Bamidbar 5773: Lifting Up Our Heads

As we start a new book of Torah, Bamidbar – or Numbers – there is a census taken of our ancestors in the wilderness.  Two years out from the Exodus from Egypt, the community stops and takes stock.  


The Hebrew directive from God about taking a census, however, is unusual (Bamidbar 1:2.)  Instead of a familiar Hebrew verb for counting, Torah uses here the verb for lifting.  This oddity draws our attention to the fact that what is lifted is literally the head of each member of the community.  Instead of looking at a mass crowd, Torah urges us to distinguish each individual in the crowd by lifting each face.

How important is it to lift our faces, a story about that before returning to the Torah.  There was once a murder trial.  A man was charged with murdering his neighbor – but there was very little evidence apart from the fact that the two neighbors were heard violently arguing for weeks before and the defendant had loudly threatened to kill the supposed victim on the same night he disappeared. 
It was a purely circumstantial case.  They had not even found the body of the man who disappeared.  At trial the defense attorney focused on the prosecution’s obligation to prove its case beyond a reasonable doubt.  She argued that her client should not be convicted on such flimsy evidence.  

Just as she was wrapping up her closing argument, she said, “Ladies and gentleman of the jury, I don’t think you are even convinced that my client’s neighbor is dead.  As a matter of fact,” she said and while pointing to the back door of the courtroom, “there’s the neighbor -- the supposed victim -- walking in the door right now!”  

All the jurors lifted their heads to look at the back door.  No one entered.  

But the defense attorney made her point, "You see,” she told the jurors, “you all lifted your heads to look because you doubt whether the supposed victim, the neighbor, is really dead."  She sat down convinced that she had won the case.  

When the jury deliberated it found the defendant guilty.  When the defense attorney asked the jury forewoman how they could find her client guilty when their own doubts were so clear, the forewoman answered, “That’s right when you told us that the neighbor was walking into the courtroom, all of us lifted our heads to the door.  But your client didn’t lift his head.  He didn’t even turn to look.  He knew for sure there was no one walking in that door so he didn't bother lifting his head.  That proved his guilt to us."   

Back to this week's parshah.  As part of the census the names of the leaders of each tribe of Israel are called out.  And nearly all of them share something in common – that they invoke God or something deeply religious.  For example, Nitan-el (Gift from God) in Bamidbar 2:5 or Elitzur (God is my Rock) in 2:10 or Eliasaph (God will add) in 2:14.  These names make the tribal leaders seem very important.   

By contrast the name of one tribal chief stands out in its form.  It is the name Nachshon; derived from the Hebrew word for snake it is a base name.  Not lofty like the others.  

My colleague Jack Reimer points out that these other leaders, the Princes of Israel, they were not remembered for very much.  They had big names, but were tiny in deeds.

Nachshon, on the other hand, had a tiny name, but was big in deeds.  You might remember that it was Nachshon who led the Children of Israel into crossing the Sea of Reeds, while even Moshe was nearly paralyzed with anxiety on the shore of the Sea.

So it is with us, big names, big words, don’t mean very much unless we make them real through our thoughts and conduct.  None of us can rest on our name alone.  How we think and what we do matters more than what we are called.  

So it is with us.  We learn from Bamidbar that in order to build a community of purpose and caring, we need to enact deeds of justice and mercy not merely put words about them on posters.  Our names are not nearly as important as our deeds.  And this work calls on us to treat each person in our community as a unique individual, lifting her face to really see who she is.  We count by faces so that we can see the uniqueness of each individual.  Not a list of names but an accounting of deeds; not a tally of the group, but a valuing of the community created when individuals come together.

May the week ahead be filled with many opportunities to lift the face and spirits of those with whom we interact and learn.     

PS: I heard a couple different versions of this jury story when practicing law, but doubt whether any of them are true; Snopes.com on the no-body defense]