Let's review.  The Israelites have seen plague after plague descend upon Egypt.  A pillar of fire , or cloud follows and leads them around the desert.  The Sea splits before them and they pass through on dry land.  Manna appears to feed them, or birds fall out of the sky, already marinated in a lovely lemon-pepper rub and stuffed with herb-cornmeal dressing.  Water bursts forth from rocks.

Oh, and then there's the whole Theophany at Sinai thing, where God Almighty Himself, Blessed is His Name, appeared and spoke directly to Moses in front of everyone.    All of this happens under the watch and leadership of Moses.

So what, ask some of the other would-be leaders of the nation.  Who died and made him king?  What right does Moses, or his brother Aaron have to tell us who is holy and who gets to do what?

This question is answered this week, when Korach, the leader of the rebellion, and all his household are swallowed alive by the very earth which opens beneath them and then seals them in the underworld. The rest of his followers are immediately consumed by holy fire.  Pretty cool, right?  But then, it goes from typical bible action to truly hard-core.  The men consumed by the fire were holding copper fire-pans.  "Those are holy, now"  says Moses, and they are gathered from the charred remains of the rebels, beaten into plates and used to cover the altar in the tabernacle.  "As a reminder".  Forget Charlton Heston.  We need Samuel L. Jackson to play Moses.  Or Clint Eastwood.  You know, depending on your generation. 

One must give Moses lots of credit for not saying something glib or hollywoodesque, like, "any other questions?" or "Thanks for playing who wants to be a prophet.  We have some lovely parting gifts for you.  Tell them what the've won, Aaron..."

"Thanks, Moses, Korah will be spending eternity in Sheol, a shadowy underground cave where the spirits of the dead hang out! This all-expenses paid trip to the Jewish version of Hades is brought to you by God, maker of Heaven and Earth."  

But wait, there's more...next we come to the part we read tonight from the sefer torah.  Where Moses takes a staff from each of the heads of the tribes and brings them into the tabernacle.  In the morning, Aaron's has sprouted flowers and even fully formed almonds....another Miracle!  This staff of Aaron is to be placed in the sanctuary, also as a reminder of Aaron and his family's position as Cohanim  forever.  

Signs, wonders and miracles.  Again and again we read of them.  Again and again we are forced to confront what this means to us as modern Jews.

If only God would silence his enemies  in  this way in our day.  What if a noted Athiest speaker were to be carried off by a giant eagle in the middle of a speech, or the ground open up and swallow Achmadinijad out of nowhere?  

It would certainly make it easer to believe in the miracles we read of in the bible.  But we aren't the first generation to struggle with miracles and what they mean.  

To be precise, a miracle occurs when events occur that defy the laws of nature.  When the impossible occurs.  And what we are left with is nagging doubts.  Can we rely on the report of the Torah?  If these miracles are truly incredible, truly unbelievable, then what can we believe in the Torah? And does the whole thing, as critics of our faith would suggest, fall apart like a house of cards?

I am relieved to say emphatically no.  And I would like to point out some responses to the idea of Miracles that have been passed down to us. In doing so, perhaps we can reconcile that which seems impossible to believe with that which we know to be true. 

The early rabbis explained miracles as pre-programmed 'events', built into creation by God and set up to occur at set times.  The Red Sea split because it was supposed to.  The earth opens under Korah at just the right time.  The ground ball to Bill Buckner in game 6 of the 1986 World Series was supposed to go right through his glove.  It isn't therefore, a suspension of reality or of nature.  It was built in that way.  That's one way of explaining miracles. 

Satisfied? I hope not, because nobody else was, either. 

Maimonides, and you better memorize this guy because you will hear about him a lot, First Class Jewish Hall of Fame, active in the 12th century, also known as the Rambam, teaches that the purpose of Miracles is precisely to amaze and awe us.  Because we don't understand how they happen we are filled with increased respect and admiration for God.  

A third response to Miracles comes to us from Maimonides' nephew, Nachmanides.  Nachmanides tends to be a little more mystical, more mysterious than his uncle, and sometimes that makes him hard to follow. But in this case, I really like his approach. He teaches that great Miracles, the show-stoppers, can increase our awareness and stretch our perceptions so that we take better notice of the smaller or 'hidden' miracles that surround us in our daily lives.  "Everything that happens in our affairs, private or public is miraculous."

On one level, we can get behind that thought easily enough.  Sure.  Every baby that is born is indeed a miracle. We always say that.  But I think to properly understand what Nachmanides is telling us, to truly get what it means to be a miracle, we have to look deeper.  Babies are born every day.  And they are indeed a magnificent and priceless blessing.  But they aren't miracles, at least.  Childbirth is part of the natural order.  All of nature is perhaps a miracle, and that includes babies, and sunrises, and mosquitoes.  So I'm hesitant to write that all under the column of "miracle."

Here's where I want to go with this.  The first rabbis said it's all part of the program--okay.  Maimonides says it is so we can appreciate God's magnificence. Fair enough.  Nachmanides says we are surrounded by miracles, which, actually,  means miracles aren't that special at all!

You are a miracle.  Think about this.  In order for you to be alive at all, your DNA had to travel through millions of years of evolution.  Every one of your ancestors going back MILLIONS of years had to meet each other and mate and somehow that child had to survive to meet the next mate, and so on and so forth.  Every chance that one of them had to fall off a cliff or get eaten by wolves or get sick or killed by a hittite or a roman or a cossack or an Apache  raiding party...every  one of them made it.  If they were Jews, they had to survive all that we read about today, which means they weren't part of Korach's crew, to be sure.   

That's just you getting to planet earth in this generation.   Then there's the specifics.  Based on everything you know about your life and the choices you have made or not made,  here you are.  In this room. With these people.  The chances of that happening on their own given the scope of history and chance are incomprehensible to me.  There is no way to explain it in any logical meaningful way.  How could you?  Consider it.  Thirty thousand years ago, one of my ancestors won a fight and had a baby with the hot cavewoman he liked, or whatever. He could have lost that fight. And I wouldn't be here. 

Of all the houses my family looked at in 1978, they bought the one in Huntington, Long Island, and that led to me going to Temple Beth El, which leads me here.  

Your lives are just the same.  And you can't tell me it was programmed.  Free Will had just as much to do with all of this as anything.  And  at the same time, we human beings are really not so important as we would like to think we are. 

Rabbi Simcha Bunem of Psischke carried with him, at all times, two notes.  One said “the world was created for my sake."  Remember that.  All that has happened throughout the entire history of the universe has happened just so, and just so you could be here in this moment.  It is, to be sure, miraculous. 

At the same time, remember Rabbi Simcha Bunem's other note. "I am but dust and ashes."  And to my mind, this makes the miracle even greater and more precious. 

 

In closing, we should note that the early rabbis, who surely believed in miracles, also remained appropriately skeptical.  "One should never rely on a miracle" says one sage, and another taught "Miracles occur, but food is rarely provided by them".  Food will be provided, however, at the oneg.   Shabbat Shalom.