By Shlomo Riskin

“And God spoke to Moses in the Sinai Desert, in the tent of meeting, on the first day of the second month, in the second year after they left the Land of Egypt.” [Num. 1:1]

How can we transform a no man’s land into a domain of sanctity? The Book of Numbers, which we begin reading this Sabbath, provides an answer to this question. In doing so, it addresses the uncertainties and complexities of transitions: from Egyptian servitude to desert freedom and from abject slavery to the possibility of redemption. Perhaps most importantly, this fourth book of the Bible offers a glimpse into the complexities assailing the greatest leader in world history, Moses, and the challenges he faced in leading this transformation.

A fierce advocate for his people and passionate lover of God, Moshe Rabbeinu (Moses) is a towering persona who reminded a nation about its mission in the world and inspired humanity with his clarion call about the human right to freedom. Nevertheless, and notwithstanding his stunningly remarkable achievements, Moses left the world frustrated and disappointed, having been denied his dream of joining his people in the Promised Land.

Fortunately, God’s greatest prophet has been resoundingly vindicated by Jewish history. The Jewish people’s dramatic and historic return to the Land of Israel continues to draw inspiration from his teachings and longings, as well as from his legacy.  The book that bears his name, “Torat Moshe,” is humanity’s blueprint for redemption.

It is with this context in mind that we approach the book of “Bamidbar” [“In the Desert”], an apt name for a work that documents the Jewish people’s 40-years of transition between Egypt and the Land of Canaan. Indeed, this desert period serves as the precursor of – as well as a most poignant metaphor for – the nearly two thousand years of homeless wandering that characterized much of Jewish history from the destruction of the Temple in 70 C.E. to the establishment of the State of Israel in 1948.

The Hebrew word for desert midbar contains meanings and allusions that in many ways have served as a beacon for our exile. An example of this is the word for leader, which, though most commonly referred to in Hebrew as manhig, our Sages also referred to as dabar, fully cognizant of its shared Hebrew letter root d-b-r with midbar. [Babylonian Talmud, Sanhedrin 8a]

In the Bible, the paradigmatic position of leadership – as exemplified by Abraham, Moses, and David – is the shepherd. And the desert is, of course, the most natural place for a shepherd to lead his flock: the sheep can comfortably wander in a virtual no-man’s land and graze on the vegetation of the various oases or their outskirts without the problem of stealing from private property or harming the ecology of settled habitations.

And perhaps the letter-root d-b-r means leader-shepherd because it also means “word” (dibur). Just as the shepherd directs the flock using sounds and words, the leader of people must also inspire and lead with the verbal message he communicates. Indeed, the Aseret Ha-Dibrot [literally “Ten Utterances,” but better known as the “Ten Commandments”] were revealed in the Sinai desert [midbar], and they govern the Jewish People – as well as a good part of the whole world – to this very day.

Moreover, it is important to note that wherever the Jewish People wandered in the desert, they were always accompanied by the portable desert sanctuary [mishkan], which is derived from the word Shekhina [Divine Presence]. However, God was not in the Sanctuary, for even the greatest expanse of the heavens cannot contain the Divine Presence, as King Solomon declared when he dedicated the Holy Temple in Jerusalem (I  Kings  8:27). It was rather God’s word [dibur], which was in the sanctuary, in the form of the Ten Utterances [Aseret Ha-Dibrot] on the Tablets of Stone preserved in the Holy Ark, as well as the ongoing and continuing Word of God that He would speak from between the cherubs on above the Holy Ark [Ex. 25:16-22].

It was by means of these Divine words [dibrot] that even the desert [midbar] – a metaphor for an inhospitable and alien exile environment: boiling hot by day, freezing cold by night, and deficient in water, the elixir  of  life – can be transformed into sacred space, the place of the Divine word (dibur). Indeed, the words from the desert of Sinai succeeded in sanctifying the many Marrakeshes and Vilnas and New Yorks of our wanderings. The world is a desert [midbar] waiting to become a sanctuary [d’vir] by means of God’s word [dibur], communicated by inspiring leaders [dabarim.]

Rabbi Shalom Reskin is founder and rosh yeshiva of Ohr Torah Stone, and founding rabbi of Efrat, Israel.