In tonight's portion, we continue with Numbers and have a fucking time of it. We open with a discussion of the further duties of the Levites, as well as their being made an elevation offering to G-d. Fun fact: G-d had the men shave themselves smooth first, which really makes it feel like a sex thing1. Next we discuss whether you can offer the paschal offering while unclean, to which Moses tells the people asking him to hold on a sec while he dials up G-d. Afterwards, a discussion of the logistics of signaling armies and camps of people via trumpet, as well as some of the precedents for how shofars are used during festivals in the modern era.
And then we get to the manna.
As you may recall, we know that manna 1) is deposited on the ground like the morning dew, or frost, 2) has a similar shape to a coriander seed, and 3) tastes decent. For unclear reasons, a number of the sages are quite insistent that the manna was not actually worked by the people (such as being ground or pounded or baked into cakes) but was rather capable of assuming any flavor 2. There's a comparison to cream that G-d makes, and then we learn that the sages didn't have any notable lactation fetishes
The text indicates people were unhappy with manna day in and day out and wanted meat; the sages were of the opinion that a number of them were stirring shit and looking for excuses. This leads to G-d and Moses getting very fed up and this incredible exchange:
At this point the people are beset by a plague of quails flying at chest height, and a number of them are stricken dead by some kind of food poisoning and/or divine quail-mediated wrath.
A lot going on there.
Anyways, next there's a discussion of Moses divorcing Zipporah in which Miriam calls him out for not fucking his wife, G-d calls out Aaron and Miriam while they're fucking their partners, and strikes Miriam with leprosy for seven days, during which the Israelite camps refuse to move from their position. In sum, we're pretty sure G-d and Moses are married now?
Eventful parsha, to say the least.
Some further commentaries and notes:
- we've identified moses as a terezi, the christian paul as a vriska, and otherwise have begun situating the midrash homestuck
- brief discussions of miriam/zipporah yuri
- due to the leprosy afflicted on miriam being described as "white and scaly", we being who we are were forced to immediately imagine a dragon/snakegirl miriam
- miriam really did call out moses for not fucking his wife, unlike her and aaron who fucked their spouses all the time, huh. it's like the world's worst sitcom misunderstanding where you don't realize your bro is fucking the Omnipresent and so he has to tell them to cut out the leprosy shit.
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oh? the levites shall be yours, hashem? all the smoothest men in israel?
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save melon, cucumber, garlic, onion, or leek
ok so this time around we got into talking about the candelabra stuff. ramban goes into a lot of detail about how G-d thought Aaron would feel bad seeing the various leaders' offerings so G-d gave him a special task, but also then is like "but G-d could have just reminded him of all his special qualities" and then suggests that this is drawing a line between this story and the origin of chanukah, and tracing a line from aaron and his sons to that and making a kind of narrative arc rather than something intended to be read as a document qua document
we also talked about how given the rituals around certain offenses last week, the purification of the levites seems pretty straightforward, but also it does fit into the offering framework with a really special cow. (the fact that it's a heifer in this case i wonder if is kind of intended to be specifically calling back to the golden calf as far as like... here's its opposite since the levites weren't in on that?)
divination also comes up when discussing what counts as magic and sorcery vs ritual, which we end up kind of putting down as "mostly divination" and geo suggests that probably it's because it's an "actually you should be asking g-d about this" kind of thing. (we get into a bit of a tangent about modern conceptions of magic and how urban fantasy throws around the name of G-d a lot in a weird kind of way. callout post for harry dresden)
geo recommends this zine about antisemitism and appropriation in modern occult movements
i think it wasssss pleroma (my memory is bad) who brought up that the levites are functionally a "slow-burn sacrifice" which we got into for a bit as a kind of like, offering of people who are dedicated to the lord
going onward we talk about how strangers traveling with you and their ability to participate in ceremonies and rituals is allowed, but they have to be circumcised first, and that maybe it was in a sense to set yourself apart from other cultures, where it was pretty common to pay tribute to the local gods while passing through the area rather than keeping to your own religion. (and also how that ties in with all the concerns about Loose Morals and Worshipping Foreign Gods all over) (also how the term "stranger" implies a distinction from official converts)
the text transitions into talking about trumpets and marching/travel, which starts to kinda set up for the people to get on the road again after we've been doing a lot of administrativa. actually looking at the above, this is like. completely different stuff than we discussed last time? wild
awesome desert!
then we go to the journeying and the manna and quail and the people complaining about the provisions. laenan raises the important question as to whether the quail were stacked, or just hovering at chest height for discussion.
"put down a bowl of ambrosia salad and behold, manna. except it has coriander in it for some reason." — pleroma
'asaf = "to gather"
'asafsuf = ~"gatherer" [pejorative]; colloquially "riffraff"
c/o laenan