Tanach, the Hebrew Bible, is remarkable for the extreme realism with which it portrays human character. Its heroes are not superhuman. Its non-heroes are not archetypal villains. The best have failings; the worst often have saving virtues. I know of no other religious literature quite like it.
This makes it very difficult to use biblical narrative to teach a simple, black-and-white approach to ethics. And that, argued Rabbi Zvi Hirsch Chajes (Mevo ha’Aggadot), is why rabbinic midrash often systematically re-interprets the narrative so that the good become all-good and the bad all-bad. For sound educational reasons, midrash paints the moral life in terms of black and white.
Yet the plain sense remains (“A biblical passage never loses its plain interpretation” Shabbat 63a), and it is important that we do not lose sight of it. It is as if monotheism brought into being at the same time a profound humanism. God in the Hebrew Bible is nothing like the gods of myth. They were half-human, half-divine. The result was that in the epic literature of pagan cultures, human heroes were seen as almost like gods: semi-divine.
In stark contrast, monotheism creates a total distinction between God and humanity. If God is wholly God, then human beings can be seen as wholly human – subtle, complex mixtures of strength and weakness. We identify with the heroes of the Bible because, despite their greatness, they never cease to be human, nor do they aspire to be anything else. Hence the phenomenon of which the sedrah of Beha’alotecha provides a shattering example: the vulnerability of some of the greatest religious leaders of all time, to depression and despair.
The context is familiar enough. The Israelites are complaining about their food: “The rabble among them began to crave other food, and again the Israelites started wailing and said, ‘If only we had meat to eat! We remember the fish we ate in Egypt at no cost – also the cucumbers, melons, leeks, onions and garlic. But now we have lost our appetite; we never see anything but this manna!’ ” (Numbers11:4-6).
This is not a new story. We have heard it before (see, for example, Exodus 16). Yet on this occasion, Moses experiences what one can only call a breakdown:
“He asked the Lord: Why have you brought this trouble on your servant? What have I done to displease you that you put the burden of all these people on me? Did I conceive all these people? Did I give them birth? … I cannot carry all these people by myself; the burden is too heavy for me. If this is how You are going to treat me, put me to death right now – if I have found favor in your eyes – and do not let me face my own ruin” (Numbers 11:11-15).
Moses prays for death! He is not the only person in Tanach to do so. There are at least three others. There is Elijah, when, after his successful confrontation with the prophets of Baal at Mount Carmel, Queen Jezebel issues a warrant that he be killed:
“Elijah was afraid and ran for his life. When he came to Beersheba in Judah, he left his servant there, while he himself went a day’s journey into the desert. He came to a broom tree, sat down under it and prayed that he might die. ‘I have had enough, Lord,’ he said. ‘Take my life; I am no better than my ancestors’ ” (I Kings 19:3-4).
There is Jonah, after God had forgiven the inhabitants of Nineveh:
“Jonah was greatly displeased and became angry. He prayed to the Lord, ‘O Lord, is this not what I said when I was still at home? That is why I was so quick to flee to Tarshish. I knew that you are a gracious and compassionate God, slow to anger and abounding in love, a God who relents from sending calamity. Now, O Lord, take away my life, for it is better for me to die than to live’ ” (Jonah 4:1-3).
And there is Jeremiah, after the people fail to heed his message and publicly humiliate him:
“O Lord, You enticed me, and I was enticed; You overpowered me and prevailed. I am ridiculed all day long; everyone mocks me … The word of the Lord has brought me insult and reproach all day long … Cursed be the day I was born! May the day my mother bore me not be blessed! Cursed be the man who brought my father the news, made him very glad, saying, ‘A child is born to you – a son!’ … Why did I ever come out of the womb to see trouble and sorrow and to end my days in shame?” (Jeremiah 20:7-18).