Desert, Dakota, Door
Shabbat shalom, parashat Chukat
There’s a stretch in parashat Chukat that is a travel itinerary.
The Israelites are moving, and we track it: they camped at Oboth, set out from Oboth, camped at Iye-abarim, set out from there, camped at wadi Zered, and so on. Then the people sing an old road song about a well the chieftains dug. And then the itinerary picks right back up: they go from Midbar to Mattanah, from Mattanah to Nahaliel, from Nahaliel to Bamoth…
Some would say this is a boring stretch of Torah.
Rabbi Adina Allen pointed me to a beautiful comment by Onkelos, the great second-century translator, who writes on the phrase mimidbar matanah (Numbers 21:18). In context, it appears to be just two more stops on the route. But midbar means wilderness, and matanah means gift.
So he translates it not as just two more places, but as a complete sentence: “From wilderness, a gift.”
I’ll just pause and say that this is part of what I love about Torah study.
The text gives us a road log, and a reader 16+ centuries ago (!) stops at the names of two places and hears a whole thesis in it. And that message reaches us, today.
Kathleen Norris, in her book Dakota, does something similar.
She moved to the Great Plains and wrote about the land:
“A person is forced inward by the spareness of what is outward and visible in all this land and sky. The beauty of the Plains is like that of an icon; it does not give an inch to sentiment or romance. The flow of the land, with its odd twists and buttes, is like the flow of Gregorian chant that rises and falls beyond melody, beyond reason or human expectation, but perfectly. Maybe seeing the Plains is like seeing an icon: what seems stern and almost empty is merely open, a door into some simple and holy state.”
Norris stopped where most people pass through, and found something beautiful. In a stretch of land (or text) that people might find boring or empty, she found a gift.
We spend the whole week moving, camping here and there, listing all the places we go.
Shabbat is when we slow down and stop, and sometimes it’s quiet or open in a way that can feel boring. That is right where the gift arrives. “Mimidbar matanah” - - from wilderness, a gift. It’s “a door into some simple and holy state.”
Whether you’re in North Dakota, or the desert, or your living room on a long Saturday, may the place that seems empty turn out to be full of gifts for you.
Shabbat shalom!
PS: If you’re in the Boston area…
Join me at Eitz Chayim in Cambridge for Kabbalat Shabbat tonight at 7pm, and at Shabbat morning services tomorrow at 9:30am!
Beautiful. Thank you. 🙏