The Barking Dog That Wasn't

Rabbi Melanie Aron

August 2, 2003

In one of the Sherlock Holmes stories, Sherlock Holmes and his sidekick Watson are discussing a troubling case. In middle of the night, there had been a break-in.

"But Holmes," Dr. Watson replied, "none of the neighbors said anything about hearing a dog barking."

"Precisely," the detective answered. "And don't you find that peculiar?"

Last night we spoke about the rebellion of Korach, one of the most dramatic stories in the book of Numbers. It is a story for which an entire weekly Torah portion is named. It totally consumes three chapters of the fourth book of the Bible, over 100 verses. Yet what caught my attention this year is that, in Moses' extensive retelling of the story of the Israelites and their wanderings, he never mentions the incident at all.

Consider this week's Torah portion. Moses talks about appointing of judges in the wilderness and retells the story of the 12 spies and of the Israelite's punishment. Next week we will have a retelling of the Israelites at Sinai, the giving of the Ten Commandments and the sin of the Golden Calf. Moses also mentions the Israelites struggles with neighboring peoples and other incidents that mark the 40 year period of wandering. Korach's rebellion is easily as important an event as many which are mentioned by Moses in his final speech to the Israelites. Why is it missing?

One first hypothesis might be that Moses doesn't want to dwell on this incident which brought punishment down on the community. But Moses doesn't shy away from other stories which reflect poorly on the Israelites and which also lead to punishments.

Perhaps Moses skipped over this incident, because of the accusations made against him and the negative image of the Levites. But Moses mentions his own sin and the punishment he received in the incident of the waters of Masah Meribah. He tells other stories which reflect poorly on the priests, including the involvement of Aaron in the incident of the Golden Calf. Moses even recounts: "God also expressed great anger toward Aaron, threatening to destroy him". Why then does he completely skip the story of Korach?

The name Korach, which incidentally is equivalent to the English name Baldy, appears in two genealogies, one of Esau's descendents in the book of Genesis and the other in the opening chapters of Exodus, in a list of descendents of Levi.

Though Korach stars in chapter 16-18 of Numbers, his story is not alluded to anywhere in the Torah except parenthetically when the daughter's of Zelophechad, also in the book of Numbers, insist that their father still had a claim to his ancestral land, not having died in Korach's rebellion. It is not mentioned in any of the retellings of the Israelites history, neither in Deuteronomy nor among the prophets who often mention earlier incidents, at least in passing. Korach's sons seem prominent in the Psalms being associated with psalms 42-49 and 84-88, without any reference to their father's wrongdoing and dramatic death. Tradition has it that they repented and that therefore their voices were particularly pleasing to God and the community.

For me the most compelling explanation of Korach's absence from our Torah portion this week comes from the modern study of the Bible's editing. While Deuteronomy seems to come after the first four books of the Bible, Biblical scholars believe that the final editing of the first four books of the Bible followed the period of the composition of Deuteronomy. A class of Jewish scholars, or perhaps even an individual, living after the return from Babylonian exile wove together existing stories that had been held sacred by the Israelite community. But the redactors did more than combine pre-existing material. By framing the stories and adding some of their own material, they also shifted emphasis and helped to create institutions which their own community desperately needed.

Some scholars believe that Moses's retelling of the desert wanderings doesn't include the story of Korach because the story reflects later conflicts within the Jewish community, that postdate the period of Josiah with which we normally associate Deuteronomy. In order to bring stability to post-Exilic Israel, it was necessary to retell the story of the desert wandering in a way that established the primacy of Aaron's descendents.

Professor Ellis Rivkin of the Hebrew Union College explains it in this way. The book of Deuteronomy gives power to the Levites, the Kings, and the Prophets creating conflict and instability. When the Jews returned from Babylonian exile, they remained under Persian rule. A return to the Kingship of the line of David was not acceptable to the Empire. But the Persians were not threatened by religious leadership, particularly if it was separated from economic power in terms of land ownership. The leadership of the time created a new system of government for the community, the Aaronide priesthood. Dr. Rivkin compares the change to that which occurred in the United States when the Constitution replaced the Articles of Confederation.

The barking dog that wasn't, the missing story of Korach is a hint at the adaptability of our ancestors. They drew upon an existing institution, the levitical priesthood, to create a new institution, the Aaronide priesthood, which brought stability to Jewish national life for hundreds of years. That ability to creatively draw from the past to meet the needs of the present remains important today, as we too struggle to shape a Judaism that will be responsive to contemporary challenges.