Balak | The Sin of Ba’al Peor

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And Israel abode in Shitim, and the people began to commit harlotry with the daughters of Moav. And they called the people to the sacrifices of their gods; and the people did eat and bowed down to their gods. And Israel joined himself to Ba’al Peor; and the anger of the Lord was kindled against Israel. And the Lord said to Moshe: “Take all the chiefs of the people, and hang them up to the Lord in face of the sun, that the fierce anger of the Lord may turn away from Israel.” And Moshe said to the judges of Israel: “Slay you every one his men that have joined themselves to Ba’al Peor.” (Bamidbar 25:1-5)

Elsewhere (in the context of a discussion concerning the allowance granted to Bilam to go to Balak and the story involving the ass), we dealt at length with the question of whether the harlotry in Shitim took place after Bilam returned home and Balak went on his way, as it is presented in Scripture, or whether the harlotry at Shitim took place parallel to the initial negotiations between Balak and Bilam. According to the second approach, Bilam was permitted to go and curse Israel at the time of the sin in Shitim, and then the angel stood in his way with his sword drawn in his hand, stretched out over the camp of Israel at the time of the plague. After Pinchas repaired the harlotry with his killing of Zimri and Kozbi and the harlotry came to an end, God directed Bilam to bless Israel. We will begin our discussion of this painful affair with an examination of the identity of the women who seduced Israel to harlotry and idolatry and of the identity of the men who fell to their seduction.

I. The Daughters of Moav and the Daughters of Midyan

The verse in our parasha describes the harlotry with the daughters of Moav. The daughters of Midyan are not mentioned here in connection to the sin. In the account of the war against Midyan, however, it is the sin of the daughters of Midyan that is mentioned, and the armies of Pinchas are commanded to kill them. The war is waged against the Midyanites and not against the Moavites. The daughters of Moav come out clean from the entire episode. In fact, even though the Torah forbids a Moavite from entering the congregation of the Lord on account of the Bilam affair, Chazal expounded (Yevamot 76b-77a and elsewhere) that the daughters of Moav are permitted.

Moreover, at the height of the sin in our parasha, mention is made of Zimri ben Salu, who brings to his brothers Kozbi, the daughter of the prince of Midyan. Furthermore, the sin involves sacrifices offered to Ba’al Peor, a Midyanite god. The Moavite god is Kamush (see, for example, Bamidbar 21:29 and many other places), and no mention is made of its involvement in the sin.

In light of these factors, we are persuaded by the words of R. Yitzchak Abravanel that "the daughters of Moav" mentioned in our verses are actually the daughters of Midyan. Let us briefly review what we wrote elsewhere about the historical background of Balak's plan.

The Midyanites and Moavites shared the east bank of the Jordan, the length of the Dead Sea and north of it. The Moavites lived in the western portion of that area and were primarily farmers. The Midyanites lived in the eastern portion and were primarily shepherds. During Sichon's campaign north of the Arnon, the Moavites fought against him. Their defeat in battle resulted in the deaths of most of them; those who survived became refugees and the women were taken as captives of war, as is described in the “song of those that speak in parables” (Bamidbar 21). The Midyanites cooperated with Sichon, betraying their Moavite allies. Their kings became "the princes of Sichon" (Yehoshua 13), and they remained in their land. After the destruction of Sichon and the Emorites at the hands of Israel, the Midyanites could also spread out to the west, the previous area of settlement of the Moavites. The daughters of the Midyanites who engaged in harlotry at Shitim were now called "the daughters of Moav," because they lived in the land of Moav north of the Arnon, in the former kingdom of Sichon. The true daughters of Moav lived only south of the Arnon, in a place that the people of Israel did not camp, and they did not participate in the harlotry at Shitim.  

II. The Tribe of Shimon

The results of the census that followed the plague in Shitim indicate with a high degree of certainty that the victims of the plague were exclusively from the tribe of Shimon. In all the tribes (except for the tribe of Menashe for their own reasons, which we will discuss elsewhere), there were relatively small fluctuations in population between the census conducted in the second year and the census taken in the fortieth year. In the tribe of Shimon, the drop in population was enormous. In the census conducted in the second year, the men of the tribe twenty years old and up numbered 59,300; now, in the aftermath of the plague, they numbered only 22,000. Almost two-thirds of the tribe perished! In the plague at Shitim, "only" twenty-four thousand people were killed, and they alone do not fully account for the shrinkage of the tribe. Perhaps when the judges of Israel killed those who had joined themselves to Ba’al Peor, many more fell from the tribe of Shimon. Alternatively, perhaps the problematic nature of the tribe resulted in the deaths of its members in other contexts when there was plague, as in the story involving the burning serpents and elsewhere.

This argument is supported by the brazen act of Zimri ben Salu, who was a prince among the Shimonites.

Why was the primary problem specifically in one tribe? And why the tribe of Shimon?

The problems in the tribe of Shimon began already in the ancestor of the tribe. Shimon was severely rebuked in Yaakov's final words (see Bereishit 49:5-7) for his part in the Shechem incident, and according to a tradition of Chazal, also for his part in the plot to kill Yosef.[1] His especially active part in the hours before the sale of Yosef also rises to a certain extent from the fact that Yosef incarcerated him in particular after releasing the rest of his brothers.

Shimon bore all his life the name given to him by his mother: "Because the Lord has heard that I am hated" (Bereishit 29:33). It is difficult to expect something good to turn out from somebody who grew up that way as a child! Later, the Torah emphasizes about him in particular that he married a Canaanite woman (see Shemot 6:15). If one had to predict the deterioration of one of the tribes, the tribe of Shimon would have been a good candidate for the honor.

Let us return now to our first question: The Torah relates that Reuven and Gad asked to receive their tribal territories east of the Jordan. Moshe was not happy with their request, but in the end he granted it to them. Reuven and Gad constitute a group only if we join to them the tribe of Shimon, the three tribes constituting the southern flag of the camp of Israel – Reuven, Shimon, and Gad. It is possible that Shimon was also with the others in their request from Moshe and that Shimon too received tribal territory to the east of the Jordan. On the assumption that the three received their territories in their order from south to north, Reuven received the southernmost part, the portion to the north of the Arnon; Shimon received the part to the north of that; and Gad received the southern Gilad, north of Shimon. According to this, Shitim, the place where the sin of harlotry was committed, was located in the tribal territory of Shimon.

The three tribes (the half-tribe of Menashe will be discussed elsewhere separately) received their territories in advance in exchange for their commitment and oath to pass before the people of Israel to the west of the Jordan. They began to build their houses and animal pens and settled in their territories as permanent residents. They stopped being part of the wandering camp of Israel in the plains of Moav, of which the Mishkan, the pillar of cloud, and the pillar of fire were a part. As permanent residents in their land, they were less dependent on the leader, Moshe Rabbeinu, and his instructions. They were more exposed to the danger that the Torah later warns about:

Lest when you have eaten and are satisfied, and have built goodly houses, and dwelt therein; and when your herds and your flocks multiply, and your silver and your gold is multiplied, and all that you have is multiplied; then your heart be lifted up, and you forget the Lord your God, who brought you forth out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of bondage; who led you through the great and dreadful wilderness, wherein were serpents, fiery serpents, and scorpions, and thirsty ground where was no water; who brought you forth water out of the rock of flint. (Devarim 8:12-15)

Evidence that the tribes of Reuven, Shimon, and Gad were more exposed to the sin of Ba’al Peor than the other tribes in the camp of Israel, and to some extent were accused of it, can be found in the words of Pinchas and the ten tribal princes to the tribes of Reuven, Gad, and half of Menashe after the latter built an altar near the Jordan:

Is the iniquity of Peor too little for us, from which we have not cleansed ourselves to this day, although there came a plague upon the congregation of the Lord, that you must turn away this day from following the Lord? And it will be, seeing you rebel today against the Lord, that tomorrow He will be angry with the whole congregation of Israel. (Yehoshua 22:17-18)
 
The book of Shoftim illustrates this danger. The second generation, the generation that grew up in the Land of Israel, viewed their connection to the land as self-evident. Their connection to the Torah, which conditions the continued dwelling in the land on the observance of the Torah and its commandments, gradually faded. The people of Israel forged alliances with the Canaanites, married their daughters, and even worshipped their gods.

The danger posed now to the members of the tribe of Shimon was sevenfold greater. The Midyanites are not a foreign people. They are descendants of Avraham, born to his wife Ketura. As descendants of Avraham, they too underwent circumcision (see Rambam, Hilkhot Melakhim 10:8), in contrast to the people of Shechem in the story of Dina. Marital relationships with the daughters of Midyan did not seem absurd, as argued by Zimri ben Salu. Even Moshe forgot the halakha concerning this matter, as there is no explicit Torah prohibition concerning a Midyanite woman who is a descendant of Avraham:

He [Zimri ben Salu] then seized her [Kozbi bat Tzur] by her coiffure and brought her before Moshe. He said to him: Is this woman forbidden or permitted? And should you say: She is forbidden, who permitted Yitro's daughter to you? At that moment Moshe forgot the halakha [concerning intimacy with a heathen woman]. (Sanhedrin 82a)

This defense of the members of the tribe of Shimon who fornicated with the daughters of Midyan is shattered by the harsh reality described by the verse:

And Israel abode in Shitim, and the people began to commit harlotry with the daughters of Moav. And they called the people to the sacrifices of their gods; and the people did eat, and bowed down to their gods. And Israel joined himself to Ba’al Peor; and the anger of the Lord was kindled against Israel. (Bamidbar 25:1-3).

Here lies the answer to Zimri's question concerning the difference between Kozbi bat Tzur and the daughter of Yitro. Moshe brought his wife, her father, and his entire family to faith in and service of God. The daughters of Midyan dragged the young men of Israel after them to the sacrifices that were offered to Ba’al Peor.

There is no difference between the Canaanite women about whom the Torah expresses concern and the Midyanite women in Ba’al Peor. In Shitim there transpired that which the Torah warned against when Israel was to enter the Land of Canaan – being drawn after the local gods:

Lest you make a covenant with the inhabitants of the land, and they go astray after their gods, and do sacrifice to their gods, and they call you, and you eat of their sacrifice; and you take of their daughters to your sons, and their daughters go astray after their gods, and make your sons go astray after their gods. (Shemot 34:15-16)

The tribe of Simon failed in this matter. The plague that resulted in so many deaths was only the first part of the punishment received by the tribe. The second part of the punishment was its dispossession of its territory in Shitim. The tribe crossed the Jordan together with the nine and a half tribes and did not receive its territory among them either. Moshe, on his last day, did not bless the tribe of Shimon, because his blessings applied to the tribes in their territories (even with respect to the tribe of Levi, for whom God was their inheritance). There is, however, a hint in the blessing given to Yehuda to the tribe of Shimon, who in the end settled in the territory of Yehuda. The allusion lies in the request that God hear the voice of Yehuda, and perhaps also in the continuation: "And bring him to his people":

Hear [shema], Lord, the voice of Yehuda, and bring him in to his people. (Devarim 33:7)

It can be argued that from the perspective that we described, the book of Shoftim opens with the sin of Ba’al Peor in our parasha. The generation of those who are becoming rooted in the country see themselves as part of the sons of "Mother Earth" together with the peoples who have lived there for many generations. They blend in with them through mating and are drawn after their daughters to the sacrifices offered to their gods. Even the hero who risks his life to save the situation, in our case Pinchas, brings to mind the heroes of the book of Shoftim, anonymous people who suddenly arise to save their people from calamity and lead them back to the way of God. Pinchas will appear in the book of Shoftim as a leading figure, especially in the midrashim.

III. The Decree

And the Lord said to Moshe: Take all the chiefs of the people and hang (ve-hoka) them up to the Lord in face of the sun, that the fierce anger of the Lord may turn away from Israel. And Moshe said to the judges of Israel: Slay you every one his men that have joined themselves to Ba’al Peor. (Bamidbar 25:4-5)

This hoka'a is understood as hanging,[2] as the Givonites did to the sons of Shaul:

And he delivered them into the hands of the Givonites, and they hanged [va-yoke'um] them in the mountain before the Lord, and they fell all seven together; and they were put to death in the days of harvest, in the first days, at the beginning of barley harvest. And Ritzpa bat Aya took sackcloth and spread it for her upon the rock, from the beginning of harvest until water was poured upon them from heaven; and she suffered neither the birds of the air to rest on them by day, nor the beasts of the field by night. (II Shmuel 21:9-10)

The context indicates that they were hanged, and therefore their flesh might have been eaten by the birds of the air and the beasts of the field.[3]

What is the role of "the chiefs of the people" in this punishment? Almost all of the commentators, as well as the Aramaic translations, understood, in accordance with the gemara's conclusion in Sanhedrin (35a), that the chiefs of the people were taken as judges in order to judge the sinners. "And hang them" refers to the sinners. This is a logical approach, but far from simple meaning of the verse itself. R. Yitzchak Abravanel explains (in accordance with the gemara's initial assumption) that God commanded to hang (kill) the chiefs of the people, under whose responsibility the abomination was committed, for they did not object to the transgressors, nor did they judge them. This is a decree more severe than anything that we have seen. It seems that for this reason Moshe commanded the chiefs of the people to judge the sinners, in order to save themselves from the punishment that God had imposed upon them.

Perhaps "the chiefs of the people" in God's command refers to the chiefs of the sinners, to people like Zimri ben Salu, who was the prince of a father's house. God's command to kill them immediately was an emergency ruling, in the absence of an orderly trial, like the punishments meted out by a king, who can kill many people on one day and based on the testimony of a single witness. The execution of the leaders of the sinners was meant to deter the people from continuing to cling to Ba’al Peor. Perhaps Moshe could not locate the leaders of the sinners, so he established courts to judge the sinners themselves in each tribe. Pinchas located the leader of the sinners, Zimri ben Salu, and when he killed him without a trial, as commanded by Moshe, God's wrath departed from Israel, as God had promised Moshe.

At first glance, we might have expected that Moshe would act as he had acted in the incident involving the golden calf. We might have thought that he would stand at the gate of the camp and call God's faithful to a national war, with the purpose of punishing the transgressors who were responsible for the plague. Instead, Moshe sent the judges of each tribe to deal with the members of their own tribe. We learn from this that there were sinners from other tribes as well, but they were few, and the tribal judges sufficed to judge and punish them. In the tribe of Shimon, the problem was much greater, as is evident from the number of deaths.

The very imposition of the role of dealing with the sinners on those who were responsible for each tribe is indicative of clear tribal division already at this stage. Moshe did not declare the problem to be a national problem. When Zimri ben Salu, prince of a house of fathers, came before Moshe with the daughter of the prince of Midyan, it was already clear that this was not a minor problem that could be resolved on the tribal level, but rather a national problem.[4] But when this happened, it was already too late. Therefore, Pinchas rose up in order to resolve the problem at any price.

IV. Bilam's Connection to the Sin of Ba’al Peor

Bilam is not mentioned in the account of the sin of Ba’al Peor. On the contrary, we are told that after finishing his parables, he returned to his place:

And Bilam rose up and went and returned to his place; and Balak also went his way. (Bamidbar 24:25)

Two points contradict this assumption:

1. Moshe explicitly says at the time of the war against the Midyanites that Bilam was the initiator of the sin of Ba’al Peor:

Behold, these caused the children of Israel, through the counsel of Bilam, to revolt so as to break faith with the Lord in the matter of Peor, and so the plague was among the congregation of the Lord. (Bamidbar 31:16)

2. At the time of the war against the Midyanites, Bilam was not in his city Petor, but rather in the tents of Midyan, where he was captured and killed. His killing also attests to his guilt in the sin of Ba’al Peor, for Pinchas and his army went out to avenge that sin.
 
Perhaps there is no escape from the explanation offered by R. Yitzchak Abravanel:[5] Bilam, while on his way home, first visited the elders of Midyan, who had initially come to him together with the elders of Moav. After being banished in disgrace by Balak king of Moav, Bilam went to try his luck with the elders of Midyan and suggested to them to draw the young men of Israel into harlotry with their daughters and to the sacrifices offered to Ba’al Peor. There he was captured at the time of God's vengeance against Midyan, and then killed. This too is proof that "the daughters of Moav" in the sin of Ba’al Peor were the daughters of Midyan.

V. In Defense

            In the wake of similar ideas that I proposed with regard to Datan and Aviram (in the spirit of the words of R. Eliezer ben Horkanos), I will offer a defense for those who sinned with Ba’al Peor.

In my opinion, the sin as it appears in the Torah raises difficult questions of faith. The people of Israel experienced (in their youths or as directly attested to them by their parents) the exodus from Egypt and the splitting of the Yam Suf, the revelation at Mount Sinai and the giving of the Torah, the manna that fell for forty years in the wilderness and the water that issued forth from rocks. They experienced victories over mighty kings, such as Og and Sichon, and the curse of Bilam that was turned into a blessing. They experienced the greatness of Moshe and Aharon, and especially the Mishkan and the pillars of cloud and fire that hovered over it. With Ba’al Peor, in a moment, all this faded and vanished; \the people of Israel threw away all their faith and all their upbringing, fornicated with foreign women, ate from the offerings to their gods, and prostrated before them. Is this possible? What is the value of faith in God, in Moshe, and in the Torah if it is acquired through such great efforts, and the Torah strengthens it so many times, and here it fades away in a moment through the cheap seduction of the local women and offerings to Ba’al Peor?[6]

We will try to understand the nature of the sin of Ba’al Peor from another place in the Torah: 

You shall not add to the word which I command you, neither shall you diminish from it, that you may keep the commandments of the Lord your God which I command you. Your eyes have seen what the Lord did in Ba’al Peor; for all the men that followed Ba’al Peor, the Lord your God has destroyed them from the midst of you. (Devarim 4:2-3)

From these verses it appears that the great sin of the people of Israel involving Ba’al Peor was that of adding to (bal tosif) or diminishing from (bal tigra) the Torah's commandments, like donning tefillin with five passages instead of four or taking five species on Sukkot instead of four.

Similarly, the verses cited above from the book of Yehoshua seem to indicate a relatively narrow and minor transgression:

And when they came to the region about the Jordan, that is in the land of Canaan, the children of Reuven and the children of Gad and the half-tribe of Menashe built there an altar by the Jordan, a great altar to look upon. And the children of Israel heard say: Behold, the children of Reuven and the children of Gad and the half-tribe of Menashe have built an altar in the forefront of the land of Canaan, in the region about the Jordan, on the side that pertains to the children of Israel. And when the children of Israel heard of it, the whole congregation of the children of Israel gathered themselves together at Shilo, to go up against them to war… and they spoke with them, saying: Thus says the whole congregation of the Lord: What treachery is this that you have committed against the God of Israel, to turn away this day from following the Lord, in that you have built you an altar, to rebel this day against the Lord? Is the iniquity of Peor too little for us, from which we have not cleansed ourselves to this day, although there came a plague upon the congregation of the Lord, that you must turn away this day from following the Lord? And it will be, seeing you rebel today against the Lord, that tomorrow He will be angry with the whole congregation of Israel. (Yehoshua 22:10-18)

The people of Israel (led by Pinchas ben Elazar) drew a comparison in their rebuke of the tribes that settled on the east bank of the Jordan between the building of an altar near the Jordan and the sin of Baal Peor. Because of the severity of the results of the sin of Baal Peor, they threaten the eastern tribes that they will wage war against them. The building of the altar by the eastern tribes was not for the sake of idolatry. It was at most an alternative Mishkan to the Mishkan in Shilo, a Mishkan with no idols – sort of a communal bama, which could be used for offering sacrifices to the God of Israel. There seems to be no similarity between it and the sin of the daughters of Midyan and clinging to Ba’al Peor.

On the other hand, it is possible to draw a connection between the sin as it is mentioned in the book of Devarim, a sin of adding to the Torah's commandments, and the sin as it is described in the book of Yehoshua. The sin of bal tosif with five species with the lulav is a halakhic conclusion of the Oral Law, which expands what is stated in Scripture. The plain meaning of the verse may deal with a more severe sin of bal tosif – a sin that comes to distort, even if with good intentions, the precise instructions that the Torah gives regarding worshipping God in the place that He chooses with sacrifices and the like. The precise instructions regarding the sacrifices are essential, in order not to make the most serious mistake of all, this too out of good intentions:

Take heed to yourself that you be not ensnared to follow them, after that they are destroyed from before you; and that you inquire not after their gods, saying: How used these nations to serve their gods? Even so will I do likewise. You shall not do so to the Lord your God; for every abomination to the Lord, which He hates, have they done to their gods; for even their sons and their daughters do they burn in the fire to their gods. All this word which I command you, that shall you observe to do; you shall not add thereto, nor diminish from it. (Devarim 12:30-13:1)

The commandment of bal tosif appears in these verses as well, the intention being that a person not think to add to the sacrifices of a bullock and ram, and bring also his son as an offering to God, as do the nations around them to their gods.

This idea may well connect to the fear of Pinchas and the people of Israel regarding the construction of an altar along the Jordan by the tribes who had settled on the east bank of the river. The altar was built for the service of the God of Israel, but when it involves the violation of the prohibition of bal tosif and adds a site for the worship of God about which they were not commanded, that place is liable to deteriorate into a place where sacrifices about which they were not commanded are offered. Is it possible to connect these concerns to the sin of Baal Peor, which, as it would appear from the verses in our parasha, involved offerings to foreign gods and the sin of idolatry?

In order to reconcile what is stated in our parasha with what is stated in the book of Devarim and in the book of Yehoshua, it might be necessary to diminish Israel's sin with Ba’al Peor in our parasha as well. Perhaps we can suggest that even those who sinned with Ba’al Peor did not mean to abandon the worship of God to which they had become accustomed, or their faith in the God who brought them out of Egypt. They met the Midyanites who lived in that place and saw them as relatives and potential allies, seeing that they too were descendants of Avraham, and as descendants of Avraham and Ketura they were circumcised. They allowed themselves to dine with the Midyanites and to eat of the offerings that they brought to their gods, out of politeness and solidarity. In gratitude for the hearty meals and the permission to enjoy their daughters, they also bowed out of politeness to the god of Midyan, Ba’al Peor – as part of a demonstration of friendship and not because of an overall conversion to their faith.[7] The psalmist in Tehillim mentions this promiscuous meal, but not the idol worship:

They joined themselves also to Ba’al Peor, and ate the sacrifices of the dead. Thus they provoked Him with their doings, and the plague broke in upon them. Then stood up Pinchas, and wrought judgment, and so the plague was stayed. And that was counted to him for righteousness, to all generations forever.  (Tehillim 106:28-31)

The Torah in our parasha relates to this sin as outright idolatry, in its usual manner of utmost stringency regarding such matters, for fear that this would lead to a more severe sin, and thus also to a more severe punishment. The sin was serious, but it can be catalogued together with the prohibition of bal tosif in the book of Devarim: serving God in a manner that recognizes the neighboring culture and the need to become integrated into it and its rituals.[8]

Translated by David Strauss