בְּהַעֲלֹתְךָ
B’ha’alotkha / In Your Setting Up
Numbers 8:1-12:16
HafTorah Portion Zechariah 2:10-4:7
Brit Chadasha 1 Corinthians 10:6-13
This Torah Parsha is filled with dynamics, drama, and input for our lives today. B’ha’alotkha begins in chapter 8 with the setting up of the seven lamps to give light in front of the lampstand. The cleansing and dedication of the Levites is found in Numbers 8:5-19. It is in Numbers 8:16-19 that we can truly understand the depth of God’s love towards the Levites. He says in Numbers 8:19 that He has given the Levites as a gift to Aaron and his sons.
Chapter 9 contains the instructions for the second Passover after certain men who could not attend the Pesach come before Moshe and inquire: ‘What about us?’ God could have said, ‘sorry no second chance for you guys’, but rather Ha Pesach Sheni (the second Passover) was implemented by the grace of HaShem for His people to participate.
Numbers 9:14 clarifies the designation of One Torah, One Law for all as it states: ‘A foreigner residing among you is also to celebrate the Lord’s Passover in accordance with its rules and regulations. You must have the same regulations for both the foreigner and the native-born.’
Exodus 12:49, Leviticus 24:22, and Numbers 15:15 also reiterates this. John 1:1-4, John 1:14, John 10:30, John 14:6, and 1 Peter 3:18 also stand by One Torah, One Ordinance for all people who are in covenant with God. The Torah, as Yeshua, is not the Bible just for the Jews or salvation only for the Jews but for all the nations. One must question: were the Ten Commandments given to the Jewish people only?
Chapter ten contains instructions for the silver trumpets, the divisions of the camps as the Israelites leave, and an interesting dialog between Moshe and Hobab as he explains the goodness, grace, and mercy of Adonai according to the promises to Israel, Numbers 10:31-36.
Chapter 11 begins with the people complaining again, resulting in the anger of the Lord, the mana, and the quail. Moses becomes distraught and it seems to be the lowest point in his life, for he begs The Lord in verse 15 to kill him. Numbers 11:14-15 ‘14 I am not able to bear all these people alone, because the burden is too heavy for me. 15 If You treat me like this, please kill me here and now—if I have found favor in Your sight—and do not let me see my wretchedness!”
Even though it was the people giving him grief, Moses turned to God, equating his despair directly to God. ‘If You treat me like this…’ But what was the difference between the role of Moses in Exodus and Numbers? In Exodus, the problems were so large that only God could solve them. God sent signs and wonders, the 10 plagues, He divides the sea, He sends manna from heaven, and water from The Rock. When a problem arose, God gave Moses the solution, God did the solution. In Numbers, however, Moses has the chore of getting the people to change. They have gone through the Exodus, reached Sinai, made a covenant with God, and are on their way to the Promised Land. Moses’ role is now different. He has to get the people to change, take responsibility, and learn to do things for themselves while trusting in God, instead of relying on God to do things for them. But he realizes that they haven’t changed at all, for they are still complaining about the food, just like they did before Mount Sinai, before their covenant with God, before they had built the sanctuary, which was their first amazing undertaking together. This was an unconventional role, not expected by Moses. The same is true for us; we are fine when God solves our problems, but when the responsibility is upon our shoulders, it is easy to shrink and wonder. It is through the Psalmist in Psalm 121 that we know the cure. ‘Where does my help come from? It comes from The Lord.’
Numbers11:16-17 contains the implementation of the seventy elders. God assures Moshe of His goodness and faith as He tells him to take seventy elders who will bear the burden with him. God takes His Spirit that is upon Moses and extends it to the elders, relieving Moshe of the feeling of being alone against the people. Yet, two of them, Eldad and Medad, among the six chosen from each tribe but left out of the final call, begin prophesying within the camp. Joshua fears that this may lead to a challenge of Moses’ leadership and urges Moses to stop them. Moshe answers with a new and different type of certainty: “Are you jealous on my behalf? Would that all the Lord’s people were prophets, that He would rest His Spirit upon them all!” Numbers 11:29.
Yeshua in Luke 10:1 references the seventy elders, ‘After these things the Lord appointed seventy others also, and sent them two by two before His face into every city and place where He Himself was about to go…’
B’ha’alotkha ends with Miriam and Aaron’s opposition against Moshe, and the consequences that followed. But the attack against the leader Moshe is a side attack, as they complain against his wife, the Kushite woman, and not directly about him. He had been betrayed and slandered, by those closest to him. Yet Moses is unaffected. It is here that the Torah makes its great and famous statement: “Now the man Moses was very humble, more so than any other man on Earth.” Numbers 12:3. The idea that a leader’s highest virtue is humility must have seemed absurd, almost self-contradictory, in the ancient world. Leaders were kings, proud, magnificent warriors. They built temples in their own selves. Their role was not to serve but to be served. Everyone else was expected to be humble but not them. However, as we see once again Moshe climbs up to humility.
This was true of the King of Kings, Yeshua. People wanted a battle, a risen formation of Kingship, One to physically rescue them from the bondage of the Romans. Yeshua was that, but at the time they couldn’t see it. He conquered death, and opened the way into God’s presence, paving the way for His future return as the conquering King.
בְּהַעֲלֹתְךָ
B'ha'alotcha / In Your Setting Up
Numbers 8:1-12:16
Zechariah 2:10-4:7
1 Corinthians 10:6-13
Numbers 8:3 states: ‘And Aaron did so; he arranged the lamps to face toward the front of the lampstand, as the Lord commanded Moses.’
The importance was to arrange the lights so that the light shines in front of the menorah. Not behind it, but in front of it. What a metaphor for our lives. The menorah is the main component, and the seven lights shine from it. There is one light and we are to shine from it, outwardly, for the Main Light does not need our light, but rather we need the base of The Main Light and we represent that true One Light.
Psalm 119:105 ‘Your word is a lamp for my feet, a light on my path.
Numbers 6:24-26 “The Lord bless you and keep you; the Lord make his face shine on you
and be gracious to you; the Lord turn his face toward you and give you peace.”
Isaiah 60:1 ‘Arise, shine, for your light has come, and the glory of the Lord rises upon you.’
John 8:12 ‘Then Yeshua spoke to them again, saying, “I am the light of the world. He who follows Me shall not walk in darkness, but have the light of life.”
Acts 13:47 ‘For so the Lord has commanded us: ‘I have set you as a light to the Gentiles,
That you should be for salvation to the ends of the earth.’
We cannot shine His light without walking in the truth. The light of the menorah alludes to the Torah, the light of which is the eternal flame, lighting the pathway of men and the light of Yeshua. The whole truth of God’s instruction is to be the spiritual light of man. King Solomon speaks of God’s grace in giving His Torah to His people: Proverbs 6:23 - “For the commandment is a lamp and the teaching a light, and the reproofs of discipline are the way of life.” God’s commandments are clear as they “enlighten the eyes” as the Psalmist says in Psalm 19:8.
Three incidents in this Torah portion are the opposite of living in the light. These three incidents represent the flesh, the human mindset of self, and the want of ego. In chapter 11 the people complain and long for the lifestyle they had in Egypt. Keeping His camp clean, God consumed the people outside the camp‘…when the people complained, it displeased the Lord; for the Lord heard it, and His anger was aroused. So the fire of the Lord burned among them, and consumed some in the outskirts of the camp.’ Numbers 11:1.
However, the complaining continues at which point Moshe pleads to God ‘I am not able to bear all these people alone, because the burden is too heavy for me. 15 If You treat me like this, please kill me here and now—if I have found favor in Your sight—and do not let me see my wretchedness!” Moses seems to blame God, blames himself, and asks for death in a moment of weakness.
In Numbers 12 Miriam and Aaron are filled with jealousy, speaking negatively about Moshe. Miriam is stricken with leprosy, where she is placed ‘outside’ the camp. Leprosy is a form of death, caused by lashon ha’ra, and like the death in Numbers 12:1-15, she is put outside the camp.
How can two opposite events occur within the same timeline? Instructions for the menorah, the symbol of Light, and then toxic speech and toxic emotions bitterly complaining basically about life. It occurred as it occurs today because we often put our flesh above others, even God, Himself.
Often, we think we’ve chosen to step into His light. Unfortunately, that is not always the case, as we leave part of ourselves in the dark. But 1 Peter 2:9 states: ‘But you are a chosen generation, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, His own special people, that you may proclaim the praises of Him who called you out of darkness into His marvelous light.’
1 Corinthians 4:5 reveals to us the consequences of toxicity in our lives. ‘Therefore do not go on passing judgment before the time, but wait until the Lord comes who will both bring to light the things hidden in the darkness and disclose the motives of men’s hearts; and then each man’s praise will come to him from God.’
Isaiah 9:2 speaks of a future event, ‘The people who walk in darkness will see a great light; those who live in a dark land, the light will shine on them.’
In Luke 1:79 Zachariah prophesizes about the King of Kings, ‘To give light to those who sit in darkness and the shadow of death, to guide our feet into the way of peace.’
Colossians 1:13 ‘For He rescued us from the domain of darkness, and transferred us to the kingdom of His beloved Son…’
Micah 7:8 states it so clearly, that we live in darkness but God is The Light. ‘Do not rejoice over me, O my enemy. Though I fall I will rise; though I dwell in darkness, the Lord is a light for me.’
