Before We Burn the Granaries

Before We Burn the Granaries
Rabbi Andrew Kaplan Mandel | Parashat Matot-Masei, 5786

We are in a low period in the Jewish calendar called bein-hameitzarim, "between the narrow straits." It’s the time between the seventeenth of Tammuz, when we remember the breaching of Jerusalem’s walls, and the destruction of the Temple on the ninth of Av in the year 70.

But rabbinic tradition tells us that the city's destruction began far before the Romans entered the city. We often reference that sinat hinnam, baseless hatred between the Jews, was the cause of their own downfall.

One specific story from the Talmud describes that, as the Romans approached, the sages said let’s negotiate with our adversaries. But there were Jewish zealots who insisted on fighting. The sages responded that continued warfare was not going to be successful. So the zealots burned down the Jewish storehouses of food, generating a famine inside the city, forcing a crisis and short-circuiting every option but their own. The Jews as a whole lost their agency.

They could no longer wait out the Romans or even maintain social order. The zealots’ insistence that their position was the only viable route to survival was instead the road to ruin.

So what should we do when people with shared interests see different paths forward?

A story from our Torah portion this week offers an alternative. Two of the tribes, the Reubenites and the Gadites, ask Moses if they can settle permanently where they are currently camping because it seems ideal for their cattle. Moses does not take kindly to this request, to put it mildly. He first replies with a rhetorical question: "Are your brothers to go to war while you stay here?" And then another question: "Why will you turn the minds of the Israelites from crossing into the land that G-d has given them?" He next reminds them how angry G-d was when 10 of the Israelite spies spooked everyone else about the mission to enter the Promised Land, instigating forty years of wandering. Then, Moses just unleashes his anger, saying: “You, a brood of sinful men, have replaced your fathers, to add still further to G-d’s wrath against Israel.”

This is pretty extreme language. And let's be clear: these two tribes haven't done anything yet. They haven't insisted on their position. They are just asking a question.

But Moses's response is swift and harsh. He's clearly distressed that these two tribes seem to be prioritizing their own economic interests over the good of the collective. By using sharp words, perhaps he wants to emphasize the stakes of upending the plan to cross the Jordan River. He is not wrong to be concerned. But he is not right to indict them on the spot.

The two tribes now make a surprising decision, a choice that I think we often fail to make today.

The Hebrew says: vayigshu. They approach him. They move closer to him. They draw near in the heat of this moment.

It's the same verb used when Abraham is preparing to question G-d over the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah. Abraham vayigash – approaches – G-d and then asks, "Would you destroy the righteous with the wicked?" The act of drawing near opens a conversation in which mercy and justice could be explored together.

So, yes, the two tribes vayigshu. They approach Moses. They clarify their intentions. They indicate that they plan on supporting the rest of the Israelites, helping to build a secure homeland for the collective, even if they see their personal future in a different place.

To Moses’s credit, he allows the approach to become a conversation. He could have refused to hear it. He had every justification to dismiss them: the spies, the forty years, the fear of another collapse. Vayigshu is only transformative because both parties stay in the room for it. The tribes draw near, and Moses doesn't walk away. Both moves are the miracle here.

Moses next names his priorities: If you join your brothers in battle, if you help safeguard the future of the whole people, then you may return to your own separate land holdings. He accepts that a shared commitment does not require identical choices. His original accusation transforms into an agreement. The potential breaking point becomes a covenant. What’s remarkable is that neither side abandons its deepest commitments. What changes is not their destination but their understanding of one another. Contrast this with the story of Jerusalem. The zealots burned the resources that would have allowed for another possibility. Moses and the tribes preserve the relationship long enough to find one.

We are confronting significant ruptures along so many lines these days, ruptures over Israel, over politics, over how we define who's in and who's out. The tenor of the disagreements continues to reach new depths of vitriol and nastiness. We tend to react immediately, like Moses, when we perceive that others are on a different page from us. We start making assumptions about them, questioning their motives or legitimacy, raising our voice, name-calling, claiming how they are ruining everything, all the while without listening at all. Moses's initial reaction represents a natural response. It's fear kicking in. We feel that we're being abandoned. We see opposition as disloyalty. And if we're not careful, we end up like the zealots, destroying the relationships and norms that give us time and options to work through disagreement.

Imagine if Jerusalem had experienced a moment of vayigshu. Imagine if the zealots had first drawn near to the sages instead of burning down the granaries. Imagine if each side had begun by naming what they held in common: "We both want Judaism to survive." They still might have disagreed profoundly about strategy. History offers no guarantees. But they might have preserved something essential: the ability to deliberate together rather than forcing everyone into a corner.

The irony, of course, is that many of us are actually invested in the same broad vision today, living our Jewish values in peace. But we focus on different fears – and imagine very different paths to get there.

During disputes, we often skip the first act of approach.

Before we make our case, we can make it clear we’re still in relationship.

Stating that explicitly with the person across from us can restore some goodwill. It can even begin to move us all onto the same side of the table.

We’re not seeking identical beliefs or agreement on every conclusion.

But we can say: “Your future matters to me. I want to know what concerns you. Whatever happens next, I still recognize you as part of my story. I need to know I am part of yours.”

We cannot renew that sense of shared destiny if we burn down its precious resources: civility, the benefit of the doubt, the common cause that lets us come back to the table at all.

Israeli poet Yehuda Amichai warns us about dwelling in “the place where we are right.” We can remain on ground so hard-packed with certainty that nothing new can ever take root there. Or we can approach one another anew. We know where one path has led us before. Who knows where the other might lead?