Chukat, חֻקַּת. "Statute" Numbers 19:1-22:1

Chukat And The Child

Poetic notes for the parashat Chukat*

Blessed is the person

who does not sit as a captive to Satan

mocking the law of the red heifer

or the goat sent to Azazel

outside of the Temple

outside of the camp

The nations blushed to see Israel

performing the ritual of the red heifer

But God stood surrounding her

And silenced them before they could speak

“Israel cannot defend this service

It is a chukat, a sovereign decree

It is a purification concealed

from all agents of death”

Let those whose souls crave learning

who must seek to understand

do so in good faith

For an insincere philosopher

serves the agents of death

drawing maps that are mazes in madness

The one who trusts God as a child 

like the child King 

King Solomon

understands how to learn

and to confess when they don’t understand

And their teacher is joy

When they are old they are vessels 

of incense and thankfulness

There are those who will obey

only their own understanding

but do not understand

that they live their whole lives

unable to leave their death bed

Having no faith

their love is at best warm desire

unless it is taken in hand

by the faith of others

The holy desire of God is His holy love

that His holy love should be the love

filling every heart and mind in all creation

There is no vessel of heaven

through which we can fulfill God’s desire

other than His commandments

and no vessel of earth that can please God

other than the trusting obedience of our hearts

our minds and our souls and our bodies

One faith, one kingdom

obeying every mitzvah

each soul according to its role and its place

waiting together in obedient faith

for the Redeemer of Zion

Waiting for the Redeemer of Zion 

the judges of Israel

with Mishnah and Gemara and Posekim

will open the floodgates 

of the knowledge of God

And the knowledge of God shall fill the earth

as the waters fill the seas

because the simple faith of a child 

will lead them with humility

along the pathway outside the camp

to drink from Miriam’s well 

passed the place of the stricken rock

to clear the place of the fiery serpents

to know that the place of Moshe and Aaron

is the place of the red heifer 

and of the kohanim who sprinkle

and become one with the sprinkled

the place of the red ribbon and fire

the place of judgment and mercy

with hyssop and cedar wood and ashes

and purification

*Being a meditation on a Torah class based on parashah Chukat, delivered by Rabbi Baitelman of ChaBaD Richmond, B.C., based on the series, Torah Studies, by Rohr Jewish Learning Institute. Neither Rabbi Baitelman nor the JLI have reviewed or approved of the content of this post. 

With reference to Ramban on Numbers 19:2

With reference to As A New Day Breaks, chapter 5  by Eli Touger