Tyler’s Torah Thoughts for 1 Sivan, 5784– Day 45 of the Omer
Parsha Be-Midbar – “In The Desert”: (Numbers 1:1 – 4:20)
Sixth Portion: Numbers 3:40 – 3:51

Good morning! It is the Rosh Chodesh! The month of Sivan. This is the month of direction for us. Things coming to light to push us into a direction for the near (and possibly long term) future. As we transition – what intents are we setting for ourselves?

For me? Its abundance and prosperity. I have lived disconnected. My intention is to set a direction forward.  This is my mantra:

I am rooted in abundance and prosperity
I am creative and I am creating abundance and prosperity
I am strong in abundance and prosperity
My heart is filled with abundance and prosperity
I see abundance and prosperity in different dimensions
I am crowned with abundance and prosperity.

Yes. Yes I am.

What is your direction?

Today is the 45^th day of the Omer. Our theme today is the Compassion of Dignity. From Chabad:

Examine the compassion of sovereignty. A good leader is a compassionate one. Is my compassion compromised because of my authority? Do I realize that an integral part of dignity is compassion?

Tiferet – harmony – is critical for successful leadership. Do I manage a smooth-running operation? Am I organized? Do I give clear instructions to my subordinates? Do I have difficulty delegating power? Does my organization work as a team? Do we have frequent staff meetings to coordinate our goals and efforts?

Exercise for the day: Review an area where you wield authority and see if you can polish it up and increase its effectiveness by curtailing excesses and consolidating forces.

As I write my mantra of abundance and prosperity – if I look at this as purely from a place of financial wealth? I could end up losing the other abundance I have – the abundance and prosperity of emotions. Of spirit. Of soul. We are abundance and prosperity. Today’s theme and torah Parasha reminds us – no matter which direction we take? Compassion and harmony is what we need to lead with externally. Harmony comes first. Finding a way to integrate – to move from either/or into both/and.  Expanding as opposed to contracting.

The other thing I notice in today’s theme is communication. Communication is the root of harmony. That starts within us. Are we a smooth-running operation within ourselves? Do we live clear lives? These are the pieces of the compassion of dignity, sovereignty, and leadership. Let’s dig into the Torah with these in mind:

40The Lord said to Moses: Count every firstborn male aged one month and upward of the children of Israel, and take the number of their names.

41And you shall take the Levites for Me I am the Lord instead of all firstborns among the children of Israel. And [take] the Levites’ animals instead of all the firstborn animals of the children of Israel.

So we are now getting a third count. Our first count was men over 20 in all the tribes but Levi. Second count was all males over 1 month in the tribe of Levi.

Now – it’s every first born male one month or older.

Why?  Because technically the first born males belonged to Hashem. They would have gone to the Levites. And, instead? Hashem was basically showing WHY he chose the Levites. Instead of taking the first born male? He received the tribe of Levi. They were to substitute – because Hashem knew how disruptive it would be for children to be taken from their parents.

42So Moses counted every firstborn of Israel, as the Lord had commanded him.

43The firstborn males aged one month and upward, according to the number of names, was twenty two thousand, two hundred and seventy three.

22,273 first born males. That tells us too, how many mothers there were, right? That was an interesting way to count fertile women who gave birth.  We don’t often think about this – why weren’t women counted?

They were.

We often assign value to this. Right? Men’s value came from their ability to fight. Women’s value came from their ability to MANIFEST.

Let’s look at this:

We know there were 603,550 men over the age of 20.

There were 22,273 mothers. Um. That is not even 4%.

This is not to say these are the only women. These were the only women who gave birth. 4 women. For every 100 men.

1 mother for every 25 dudes over 20.

You want to talk about value? Women were high value.  1 woman for 25 men.I am struck by this.

I figured there would be 603,555 women to match the 603,555 men. If that were the case, what were the OTHER women doing if not giving birth to males? Were they giving birth to girls? I don’t think so.

I think what gets lost? Women were precious and rare. They had their pick of the men. How do we know this? Because this month we celebrate Shavuot. The book we read? Ruth. More to come.

I am contemplating this. Is this the image we’ve been taught about the Torah?

Ok. Let’s move forward:

44The Lord spoke to Moses, saying:

45Take the Levites instead of all the firstborns among the children of Israel and the Levites’ animals instead of their animals, and the Levites shall be Mine I am the Lord.

46As for the two hundred and seventy three of the children of Israel who required redemption, who are in excess of the Levites,

47you shall take five shekels per head, according to the holy shekel, by which the shekel is twenty gerahs.

I wrote about this before. There were only 22,000 Levites. There were 22,273 first born in the rest of the camp.  Hashem gives us a way to equalize this out. 5 shekles per head.

48You shall give the money to Aaron and his sons, in redemption for the firstborns who are in excess of them.

49So Moses took the redemption money for those in excess of those redeemed by the Levites.

50He took the money from the firstborn of the children of Israel; one thousand, three hundred and sixty five of the holy shekels.

If we do some math, 20 gerahs = a shekel.  1,365 shekels divided by 22,273 first born? Is .06 shekels per person.  We are looking at 1.2 Gerahs per person.

51Then Moses gave the money of those redeemed to Aaron and his sons, in accordance with the word of the Lord, as the Lord had commanded Moses.

 What a beautiful passage today.  It’s all about the value of a woman vs the value of a dude.  Not really. 

What is your take?

Here are my thoughts from the past two years:

Tyler’s Torah Thoughts for 29 Iyar, 5783.

43rd Day of the Omer

Today we start a new (and final week) of the Omer.  This week’s theme is Malchut – Sovereignty.  I love that we finish almost where we started – as my own personal journey has been centered around this idea of sovereignty – and how often I have made the decision to give away my sovereignty to others.  From Chabad:

Week Seven – Malchut

Sovereignty – the last of the seven attributes – is different than the previous six. It is a state of being rather than an activity.

Leadership is a passive expression of human dignity which has nothing of its own except that which it receives from the other six emotions.

On the other hand, malchut manifests and actualizes the character and majesty of the human spirit. It is the very fiber of what makes us human. When love, discipline, compassion, endurance and humility are properly channeled into the psyche through bonding – the result is malchut. Bonding nurtures us and allows our sovereignty to surface and flourish.

Malchut is a sense of belonging. Knowing that you matter and that you make a difference. That you have the ability to be a proficient leader in your own right. It gives you independence and confidence. A feeling of certainty and authority. When a mother lovingly cradles her child in her hands and the child’s eyes meet the mother’s affectionate eyes, the child receives the message that I am wanted and needed in this world. I have a comfortable place where I will always be loved. I have nothing to fear. I feel like a king in my heart. This is malchut, kingship.

Day One of Week 7: Chesed of Malchut

Healthy sovereignty is always kind and loving. An effective leader needs to be warm and considerate. Does my sovereignty make me more loving? Do I exercise my authority and leadership in a caring manner? Do I impose my authority on others?

Exercise for the day: Do something kind for your subordinates.

This jumps out at me: “Malchut is a sense of belonging. Knowing that you matter and that you make a difference.”  And “I have a comfortable place where I will always be loved. I have nothing to fear. I feel like a king in my heart. This is malchut, kingship.”

First – we need to address the idea of kingship, royalty, and monarchy (even the word sovereignty) are potentially triggering words for us.  There has been a LOT of oppression in the name of royalty.  For me, there is a certain comfort in looking at (with curiosity) these concepts in a way that may be able to get to the heart of WHY much has happened with oppression.

So much of the Torah is a battle for sovereignty within.  Stories upon stories of people giving away their sovereignty AND taking away the sovereignty of others.

Who is the king of our internal heart?  This is the fundamental question.

Two of my children last night shared what they are learning about “buckets.”  My seven year old shared how there are “love buckets” and when they are empty, we aren’t able to love.  We need to have our buckets filled by others in order to feel loved.

I shared that I saw things differently – which perked her ears.  “What if we could fill our OWN buckets up with love?”  She asked “how is that possible?”  I said “remember sometimes you say ‘I’m stupid’ when you make a mistake?”

What if, when you WANT to say “I’m stupid” you instead tell yourself “I am human and made a mistake – I can forgive myself because I am worthy of forgiveness?”  Would THAT fill your love bucket on your own without any one else?

Her eyes lit up.  She was catching it.

I said “no doubt others can fill our love buckets too!  But if our love bucket is empty, we need to do the job of filling our own love bucket because we are in charge of us.  Because if we rely on others to fill our love bucket?  When THEY make mistakes we may take it personally.”

This.  This is sovereignty.  We need to matter. We need Malchut.  But it starts within.  And this morning, I was reading in Mark Nepo’s book of awakening – this is what he wrote:

At times in my life, I have wanted love so badly that I have reimagined myself, reinvented who I am, in an attempt to be more desirable or more deserving, only to discover, again and again, that it is the tending of my own soul that invites the natural process of love to begin.

I remember my very first tumble into love. I found such comfort there that, like Narcissus, I became lost in how everything other than my pain was reflected in her beauty. All the while, I was abdicating my own worth, empowering her as the key to my sense of joy.

If I have learned anything through the years, it is that, though we discover and experience joy with others, our capacity for joy is carried like a pod of nectar in our very own breast. I now believe that our deepest vocation is to root ourselves enough in this life that we can open our hearts to the light of experience, and so, bloom. For in blooming, we attract others; in being so thoroughly who we are, an inner fragrance is released that calls others to eat of our nectar. And we are loved, by friends and partners alike.

It seems the very job of being is to ready us for such love. By attending our own inner growth, we uncannily become exactly who we are, and like the tulip whose blossomed petal is the exact shape of the bee, our self-actualization attracts a host of loving others more real than all our fantasies. In this way, the Universe continues through the unexpected coming together of blossomed souls. So, if you can, give up the want of another and be who you are, and more often than not, love will come at the precise moment you are simply loving yourself.

“Abdicating our own worth.”  How much do we do this?  This is giving away our sovereignty.  It’s time we stop abdicating our own worth.

AND.  This connects to today’s portion.  Because this passage is about taking a census of the first born.  What is a census?  It’s counting.  It’s mattering. It’s worth.  Because the Torah assigns a worth.

We need to stop abdicating our worth.  If we do this, we heal ourselves, and in turn, we heal the world.

What are your thoughts?

Tyler’s Torah Thoughts for 4 Sivan, 5782

Today is the 48th day of the Omer.

What this day if the Omer means is that at Sundown tonight, we enter into the final day of the Omer. This has been a journey for us that is about to come to a close so that a new chapter can begin.

Our journey started at Passover; where we learned about our process from slavery to liberation. We became free, but that was not the end of the story; only the beginning. We made mistakes in our freedom. We learned to grow and develop.

And through it all, Hashem kept us safe. He provided consequences for us to learn. And we were to count the Omer between the day we became free, and the day we were given the Torah. That is where we are approaching. On Saturday evening, at Sundown, we enter the holiday of Shavuot. This is commonly referred to as “the feast of weeks.” This marked the wheat harvest in Israel. It is often celebrated by offering up first fruits to the community – including babies born over the last year (think Simba being presented in the Lion King).

Another tradition is the eating of dairy. Consuming milk is supposed to represent the “milk and honey” that the promised land is supposed to represent.

Just some things to reflect on as we enter this season! Ok let’s dig into the Torah:

Todays portion starts with the census of the firstborn.

God tells Moses to count every firstborn male aged one month and upward. He does so. There were 22,273 first born males at the time. (Not including the Levites).

God tells Moses specifically; the number of all the Levites is LESS than the number of all the first born – the Torah mentions by 273. God Also says that because of this, the extra first born will need redemption. God tells Moses to take money from the firstborn of the children of Israel – 5 shekels per head – and give it to Aaron. In redemption for those 273 extra first born.

Moses takes the money from the extra 273 and collected 1365 shekels. He gave the money to Aaron.

Now. Some questions. Why 5 shekels? Rashi points out this was the price of sale for Joseph in Egypt – who was Rachel’s first born.

How did they know who those extra 273 were going to be? They actually were told in the Torah to write down the names of each first born. So they knew who those final 273 were.

What is our takeaway?

For me, it’s that Hashem knows us. He knows us so intimately – he cares about the extra 273. The Torah could have rounded easily here. Saved itself some trouble. But the Torah digs into the details.

Hashem knows and works out all the details of our lives. What details is he working out in yours?

What are your thoughts?