I once taught in a Jewish high school in which Many of the students in the senior class drove their own cars to school on a daily basis, some in relatively old jalopies, others in BMWs. When the administration announced that numerous spots in the parking lot would now be reserved for faculty and off-limits to students, as one would expect in any school, the seniors staged a full-fledged protest and a sit-in outside the administrators’ offices. They had signs, chants, they refused to go to class, the full works. To be fair, they were mostly protesting in a sort of tongue in cheek way, pretty aware of the absurdity of demanding student access to faculty parking spots. But their organized protest reflects a growing trend in the 21st
Within the last few years, we have seen one of greatest series of uprisings in the history of mankind. All across the world, the political landscape has been shifting, particularly in but not limited to the Middle East. Many of these changes began as protests against the ruling powers or the current power structure.
If you pay close attention, however, you’ll notice that though there have been protests in many different countries, there have been two general types of intended results. The actual fruits of these movements have varied. In Tunisia, Egypt, Yemen, Ukraine, Libya, and Syria, protests led to violent revolutions, overthrowing the government, or continuing crises. In Algeria, Bahrain, Iran, and Turkey, similar protest movements were crushed by police and military might. In a few countries, such as Jordan, Morocco, and Oman, the result of protests has been change in political leadership, but it is unclear whether the lives of citizens of those countries has substantively improved. What all of these nations have in common is that the protest movements were intended to change the leadership.
Looking at an example earlier in Jewish history, Korach’s rebellion too was an eclectic protest movement against the leadership of the Jewish People. In fact, it was even a peaceful protest – the Torah does not record any violence between the Moshe and his fellow leaders and any of the protesters. It is worthwhile to consider what this protest movement was really about and whether they accomplished any of their goals.
Understandably, the Midrash suspects that it was Korach’s jealousy of the members of his family who had achieved positions of leadership, such as Elitzafan ben Uziel, and even Moshe and Aharon themselves, that fueled Korach’s movement. It is no wonder, then, why Hashem and Moshe rejected his arguments.
After a closer read, however, it seems that Korach’s complaint is really about a much broader issue, one that seemingly challenges the notion of authority altogether. Korach asks Moshe, “You haven’t taken enough for yourself? All of the community is holy and G-d is amongst them so why should you be princes over the nation?” He seems to be making a much more substantive criticism of Moshe’s leadership. Realizing this, Rabbi Joseph B. Soloveitchik, the ‘Rav,’ suggests that Korach’s grievance was not with the fact that Moshe and Aharon were the leaders as opposed to others but rather with the nature of their authority over Jewish law.
The Midrash Tanchuma, quoted by Rashi, famously says that since the rebellion story immediately follows the commandment of tzitzit, Korach’s complaint must be about the arbitrary nature of mitzvoth generally. According to the Midrash, in his initial complaint, Korach asks Moshe whether a garment made entirely of blue died wool would need to have תכלת strings on it. Moshe admits that it would. Korach then asks, what about a house full of whole Torah scrolls – would it need a mezuza, which only contains a couple of paragraphs from the Torah? Moshe replies that here too the law of mezuza would apply even if the rationale seems to have been fulfilled without it. Korach concludes that the mitzvoth, as Moshe is teaching them, must not be of divine origin.
To Korach, religious law should follow human logic – it should apply when it makes sense and it should change to reflect the intended effect on its practitioners. Rav Soloveitchik thus argues that the mistake of Korach and his followers is parallel to that of non-Orthodox Jewish movements, who view religious law as dependent on the subjective experience of the religious individual and not on formalistic applications of rules. From Korach’s perspective, everyone truly is equal because anyone can interpret their own experiences and change ritual to their liking based on their own common sense.
In reality, what makes Moshe unique is that he has a more objective and intimate understanding of divine will and the inner logic of Halacha because of his direct encounter with G-d on Har Sinai. This enables him to understand mitzvoth as categorical imperatives that are not dependent on the whims and experiences of people.
So Korach’s rebellion was against Moshe and Aharon’s leadership itself, maybe because he felt that he deserved their roles more than they did or maybe because he sincerely believed that Moshe’s approach to Jewish law was too rigid and formalistic. What he and Datan and Aviram wanted was nothing short of a revolution, an overthrowing of the government.
Looking at the results, we find that Korach, Datan, and Aviram leave no positive legacy after their uprising; Moshe doesn’t even bother to address their concerns. He does nothing but castigate them and obey G-d’s command to separate from them as the earth consumes them alive. If you think about it, how could Moshe react otherwise? If he were to listen to their protest against his authority and abdicate his leadership position, the Jewish People would have been left without someone of stature to replace him and the Torah itself would be undermined.
As we watch governments topple in the Middle East, we are reminded that even if we don’t like the current leadership, overthrowing the leader can sometimes be much worse. As we see in Iraq and Syria, you can be left with a power vacuum, opening the door for charismatic but dangerous leaders to fill the void.
Ari Shavit points out in his book My Promised Land that the only recent protest movement that has led to real policy changes rather than political change was the 2011 Occupy Rothschild movement in Israel. The Israeli protests over the high cost of living were comprised of people from across the political spectrum to the extent that 85% of Likud voters supported the protests. The question is, what led to the success of the protests? What was unique about the way the government responded that kept Likud in power and Bibi at the helm?
Rav Moshe Lichtenstein points out that while Korach’s interests are clearly self-centered, the interests of the other protesters are less obvious. He notes that the Netziv in Ha’emek Davar suggests that there are really three different protests taking place simultaneously: Korach’s protest against Moshe and Aharon’s religious authority, Datan and Aviram’s protest against continuing travels in the desert rather than returning to Egypt, and the protest of 250 individuals seeking closeness with G-d.
The Netziv characterizes these 250 as people who are wrong but righteous, who were genuinely seeking ways to attach themselves to G-d, so much so that they were willing to risk their lives to burn קטורת and see if G-d would choose theirs. In contrast with his unsympathetic reaction to Korach, Datan, and Aviram, Moshe does address the concerns of the 250 by giving them the opportunity to bring קטורת and prove themselves. Though they die in the process, their sacrifice is not entirely in vain – the copper fire pans they use for the קטורת are melted down and applied as the outer coating of the מזבח. They are like tragic heroes who go too far in their search for spirituality and yet pave the way for others to seek more moderate forms of the same.
As the Rashbam notes, the Jewish People recognized this sacrifice and later protest to Moshe about their tragic fiery deaths, which to them were too similar to the deaths of Aharon’s sons Nadav and Avihu. After quickly working to end the plague that subsequently befalls them, Moshe conducts a lottery once again to choose who would conduct the Avodah in the Mishkan. Moshe again responds to their protest, acknowledging the concerns of the people, even if the lottery ends with Aharon remaining as the progenitor of כהנים for all time.
From this perspective, we can now distinguish between two kinds of protests. There are those who are seeking to challenge authority, to overthrow the current power structure, like Korach, Datan, and Aviram in ancient times and Egypt, Syria, and Yemen today. This type of protest will rarely succeed because it leaves little to no motivation for the leadership to change and if it works, there may be no easy way to replace the leadership with someone qualified to lead and sympathetic to the needs of the people.
In contrast, there are those people who are seeking to improve their physical and spiritual lives and who take the personal risks necessary to fight for those changes, just like the 250 other protesters back then and the protesters in Israel, Jordan, and other nations in recent years. The successes of the Occupy Rothschild movement were in large part due to the nature of their goals – they didn’t want a different government, just that the current one pay attention to the needs and burdens that the average Israeli faces.
Still, there is another ingredient that is necessary for a protest to effectively generate change, namely, the response of the leadership. A leader can attempt to quell a rebellion by force, which Moshe does not do, or they can attempt to give the people opportunities to try their proposed reforms, which Moshe does in response to the 250, thus successfully preventing the protests from spreading further and lasting longer
The reason Moshe is able to maintain leadership is that he does not insist on ending the rebellion with military force. In fact, when Yehoshua offers to execute Eldad and Medad for challenging his authority by prophesying in the camp, Moshe tells Yehoshua to let them be – if only everyone would aspire to become a prophet of G-d! Moshe does not feel personally threatened by protests against his status as leader; remember, he originally tried to refuse to take the job! Instead, he tells those he deems innocent to stand back and watch as G-d meets out justice.
However, when some of the protesters seem genuinely interested in spiritual opportunities, rather than overthrowing the leadership, he does respond. By G-d’s command, he offers them a dangerous bet, one they take and that is forever memorialized on the surface of the altar.
Similarly, the governments most successful in quelling unrest are those who listened to their people, who made even minor concessions and admitted that things aren’t perfect. To his credit, Binyamin Netanyahu was willing to respond to the protests and address the people’s concerns. King Hussein of Jordan, too, successfully maintained his reign by changing the government leadership rather than crushing protests. When leaders listen to their people, not only will they be able to maintain the stability of their government but they may also come to find that they agree with their concerns.
This right to organize and protest is part of the First Amendment to the US Constitution. It is an inalienable right and one that is fundamental to the success of democracy. This past week, many people exercised that right to protest US silence about the abduction of three of our boys, three people tremping in the Gush, just as my sister, many of my friends, and I have each done countless times. It is important that we make sure to use protests, not to start rebellions, but to demonstrate our values and our concern for those we care about most.
דורש לנפשי 