I was reading in the paper today that Shaas, the largest religious party in the Kenesset, was planning to pull out of the government coalition. What does that mean? If they pull out, Prime Minister Barak would be hard pressed to persuade a majority of the government to side with him on any issue. And what does that mean? There may have to be new elections. Without unity, the government can't stand. America, with its citizens in the hundreds of millions has only two political parties. Yet, Israel, with its citizens numbering only 6 million, has too many to count on your fingers and toes. Why do we Jews have such a need to express our independence, even at the cost of national unity?
Rav Zeff reminded us this week that this emphasis on independence is nothing new. The Midrash brings an account of the moment that Torah was given at Mount Sinai: All the tribes were camped at the base of the mountain as 22,000 angels began descending upon the summit, each holding a flag. Seeing this, we got very excited and prayed to G-d for such banners for each of the twelve tribes. This request granted, Moshe started to panic. "Hashem, are you sure this is such a good idea? Keeping the people unified around a national identity has been a challenge from day one. Now, as they band behind their new flags, the schism between tribes will only become wider. To this, G-d responded, "Moshe, have a little faith. They don't see these flags as dividers...don't you remember what their forefather Yaakov told them?!"
What did Yaakov tell them? In a peculiar line in Genesis where he blesses all of his sons (and thereby all of their descendants), the words "he blessed them" appear twice. This has traditionally be understood to mean that he not only blessed all of his sons as individuals, but each individual blessing also applied to his sons as a group. For example, Naftali was blessed to be as quick as a gazelle. Thus, this blessing of swiftness would be manifested to the greatest degree in Naftali, but the other sons would also become swifter. On the other hand is the interpretation of Rav Zacks. According to his view, Naftali was blessed to be the swiftest, and his brothers were blessed BECAUSE Naftali was the swiftest. Having their brother and his individual gifts as part of their family, their nation, was a blessing. It seems that this is is what the Midrash saw being passed on from Yaakov to his ancestors at Har Sinai.
In this week's parsha, we're told of Aaron's responsibilities with the Menorah in the Mishkan (desert Temple). The word used there is "behaalotecha" - raise up. Aaron was to raise up the Menorah. What, he was supposed to lift this two ton gold mass? Not exactly. Aaron is described as one who chased after peace. He would stop at nothing to restore the love in our relationships. He was the constant reminder of the need to love our fellow, our spouse, our G-d. The Lubavitcher Rebbe brings down that with this commandment of "behaalotecha," G-d is telling Aaron to take the people "to the stage where they would give light on their own accord." When we accepted the Torah at Har Sinai, we rekindled the light in our souls. That was the first stage. Now Aaron had to inspire us to go to the next level. He saw all of our differences as sparks that would all make up the flame of the Jewish People -- just as the flames on all the branches of the Menorah focused their light towards the middle for a concentrated blaze.
Moshe had a hard time seeing the point -- unity in our differences. He saw many flags, but what he didn't see was that really, there was one voice, one goal: we were all consciously searching for our way to connect to G-d in a way that would fulfill us and bring us closer to our people. Today in Israel, one flag flies. May we soon see the day when we are all striving to unite as one people under that flag.