Rabbi Binyamin Yuhanan Parshat Bamidbar 1

uh good evening we are learning part shop is the first Parsha in the new book safe and part shot is happening on the first of the month of er which is the second month of the year and it's in the second year of the Jewish people coming out of Egypt which means this is already one year and two weeks since the Exodus the Jewish people already spent an entire year in the desert they received the Torah and now they are still by Mount Sinai continuing to learn the Torah understand it and build themselves up as a nation we're on page 727 of the art scroll homage and we begin Hashem spoke to Moshe in the wilderness of Sinai in the tent of meaning tent of meaning is the another name for mishkan the Tabernacle on the first of the second month in the second year after their Exodus from the land of Egypt saying this is the message of Hashem to Moshe take a census of the entire assembly of the children of Israel every male from 20 years of age and up and we know that they were counted from 20 until 60. this is the age when they go to the Army as it says everyone who goes out to the legion in Israel so this is not the first time the Jewish people were counted they were counted when they left Egypt we know that they were approximately six hundred thousand men that's six hundred thousand families because each man between 20 years of age and 60 had a family and they were counted again after the eagle after the golden calf and now again they're counted and um the question is asked actually a few questions number one why count the Jewish people so many times and one of the answers is that it's important to count things that you love you enjoy like we know the famous um pictures of greedy people counting money because they love money and Hashem loves the Jewish people so he loves to count how many Jews there are um another answer is that the Jewish people are about to leave Mount Sinai and start traveling to the land of Israel and once they approach the land of Israel they need to form an army and need to start fighting and when they enter they have to conquer the land so they need to know exactly how many able-bodied men there are so that they can form the Army properly um we know that it's gonna take them another 39 years until they're going to enter Israel but that is because of um the sin of the spies at this point they were supposed to enter the land of Israel in just another few days in fact Rashi says that it would only take them 11 days to get to the land of Israel and in fact they got to the border of the land of Israel uh soon soon after and then they send the spies and the spies took 40 days and when they came back they didn't want to go in and that's when an extra 39 years of um traveling in the desert was decreed now another question that is being asked um how they were counted and we know that um the way we we learned after the golden calf they were counted using coins each Jew would give a coin of half a shekel worth and then they would count the coins and they will get the whole number why not count people and that is because we have another rule that um there is a concept called inara evil eye and that can fall whenever you have exact numbers whenever you are counting it's as if you are setting a limit you're setting a limitation on the subject and you're saying this is supposed to be only this much and not more and when you count how many people are in the family it's as if God forbid you're saying this family should only have this number of people that's that's the stamp that's a label for that family if I count the nation and I say this nation is supposed to have only this number of people so we don't want that to happen to the Jewish people and therefore we don't count them rather we count objects that belong to them and in an additional similar statement we have is that if you want a blessing make sure you don't show your resources to anyone a blessing is only found in things that are hidden from their eye as soon as a person starts bragging or sharing the good news there is a great um Danger not only that people might get hurt or people might get jealous but in addition the danger is that it may be considered that you are taking the credit for that blessing and you're saying I have this much I earned this much it may sound and it may even enter your mind that it is my achievement my Merit and then Hashem says you think it's yours forever you think you got it all by yourself I want to show you that it's only temporary and very quickly after sharing the good news seemingly or bragging a person loses um a person loses that blessing so someone is asking a very good question so should we never share good news so the answer is um you should only share the good news when you know that the person you're sharing with will not get hurt will not become jealous and when it's no longer possible to hide for example the the common example a lady that became pregnant she should not share the news until she can no longer hide it which is approximately three months um and it also so happens that the first three months are the most dangerous for the baby the highest um miscarriage rate is the first three months and therefore something that is not certain yet don't talk about it because you don't want to endanger your blessing in any way people that you know are not going to become jealous like your immediate family your parents you can share it with them from the first moment and the opposite they might worry about uh you why aren't you getting the blessing but anyone else who may have had harder time receiving that blessing you should not share it with them until you can no longer hide it um and now another question is asked what if someone is questioning you so if someone is questioning you there is a permission in the talmud that you don't have to reveal the entire truth you can diminish the truth which means you can say something that is not entirely true for the sake of not harming anyone which could be yourself or the other person because if you know they're going to get hurt or jealous then to prevent that you're allowed to say less than the truth and um also for humility um and you don't have to say the truth in order to protect your private information so that means if someone is asking you um how much money are you making and they're pushing you tell me you can you don't have to tell them but if they're pushing and they're going to get upset if you don't tell them you can say oh I'm making this amount but really it's not the truth really you're making more but you're telling them something that is reasonable that they will believe and that's not considered a sin of lying because you're protecting your private information you're protecting them from getting hurt by jealousy and you're protecting potentially yourself from Aina and similarly if someone asks you are you pregnant you can say oh I don't know I didn't check yet I wish please pray for me uh you don't have to say yes I am already um six weeks my due date is such and such uh my my doctor his name is this and that you don't have to give all the information you can say I'm not sure where why do I look pregnant and if they say yes you do or you say oh okay I guess I have to check um so you if you can get out of it um that is um better than just bragging now let's continue that is the reason why the Jewish people are not counted um by the number of people because we want to give the blessing to the Jews that they should always increase they should never be limited however because of hashem's love for us he can't help it he wants to count us as one would count his diamonds now we are on page 727 verse uh four and with you shall be one man from each tribe which means with Moshe and aharon there will be one man assigned responsible for his tribe a man who is the leader of his father's household and then in the next paragraph we're given the names of 12 people responsible for the 12 tribes and in addition to that we have um who is son of aharon who is responsible for all the leaders he is the leader of the leaders now on page 729 Verse 18 they gathered together the entire assembly on the first of the second month and they established their genealogy according to their families not only counting the people but also making sure that their genealogy is known and recorded who comes from which tribe who comes from which father grandfather and so on all the way till the 12 sons of yaakov according to their father's household by number of their of the names from 20 years of age and up and now for the next two pages we have the numbers for each tribe for ruven the total is 000 and 500. families for Shimon 59 and 300 families for God 650 families for Yehuda seventy four thousand six hundred families for you Sahar fifty four thousand four hundred families for civil un 57 400 families foreign forty thousand five hundred families share thirty two thousand uh 200 families for binyamin thirty five thousand four hundred families for that done sixty two thousand seven hundred families for a share forty one thousand five hundred families for naftali fifty three thousand four hundred families and the total is given on page 731 in um verse 46 all the accountings were six hundred and three thousand five hundred and fifty now um a few things about this count number one the total 600 600 and 3550 is identical to the count that they made after the golden calf which happened half a year earlier and surprisingly the number is exactly the same now the question is asked how is that possible what are the chances that half a year later you have exactly the same number of um um people now I see some people asking questions we're gonna address the questions at the end but feel free to continue asking um so one of the answers that the tarashi gives is that the way we count people's age according to Torah is not based on when they were born but rather based on a national count and that count goes from Rosh Hashanah which means on the day of Rosh Hashanah in tishre we record the age for National purposes for the Army of every male and we say you are 40 years old you are 30 years old you are 20 years old and that is your official government age until the next Rosh Hashanah even though you may become a year older in the middle of the year it doesn't matter next year we will record your age accordingly and therefore since the first count right after the the they were forgiven for the golden calf happened the day after Yom Kippur which is in tishre after Rosh Hashanah it's in the same year as now in the month of ER and therefore even though some people became 20 in the meantime we don't care we don't count them because the count goes from Rosh Hashanah and even though some people became already 61 so they are older than 60 they shouldn't be counted but still we go after Rosh Hashanah and we still count them as within that range now if we do some data analysis on the numbers we will see that the the smallest tribe is the the tribe of menashe 32 200. and the largest tribe is the tribe of Yehuda 74 600. and surprisingly the next um largest tribe is done 62 700 even though done was um one of the last children born and not only then that Don had the the smallest number of children himself he only had one son and here we see a surprising thing one of the lowest tribes with the smallest number of children to begin with grew into the second largest tribe to show you that it's never too late you should never give up you should always continue trying even if you're not successful at the beginning you may catch up later another thing we have to um note that the tribe of yourself is split into Ephraim and Menace and therefore if we combine Ephraim and minashir who came really from one um son of iaco we are going to have seventy two thousand and seven hundred which means it will be the second largest tribe the tribe of Yosef you who dies number one yourself is number two and it's only because they were split in half that um the tribes seem small so then in reality the smallest tribe is binyamin who have only thirty five thousand four hundred and that is also surprising because we know that binyamin had ten Sons why is it that binyamin who had ten Sons has the smallest tribe and Don who had the least number of children himself has the third largest tribe and again the answer is because the result is not up to us up to us is to try to do our best and what happens is up to God and therefore we should never um give up and we should never slow down we should continue our achievements and from here our sages also say just because you achieved a lot in your youth don't stop your achievements late in life because you never know which of these will be more successful you'll achieve something when you're young and again when you're a little bit older and in your old age and you never know maybe the one that you will achieve later in life will be more successful and they say it specifically about children just because you had some children when you were young don't stop having children as long as you can continue having children because you will have more blessings more happiness in life and more chances that your children will give you more grandchildren and if God willing all of them are going to be successful so better for you and if not all of them will be successful at least you have greater chance that some of them will be successful so it's for persons benefit to to put an effort and try but at the end of the day a person has to recognize that the final result is up to Hashem now we are on page 731 um verse 47. the Levites according to their father's tribe were not counted among them so this count of six hundred and three thousand five hundred fifty families of the Jewish people does not include the tribe of Levy Hashem spoke to Moshe saying but you shall not count the tribe of Levy and you shall not take a census of them among the children of Israel why so two answers number one because the Levites did not fight in the army and since this count was in order to form an army the Levites are not included why the Levites uh don't fight in the army for two reasons number one because only someone who received land in the land of Israel has to fight for it and the Levites did not receive the land the Levites received just towns to live in but no land for agriculture people and reason number two is be and they're connected is because the Levites are busy with their service in the betamic dash Levites include the kohanim and livim and they are dedicated to serve Hashem for um the the Jewish people appoint them as their Messengers and they are busy and therefore um they don't fight in the army so again one reason that the Levites were not counted was because they don't have to fight in the army the second reason for not counting the Levites is because Hashem knew that unfortunately the Jewish people will sin by sending the spies and he knew that they will be punished with staying in the desert for another 39 years and everyone who was between the age of 20 and 60 at that time will have to die in the desert but since the Levites did not send by the golden calf and not by the um the spies they will survive and therefore he did not want to include them in that same count because the these 603 550 man are destined to die and he wants to separate them from um from from then now but still the Levites will be counted separately by themselves in verse 50. now you appoint the Levites over the Tabernacle of the testimony over all of its utensils they shall carry the Tabernacle and all its utensils and they shall minister to it and they shall encamp around the Tabernacle when the Tabernacle Journeys the Levites shall take it down and when the Tabernacle in camps the Levi's shell it up and whoever is not a kohen or Levy who approaches shall die now um we're on page 733 the children of Israel shall encamp every man at his camp and every man at his Banner at his flag according to their allegiance the Levites are in the center around the Tabernacle and the Jewish people are all around the Levites now in Chapter 2 the formation of the camp we just mentioned that the Tabernacle is the center of the Jewish people just like in our days the synagogue is the center of our life and then surrounding the Tabernacle are the Levites with motion aharon on on the east and surrounding the Tabernacle and the Levites on all four sides are the Jewish people since they were 12 tribes the the tribe of Levy is the 13th tribe so they are in a separate Circle but the other 12 tribes are divided into four parts each part having three tribes three tribes on the north three tribes on the East three tribes on the west and three tribes on the south this is what we're going to speak about in chapter two foreign the children of Israel shall encamp each Man by his Banner going to the insignias of their father's household