Parsha Paragraphs
Rabbi Naftali Kassorla
Parshat Naso 5778
The Painful Truth
The D’var Torah for this week is dedicated in memory of:
גיסי ר׳ אלחנן יעקב בן מו״ח ר׳ שמואל פנחס זצ״ל
גיסי ר׳ אלחנן יעקב בן מו״ח ר׳ שמואל פנחס זצ״ל
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This week's parsha tells of the Nesi’im, the Nazir and the Sotah.
After secluding herself with another man, having already been warned by her husband, the Sotah is brought to the Kohen. She must drink the מי מרים (bitter waters) which will test her: If she was unfaithful, the water causes her innards to burst. If she was truthful in denying the accusation, she lives.
The Mishna in Sotah (8b) tells us that when punishing the Sotah, G-d deals with her מידה כנגד מידה – commensurate to her actions. Just as she dressed to entice the man, her punishment is that her appearance is sullied. And just as she used her thigh for sin, her punishment is that her thigh is attacked first.
The Gemara points out what would seem to be an inconsistency in the text. The Torah tells us that when warning her of the punishment, the Kohen should state that the Sotah’s thigh will be stricken first, and afterwards her stomach. (Naturally water travels to the stomach before the thighs. This change in the natural order would fulfill the מידה כנגד מידה discussed in the Mishna.) Yet later, the verse indicates that “her belly shall swell, and her thigh shall fall away” (Bamidbar 5:27). The Gemara questions why the Kohen contradicts what the Torah says will happen, and gives a fascinating answer:
Abaye said in explanation: When the priest curses the woman, he first curses the thigh and then he curses the stomach, but when the bitter water evaluates her, it evaluates her along its way through the body. The water first enters the stomach and then reaches the thigh. The Gemara asks: But in the verse detailing the curse it is also written: “And this water that causes the curse shall go into your bowels, and will cause your belly to swell, and your thigh to fall away” (Numbers 5:22). The Gemara answers: That verse teaches that the priest notifies her that the stomach will be affected first and then the thigh, so that one not cast aspersions on the bitter water.
The pasuk which tells us that the stomach is hit first is describing the natural path of the water, as it travels the body and evaluates the woman’s actions. But the Kohen is meant to tell the woman exactly what part of her body will actually be punished first, and that is the thigh. The reason he needed to do so was שלא להוציא לעז על מי המרים. Rashi explains: For they [the onlookers] will say that since the water did not work in that order, the punishment [of death] was not caused by their [the Kohen and the bitter waters’] hands.” Due to an apparent slight change in the order of the punishment described by the Torah, people may have discounted the supernatural cause of the Sotah’s death.
This Gemara is absolutely amazing. Simply because the it seems that the waters didn’t go in the exact order which was described, despite the subsequent death of the Sotah, people will discredit the waters – and the miracle?! How is that possible? The onlookers of this process just witnessed a woman die instantly from drinking water mixed with ink. How could a person ever fathom that this death was anything but miraculous? How could one allow such a minor detail to derail him from the greater message?
We see in this Gemara a deep insight into the complexity of the human psyche. People naturally avoid criticism. We generally don’t like being told we are wrong, and if given the chance to defend ourselves, we may latch on to any detail or excuse to remove from us a sense of guilt or obligation. It can cause us to discount the truth – even a miraculous event – which happens right before our very eyes.
Carl Jung (a 20th century psychoanalyst) termed this as “the Shadow” – the unconscious aspect of the personality which the conscious ego does not identify in itself. Because one tends to reject the least desirable aspects of one’s personality, the shadow, or the part which one is subconsciously covering, is largely negative.1
This inherent reflex to avoid contemplating the negative parts of ourselves, leads us to search for even the slightest inconsistency, so as to abdicate ourselves from the responsibility to admit fault or confront a painful reality. So fearful is the human psyche of itself, it actively turns away from the prospect of the blunt truth.
This is what the onlookers of the Sotah’s punishment would fall into: the refusal to engage with themselves on this deeper level, for fear of confronting uncomfortable truths. Rather they latched on to one small detail in order to ignore the whole.
It can be very difficult to get past this natural tendency to avoid criticism, and the searing pain that accompanies it. It requires a great deal of honesty and sincerity to know when we are ignoring the truth and getting distracted by these minor details, simply because we don’t want to admit we are wrong. But more importantly, it requires that we be confident enough in ourselves to understand that criticism is not a discounting of who we are, rather it is a means towards becoming better.
James A. Garfield, the 20th President of the United States once quipped: “The truth will set you free, but first it will make you miserable.” We need to keep in mind that this small bit of misery, just like a bitter pill, heals us like no other remedy.
If we can open our ears and listen to the messages that Hashem is sending us, as difficult as they may be to “swallow,” we can actually learn to respect ourselves more and derive confidence from the true heroism in confronting painful truths.
Shabbat Shalom
1 It's not a completely negative aspect, as there are also positive aspects that may remain hidden in one's shadow (especially in people with low self-esteem, anxieties etc.)
