Turning A Curse Into A Blessing

by Rabbi Neil Fleischmann
Special To The Jewish Week

Candlelighting, Readings:
Shabbat candles: 8:13 p.m.
Torah reading: Numbers 19:1-25:9
Haftarah: Micha 5:6-6:8
Sabbath ends: 9:21 p.m.

“Mah tovu ohalecha Ya’akov, mishkenotechah Yisrael!” — “How good are your tents, Jacob, your dwellings, Israel.”

These beautiful words of blessing stir up warm memories of growing up Jewish, as they were among the first holy verses that I sang and chanted with peers in school and in camp. And yet, I wonder how these words of blessing — uttered by Bilam, who came to curse — got into our Torah in the first place.

Given the fact that God runs the world, why did He seem so concerned with Bilam’s curse? Bilam himself conveys the generally accepted principle that the Rabbis encapsulate in the aphorism “ein mazal le’Yisrael,” “there is no power of the constellations (astrology, or luck) over Israel [Shabbat 156a]."
Bilam concedes “there is no divination in Jacob and no sorcery in Israel” [Bamidbar 23:23].

Yechezkel Kaufman asserts that it seems, from the text, that Bilam’s powers were real and therefore taken seriously. He explains that, although he did not have the magical power to curse, Bilam possessed a rare wisdom, which he applied in a natural way and used for negative purposes. God blocked Bilam’s curse because Bilam had an ability to harm others by psyching them out. A lesson to take from this story is that one cannot fight the will of God. As King David summed it up, “Many are the thoughts in the heart of man but the will of God prevails.”

An alternative answer to this question relates to interpersonal connections in a very practical way.

Nechama Leibowitz quotes the commentary of Rav Yosef Ibn Kaspi. He asserts a truth regarding relationships, which explains why God turned Bilam’s curse into a blessing. As Kaspi puts it, “A true friend will save his colleague any pain; even if he knows that no danger will ensue. Similarly, the Almighty, out of the abundance of his love for Israel prevented Bilam from cursing them.” When you really love someone, you care about that which matters to them, even if you know it to be insignificant.

God knew that the Israelites were afraid of Bilam’s curse, so He not only prevented Bilam from saying his negative words but He flipped them into blessings, all because of His love for His people.

Ibn Kaspi’s take on Parshat Balak exposes the subconscious layer of the literal text, revealing God’s love of the Jewish People as the theme of this episode. God is modeling a loving relationship for us, and thus we must try to be like God, fulfilling the mandate of Imitatio Dei. We need to remember that what matters to others aren’t necessarily the things that we think are important. To truly care for another person means to be sensitive to what they care about. When those around us are concerned about something, even if we don’t understand why they care about it, true friendship and love dictates that we be supportive of their feelings.

Additionally, God’s love for us is a central concept of Judaism, one that is perhaps not reflected upon often enough. We need to focus on the fact that God’s love for us is an essential Jewish belief. This idea is highlighted throughout our Torah and liturgy and it would serve us well to look at some sources.

When God took the Jews out of Egypt He took us the long way in order to avoid war. He could have told the Jews to buckle up and that He was with them and they didn’t have to be afraid. Instead, He respected and accommodated to people’s fears rather than challenging their feelings.

The Rabbis teach that every human being is beloved by God. This love is made clear by the awareness we are granted of the fact that we were created in the image of God. Additionally, that love is evidenced by the giving of the Torah and by our being deemed Children of God.

Before we fulfill our obligation of reciting Shema in the day and the night we reference God’s abundant love for us, highlighting this aspect of the relationship. Tradition has it that just as we wear tefillin that contain the Shema, God wears tefillin, which state, “And who is like your Jewish People, a singular nation in the world! [I Chronicles 17:21].” In a similar vein, we thank God on all of our holidays for having chosen us and for loving us, emphasizing that God’s choosing us was an act of love. It is also relevant to point out that the expression Chosen People (Am Segulah, adapted from Exodus 19:5), is more precisely translated as “treasured” people.

God turned Bilam’s curse into a blessing at a time of transition, right after the decree that Moshe would not enter the Land of Israel. The generation that left Egypt had died out; the new generation was feeling insecure as they prepared to finally enter the Promised Land.

May this illustration of God’s great love for His people in the desert cause us to recall and be inspired by the immeasurable love that God has for each of us today. May we approach our spiritual lives with a sense of God’s love and reciprocate that love through joyous involvement in Torah life, rather than regarding our observance of mitzvot as a mandated burden. And may we all strive and succeed to follow His ways and to be there for each other in vulnerable times when we are needed most.

Rabbi Neil Fleischmann is director of Torah guidance at The Frisch School as well as a writer and poet whose work can be found at http://rabbifleischmann.blogspot.com.

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