Parshat Naso
By: Moshe Goodman, Kollel Or Shlomo, Hebron
בס"ד
לשכנו תדרשו
Lifting Our Thoughts Towards the Holy Presence in
Our Holy Land Land
"ואשא אתכם על כנפי נשרים ואביא אתכם אלי" (שמות, יט, ד)
"... לא יטמא להם במותם כי נזר א-היו על ראשו" (במדבר ו, ו)
"And He said to me: Son of Man, these bones are all of Israel. Behold, they say our bones are dry, our hope is lost, we are lost. Therefore, prophecy and say unto them: So says the Master, HaShem: Behold, I open your graves, and I will raise you from your graves my People, and I will bring you to the Land of Israel... and you shall know that I am HaShem" (Ezekiel 37, 12).
Yehezkel's vision of the "dry bones", which we read on Shabbat Hol HaMoed Pesah, describes the return of our People from Exile to our Holy Land not as a resurrection of recently deceased people, but as a resurrection of those in graves, dry bones, dead very long before.
It is evident from this prophecy that the physical ascent of our People to the Holy Land is a tremendous spiritual ascent and lifting of consciousness towards the Holy Presence for our People and the world at large. The name of this week's parsha, Naso, meaning "to lift up", ties together much of the topics discussed in the parsha and on Shavuot, always subsequent to this parsha, as well.
Our first title quote from the reading for Shavuot shows us God's love for us preceding the Giving of the Torah, describing the exodus from Egypt to Mount Sinai as an ascent "on the wings of eagles" towards HaShem. Similarly, Midrash Tehilim, 48 says that the future redemption will be by ascent to the heavens (literally (plane-flight?) and/or spiritually) to the Land of Israel.
In parshat Naso this motif continues, as in the "lifting" or choosing of the Gershonites for Divine service, which involves "lifting" the different parts of the Mishkan. Later in the parsha, we are blessed by the Cohanim in what our Sages call "the lifting of hands", which also concludes with the words: "May HaShem lift His Countenance upon you and give you peace." Our parsha ends with gifts to the Mishkan given by the princes of Israel, called "Nesiim", which means "those lifted above the people."
While in all these instances, the same root, nun, sin, aleph, meaning "to lift", literally and grammatically reappears, in many instances in this parsha "lifting up" reappears in a conceptual way. Take for example our second title quote: The Nazirite is bid not to defile himself to the dead, because he has a "crown" ("nezer") of God upon his head (growth of hair for the sake of HaShem). A crown is the ornament, par excel lance, lifted upon one's head, signifying an individual's status "lifted above the people", as we explained with the word
"nesiim". Indeed, a king is called a "nasi" in Vayikra 4, 22.
Because of this special "lifted up" status, the Nazirite is not to
deal at all with the dead, those whose life-lifting souls have left them. This prohibition from Torah ordained mortal impurity is expanded by our Sages to include Rabbinic mortal impurities. An example of one of these Rabbinic impurities is the land outside the Land of Israel (Rambam Nzirut 7, 6-7).
This Rabbinic prohibition is so stringent that the Mishna of Nazir (ch. 3) tells us the story of Queen Helen who vowed in the Diaspora to be a Nazirite for seven years when her son returns from battle. For seven years after her son's return she observed Nazirite laws in the Diaspora. When she came to the Land of Israel, she learned that she must keep another seven years in order to observe the Nazirite laws properly in the purity of the Holy Land.
These ideas come full circle with Yehezkel's prophecy: when our People "ascend" to our Holy Land, our People are "lifted up" from the graves of impurity, "lifted up" as princes (and nazirites) in the Palace of our Father-King, "lifted up" in the crowns of the Torah of Zion (see Hagiga 5b), "lifted up" in the spirit of Hebron, First Kingdom of David, burial place of Ruth and Yishai his predecessors (auth. by Arizal), springboard of inspiration for Kaleb, his predecessor of Judah: "For my servant Kaleb... a different spirit was with him" (Num 14, 24).
Real Stories from the Holy Land #18: "Last week I dreamt that it poured in the summer months (I did not see or know of any forecast). The next day, on Hebron Day, it suddenly poured in Hebron,
