Parashat Bamidbar- Maintaining Our Standards Under Stress
The Torah in Parashat Bamidbar describes Beneh Yisrael’s formation as they traveled through the wilderness on their way to Eretz Yisrael. God issued specific instructions concerning the nation’s travel and encampment, as each tribe was assigned a specific place both during travel and when the nation encamped. Beneh Yisrael thus traveled in an orderly, organized fashion, and not in a reckless, chaotic march.
The Midrash relates that when God first informed Moshe of this detailed formation, he was dismayed. "Is it not enough," he wondered, "that the nation complains about the harsh conditions in the wilderness? Now they have something else to complain about! The tribes will object to their position, arguing that the other tribes received a more favorable spot!" Moshe was concerned that the tribes would quibble with one another, each coveting the assigned place of the other.
God, however, reassured Moshe that the tribes would all find the formation acceptable, noting that there is already a precedent to this kind of arrangement. After the death of Yaakob Abinu, his sons carried his coffin to Eretz Yisrael for burial. The procession was conducted in a special formation, with each son assigned a specific place. Yaakob’s funeral, God told Moshe, established a precedent of a specific, prearranged formation. Beneh Yisrael would voice no complaint against the formation of travel through the wilderness because they would recall the similar arrangement that was followed by their ancestors during Yaakob’s funeral.
The obvious question arises, why was Moshe concerned that the tribes would argue over their positions? We are dealing with mature adults, not young schoolchildren! And why would the experience of Yaakob’s burial nearly two centuries earlier preclude the possibility of such quibbling?
One explanation is that people often become edgy and argumentative during times of stress. Beneh Yisrael were traveling under harsh conditions, through the ordinarily uninhabitable desert. Although they received God’s supernatural protection, they were, nevertheless, in a precarious position. They had no food or water, and fed their families only with the manna that fell each day from the heavens and a well that miraculously accompanied them. Behind the clouds of glory that encircled them were snakes, scorpions and other wild animals – not to mention the searing desert sun. Beneh Yisrael faithfully followed God through the wilderness, but this was, without question, a difficult and stressful period.
This is what concerned Moshe. He feared that the anxiety of desert travel would, understandably, cause the people to become especially oppositional and irritable. He therefore figured it would be better to avoid arguments by allowing everyone to travel and encamp as they pleased, rather than assign everyone a place, which could breed discontentment.
God responded by noting the precedent of Yaakob’s burial. Despite the strong emotions of grief felt by Yaakob’s sons after his passing, they all maintained their dignity and composure throughout the difficult process of transporting his remains to Hebron. This was a period of mourning and sorrow, and yet the brothers conducted themselves calmly. They resisted the common tendency to grow fussy and quarrelsome in times of stress; they remained perfectly composed and good-mannered despite their state of bereavement.
God knew that Yaakob’s sons had passed down this legacy to their descendants. Moshe had no need to worry about objections to the formation system, God assured, because Beneh Yisrael have received from their forebears this special quality of maintaining strict standards of behavior even under stressful conditions. And this tradition has continued throughout the generations, even to our times. There are many stories of selflessness and unfailing integrity by Jewish inmates in concentration camps during the Holocaust. Despite the Nazis’ efforts to reduce the Jews to animals, many Jews retained their dignity and acted with pristine morals and nobility despite the unspeakable conditions.
We must continue this legacy today, as well, and resist the natural tendency to allow stress to taint our characters. Let us follow our ancestors’ tradition of remaining faithful to our nation’s strict standards of integrity, selflessness and courteousness even during difficult periods and times of hardship and stress.
