From: Netvort@aol.com
Sent: Friday, June 15, 2007 2:14 AM
To: JoshHoff@aol.com
Subject: Netvort : parshas Korach, 5767




                                               Not in My Name

           By Rabbi Joshua (unmentionably known as The Hoffer) Hoffman



  In honor of my nephew, Yisroel Meir Hefter, on the occasion of his marriage to Tova Erenberg, which took place this past Sunday, 24 Iyyar (June 10), in Chadeira. May they merit to build a home that is faithful to the Torah and the Jewish people.


  When the Torah lists the genealogy of Korach, it stops just short of mentioning that he was a descendant of Yaakov. Rashi, citing the midrash, explains that Yaakov asked not to be mentioned in connection with Korach’s rebellion against the leadership of Moshe and Aharon, although his name is mentioned in Divrei Hayomim in connection with the work of Korach’s descendants in the Beis Hamikdash. Why was Yaakov so concerned that his name not be mentioned in connection with this controversy recorded in this week’s parsha ? One answer could be that Yaakov, in kabbalah, represents the trait of tiferes, a combination and  reconciliation of the seemingly opposite traits of chesed and gevurah. Korach, on the other hand, insisted on seeing only his own view, which was really that of strict judgment, without any element of chesed, or kindness, as elaborated on by the Izhbitzer Rebbe in his Mei Shiloach. Korach’s approach in the controversy was completely opposed to Yaakov’s mission in life, and, therefore, he did not want to be associated with Korach in this context. Rav Zalman Sorotzkin, in his Oznayim LaTorah, offers a different approach, which, I believe, can be expanded in a way that sheds a great deal of light on Korach’s basic error.


Rabbi Sorotzkin explains that Yaakov was worried lest his own actions in tricking Eisav out of the birthright would be seen as a justification for Korach’s rebellion against Moshe’s leadership. Actually, Korach may have had such a claim, because, as Rashi mentions, he had a prophecy in which he saw a chain of great descendants coming from him, beginning with  the prophet Shmuel. Why, he may have argued, was he granted this prophecy, if not in order to bolster his claim to a position of stature among the Jewish nation? Yaakov, too, he could have argued, went ahead with his deception of Yitzchok in his efforts to receive his father’s blessings, because his mother Rivkoh had told him that her instructions to him were based on a prophecy, as the Targum to parshas Toldos seems to indicate. In order to dissociate himself from any such line of argument, Yaakov prayed that his name be left out of the lineage of Korach in the parsha that records the episode of his rebellion.


One may ask, however, why Korach was, in fact, wrong. If Yaakov based his deception of Yitzchok on a prophetic vision received by his mother, why couldn’t Korach use his vision of the great chain of descendants to emerge from him as an indication that he could challenge the choice of leadership made by Moshe just as Yaakov challenged the choice made by Yitzchok?  The answer is that Yaakov, living in the time period before the Torah was given, was able to act based on a prophetic vision. Once the Torah was given through Moshe, however, halachic decisions could only be made based on Torah, not on prophecy, based on the principle of  'lo bashamayim hi,’ or, the Torah is not in heaven, but was given to man to work with. And decide its application. Moreover, as the Rambam teaches in his commentary to the mishnah in Chullin (perek Gid HaNasheh), once the Torah was given through Moshe, our source of obligation in mitzvos comes only from Moshe and the Torah given through him, and not from any other source. Thus, we observe bris milah, not because Hashem told Avrohom to circumcise himself, but because Moshe was told by God to tell us to observe it. Korach’s resort to prophecy as a basis of his rebellion against Moshe’s decisions as to who would be the leaders of the Jewish nation and who would perform the service in the mishkan thus constituted a denial of Moshe’s special status, and of the entire underpinnings of the halachic system. That is why Yaakov did not want his name mentioned in regard to the rebellion, so that people would not associate what Korach tried to do to Moshe, based on a prophecy he had received, with what Yaakov had done to Eisav through deceiving Yitzchok, based on a prophecy he had received. Once the Torah was given, what was proper for Yakov to do was no longer proper for anyone else to do, and this factor lay behind Korach’s mistake in challenging Moshe.



  Please address all correspondence to the author (Rabbi Hoffman) with the following address - JoshHoff @ AOL.com.

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