Our Torah portion, the full cycle begins with a unique phrase. Beha’alotecha, translated here in Sefaria, the JPS 2006a edition as: 

Speak to Aaron and say to him, “When you mount the lamps, let the seven lamps give light at the front of the lampstand.” (Numbers 8:2) 

But the root of beha’alotecha is the same as aliyah, when you go up, when you raise. When the menorah is lit it is s spiritual going up, just like having an aliyah here or making aliyah in Israel. Aaron raised the lights. The lights went up, they made an aliyah.  

It becomes everyone’s job to make sure that the light stays lit. The whole community, especially the Levites who as tasked with the Lord’s service, at least from age 25-50. After 50 the text tells us Levites can stand guard but are essentially retired. (That would be an interesting sermon for another time.)  

Our whole community as an act of spiritual discipline and meaning has to make sure that the light, this light stays lit. It is a sacred responsibility. 

 In the middle of our portion, as the Israelites are wandering, plodding, they are guided by a cloud that settles over the Holy of Holies. It seems like a Divine game of red light, green light. This cloud, however, is a measure of the Divine Presence, the Shechinah and it offers G-d’s protection and guidance on the journey. Listen carefully to the language. We use the same language today when we wish someone a “Nisiyah Tovah”, a good journey, especially if they are traveling to Israel. We want G-d to protect us, to guard us, to keep us safe. It was embedded in last week’s parsha as well. “Yiverechecha v’yishmarecha” May G-d bless you and keep you, watch over you, guard you, protect you. We want G-d to go with us. My friend and colleague, Pastor Dave Daubert from Zion Lutheran Church ends meetings with “Go with G-d and may G-d go with you.”   

At the very end of our parsha today we hear a line that is very familiar to us. Kuma Adonai… 

Arise Adonai.  

וַיְהִ֛י בִּנְסֹ֥עַ הָאָרֹ֖ן וַיֹּ֣אמֶר מֹשֶׁ֑ה קוּמָ֣ה ׀ יְהֹוָ֗ה וְיָפֻ֙צוּ֙ אֹֽיְבֶ֔יךָ וְיָנֻ֥סוּ 

 מְשַׂנְאֶ֖יךָ מִפָּנֶֽיךָ׃  

When the Ark was to set out, Moses would say:
Advance, O יהוה !
May Your enemies be scattered,
And may Your foes flee before You! 

This translation has Advance. Most seem to use Arise. There is another place where we see Kum—Tzur Yisrael Kuma b’ezrat Yisrael…Rock of Isarael, Arise and come to Israel’s help. It is at that point that we all stand up for the amidah, the standing portion, the central portion of our service. But these two instances while they act as stage directions are mucch more than that. 

In Psalms it says, Kuma Adonai, hosheini elohai, l’adonai hayeshua, al amcha birchatecha… (“Arise, oh Lord! Save me, oh my God!  Salvation belongs to the Lord; Your blessings are upon Your people” (Psalm 3:7-8) There are beautiful musical settings for this but I don’t know of an instance where we use Psalm 3 in our liturgy. 

 What we see here is an evolution of how the text is used. First, we see it in the Book of Numbers. Then we see it in our liturgy. Finally, we then see it in modern day leaders who use this line begging G-d to take care of G-d enemies. David Ben Gurion, Israel’s first prime minister famously said that in order to be a realist in Israel you have to believe in miracles. 

Will G-d really come to Israel’s aid? Is G-d really on our side? Or as others have said does G-d help them who help themselves. What do those two truths mean? Is it ours to wrestle with? Set public policy by?  

I have never been completely comfortable with the theology that says G-d is on our side. I don’t like it especially in the Song at the Sea where the Israelites sing that G-d is a man of war. Perhaps this week’s reading is saved by the haftarah. It is clear that the connection between the haftarah and the Torah is the menorah itself. However, maybe the haftarah also acts as a foil. The haftarah ends with the vision, “Not by might and not by power but by My spirit alone shall we all live in peace.” That’s the world I am working toward. I have sung it at Chanukah in the Debbie Friedman rendition. I have sung it after acts of senseless violence like Sandy Hook. And I will continue to do so.   

It is said that a book, a movie, a play of historical nature says more about the time it is written about than the history it portrays. Using our verse from Numbers in our weekly Torah portion was designed to do precisely that.  

 While it is true that the service for removing the Torah from the ark, parading it around the congregation, reading it, and then returning it became an opportunity to symbolically reenact the history of Israel, from the giving of the Torah at Sinai to the worship in the Temple in Jerusalem. Our verse, Kuma, was not added in the service until the middle of the 13th century in France and not made universal in Ashkenazi tradition until the middle of the 16th. 

 Using the idea that it tells us more about what was happening at the time it was comiled, let’s ask that question. What was happening in those time periods? In France in the early 13th century Jews were expelled. The history channel teaches: 

“As with most European nations, France had been home to Jews since antiquity. Also as in the rest of Europe, the Jews of France faced frequent discrimination and persecution. French Jews had already suffered through burnings of their religious texts, discriminatory taxes and other fiscal policies targeted at Jews, being scapegoated for the Black Plague, and multiple prior attempts to expel them from France. Various cities in France independently expelled their Jews throughout the 13th and 14th centuries. They were formally expelled from the country 1306 and had their lands confiscated by the government, only to be recalled in 1315 and made to pay for the privilege of returning. Under the rules set in 1315, Jews were ordered not to discuss their religion publicly, made to wear a badge identifying themselves, and cautioned against committing usury, an accusation often leveled at Jews based on racist stereotypes.” 

 It would make sense then, fearing reprisals from the French government to beg G-d to scatter G-d’s enemies. A close reading of the text (thank you, Brad!) shows that these are G-d’s enemies, not our enemies.  

 13th century France, Nazi Germany, or today’s rising anti-semitism, or the continuing war in the Israel after October 7th.  The fear is real. Begging G-d to scatter G-d’s enemies is a natural response. Yet some of it is up to us.  

 We have examined three words that mean to arise, to go up, to stand, aliyah, kum, and amidah. I think what it is telling us is that we need to go up, as a spiritual arising, to stand up and to be counted. Only then can we demand that G-d also arise!