פרשת במדבר

משפחת בני קהת יתנו על ירך המשכן תימנה

The families of the Children of קהת would encamp on the side of the משכן, to the south.

                The idea I would like to bring out in this week’s דבר תורה is the idea of neighbors and friends, and how they affect us. In רשי based on פסוק כט says that יששכר and זבולון became great scholars in תורה because they lived in tents neighboring משה and אהרון and his sons. It also says that 250 men followed the ways of קורח (in his rebellion), followed him because they were his neighbors (based on a מדרש).

                It seems that the מדרש here is attributing both the success in תורה of יששכר and זבולון and the destruction of קורח’s followers to the influence of their neighbors.

                I believe that this brings out a BIG idea here, unfortunately/fortunately we see this all too often in modern society. Take a look around you and tell me what you see. Well I’ll tell you at least what I see (being that I live in Miami). When we go outside we see everybody out there has to be driving the fancy cars, with the fancy clothes, the expensive watches, and all of that kind of stuff. Why do people do these things? The answer is because that is what we are surrounded by in modern western society. Almost everyone is so worried about what their friends are going to think that they make decisions based on that. The same could be same for teens and starting to smoke and do drugs, they do it because the want to be cool and be able to be “down” with everyone else.

                However there is also a positive side to this. When we see people who work hard (whether it is in school or in תורה learning), we begin to say “hey I want to try to be like this guy, or those people. We want to show that we can fit in with these people too.

                Why is this? Why do we always need to prove ourselves? The answer seems to be, because human beings are SOCIAL BEINGS and are influenced by people around them. People need friendships, communities; we need to identify ourselves with a group. Our friends and neighbors affect our values, the way we view ourselves and our roles in all we do. However this can be dangerous as well as helpful…

                Because 250 men who rebelled lived in קורח’s vicinity, it became their community and who they identified with them. It created their social environment. The people were so inspired by קורח that they allowed themselves to be led to destruction. However the people who lived near משה and אהרון were affected by their influence. The group formed ideas and a way of life based on the תורה values given over by both of these תורה giants. It affected יששכר and זבולון for generations.

                Chazal are teaching us that the destruction of one group and greatness of the other was because of…. Peer pressure.

                The men who followed קורח were not stupid. We see that they were all great people who were singled out at the beginning of the פרשה, yet they were influenced to rebel against ה'. So to the men from יששכר and זבולון were smart people, yet they too were influenced by others and became great תורה leaders.

                All of this shows us that we need to be very careful with the people who we surround ourselves with, because they can literally make us or break us.

Have a Great Shabbos

Yoni Spigelman

Adapted From- The Shmuz on The Parsha- Rabbi Benzion Shafier