Friday, July 02, 2010

PARSCHAS PINCHAS

In which Pinchas slaughters and Israelite man and his Midianite girlfriend. Quite one of the most exciting scenes in the entire book.

Bamidbar (Numbers) 25:6 "Ve hine ish mibnei Yisrael ba vayakrev el echav et ha Midyanit, le einei Moshe u le einei kol adat bnei Yisrael, vehema vochim petach ohel moed" ('And look, one of the children of Israel brought to his brothers a Midianite woman, in the eyes of Moses and of all the congregation of the Bnei Israel, while they were weeping at the entrance of the tent of meeting'),

25:7 "va yar Pinchas Ben Elazar, ben Aharon ha kohen, vayakam, mitoch haeda, va yikach romach beyado" ('and when Pinchas the son of Eleazar, the son of Aaron the priest, saw it, he rose up from the congregation, and took a spear in his hand'),

25:8 "va yavo achar ish Yisrael el ha kuba, va yidkor et sheneihem, et ish Yisrael ve et ha isha el kovata…" ('and he went after the man of Israel into the chamber, and speared both of them, the man of Israel, the woman through her gut…').

I feel warm all over.

Pinchass was an honourable man (as were they all honourable men).
But according to Rashi, Pinchas was ambitious

I'm thinking movie.
Mel Gibson, Amy Winehouse, and Mark Wahlberg.

3 comments:

Kylopod said...

Pinchass was an honourable man

I don't normally comment on typos, but this one is funny enough to make me wonder if you did it on porpoise.

Also, why the British/Canadian spelling of "honourable"?

The back of the hill said...

Kylopod,

'As were they all honourable men'.

And in school it was drummed into me that English spelling conventions ruled in Holland.

Several times I got failing grades in high school English, despite speaking reading and writing the language as a native, better than the teachers, and far, far better than any of the students, because I used American spelling - - oh horrors! EVERYONE knew that Americans were illiterates who needed kind-hearted people like the Dutch to instruct them!

Words just don't look 'comfortable' if not spelled the way I am accustomed - centre, theatre, colour, honour, etcetera. One's education tailors one's neuroses.

The back of the hill said...

Kylopod,

Aaack, ooops, and sorry. Just noticed what you meant.

Pinchas.
Not 'Pinchass'.

I wrote the post several months ago, but scheduled it for publication on an appropriate day in the reading.
I may have mis-spelled the name deliberately - but as I cannot remember if I did os, I cannot claim credit for it either.

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