Date: 22.7.24 / 16 Tamuz 5784

Parsha: Pinchas: Numbers 25:10 - 26:4

In Parsha Pinchas, there is a man named Pinchas. He is the grandson of Aaron, who was a very important leader. Pinchas did something very brave to stop a big problem among the people of Israel. Because of his bravery, God decided to reward him and his family with a special blessing.

God also told Moses, the leader of the Israelites, to count all the people again. This was important because they were getting ready to enter a new land that God promised them. Each family and tribe had to be counted so they would know how to share the land fairly.

Another important part of this parsha is about choosing a new leader. Moses was getting old and needed to find someone to lead the people after him. God chose Joshua to be the new leader because he was strong and faithful.

Finally, Parsha Pinchas talks about special offerings and sacrifices that the Israelites had to give to God. These were important for their worship and to show their respect and thankfulness to God.

So, in summary, Parsha Pinchas is about bravery, counting people, choosing a new leader, and special offerings to God. It's a part of the Torah that teaches important lessons about leadership, fairness, and faith.

Thought of Rabbi Sacks

Ezra and Nechemiah instituted a public reading of the Torah. This is where our tradition of reading the weekly parsha each Shabbat comes from.

This set in motion a profound change in Jewish life, one whose early details are hard to come by because of the shortage of literary materials from Jewish sources between the fourth and second centuries BCE. But we can take up the story with Shimon ben Shetach in the first century BCE. Until then, education had largely taken place within the family. Shimon ben Shetach established the first national educational system in Israel, creating schools throughout the country for sixteen- and seventeen-year-olds… This was the first system of its kind in the world. The Talmud also contains the world’s first regulations about teacher provision and class size.

As H.G. Wells noted in his Outline of History, “The Jewish religion, because it was a literature-sustained religion, led to the first efforts to provide elementary education for all children in the community.” By contrast, universal compulsory education did not exist in England until 1870. There was nothing remotely similar in the ancient world. Even the great academies of ancient Greece were confined to an elite. Rabbinic Judaism set itself to achieve a society of universal literacy. Paul Johnson calls it an “ancient and highly efficient social machine for the production of intellectuals.”

Ceremony & Celebration, Shavuot: The Greatest Gift, p.279

Jewish History

Golden Calf Made; Hur Killed (1313 BCE)

In the year 2448 from Creation (1313 BCE), Tammuz 16 was the 40th day following the Giving of the Torah at Mount Sinai, and the people of Israel wrongly expected Moses' return from the mountain (he would actually return on the following day). When their leader failed to return, they demanded from Aaron: "Make us a god that shall go before us". Hur (Moses' nephew, the son of Miriam and Caleb) tried to stop them and was killed by the mob. Aaron fashioned a calf of molten gold.

Around the Shabbat Table

1. What was on Moshe's mind when he asked God to find a successor? 
2. Do you think education is important for all children and all adults? Why?
3. What is the difference between a nachala and a yerusha? Which is the Torah?

Answers:

1. Moshe had recently seen both his siblings die, and had been told he was at the end of his life, so he knew that he would be unable to complete his life's work and bring the Children of Israel into the Land of Israel. He wanted to ensure a worthy successor would be chosen to complete this mission. He had also recently presented the question of the daughters of Tzelophechad to God, asking what happens when a man only has daughters to inherit his state. This raised the question in his mind of his own legacy and the role his children would play in continuing it. 
2. See From the Thought of Rabbi Sacks, answer 2. Torah education is also encouraged as a daily activity even for adults who have learned for many years. We study Torah again and again, and the more we learn, the more we discover. 
3. A nachala, like a stream, flows to the next generation without any action required. A child automatically inherits their parent's estate. A yerusha on the other hand needs to be actively taken as an inheritance. Yerusha means “to take possession.” It refers to something to which you have legitimate title, but which you need positive action to acquire. This is the Torah, our inheritance, that we must work hard to earn. And even though a child born from a Jewish mother is automatically Jewish, to fully acquire the Torah we must study and engage with it all of our lives.

Parsha summary adapted from Chabad.org and Rabbi Sacks Legacy

The weekly mitzvot are adapted from the PAJES Primary Parashat Hashavua Curriculum, and form the basis of the school's PSHE curriculum for all pupils alongside the Torah, Well Being and Me curriculum.