5779 Haftorah This week’s Haftorah discusses יפתח who went to war with בני עמון. The Gemara in ראש השנה דף כה ע"ב says יפתח בדורו כשמואל בדורו. The simple understanding of this Gemara is that in spite of the fact that יפתח was not a prophet and was just a warrior (ילקוט שמעוני ספר שופטים סז goes as far as to say he was not even a בן תורה), nonetheless for his generation he was as good as Shmuel....
5781 Motivation for Machlokes The Parsha begins ויקח קרח בן יצהר בן קהת בן לוי ודתן ואבירם בני אליאב ואון בן פלת בני ראובן. This coalition was made up of a group of individuals who were all seeking different things, some the נשיאות and some the כהונה. Although און בן פלת didn’t really have a claim, it could be that he was the man behind the ideological טענה of כל העדה כלם קדשים ובתוכם יקוק ומדוע תתנשאו על קהל ה'....
5781 Wise and Righteous The Parsha begins שלח לך אנשים. Rashi on the words כלם אנשים says כל אנשים שבמקרא לשון חשיבות ואותה שעה כשרים היו meaning they were Tzadikim. The Targum Yonason Ben Uziel says on the word אנשים that they were חריפין-sharp/astute people. Lastly, the Ibn Ezra says on the word אנשים that they were גבורים. So it would appear that everyone agrees that אנשים is a לשון of חשובים but there are three ways in explaining in what their חשיבות was....
5781 Opportunity When Out of Place The Parsha begins with Ahron being commanded בהעלתך את הנרת. Rashi points out that this Parshas is out of place by asking למה נסמכה פרשת המנורה לפרשת הנשיאים because if these events occurred chronologically, then there would be no need for such a question. Therefore, the fact that Rashi asks למה נסמכה indicates that this event is not in the chronological order of event as we see in the Gemara in Gittin on 60b that the Parshah of the Menorah was one of the eight Parshiyos given on Rosh Chodesh Nissan before the Nesiim began to bring their Korbanos and it wasn’t said now, after the Nesiim concluded bringing their Korbanos, which was on the twelfth day of Nissan....
5781 Importance of personal connection The second half of the Parsha discusses the Korbanos that were brought by the Nesiim by the Chanukas Hamishkan. Although the Nesiim brought identical Korbanos, the Torah spells out the Korbanos that each Nasi brought. It would seem to make more sense for the Torah to write it once and then say that this is what each Nasi brought. What is the significance and message being taught that the Korbanos of each Nasi is written out even though it is seemingly repetitious as they are all identical?...