approximately half a year and then again after 24 weeks they would go again to uh the temple so only two weeks out of the year the kohanim and the living would serve in the temple what did they do the rest of the year the rest of the year they were free to do whatever they want but they could not be committed to farming and therefore they did not receive any land so where did they live the the Levites received uh 48 cities throughout the land of Israel there were 4 48 levite cities which also served as Cities of Refuge in case someone um kills another Jew by mistake he has to run to the City of Refuge as a punishment as and for being negligent and also for protection so that no one from the family of the killed man uh should hurt him um so the Levites had cities to live in but they did not have farm land now we're on page 733 and the the Torah again lists explains to us the formation of the camp the Jewish camp and uh that the temple is in the center and the the tribes are all around and it's repetition of what we just said so we're gonna go quickly through it Chapter two The the four formations of the camp Yehuda is on the um East and it gives us the total number of the encampment in the East and that is 186 and 400 families now we turn to page we have the tribe uh and and now we go to the southern side of the mishkan we have the tribes of reuven shiman and God and the total number of families in the southern encampment is 151 and 600 families now I'm sorry 151 000 and 450 families and in verse 17 it uh explains where the tent of meeting was and where did Levites in Camp the tent of meeting the camp of the Levites shall journey in the middle of the camps as they encamp so shall they Journey everyone in his place according to the Badness now there is a an argument in the talmud how did the Jewish people travel through the desert as I explained the way they encamped was that the mishkan was in the center the Levites were around and the remain other 12 tribes were around the Levites in a square formation so there are two opinions in a talmud one opinion says that the way they encamped that's how they traveled in a square not in a line in a square just like it says in verse 17 the 10th of the meeting the camp of the Levi's shall journey in the middle of the camp as they encamp so shall they Journey so the opinion that says they traveled as a square and the square was huge it was 12 kilometers in width and 12 kilometers in length that means they needed a huge Highway and that's why the clouds of Glory had to flatten the mountains and raise the valleys because according to this opinion they traveled as a 12 kilometer group but the second opinion in the talmud says that they did not travel in a square but rather in a line every tribe traveled together but there was one tribe and then another tribe and then another tribe it was still huge because okay it was not 12. uh kilometers but it was still an entire tribe and an entire tribe let's say uh if you have three tribes this way and that's 12 kilometers plus the mishkan so each single tribe was three kilometers so again the argument is did they travel as as a square of three tribes wide of 12 kilometers wide or One Tribe wide one tribe after another tribe and that was about about three to four kilometers wide group and so how does he interpret this pasuk as they jur as they encamped so they Journey so he says that uh what it means is that the Tabernacle was in the center there was the the tribe of the the camp of Yehuda then the camp of ruven and then the Levites would carry the Tabernacle and then the camp of Ephraim and then the camp of done now Verse 18 speaks about the western side of the mishkan the head of that encampment was Ephraim minashe and binyamin and together their total number was 108 000 and 100 families and now on the North side of the mishkan was the the leader tribe of Don and together with them a Sharon of Tali and together the total number was 157 600 families now we go to page 737. and verse 32 gives us the grand total these are the countings of the children of Israel according to their father's households all the countings of the camps according to their Legions were 603 550 families the Levites were not counted among the children of Israel as Hashem had commanded motion now we go to chapter 3. and now we will speak about the kohanim and levim these are The Offspring of aharon and Moshe on the day Hashem spoke with Moshe and Mount Sinai these are the Sun the names of the sons of aharon and again we list all of Aaron's sons even those that died these were the names of the sons of Aaron the anointed kohanim whom he inaugurated to minister however an unfortunate thing happened and verse 4 says who died before Hashem when they offered an alien fire before Hashem in the wilderness of Sinai and therefore they had no children but al-azhar and itamar ministered during the lifetime of haranda father so at this point there are three kohanim in the entire world and itamar later one more Cohen will be added and that is pinhas and of course children of elazar itaman and children of pinhas are the quanim that we have in our times now the appointment of the Levites verse 5 says Hashem spoke to Moshe saying bring near the tribe of Levy and have it stand before around the kohen and they shall serve him and already in the Torah portion he draw we learned that after the Jewish people built the golden calf they lost the ability to serve in the mishkan originally from every Jewish Family there was supposed to be one person who is the firstborn to be the Cohen of the family and every family would have a personal altar a personal Miss Baya in their home and the firstborn would be ministering would be serving on that altar but after the Jewish people created the golden calf Hashem said no more personal altars from now on you can only have a national museum in the betamic dash and no longer firstborn are allowed to be kohanim rather now it is the Levites and kohanim who will serve in betamic dash so now go to page 739 verse 9 you shall present the Levites to Aaron and his sons verse 10 you shall appoint Aaron and his sons and they shall Safeguard their priesthood and the alien anyone who is not a Cohen who approaches the Tabernacle to serve will die verse 12. speaks about the replacement of regular firstborn with the Levites behold I have taken the Levites from among the children of Israel in place of every firstborn how so the now Hashem will tell the Jewish people to count the number of the Levites and later to count the number of all the firstborn Jews and we will see that the the number is almost identical and however uh many Jewish people they were extra among the firstborn who could not be Redeemed by the Levites and there were very few of them would have to pay five shekel prize to be redeemed this is what we do when we have a firstborn baby boy we redeem him from Cohen again because originally the firstborn was supposed to serve in the temple and now cohend us so we have to pay Cohen five silver coins as a Redemption for our baby so now verse 15. count the sons of Levy according to their father's household according to their families and here there's a difference every male from one month of age and up shall you count them unlike the Jewish people who are counted from the age of 20 years old until 60 the Levites are counted from the age of one month and up no upper limit and the reason why they're counted from one month is because a baby that is under one month old is not yet considered a full citizen why because we're not sure if he will survive the first month of the baby is the most dangerous and um therefore we wait one month and only then we count him as a citizen and that is why when we do Pidgeon haben Redemption of the firstborn baby boy we wait 30 days only after the first 30 days we give the five coins to the Cohen but if Hassan Shalom the baby dies within the first month then the parents don't have to give the kohen five silver coins okay now verse 17 tells us the structure of the levite tribe these were the sons of Levy by the names Gershon kehat and mirari so there were three levitic families and it tells us the children of Gershon the children of kehat and the children of mirari and by the way the kehat is the father of amram and amram is the father of Moshe and aharon and Miriam therefore were from the family of kehat now we go to page 741. and the Torah gives us the the number of uh a man in the tribal in the family of Gershon and they were 7 500 men not families because we're counting even babies from uh one month old and they encamped in on the west of the mishkan and the family of kihad had 8 600 men and they encamped on the south of Michigan and the family of mirari had 6 200 men and then camped on the Northern side of the mishkan and verse 32 tells us that the Levites had a leader who was a kohen the leader of the levite leaders was elizar son of aharon De Cohen and now verse 38 tells us who encamped on the Eastern side of the mishkan that was the entrance to the mishkan those who encamped before the Tabernacle to the front which means the East the East is always considered the front before the tent of meeting to the east where Moshe and aharon and his sons and now the total number of the Levites was 22 000 plus 300 Levites who were first born themselves and therefore therefore they could not redeem the Jewish firstborns now in verse 40 we count the Israelite firstborn Hashem count every firstborn male of the children of Israel from one month age and up and the firstborn of Jewish people we also count from one month because that is the age of pidionaben of redemption and you shall take the Levites for me I am Hashem in place of every firstborn of the children of Israel mosh accounted as Hashem had commanded him every firstborn of the children of Israel and how many there were there were 22 000 and 273. if you remember there were 22 000 Levites plus 300 first born Levites so the 22 regular 22 000 of regular Levites redeemed the 22 000 of of the firstborn Israelites but you have 273 extra first-born Israelites who will now need to redeem themselves with money verse 46 and as for the redemptions of the 273 of the firstborn of the children of Israel who are in excess of the Levites you shall take five shekels each according to the head count in a sacred shekel shall you take and you will give the money to aharon the kohen and his sons as Redemption of the additional ones among them so how did they choose who is going to pay the five dollar fee five silver coins if motion would come to any firstborn Jew and say why don't you pay five shekels the Jew would say why Me Maybe I'm included in the 22 000 Levites that redeemed us so what was Moshi supposed to do so Hashem told him take pieces of whatever it is parchment pottery and right on them lazy and take 22 000 pieces that say levy on them and then take 273 blank pieces of parchment and put all of these together in one huge box 22 lots and let every firstborn Jew go and take one if he chooses the one that says Levi then he's redeemed but if he chooses a blank one then he needs to pay five silver coins now we'll go to page 745 chapter 4 duties of the Levites we said that Levites will serve the um in the Tabernacle and their main job was to assemble it one day in Camp and disassemble it when they need to travel and so what exactly did they carry when they traveled this is what chapter 4 is going to speak about first we speak about the the duties of the children of kehat since aharon the son of amram was the grandson of kehat that means that all the kohanim come from kehot and that is why kehat is the first one to be listed now Hashem spoke to motion Aaron saying take a census of the sons of kehad from among the sons of Levy according to the families according to the father's household but this time the senses is different from 30 years of age and up until 50 years of age only 20-year Gap from 30 to 50 years old because that is the age of Levites that can serve in the temple from 30 until 50 that's it and first we list the duties of kohanim so this is the work of the sons of kehat in the tent of meaning the most holy when the camp is to journey aharon and his sons who are the quanim shall come in and take down disassemble they shall take down the partition cover curtain the parochet and the cover the ark of the testimony with it and they will cover it with special covering made from tahash hide because when the Levites carry these utensils they were not allowed to touch them and not allowed to see them so before the Levites come the kuani would come in and wrap them in tahash skins takash is a special animal that lived at that time and on top of it they will spread a cloth entirely of turquoise wool over it and the same with the table the golden table and they would also spread a cloth of scarlet wool and takash height and turquoise wool on it and the menorah they would wrap as well they would not carry Menorah openly they would wrap it now we go to page 747 verse 11 upon the gold altar they shall spread a cloth of turquoise wool and cover it with a covering of takash hide and they would take the utensils and also wrap them in turquoise wool and takash height and they would take the the golden altar take off the Ash and spread the cloth of purple wool over it okay now verse 15. aharon and his sons the kohanim shall finish covering the holy utensils when the camp Journeys and only then the sons of kehad the Levites shall come to carry so that they not touch the sanctuary and die so here we see that a levite is not allowed to touch any of the utensils that are in the Holy and in the holy of holies now verse 16 tells us the duties of the sons of elazar the kohen of elazar the son of of himself he carried the oil of Illumination the incest spices the ketoret and the meal offering the minha and the anointment oil as well as he was in charge of the entire running of the Tabernacle so again just to summarize the children of kehat carried all the utensils that were in the kodesh and in the code shakudashim after they were wrapped by kuanim and elazar Har Cohen himself carried and minhan and now we're in verse 17 page 747 Hashem gives special precautions for the children of kehat we mentioned already that the children of kehat and all the Levites are not allowed to touch the utensils the holy utensils they can carry them but they cannot touch them so now Verse 18 says do not let the tribe of the families of kehat be cut off from among the Levites because if they either touch or see the utensils they will die thus shall you do for them so that they shall live and not die when they approached the holy of holies and his sons shall come and assign them every man to his work and his burden but they shall not come and look at the holy utensils how they are inserted into their coverings lest they die with this we conclude uh this is the first in the safe bar we learned about the senses the the counting of the Jewish people multiple countings of the 12 tribes and separately of the Levites and separately of the firstborn of the Jewish people and the Redemption of the firstborn with the Levites and as well the the animals of the Jewish people the firstborn animals of the the Jewish people were Redeemed by the animals of the Levites and the designation of Levites and kohanim as the servants in the in the temple and the duties of uh the the children of kihad and the duties of the other two families Gershon and mirari will be in next week's Torah portion thank you for listening is coming on Sunday night Monday and Tuesday all the best shalom