T orah P ortion
Korach, Racism and Pruning the
Tree of Life
BY RABBI SHAI CHERRY
Parshat Korach
AT THE BEGINNING of each
“Introduction to Judaism” class
I’ve taught at college, before I
even introduce myself to the
students, I ask them to yell
out things they know about
Judaism. Since the vast majority
of my students were not Jewish,
much of what they knew about
Judaism was from pop culture,
their friends or grandparents
or reading Anne Frank/Elie
Wiesel in their high school
history class’s Holocaust unit.

After a few minutes, the
lists inevitably included bar
mitzvah, bat mitzvah, not
eating milk and meat together,
Chanukah, monotheism and
Manischewitz. There were a
few others on the top 10 lists,
but I circled those listed above
in red ink and explained that
none of these is biblical. Not
one — even “monotheism” —
gets an asterisk. Then I would
introduce myself and say, “Your
first lesson in ‘Introduction to
Judaism’ is never to confuse the
Hebrew Bible with Judaism.”
When we meet Korach
in this week’s parshah, he
is mustering his forces to
challenge Moses for leadership.

CAN DL E L IGHTIN G
June 11
June 18
8:12 p.m.

8:14 p.m.

Here’s his charge against
Moses: “You have gone too far!
For all the community is holy,
all of them, and the Lord is
in their midst. Why then do
you raise yourselves above the
Lord’s congregation?” Moses
responds that the Lord will
“make known who is His and
who is holy.”
Who is holy? According
to the Hebrew Bible, Moses
prevails, but the Torah is short
on explanation. It wouldn’t be
unreasonable to conclude, based
on their dialogue, that Moses is
the holy one. But don’t confuse
the Hebrew Bible with Judaism!
Unlike Christianity,
Judaism doesn’t know of a
chosen one. All humans are
created in the divine image,
which is the biblical idiom for
the American creed that all
men are created equal. Nowhere
in rabbinic literature is there
a claim that Moses is holier
than his cousin, Korach. The
rabbis categorically reject the
possibility that Moses believed
he was holier than Korach.

The Midrash and Rashi (1040-
1105) explain the disagreement
between the cousins was rooted
in a misunderstanding.

When Korach claimed all the
community are holy, he meant,
explains the Midrash, that all
the community had heard God
at Mount Sinai. That experience
conferred upon the whole people
the status of holiness regardless
of behavior. The Midrash and
Rashi’s Korach believed that
after Sinai, holiness is essential
— of the Jewish essence —
while Moses believes holiness
is purely functional. It’s how
Rashi explains what Moses
means: “The Lord will make
known who is his for Levitical
service and who is holy for the
priesthood.” According to the Midrash
and Rashi, God did not make
the Israelites holy. God chose
the Levites and Cohanim
(priests) to serve the holy One
at the sacrificial altar. Their
miscommunication ended in
tragedy. Korach and his gang
were swallowed up in the sink
hole of sedition.

Subsequent commentators
used Korach’s rebellion to
emphasize that holiness is a
behavioral goal, not a given
status. But the truth is more
complicated. From the Torah
to today, there have been those
who view Jews as essentially
holier than non-Jews. This
strain is particularly promi-
nent in the mystical vein of
Judaism that runs from the
biblical Ezra (Ezra 9:2) to
today’s ultra-Orthodox.

Rabbi Mordecai Kaplan
maintained that the idea of a
holy people, a chosen people,
was irredeemable. It takes too
much explanation to circumvent
the simple understanding of the
term, and the simple meaning
of being the chosen people is
racist. Kaplan thought the idea
of the chosen people was better
off relegated to a premodern
time when it may well have been
a net gain to help Jews survive a
world where, too often, gentiles
behaved in ways that could only
be described as unholy.

In our times, Kaplan gave
four reasons for rejecting the
idea of chosen people: theolog-
ical, God does not operate
preferentially; psychological,
it induces feelings of smug
superiority among Jews; socio-
logical, it prompts feelings
of envy among gentiles; and
political, it is undemocratic.

All in all, asserted Kaplan,
insisting on superiority smacks
of an inferiority complex.

Here’s another reason.

We Jews need to model that
religious ideology, as our
liturgy says, is a tree of life, not
petrified wood. Sometimes the
tree’s branches need pruning.

The Catholic Church included
Jews in its circle of the saved
in Vatican II. Wouldn’t it be
a harbinger of the messianic
days if Hamas were to change
its charter and recognize the
right of the Jewish people to
a sovereign state in what was
once Dar al-Islam, the abode
of Islam?
Ezra’s racism shouldn’t be
confused with how modern,
antiracist Jews strive to embody
our Judaism today. Let’s learn
from Moses and avoid the poten-
tial for ugly misunderstandings.

Let’s be explicit and retire the
term. Pruning the trees of life
lets the sunshine in. l
Eddie. Herskovitz worked as
an auto mechanic’s assistant
while his wife, a survivor who
died in 2006, worked in a
sewing factory.

Eventually, Herskovitz
entered into a partnership that
brought him part ownership of
a gas station at City Avenue and
Conshohocken Avenue. After
16 years, Herskovitz’s partner
retired, and Herskovitz took over
the entire business. He eventually
expanded his business to include
Main Line Auto Center, shoe
stores in Philadelphia, Ardmore
and Miami, and the Main Line
Taxi Co.

It was at one of his filling
stations that Herskovitz met
the woman who would eventu-
ally become his second wife,
Tonya (Nowlin) Herskovitz.

When she pulled into the
station, in from out of town
for work, she heard the same
heavily accented voice that
she’d hear until the day
Herskovitz died, and saw the
same twinkly smile.

“Michael was a man of
many, many wonders,” she
said. He “held no hatred for
people,” Tonya said. “When
people asked him how he
could drive a [German-built]
Mercedes, he would say, ‘These
people that made this car didn’t
hurt me. They had nothing to
do with it.’”
Herskovitz was predeceased
by his first wife, Frida. He is
survived by his wife Tonya
Herskovitz; his children, Pearl
(Jacky) Kouzi, Edward (Jean)
Herskovitz and Mercedes
Griffin; four grandchildren;
and six great-grandchildren. l
Rabbi Shai Cherry is the rabbi at
Congregation Adath Jeshurun
in Elkins Park and the author of
“Coherent Judaism: Constructive
Theology, Creation, and Halakhah
and Torah through Time:
Understanding Bible Commentary
from the Rabbinic Period to Modern
Times.” The Board of Rabbis of
Greater Philadelphia is proud to
provide diverse perspectives on
Torah commentary for the Jewish
Exponent. The opinions expressed
in this column are the author’s own
and do not reflect the view of the
Board of Rabbis.

Obituary Continued from Page 4
In 1948, he joined the army
of the newly formed Jewish
state, using his skills as an auto
mechanic that he’d learned in
Canada to fight for the estab-
lishment of Israel, and for its
occupation of the Sinai in 1956.

In 1959, he moved to
Philadelphia, where his sister
Helen was living. He and his
first wife, Frida, settled in their
own home in West Philadelphia
with their children, Pearl and
24 JUNE 10, 2021
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