Parashat Balak: When a Blessing can become a Curse

This week we read how Balaam is sent by Balak, a king of the Moabites, to lay a curse on Israel. Israel is on its trek to Canaan; Balak fears that Israel would defeat his people in battle and overrun his territory. Balaam, a powerful soothsayer, knows some of the limits of his powers, and learns more about the limits of his vision along the way. None the less, he is told by Hashem to go along with Balak’s delegation and attempt to do what they ask of him. Balaam makes several attempts, but instead of casting curses upon Israel, he utters words of praise. That is the story in a nutshell.

The first of these blessings raises a question. We read the following:

הֶן־עָם לְבָדָד יִשְׁכֹּן וּבַגּוֹיִם לֹא יִתְחַשָּׁב

There is a people that dwells apart, among the nations not reckoned. (Nu 23:9)

How, exactly, is this a blessing? In a literal sense, it can refer to security. Balaam sees them alone in their world, and the blessing is one to remain unencumbered by the designs of others. If only things could have turned out that way. For the land promised to Israel is one that was forever at the crossroads of history. It was always the junction between Europe and Asia Minor, and Africa, eyed by empires as an invaluable piece of real estate. To this day, it is the most fought over piece of territory that exists. Even if its mercantile and military value is not what it once was, its spiritual, emotional, and political value is unquestionable.

But there is another way of reading this verse. Israel, as a people, should remain separate from the world around it, unconcerned by the world outside of it.

Should Israel live in isolation and seclusion? Obviously, there are those who believe this should be so; let us live alone, away from everyone else. Let us do our own things in our own way. We have nothing for you, and you have nothing for us. This is the ideal of the Jew who opts for the ghetto. It will, forever, be us against the rest of the world, both spiritually and politically, and so we should separate ourselves from all others. For those who see the world in those terms, this verse can be read as a blessing of isolation.

But is that what the Torah intends for us? And if so, is this really a blessing?

If that is the intention, then the verse would have to be removed from the context of Balaam’s oracles. In this first one, Israel lives in secure isolation, but in the succeeding oracles, Israel emerges increasingly triumphant and powerful. It becomes clear that isolation cannot last for long, regardless of how good it appears.

The verse makes use of the word לבדד to signify Israel’s aloneness. Rabbi Jonathan Sacks, in his recent book, Present Tense, notes that it has a negative connotation. In Bereshit we are told, following the creation of man, לֹא־טוֹב הֱיוֹת הָאָדָם לְבַדּו, it is not good for man to be alone. (Gn 2:18) The opening verse of Eicha says אֵיכָה | יָשְׁבָה בָדָד הָעִיר רַבָּתִי עָם הָיְתָה כְּאַלְמָנָה, How solitary sits the city once full of people. (Lam 1:1) We find it taking on a positive dimension only when it speaks of Hashem, who is One and always alone.

If this verse advocates Jewish isolation as a blessing, then it is one founded in negativity. Humans are social beings; as individuals, as families, as nations, we cannot survive in isolation. Time has taught us that we are interdependent beings, and that we must interact. It can lead to mistrust of all others and narrow self perceptions, all of which can lead to dangerous outcomes when, inevitably, we do come to interact with others.

But what is even more important is the outcome of the second half of this passage: וּבַגּוֹיִם לֹא יִתְחַשָּׁב - among the nations not reckoned. How is this consonant with the task of the Jewish people? As Jews, we are chosen - yes, chosen (so many Jews shudder at the thought of a chosen people without any understanding of what it means!) - to perform a task: to make Hashem’s presence known, to bring Godliness into this world. That is the role of a ממלכת כהנים וגוי קדוש, a kingdom of priests and a holy people. If we are to be a people that is not to be reckoned, then we cannot become the fulfillment of what Hashem promised to Avram when He told him to leave his homeland:

וְאֶעֶשְׂךָ לְגוֹי גָּדוֹל וַאֲבָרֶכְךָ וַאֲגַדְּלָה שְׁמֶךָ וֶהְיֵה בְּרָכָה:  וַאֲבָרְכָה מְבָרֲכֶיךָ וּמְקַלֶּלְךָ אָאֹר וְנִבְרְכוּ בְךָ כֹּל מִשְׁפְּחֹת הָאֲדָמָה

I will make you into a great people, I will bless you, I will make your name great, and  you will be a blessing. I will bless those that bless you, and those who curse you I will execrate, and all the families of the land will be blessed through you. (Gn 12:2-3)

Remaining alone may be fine for the insecure or inferior, but for a proud people with a mission, it is a sentence to a solitary confinement. Torah offers us strength to face the challenges of this world, even of those who wish to deny us our role and our destiny.

Balaam was no friend of Israel. He would have been happy to utter curses, and when he had the opportunity to create a crisis, he did, as we read at the end of the parasha with the incitement at Ba’al Pe’or. If Israel were to be blessed by self isolation, the only beneficiaries could be those peoples who could only live by values that are antithetical to Godliness. While the Jewish people have had to deal with much ostracism over the years, we can always look to our strengths and achievements, and to the blessings that the world has benefitted from our blessings, most of which have been realized not in isolation.

תמוז תש’’ע/June 2010