Shabbat Shalom: Parshat Matot Numbers 30:2-32:42
By Shlomo Riskin

Efrat, Israel - “ And Moses gave to them, - to the children of Gad, to the children of Reuven, and to half the tribe of Menashe - the kingdom of Sihon the King of the Emorites, and the kingdom of Og the King of the Bashan...” (Numbers 32: 33)

From where did this half tribe of Menashe come into the story? Initially Moses had been approached by the tribes of Gad and Reuven to allow them to remain on Trans-Jordan where there was ample grazing lands for their abundant cattle (Numbers 32: 1,2). Moses explains to them that only after they participate in the battle for the conquest of the rest of the land of Israel together with their brothers of the other tribes will they be permitted to receive Trans-Jordan as their inheritance, and they agree to Moses’ conditions. And then, when Trans-Jordan is given, we suddenly find one-half of the tribe of Menashe entering as partners in the Trans-Jordan land parcels. When and why did the half-tribe of Menashe enter the scene?

The Ramban is sensitive to this issue, and suggests that, although Moses had initially been approached only by Gad and Reuven, it soon became apparent that the land in Trans-Jordan was plentiful enough to include another partner. Moses called for volunteers, and members of the tribe of Menashe responded to his call, “perhaps because they were also herdsmen seeking grazing lands” (Numbers 32: 33, Ramban as/oc)

I would add that perhaps they volunteered for another reason altogether: perhaps they were materialistic opportunists, seeking lush farmland and desiring to be distanced from the more spiritual tribe of Judah, from the more centralized location of the Sanctuary, from the eventual divinely-centered capital city of Jerusalem. In this regard the people of Menashe were acting true to their namesake and tribal forbear: remember that Joseph says about the name he chose for his eldest son Menashe, “G-d has enabled me to forget (nashe’, forget) all of my toil and everything involved in my father’s house,” including much of the Abrahamic traditions. Moreover, Menashe was the politically adept, linguistically fluent son who aided his father in his sale of grain to the various representatives of various countries of the world; he was not like his younger brother Ephraim, who studied Torah with his elderly grandfather, Jacob - Yisrael. And indeed, it would seem that these two and one-half tribes did attempt to build an altar to Idolatry in their Trans-Jordan land during the period of Joshua, until they were dissuaded from doing so by a delegation of Pinhas together with representatives from the rest of the tribes (Joshua 22:12-19). Apparently geographical distance from Jerusalem creates ideological difference as well - until this very day.

A very different scenario is suggested by the Naziv, Rav Naftali Zvi Yehuda Berlin, in his late nineteenth century Biblical commentary called HaAmek Davar. He insists that Moses specifically chose half the tribe of Menashe to join together with Gad and Reuven in Trans-Jordan because Moses was concerned lest “far from the eye makes one far from the heart” since absence often makes the heart grow absent. After all, the ancient and persistent enemies of the land of Israel and the Torah of Israel were Datan and Aviram, scions of the disgruntled and “disinherited” tribe Reuven; leaving the tribe of Reuven so far away and isolated from mainstream Israel was certainly asking for trouble.

And the tribe of Menashe, on the other hand, were perfect “religious supervisors” (mashgihim ruhaniim) for the less trustworthy Reuven. Did not the wise, the righteous, the committed lovers of Israel, the daughters of Zelafhad, come from the tribe of Menashe? And Yair (“he will shine forth light,” literally) the son of Menashe (Deut. 3:14) is considered by our Talmudic Sages to have been equal to the majority of the Sanhedrin.

Hence the sincerely Zionistic and learned tribe of Menashe are the perfect individuals to religiously influence the suspect tribe of Reuven, who together with Gad, were to be far from the spiritual center of the land of Israel and so removed from the majority of the Israelite tribes. They were to serve in a capacity very similar to Habad emissaries or Amiel Rabbis of the Joseph Straus Rabbinical Seminary, emissaries to Jews in far-flung places, to bring the traditional religious message to those who are distanced from it, geographically as well as ideologically.

And why only half the tribe of Menashe? When someone is sent to a far-flung community, hopefully he will influence them - but the danger always exists that they will influence him. If half the tribe still has another familial half - uncles, aunts, brothers, sisters, cousins - closer to the religious center, chances are that the emissaries will make frequent visitations to, and receive familial visitors from, the more religiously involved central areas; this situation of frequent communication between family members of the tribe of Menashe enhances the chances that the emissaries will remain unchanged, and firm in the commitment with which they must inspire their neighbors in Trans-Jordan.

Shabbat Shalom
Shlomo Riskin
Chancellor Ohr Torah Stone
Chief Rabbi - Efrat Israel