In our parshah, when the Torah describes the conquest of Sichon and his land, the verse says:
“We conquered all his cities at that time, and we utterly destroyed every ir {city}: men, women, and children... there was no kiryah {city} that was too strong for us.” Similarly, regarding the conquest of Og’s land, the verse says:
“There was no kiryah that we did not take from them.”
The straightforward reading of the language of the verse, “there was no kiryah,” despite having stated earlier, “we conquered all his cities,” indicates that kiryah is not exactly the same as ir. The Torah’s change in wording is not merely for literary aesthetics. Rather, the term kiryah represents a different type of settlement — distinct from ir {city}. The Torah thus adds, “there was not (even) a kiryah that was too strong for us... that we did not take from them.” This emphasizes that not only did we conquer the arim {cities} but they also conquered the kiryos.
But what is the difference between “kiryah” and “ir”? And why is it significant that the kiryos were also conquered?
Some commentators explain that the significance of kiryah over ir is that kiryah refers to a walled city, while ir refers to an unwalled city. As the Torah says immediately afterward:
“There was no kiryah... sixty cities... All these were fortified cities with high walls... besides the unwalled towns....”
{According to this interpretation,} the novelty in these verses is that not only were the unwalled cities conquered, but the kiryos were conquered as well — the walled cities that were much more protected.
However, a closer analysis of the verses points to the opposite conclusion: The very fact that the Torah adds this distinction (between “fortified cities with walls” and “unwalled towns”) in a separate verse, indicates that the difference between “ir” and “kiryah” in the previous verse refers to a different distinction (of kiryah vs. ir). This is especially apparent given that the Torah already notes the distinction between “ir” and “kiryah” by the war with Sichon that preceded this, where that distinction between “fortified cities with walls” and “unwalled towns” is not mentioned.
It should be noted that regarding the war with Sichon, the Torah only highlights the achievement of conquering the kiryos — “there was no kiryah...” — and not the achievement of conquering “fortified cities with walls,” (although there were presumably walled cities in Sichon’s land as well).
People Inside the City
The author of Seder HaDoros (in his work Erkei HaKinuyim) explains the difference between “ir” and “kiryah” as follows:
An area can be called “ir” even when there are no inhabitants or dwellings, but kiryah is so called because there are people in it, as we see in the verse, “What is the sound of the kiryah roaring?”
On this basis he explains the expression the Torah uses (regarding the cities of refuge): “Vehikrisem lachem arim {you shall designate cities for yourselves}” — {meaning} you shall make the arim {cities} into kiryos. As Rambam says:
“Cities of refuge are established only in a populated area. If the surrounding populace is reduced, it should be increased. If the number of inhabitants of the city of refuge decreases, Kohanim, Leviim [and Yisra’elim] should be brought to live there.”
However, based on this, we need to clarify: The verses in our parshah make it clear that the “arim” also had inhabitants, as it states, “We conquered all arav {his cities} at that time and we utterly destroyed every ir: men, women and children,” and “utterly destroying every ir — the men, the women, and the children.” Therefore, we must conclude that within the category of places that have a population, there must be a difference between an “ir” and a “kiryah.”
Why Is the Population Important
We will understand this by first clarifying the law regarding cities of refuge: “If the number of inhabitants of the city of refuge decreases, Kohanim, Leviim (and Yisra’elim) should be brought to live there.”
The commentators offer several reasons for this law. One of them is as follows: Ritva says in the name of Ramah that Kohanim, Leviim and Israelites are brought to live there “because they possess the traits of humility and compassion and will not be killers. They will also not hand over the killer to the goel hadam.”
According to this reason, the above law is similar in rationale to the other conditions required for the cities of refuge (as detailed in the Gemara and Rambam): “The cities of refuge that are designated should not be big cities or metropolises, nor should they be small villages. Instead, they should be cities of intermediate size. They should be located solely in trading places, where water is found. If there is no water there, water should be diverted toward them.” All these are peripheral conditions necessary for the establishment of the cities of refuge for the benefit of the exile.
The Acharonim offer another reason: It is possible that the population of exiled killers in the city of refuge will multiply, and the city will no longer be able to provide protection, because {as the law states}, “a city whose majority are killers does not provide refuge.” Therefore, Kohanim, Leviim and Yisraelim are brought to be the residents of the city so they will constitute the majority, not the exiles.
According to this explanation, this law is not just a peripheral detail but directly affects the city’s ability to provide refuge. However, it remains merely a negative condition — to prevent the city from being inhabited mostly by killers.
However, the author of Seder HaDoros connects this law to the verse, “vehikrisem {and you shall designate} arim {cities} for yourselves, arei {cities} of refuge they shall be for you. The accidental killer shall flee there.” This verse teaches us the fundamental mitzvah of establishing cities of refuge. {Since this law is derived from the foundational verse that establishes the mitzvah,} this indicates that this is a law essential to a city becoming a city of refuge. In other words, this law is not merely peripheral (regarding how the residents should treat the exile) nor is it merely negative — serving to address a possible concern of (over-population of exiles and) the city’s inability to provide protection — but rather this is a positive matter that enables and brings about the city of refuge’s ability to offer refuge.
Moreover, the language of the verse also proves this — “Vehikrisem lachem arim,” after which the verse says, “cities of refuge they shall be for you.” This indicates that the matter of “you shall make the cities into kiryah,” is essential to the core halachic status of the city. Only then does the law of “city of refuge” apply to it — “arei miklat {cities of refuge} they shall be for you.”
We need to clarify: What distinguishes the requirements of “vehikrisem — you shall make the cities into kiryah” from the other conditions of a city of refuge?
A Community
We can posit the following explanation: A city of refuge protects a person who killed someone unintentionally (and the goel hadam is forbidden to kill him there). This protection is brought about not merely because the killer is found within the boundaries of this particular city (that protects him), but rather the protection is intrinsically connected to the killer himself: When he enters the “ir” he becomes part of the community and collective of that city, and therefore he attains the protection of the (merit of the) community of that city.
When do we consider the entire city with all its inhabitants as one community? Only when the city is a “kiryah.” That is, when the city is fully settled (or at least mostly settled) with dwellers who live there permanently, not temporarily. However, when its dwellers decrease, the reality of the city’s inhabitants being a community is nullified; instead, they are merely many individuals living together in one place.
In other words, all the details mentioned in the halachah: “They are established only in a populated area. If the surrounding populace is reduced, it should be increased. If the number of inhabitants of the city of refuge decreases, Kohanim, Leviim and Yisraelim should be brought to live there,” are conditions that transform a city from a place where many individuals live together into a unified city where a particular community lives.
We can posit that this also explains why they must bring in “Kohanim, Leviim and Yisraelim.” The commentators ask: Why must the city be settled with all three groups? Based on the above, we can understand why this is necessary: A person who killed someone unintentionally needs to be (absorbed into and) protected by a community — this requires not merely that he become part of a group of Jews, but that he become part of a community that is a microcosm of the entire Jewish people. This becomes possible by having all segments of the Jewish people “brought to live there” as permanent residents: “Kohanim, Leviim and Yisraelim.”
The reason for this is clear: By killing another Jew, one has harmed the entire Jewish people, for all Jews are “one nation” — one collective, one entity. Thus, the killer has separated himself from the collective; moreover, he is in opposition to and in conflict with it. Therefore, his protection (and perhaps also his atonement) is achieved through becoming part of the Jewish people {again} by living in the city of refuge.
Unity Protects
The Sages teach that the term “goel hadam” also alludes to the Satan, who seeks to prosecute a Jew. When a Jew kills unintentionally, the goel hadam seeks to punish him for spilling blood — for his sin — and the Torah provides protection for him through running to a city of refuge.
As is well known, exile to a city of refuge constitutes atonement for the unintentional killer. However, the atonement is only completed after the individual’s time in the city of refuge ends. The main purpose of the city of refuge — as pshuto shel mikra indicates — is protection for the unintentional killer. This applies on a literal level, to protect him from the goel hadam, “lest he pursue... while his heart is hot.” It also applies protection from the spiritual goel hadam. That is, even before the Jew receives atonement (through exile), while the effects of his sin still remain, the city of refuge protects him so that the {spiritual} goel hadam cannot harm him.
The protective power of the city of refuge stems from its being a kiryah, a place of unity, as explained above.
As is well known, when peace and unity prevail, this constitutes salvation and protection. Our Sages teach that even idol worshippers, when peace and unity prevail among them, “as it were, the Satan does not touch them (the attribute of justice does not affect them), as the verse says, ‘Ephraim is joined to idols; let him be.’” Despite their extremely low spiritual status (being idol worshippers), their unity (and peace) protects them from harm, (to the extent that “the Omnipresent says: ‘I, so to speak, have no power over them’”).
Similarly, regarding the law of the city of refuge: even before the unintentional killer receives atonement, the unity of the city of refuge protects him.
Kiryah — Spiritual Protection
Based on all the above, we can also appreciate the Torah’s use of the word, “kiryah,” in the context of the wars with Sichon and Og:
As mentioned above, a large population living together in a “kiryah” indicates unity of the city’s inhabitants. This is what the verse is telling us about Sichon and Og: not only did they possess physical might (to the greatest degree), but moreover, they had unity — their cities were kiryos — which provided them with spiritual protection.
[Indeed, we find that unity protects non-Jews as well. The Midrash explains why the Dor Haflogah was not destroyed like the Generation of the Flood: because they “conducted themselves with love and friendship among themselves, as the verse says, ‘one language and unified words.’” In contrast, the Generation of the Flood “were robbers and there was strife between themselves.”]
This explains the significance of what the Torah emphasizes regarding the wars with Sichon and Og: “there was no kiryah that was too strong for us,” and “there was no kiryah that we did not take from them.” Even cities that were “kiryos” — where peace and unity prevailed and thus the inhabitants had spiritual protection — were nevertheless conquered by the Jewish people.
[Based on this, it becomes clear that conquering a kiryah is a greater achievement than conquering a walled city, because kiryos have spiritual protection in addition to (and stronger than) physical defenses. Therefore the Torah emphasizes (regarding the wars with Sichon) only, “there was no kiryah...,” and not, “cities fortified to the heavens” (as mentioned at the end of section 1 above).]
True Unity
The Jewish people succeeded in overcoming the unity of Sichon and Og — despite the fact that (as mentioned above) unity and peace also positively affect and strengthen non-Jews — because their unity was only external. (They came together and cooperated in action,) but this was not unity in the essence of their being.
Therefore, among non-Jews, there is no concept of a community — because even after they unite, each individual remains an independent entity. Thus, when the Jewish people waged war against them from a position of Jewish unity (the true unity of the Jewish people), they succeeded in nullifying the protection that unity provided to their enemies.
Jewish Unity
However, we still need to clarify why, specifically in the conquest of the lands of Sichon and Og, does the Torah emphasize this aspect: “there was no kiryah that was too strong for us,” “that we did not take from them”?
We can posit the following explanation:
The Jewish people conquered the lands of Sichon and Og on the way to (and for the purpose of) conquering the Land of Israel. Moreover, in certain respects the conquest of the Lands of Sichon and Og is considered the beginning of the conquest of the Land of Israel, to the extent that according to certain opinions the lands of Sichon and Og were included in the promise of the Covenant Between the Parts.
One of the main innovations that emerged when the Jewish people entered the Land of Israel was that the Jewish people became a unified communal existence, a “kahal.” Therefore, the Jewish people only became obligated to take responsibility for each other when they entered the Land of Israel (whereas in Babylon there is no such concept, and there are no communal fasts in Babylon). That is to say, upon their entry into the Land, their essential being as the Jewish people was completed. As the Tzafnas Paneach states: “After they entered the Land of Israel, they became a community and became one eternal existence” (and he explains at length how this is halachically relevant in many instances).
Therefore, specifically in the conquest of the lands of Sichon and Og, it was necessary to nullify the “kiryah” — the unity of the kelipah among the nations of the world — as both prelude to and commencement of the conquest of the Land of Israel. (For this very reason, Sichon and Og positioned themselves with the power of “kiryah” to prevent the Jewish people from entering the Land of Israel.)
The Jewish people’s strength and ability to conquer the lands of Sichon and Og stemmed from this very power (of unity) itself, because this was essential for the (beginning of the) conquest of the entire Land of Israel. Therefore, the Jewish people at that time had a semblance of the power of community and kahal that would exist in the Land of Israel, enabling them to conquer and nullify the kiryos — the “community” of the “opposing side.”
Unity in Exile
The parshiyos of (Mattos) Massei and Devarim are always read during the days of Bein HaMetzarim. Consequently, the concept of “kiryah” (emphasized both in Parshas Massei and in Parshas Devarim) is especially connected to this period:
The cause of the destruction of the Beis Hamikdash and exile of the Jewish people was division among them, as our Sages say that the destruction came about because of the sin of baseless hatred. Consequently, the rectification (of “Bein HaMetzarim”) is through nullifying the cause of the destruction: by adding to and strengthening the “kiryah” among the Jewish people — Ahavas Yisrael {love of fellow Jews}, to the point of complete Jewish unity.
There are two stages in this, as we learn from Parshas Massei and then in Parshas Devarim:
First: Even while the Jewish people still find themselves in exile, in “the journeys of the Jewish people,” in the desert of the nations, even before attaining atonement for our sins, we already have protection against the “goel hadam” through conducting ourselves in the manner of “kiryah” (“Vehikrisem lachem arim”) — that is, when the Jewish people are united.
This serves as the preparation through which the “kiryah” of the opposing side {the forces of impurity} is nullified (“there was no kiryah that was too strong for us... that we did not take from them”) — until the nullification (and atonement) of our sins is complete.
We will then immediately enter the good and broad land, the Land of Israel, extending until “Hashem will expand your borders,” to include not only the eastern bank of the Jordan that was conquered before the conquest of the Land and the conquest of the Land itself, but also the lands of the Keni, Kenizi and Kadmoni, as Rambam writes.
With the coming of our righteous Moshiach, who will redeem us and lead us upright to our land, speedily in our days.
Based on talks delivered Shabbos Parshas Eikev and Shabbos Parshas Re’eh 5741 (1981)
