D’VAR TORAH
Shabbat Hukkat-Balak
Parashat Balak: The Fear With No Object
In a teaching on Parashat Balak that Rabbi Zohar Atkins offered, he notices something strange: Balak is the one king Israel is divinely forbidden to harm (Devarim 2:9), and yet he is the most frightened man in the story.
וַיָּגׇר מוֹאָב מִפְּנֵי הָעָם מְאֹד כִּי רַב־הוּא וַיָּקׇץ מוֹאָב מִפְּנֵי בְּנֵי יִשְׂרָאֵל
“Moab was alarmed because that people was so numerous. Moab dreaded the Israelites” (Bamidbar 22:3).
Atkins traces that dread back to Egypt. Pharaoh had opened Exodus with the identical fear:
הִנֵּה עַם בְּנֵי יִשְׂרָאֵל רַב וְעָצוּם מִמֶּנּוּ
“Look, the Israelite people are much too numerous for us” (Shemot 1:9).
Leaving Egypt did not mean Egypt’s way of seeing Israel left the world. The fear ws located in a different king. Israel was released from bondage. We would be feared and hated in the next chapters of our history.
But the Torah responds to this cancer with blessing. Bilaam, hired to curse the Israelites, is made instead to bless — in words that restate, almost verbatim, God’s promise to Abraham:
מְבָרְכֶיךָ בָּרוּךְ וְאֹרְרֶיךָ אָרוּר
“Blessed are they who bless you, accursed are they who curse you” (Bamidbar 24:9; cf. Bereishit 12:3).
Hatred and the hired curses lead to blessing and renewing the covenant. This is not just another way of saying rallying against our enemies makes us more united and stronger. This cosmic pattern, stitched into creation, may indeed be part and parcel of how the Jewish People renews its covenant with God.
Shabbat Shalom,
Rabbi Bolton
