parsha bit: B'ha'alot'cha

[cellio]

(Try saying that three times quickly. :-) )

In the second year after the Exodus the people begin their journey from Har Sinai, and soon they begin to complain about the lack of meat and fish like they had back in Mitzrayim. Rabbi Samson Raphael Hirsch says that they do not complain out of nostalgia; rather, they are bored. All their needs are met with no effort on their part: manna and water are delivered daily, and they have the mishkan and divine protection. They feel, Hirsch says, as if they have no challenges. (Commentary on Num 11:1-11)

On a personal note, I have trouble understanding boredom. Yes, I've been in situations where I was bored and couldn't escape, but for the most part, I fill my days -- if not with activity, then at least with thinking. It can be a challenge sometimes to get my brain to shut up sometimes. I certainly remember the dull "are we there yet?" moments of my childhood, but I'm not sure Rabbi Hirsch isn't doing the Israelites a disservice with this interpretation. But on the other hand, they do act like whiny brats sometimes. :-)

Comments

[xiphias.livejournal.com]

Do you suffer from depression? 'Cause I can understand Hirsch's point. . .

[cellio]

Ah, I hadn't considered that. No, I don't (nor am I manic, to the best of my knowledge).

To what extent does depression affect groups? Do people tend to develop depression more if they're around depressed people for extended periods of time? I'm wondering if this could be many depressed people, or a smaller number of depressed people who are influential.

[magid.livejournal.com]

.... now, if they'd had a high-speed connection instead of dial-up, and a laptop in every pot....

[goldsquare.livejournal.com]

Having had my diet "monkeyed with" and made far more monotonous and bland - I don't think it is boredom, so much. Food does affect mood, and we talk about "home cooking" and "comfort food" and we understand what it means.

It's true that being "chased by a bear" takes ones mind off of smaller miseries. But that doesn't mean the smaller miseries are insincere or inappropriate. A strong analogy - I had a serious bicycle accident some years ago, and shattered my wrist, badly. When the Doctor applied a local anaesthetic (prior to trying to reset the many bones), I suddenly realized that I'd dislocated my shoulder as well. :-)

[magid.livejournal.com]

According to one interpretation, the mannah could taste like whatever one wanted it to taste like. (But yeah, working with other interpretations that disagree, I'd not be happy eating the same thing day in, day out, either.)

[goldsquare.livejournal.com]

According to one interpretation, the mannah could taste like whatever one wanted it to taste like.

Upon what reasonable basis could such a conclusion be made?

(What if someone wanted to know what pork tasted like? LOL)

[magid.livejournal.com]

I'm sorry to say, I don't remember specifically, though some of it might have been "well, there's this food provided by G-d, Who can make anything happen". I assume there's some sort of linguistic hook to hang it on, though.

There's nothing banning tasting like pork, without the actual pig in it.... (plus, weren't the kashrut laws given only at Sinai, so before then, no prob!).

[xiphias.livejournal.com]

In the modern world, it certainly seems as if Jews tend toward depression. Hirsch may have been looking at it from that perspective, even if the ancient Hebrews didn't have that genetic predisposition yet.

[geekosaur]

Apparently it comes from this parasha: the Hebrew for Num 11:6 can be read as comparing the manna to "nothing everything", a nothing which is everything. Then it goes on in 11:8 to say "its taste was like an item mixed with oil" — with no referent, the Hebrew "an item" can be understood as "any item". Therefore the Gemara (Yoma 75a) concluded that manna could take on any taste.

"Could the manna take on the unique taste of a non-kosher item? The Chid"o in Chomas Anoch says that it could." (commentary on Num 11:8; the above also came from that page)

[cellio]

But then they might have fallen in with bad influences from Nigeria. Ok, maybe that wouldn't have been worse than those from Moav... :-)

[cellio]

I assume there's some sort of linguistic hook to hang it on, though.

Here you go: "And the taste of it was as the taste of a cake baked with oil. R. Abbuha said: [Do not read le-shad (cake), but shad (breast)] viz: Just as the infant finds very many a flavour in the breast, so also did Israel find many a taste in the manna as long as they were eating it. Some there are who say: [‘Le-shad’ means] a real demon; even as the demon changes into many colours, so did the manna change into many tastes." (Yoma 75a; thanks to geekosaur for the cite that led me there.)

[brokengoose.livejournal.com]

In my attempt to 1) guess how to say B'ha'alot'cha even once and then 2) say it three times quickly, I ended up putting a phonetic pronunciation to La Cucaracha. (Having no idea what the Hebrew means, I'm hoping that the idea is more amusing than offensive.)

[cellio]

*laugh*

It means approximately "when you light" (as in lighting a menorah). Literally "raise up", I guess as in raising a flame?

[cellio]

Oh, and rough pronunciation: read the vowels as Latin vowels and then proceed as follows: b - shwa - ha - (glottal stop) al-ot - shwa - cha like in Chanukah (ch like in Bach). Shwa like in English -- somewhere between silence and a slighly-voiced "uh".

Sorry, I don't have IPA clues.

[cellio]

(What if someone wanted to know what pork tasted like? LOL)

Judaism does not generally have problems with fake treif. I've seen artificial "bacon bits" with OU (kosher) certification.

The torah says no pigs (and some other things); it doesn't say no pig flavor. There are issues of appearance to consider, but that tends to mean things like you put those fake bacon bits on the table in the original container rather than in a serving bowl, so it's obvious you're not really serving treif.

[gregbo.livejournal.com]

In the modern world, it certainly seems as if Jews tend toward depression.

Hmmm ... I wonder why?

Re: boredom, I agree that it is caused by not having challenges in one's life. I haven't been bored in years. I feel like I don't have enough time to do things. This is because there's so many things I want to be able to do, such as play piano, speak French (something I haven't spent much time on), etc.

[http://users.livejournal.com/merle_/]

I can get bored when I am lethargic and depressed. Nothing seems worth the effort, so I sit there thinking "man, this bites, there's nothing to do", even when there are dozens of things that I could do.

The worst thing, though, was when I had acute tendonitis in both forearms, so I could barely hold or lift even a 6oz glass of water, and was having ankle problem in one leg. I literally could not do much of anything at all except reread those few books that would stay open on their own and watch TV. That was a horrible summer. But, eh, that has little relevance to your quoted passage. ;-)

[cellio]

Thanks. Yeah, I should have been more clear -- sometimes circumstances force you into boredom, and that's not the case I was talking about. A scenario that sends shivers down my spine is being paralyzed while having a functioning brain. For that matter, blindness (again, with functioning brain), all by itself, scares me for similar reasons. Yeah, in both cases audio is still available, but...

[http://users.livejournal.com/merle_/]

*shudder*