First Reading: The Dew of Resurrection
Parashat Chukat stands between life and death. The beginning of the parashah deals with the red heifer, which purifies from the impurity of death. A corpse is considered the ultimate source of impurity, but one can be purified from this impurity by the ashes of the red heifer mixed with living water and sprinkled upon the defiled. Subsequently, the parashah sharply transitions from event to event: first, Miriam the prophetess dies, and the well disappears, only to return after Moses strikes the rock. However, it soon becomes clear that due to this act, both Moses and Aaron will die in the wilderness, “You shall not bring this assembly to the Land that I have given them,” and later we read about the death of Aaron the priest.
However, it is not only Miriam and Aaron who die in this parashah. An entire generation dies. The entire generation of the wilderness, upon whom the decree was made following the sin of the spies, finishes serving its punishment and dies in the wilderness. Thus, Rashi explains on the verse “And the Israelites, the whole congregation, came to the wilderness of Zin”—“the whole congregation, the complete congregation, since those destined to die in the wilderness had already died, and these were designated for life.” Therefore, the parashah swiftly skips over thirty-eight years of wandering in the wilderness (about which nothing is recounted!) and reaches the new generation that is destined to enter the Land. Indeed, later in the parashah, the Israelites enter the eastern side of the Jordan, concluding the great journey from the Exodus from Egypt at the gates of the Promised Land, “in the plains of Moab, by the Jordan, near Jericho.”
The Secret of Resurrection
Seemingly, death is a given that cannot be changed, only ignored or its impact on the living minimized. Thus, one might think that in parashat Chukat we leave the dead behind, buried in the vast wilderness, and continue onward to the Land of Israel, which is known as the “Land of the Living.” But the truth is that there is a deeper secret here, the secret of the Resurrection of the Dead. The dead themselves return, and death itself is transformed into life.
The Resurrection of the Dead is connected to the secret of the red heifer, which purifies an individual from the impurity of death. Thus, the opening of the parashah provides the remedy for the death that appears later on. The sages say that the logic behind the red heifer was not revealed even to King Solomon, the wisest of all men, “I said I will become wise, but it is far from me,” but was revealed only to Moses. Therefore, Moses carries the secret of the Resurrection of the Dead. This is highlighted in the fact that the sages derived a hint to the Resurrection of the Dead from the Torah in the verse “Then Moses will sing”—“it does not say ‘sang’ but ‘will sing,’ from here is a hint to the Resurrection of the Dead from the Torah.” Indeed, in our parashah, there is already a glimmer of the Resurrection of the Dead with Moses: God gave three gifts to Israel in the wilderness: the manna by the merit of Moses, the well by the merit of Miriam, and the clouds of glory by the merit of Aaron. After Miriam died, the well disappeared but then returned thanks to the merits of Moses and Aaron. After Aaron died, the clouds of glory disappeared, but then returned thanks to the merit of Moses. This means, in an inner sense, that after their death, the souls of Aaron and Miriam appeared within Moses’ soul. This is known in Kabbalah known as Ibbur Neshamah—an impregnation of a soul. This is a kind of Resurrection of the Dead, as it becomes clear that the souls of the departed tzaddikim are present with us, continuing their journey within the leader. Following this initial stage, we ascend to believe in the literal Resurrection of the Dead, when the souls will return to live in actual bodies.
Dew and the Manna
The central and most important description of dew in the Torah is found in the account of the manna’s daily descent from the heavens: a layer of dew came below, and upon it the manna rested, and over the manna, there was another layer of dew. As we remember, the manna came by the merit of Moses, so it is fitting to say that the dew from above and below hints to Aaron and Miriam. The dew from below resembles the wellspring that came from the earth by the merit of Miriam (about which the Song of the Well is sung in our parashah), and the dew from above resembles the clouds of glory that were by the merit of Aaron. Therefore, this special packaging of dew-manna-dew is the secret of the unification of the souls of the three great siblings within the soul of Moses.
The Dew of Torah
To grasp the secret of resurrection, let us consider a beautiful hint. Our parashah is the thirty-ninth in the Torah, which is the gematria of “dew” (לַט). The concept of dew is directly associated with the Resurrection of the Dead, as it is written: “Your dead shall live, my corpses shall rise; awaken and sing, you who dwell in the dust, for your dew is like the dew of light, and the earth shall bring forth the spirits” – “For the dew of resurrection that I will bring upon you will be like the dew that descends upon the plants, causing them to grow, so too the dead will live through the dew of resurrection.” In the words of the Midrash, in the future, God will “bring down the dew of resurrection and revive the dead."
The word for “dew” in Hebrew itself hints at the Resurrection of the Dead. How so? The word for “curse” (טָל) in Aramaic—Hebrew’s sister language—is spelled using the same two letters as “dew,” (לַט) but in reverse order. A curse represents death, and the dew transforms the curse into life and blessing. Nothing is as blessed as dew. Additionally, we note that the journey of the Israelites from Mount Sinai towards the Land of Israel began in the second year after the Exodus from Egypt, in the month of Iyar, until the decree for the sin of the spies was issued in the month of Av. Thus, the generation of the wilderness wandered in the desert for thirty-nine years, again the value of “dew” (לַט).
But what is this “dew of resurrection”? The sages interpret it as referring to the “dew of Torah,” stating that “whoever engages in the dew of Torah, the dew of Torah enlivens him.” The Torah itself is the greatest gift given to us by Moses. The person who brought the Torah down to earth holds the secret of the Resurrection of the Dead through the Torah. Indeed, the sages say that this dew of Torah already acted once as the dew of resurrection when, at the Giving of the Torah at Mt. Sinai, the souls of Israel departed due to the overwhelming Divine revelation, and God revived them with that very dew.
And why is the secret of resurrection specifically concealed within Moses? Because Moses teaches the oneness of God, “Havayah our God, Havayah is One.” When we feel the unity of God, everything is filled with life, “In the light of the king’s countenance is life.” When we distance ourselves from it, there is room for the separation that prevails in the material world and brings death. In the Kabbalistic texts, there is a well-known hint: the value of “Havayah is One” (דָחֶי-הוה א) is 39, the same as the gematria of “dew” (לַט)—the same dew of Torah that revives the dead—drops of the dew of God’s unity that touch us and awaken us to life.
