Shabbat Shalom. Mattot is a difficult parsha. Thats an understatement!

Mattot is full of contradictions The Moses in Mattot is not the Moses of Exodus or Numbers. What he does and says it leaves a lot of us wondering how to reconcile him with our venerated image of him as national savior. Were the Israelites, wandering bmidbar, in the desert. We camp when God says to, we pack up and wander some more when God says to. Moses is in charge because God said so. Weve already seen what happens to folks who question that anyone naming their kids after Korach? Yeah, I didnt think so. *smile* And now, weve sent scouts into the land of Canaan to see how fertile, how plentiful, how beautiful that land is. This is the land God promised us we could have. The only problem? There are some folks still living there and theyre our enemies. So what is a fledgling nation to do when confronted by an enemy nation living in their land?

Heres how the Torah says it. Moses spoke to the people, saying, 'Detach men for armed service against Midian, so that God's revenge can be taken against the Midianites. One thousand from each of Israel's tribes shall be sent into armed service.' From the thousands of Israel, 1000 volunteered from each tribe, [a total of] 12,000 special troops. Moses sent forth the 1000 men from each tribe as an army along with Pinchas son of Eleazar the priest, who was in charge of the sacred articles and signal trumpets. They mounted a surprise attack against Midian as God had commanded Moses, and killed all the [adult] males. Along with the other victims, they also killed the five kings of Midian: Evi, Rekem, Tzur, Chur, and Reva, the five Midianite kings. They also killed Balaam son of Beor by the sword. The Israelites took captive all the women of Midian and their children. They took as booty all their animals, all their possessions, and all

their wealth. [The Israelites] also set fire to all their residential cities and fortresses, taking all the booty and plunder, both man and beast. They brought the captives, the plunder, and the spoils to Moses, Eleazar the priest, and the entire Israelite community, [who were] in the Western Plains of Moab, on the Jericho Jordan. Moses, Eleazar and all the community princes went out to greet them outside the camp. However, Moses was angry at the generals and captains, who were the officers returning from the military campaign. 'Why have you kept all the women alive?' demanded Moses. 'These are exactly the ones who were involved with the Israelites at Balaam's instigation, causing them to be unfaithful to God in the Peor incident, and bringing a plague on God's community. Now kill every male child, as well as every woman who has been involved intimately with a man. However, all the young girls who have not been involved intimately with a man, you may keep alive for yourselves.

Rough. What do I do with that? How can I possibly redeem Moses in my mind after a line like, Why have you kept all the women alive? Sure, hes the savior of the entire Jewish people but hes coming across like a big jerk here. Greater teachers than I have tackled this subject with much wisdom. Rabbi Shefa Gold proposes that Moses is struggling, as we all do, with his own 2 unique struggles. The Muslim concept of Lesser Jihad and Greater Jihad are useful in explaining these two different struggles. The Lesser Jihad is the struggle outside our own selves, in the world and among the people around us. The Greater Jihad, then, is the struggle within our selves, in and for our souls. At times, this Greater Jihad can cause us to act strangely with the people around us. We hurt inside, so we take that hurt out on those we love or those of whom we are afraid. We feel small, so we diminish

the ones around us. It is very clear, looking through this lens, that Moses was letting his Greater Jihad influence his Lesser in this instance. Lets go back to that awful moment when Moses demands the death of the Midianite women and male children. As Gold says, In this terrible moment, that contradicts all the laws of mercy and kindness, that overturns even the laws of warfare; in this moment of witnessing the awful cruelty unleashed by unrestrained power, even the most callous among us must begin to wonder, "What is the source of this hatred? What is fueling this obsession? How can it be stopped?" We look to the life-story of Moses for answers. The name of this portion means "Tribes." Where do we find our identity? How is that identity sustained? How is it threatened? Moses, the infant saved by an Egyptian royal (queen, princess, theyre all the same). Raised as a Prince of Egypt, his life was pretty cushy until the day he learned of his true heritage and accidentally struck dead an

Egyptian who was harshly beating an Israelite slave. He ran away from Egypt, lived in the wilderness, got married, had kids and was a shepherd until he experienced God at the burning bush and received his divine mission. Well, all that time he was living as a Midianite. Married to one, raising kids in their way, assumedly growing to love their society and culture. Moses was a Midianite for roughly 40 years. How then could he order the massacre of EVERY man, woman and boy child of that nation? According to Rabbi Gold, Whenever we try to reject a part of ourselves, that part becomes our shadow. The shadow is the part of us that is hidden from the light of consciousness. In that moment when blind fury unfolds into hatred against the other, we can be sent from the Lesser Jihad, from the battle in the world, to the Greater Jihad - the battle within. We are jarred into the realization that the external

battle is only a dim reflection of the inner battle that has been raging all along. Once exposed, the shadow can be healed. Only when we acknowledge the warring tribes within us, can we begin to make peace, first in ourselves and then in the world. A moment of tragic cruelty, illuminated by the light of humility and wisdom, becomes a hard-earned blessing. In that moment, our identity expands from tribal to universal. In that moment, our tribal identity becomes transparent. The structure of that identity still gives us meaning and comfort, but we can also see right through it and celebrate the many tribes that constitute the human family, all of us interconnected, bound to each other through our shared humanity. The moment when Moses' cruelty is unmasked, and we see a man at war with himself, is a moment of blessing. The moment when Moses' violent turmoil is revealed, we see a man who has rejected

a part of himself. This is a moment of blessing. In this moment the spiritual work of healing begins. LET US REMEMBER that the Torah is not a story about someone else and it is not about some other time. It is a map of the inner landscape. It is a revelation, shining the light of awareness on all the myriad facets of human experience. AND IT IS HAPPENING IN THIS PRESENT MOMENT. If we are to truly receive the blessing of Torah, we must take the opportunity of our shock at Moses' cruelty to unmask and face our own capacity to dehumanize the other. The story of Mattot shows us that our own cruelty is the result of an inner struggle long buried by our defenses and denial. In that struggle, our tribal identity is rendered opaque. Our identity becomes a shield and a weapon; a shield against the truth of our human vulnerability, and a weapon against the "stranger." WE FIND THE BLESSING of Mattot in the fact that although the Torah tells us of Moses' command to kill the women and children,

it doesn't tell us whether this order was ever carried out. Each of us must search within and discern our own capacity for cruelty born of our personal confusions, conditioned misperceptions and brokenness. Yet ultimately, it is up to us whether those shadows will birth tragedy. It is up to us to decide whether or not their orders will be carried out. Even while that last bit (about whether the order was carried out or not) sounds like searching for an easy way to deal with Moses terrible behavior, the parsha still offers us a chance to look deeply in the mirror and see the parts of ourselves we dont necessarily even admit are there. The impatience, the anger, the hatred perhaps. Mattot teaches us, through Moses example, that it is only by facing our cruelest selves that we can shine light on those pieces and begin the work of healing them. May we all find the strength to do such grueling, rewarding work. Shabbat Shalom.