Lost and Found

Lost and Found
Rabbi Ari Lorge

A suit of armor, an antique naval diving helmet, a Jim Henson muppet, a full sheet of uncut $2 bills, a letter signed by Eleanor Roosevelt dated 1944, a live rattlesnake. What ties these things together? They were found in people’s lost luggage.

When we travel, we have a tendency to lose things. And yes, some of us don’t even need to travel to lose things, but when we are on the go, we seem especially prone to leaving our belongings behind. Today, US travelers lose millions of suitcases every year.

Our propensity led to a now booming family business: The Unclaimed Baggage Center in Scottsboro Alabama. From quite humble beginnings, it is now a 50,000 square-foot space. People come from all over to browse the museum of found oddities that are kept in special exhibits and to buy less unique items at a discount .

Losing our belongings during travel is not a new phenomenon. This week’s parshah lets us see it's as ancient as the Torah.

The Israelites are finally ready to begin to travel from Mount Sinai toward the Promised Land. They receive commandments about how to march, including a detailed order for the line.

Judah is going first - no surprise there. Line leader like always.

All the way at the back. The tribe of Dan. Dead last.

Our sages noted that in being designated as the last tribe in the line, Dan is called מְאַסֵּ֥ף. (1)

This is not a common verb. Our commentators work to understand it.

Rashi, the greatest of them all, suggests that in calling the rearguard מְאַסֵּ֥ף we learn not just about the tribe’s placement, but also its unique role. The Hebrew word מְאַסֵּ֥ף is connected to the root “אסף” which means “gathering.” Rashi teaches “Dan marched in the back so that if anyone lost any item, the tribe of Dan restored it to them.” (2)

There you have it. The original Unclaimed Baggage Center.

Now, this is not a small job. Just two parshayot ago we took a census. There are 603,550 men of army age. That doesn’t include the tribe of Levi, woman, or children! We’re talking about an extremely conservative estimate of 2 million people.

Do you know how many lost water bottles that would be. What a thankless position.

However, this isn’t Rashi’s last word on the subject. מְאַסֵּ֥ף comes up again in the book of Isaiah. (3) There we learn that God is a מְאַסֵּ֥ף for Israel. Surely God is not finding our lost luggage - anyone who spends time at JFK knows that. So, Rashi makes a second claim about what מְאַסֵּ֥ף means. He says it isn’t about collecting what’s left behind, it is about collecting who is left behind. The Tribe of Dan isn’t responsible for picking up discarded articles, they are responsible for picking up discarded people. (4)

Any group on a march will have stragglers. Those who are not able to keep up because they are sick, or infirm, or too young, or perhaps an elder, or they have some difference. What happens to them? Well, Rashi suggests they were welcomed by the Tribe of Dan, who supported and sustained them until they reached the next encampment.

Suddenly the image is transformed into a task of moral beauty. The tribe of Dan is given the godly task of making sure no one is lost or left to wander in a wilderness alone.

We might wonder why the Tribe of Dan is given this task? Most commentators note it is because they are the most numerous after Judah. But I think they miss something vital.

Who was Dan? Yes, one of Jacob's 12 sons. And while most parents go to great pains to convey they love all their children equally, Jacob and his wives took a different parenting approach. They made it abundantly clear who was loved and who was not. Dan, as the child of Rachel’s maidservant, Bilhah was among the least loved of Jacob’s 12 sons. Dan’s descendants would keenly know what it feels like to be cast aside and left behind. They are uniquely suited to collect the lost and return them home.

Ultimately, they serve as an example of what is foundational about living as a person of faith, what it means to be a Jew. None need be lost. While some believe that the only way to survive in this world is to cast others down as they claw their way to the front of the line, the children of Israel find a way to march ahead without losing a soul, modeling for all of us a way to lead a nation, to live with one another, without leaving anyone cold and in the dark. Yes, it sometimes means the road is slower, but it also means we all reach the destination together.

In the book of Ezekiel, God surveys the leaders of Israel. They would be the type of leaders familiar to us here in America. God saw them using their power to enrich themselves and their supporters while their people languished. And God said to them “You shepherds of Israel, you have been tending yourselves rather than the flock… You have not sustained the weak, healed the sick, or bandaged the injured; you have not brought back the strayed, or looked for the lost…and they have been scattered for want of anyone to tend them; scattered, they have become prey…And God said Here I am...I will look for the lost, and I will bring back the strayed; I will bandage the injured, and I will sustain the weak.” (5)

The Tribe of Dan was lost to history. The tradition says they disappeared: one of ten lost Israelite tribes. As Jews, like the tribe of Dan, we know what it means to be left out, to be cast to the side, to be unwanted in America. We inherit their legacy. In this nation of ours that is spinning, in an era when nothing seems solid or certain, in a moment when our shepherds are tending themselves and inviting the wolves to devour the flock, we can, like the Tribe of Dan, like God declare: “Here we are. We will heal the injured. We will sustain the vulnerable. We will feed the poor. We will stand with

those who sleep on the streets. We will gather up those who have been left behind.”

(1) Bamidbar 10:25
(2) Rashi’s comments on Bamidbar 10:25
(3) Isaiah 52:12
(4) Rashi’s commentary to Isaiah 52:12; picked up to subsequent commentators to Bamidbar 10:25 like Chizikuni
(5) Ezekiel 34