GOOD MORNING! Many years ago, a very close friend of mine asked if I played “negative tapes” in my mind. I had no idea what he was talking about. He explained that many people have a voice that continually repeats in the background of their subconscious things like “you’re not smart enough, you’re not good-looking enough, you’re not ambitious enough, etc.”

I explained to him that aside from it not being a very logical or effective way to live one’s life, my overinflated ego was such that I never actually believed any of those things.

However, what I failed to consider at the time was that the real reason for my healthy emotional state was probably due to the fact that I had been raised by extraordinary parents who focused on developing my strengths and constantly conveyed that they believed in me. This instilled within me a certain level of self-confidence and self-esteem, attributes that my wife would likely tell you are completely unwarranted.

This reminds me of a teaching that I heard many years ago from my brilliant father. He was giving a class on criticism and the proper way to go about dispensing it. He explained why it was so crucial to learn how to give constructive criticism and that the harm of saying something negative to someone isn’t momentary – the damage can last a lifetime.

When a person hears a negative comment about themselves that resonates, they may repeat it to themselves for years or even decades to come. Thus, one negative comment may be reviewed thousands of times in one’s mind. It can be torturous. This is what my friend was referring to when he asked me if I played “negative tapes” in my head.

I am reminded of the joke about a few engineering professors who were traveling to a convention. Their university arranged for them to take a private charter plane. Right after they were settled and comfortably seated, they were informed that the plane had been built by their students. They looked at one another in panic, jumped out of their seats, gathered their belongings, and frantically exited the small plane. As they hurried off they noticed one professor dawdling and taking his time.

They turned and asked him, “What’s going on, aren’t you worried about the safety of this plane?” He sat calmly in his seat and replied, “There’s no reason to rush, I have plenty of confidence in my students. Knowing them, I can assure you this piece of junk plane will never even start!”

In this week’s Torah reading we find a very relevant lesson regarding self-worth and the importance of knowing who we truly are in order to have self-esteem.

“God said to Moses and Elazar the son of Aaron the priest; take a census of the entire congregation of Israel from twenty years and up according to their fathers’ house […] The sons of Reuven: Chanoch, the family of the Chanochi to Pallu the Pallui family […]” (Numbers 26:1-5).

Theoretically, this week’s Torah reading we find the Jewish people nearing the end of their forty years of wandering in the desert and on the cusp of entering the Land of Israel. Here the Almighty commands Moses and his nephew Elazar (who ascended to the position of High Priest after his father’s death) to conduct a new census of the Jewish people. This census came on the heels of the terrible plague that wiped out tens of thousands of Israelites.

Rashi, in his comment on verse 26:1, quotes a beautiful simile from a teaching found in the Midrash Tanchuma on this week’s Torah reading. The midrash says, “This can be compared to a shepherd who comes to discover that wolves have attacked his flock of sheep and he carefully counts them to know the number of survivors.” Likewise, the Almighty commands Moses to count the Jewish people – those who survived the plague.

The people were counted “according to their fathers’ house.” The Midrash Rabbah (Shir Hashirim 4:12) explains that to all the family names, the Hebrew letter “ה – hay” was added as a prefix and the Hebrew letter “י – yud” as a suffix. Thus, the family of Chanoch was referred to as “HaChanochi.”

The midrash goes on to explain the reason for this. The Hebrew letters yud and hay comprise one of God’s names. What was the reason for the sudden attachment of God’s name to each and every family in the Jewish nation?

The midrash explains that the nations of the world mocked the purity of the Jewish lineage. They pointed out that the Egyptians, who had complete control of the Jewish males (whom they had enslaved), must have surely violated the Jewish women. They therefore argued that many so-called Israelites were actually descendants of their Egyptian overlords.

Because of this, the Almighty attached His name to the names of each and every one of the Jewish families (that were counted according to their fathers’ house) in order to attest to the purity of their Jewish ancestry. Still, this teaching requires further clarification.

It is difficult to understand how adding two letters to the names of the Jewish families deflected the defamatory accusations of the other nations. After all, the Torah is part of the heritage of the Jewish people, it is hard to believe that other nations would take it as proof that God Himself was affirming the purity of the Jewish lineage.

The only possible answer is that the Almighty didn’t do it in order to deflect the claims of the nations of the world. Rather, this was done to assuage the insecurities of Israelites themselves.

At this time, the Jewish people were recovering from a plague that decimated a significant portion of the nation. This plague had come as a punishment for their involvement in licentious behavior and acts of depravity while consorting with the daughters of Moab and Midian (see Numbers 25:1-9). These transgressions seemed to indicate characteristics distinctly attributed to Egyptian nature and culture.

(In fact, the sages point out that the reason that our forefather Abraham, who was traveling to Egypt due to a famine in the Land of Israel, wanted to hide his beautiful wife Sarah from the Egyptians was because they were well-known for being depraved and would think nothing of snatching her away from him.)

Consequently, given that these immoral transgressions were committed by a large number of Israelites, it might have led some to give credence to the notion that the allegations of the nations of the world were indeed true. For this reason, the Almighty lent His holy name to the Jewish families to reassure them that they were of pure lineage.

But there is also a much deeper lesson here.

One of the terrible outcomes of having poor self-esteem is that we mistakenly try to combat it and its debilitating effects by deflecting responsibility for mistakes we make. We often ascribe our own failings to issues that are beyond our control (such as ancestry or circumstances), when in truth we must own our mistakes, take responsibility, and work to improve ourselves.

Perhaps the real lesson here is that God is lending His name to our lineage to tell us that our past is in His hands, but the present and future are in our own control. What could be more empowering than that?

Pinchas, Numbers 25:10 - 30:1

In last week's Torah portion, Pinchas acted to stop a public display of immorality. He thus stemmed the plague of retribution that was killing the multitudes. He is rewarded by being made a Cohen by Divine decree.

The Almighty commands Moses to attack the Midianites in retribution for the licentious plot the Midianites perpetrated upon the Israelites. A new census is taken of the Jewish people revealing that there are 601,730 men available for army duty. God directs the division of the Land of Israel amongst the tribes. The Levites are tallied. The daughters of Tzelafchad come forward to petition Moses regarding their right of inheritance. Moses inquires of the Almighty, Who answers in their favor.

Moses asks the Almighty to appoint a successor and the Almighty directs Moses to designate Joshua (Yehoshua). The Torah portion concludes with the various offerings – daily, Shabbat, Rosh Chodesh (new month), and holidays.