Parshat Korach

‘…that he not be like Korach and his cohorts…’ (Bemidbar 17,5)

This verse states that only people commanded to perform defined roles of Cohanim (priests) should perform them, to avoid the calamity of Korach whose unwarranted challenge to Moses ended in tragedy.

How should this phrase be understood? As an injunction? As advice? Does it teach anything new, or simply emphasise laws which were well known and only amplified by Korach’s misdemeanours.

The Talmud (Sanhedrin 110a) derives from this verse that anybody who is entrenched in machloket, argument, transgresses a negative commandment. What is this negative commandment? Rabbi Baruch Halevi Epstein, in his commentary Torah Temima, suggests that it could be lashon hara, evil speech, since the punishment for lashon hara and for entrenchment in machloket is the same according to the opinion of the sage Rav Ashi in the Talmud.

A 20^th century scholar, Rabbi Meir Simcha HaCohen, in his work Meshech Chochma, focuses on a debate between two great medieval scholars, Maimonides (Rambam) and Nachmanides (Ramban). Rabbi HaCohen suggests that our verse is used by the Rabbis to emphasise the importance of avoiding the negative trait of machloket along with not assuming non-transferable roles of Cohanim. According to this approach, our verse is not a specific commandment, but instead highlights the significance of these two points.

Rabbi HaCohen continues that the plain meaning of the text (peshat) - a non-Cohen who takes on the role of a Cohen faces the same fate as Korach - clashes with the homiletical (derash) understanding of the text which considers negative values and how they are linked by the same sanction applied to these values.

Both approaches are important. The peshat is crucial to comprehend the text, whilst the derash aims to develop enhanced character traits through our performance of the Mitzvot and the life choices we make.