a kahal, not an am

Mah tovu ohalecha Yaakov, mishkinosecha Yisrael.  Bilam's words contain a lesson that too many of us have forgotten.  Ohel is tent, a temporary dwelling; mishkan/mishkinoshecha is a permanent home.  Things were great in the midbar, in the tents we lived in during our stay there.  But that existence is only on the level of Yaakov.  It is when we are in mishkinosecha, when we are in our permanent home in Eretz Yisrael, and only in Eretz Yisrael, that we reach the higher level of Yisrael (see Malbim).  

Preventing Klal Yisrael from achieving that goal was the real aim of Balak.  וְעַתָּה֩ לְכָה־נָּ֨א אָֽרָה־לִּ֜י אֶת־הָעָ֣ם הַזֶּ֗ה כִּֽי־עָצ֥וּם הוּא֙ מִמֶּ֔נִּי אוּלַ֤י אוּכַל֙ נַכֶּה־בּ֔וֹ וַאֲגָרְשֶׁ֖נּוּ מִן־הָאָ֑רֶץ.  Simple pshat in the pasuk is that Balak wanted to drive Bnei Yisrael out of his territory, but the Midrash reads the it differently: וַאֲגָרְשֶׁנּוּ מִן הָאָרֶץ – לֹא הָיָה מְבַקֵּשׁ אֶלָּא לְגָרְשָׁם שֶׁלֹא יִכָּנְסוּ לָאָרֶץ.  (see post here)

I know that when Trump said, "Jewish people who live in the United States don’t love Israel enough," he qualified it and said except for Orthodox Jews.  But we should look good and hard at ourselves and make sure that noted exception is deserved.  

Rashi comments on "Mah tovu ohalecha Yaakov" that Bilam saw  על שראה פתחיהם שאין מכוונין זה מול זה, the pesach, the doorway of each tent, did not face the doorway of another tent in the camp.  Everyone minded their own business; no one was looking into another person's home, into their neighbor's goings-on.  Midah k'neged midah of our keeping our eye's to ourselves, Hashem prevented Bilam from casting an ayin ha'ra.  

Derech remez, there is more to it than that.  “Pischu li pesach kchudo shel machat v’ani eftach lachem pesach k’pischo shel ulam.”  Hashem asks us to make an opening, a pesach, for him, even if only the size of the eye of a needle, and he will help with the rest. 

על שראה פתחיהם שאין מכוונין זה מול זה means that every individual's "pesach" is different, explains the Maor va'Shemesh.  What turns one person on may be a brilliant R' Chaim; what turns another person on may be the singing at a Carlebach minyan.  When everyone marches in lockstep and does the same thing, the yetzer hara has an easy job because he has a single, easy target to strike.  But when there are so many different "pesachim" going in so many different directions, Bilam has no chance at success.  

I would add another point.  שאין מכוונין זה מול זה means that each pesach is not opposite another pesach.  Some people operate with a win-lose mentality.  It's not enough that I have my pesach -- I have to also be opposite and opposed to your pesach.  Bilam saw that it didn't work that way in the midbar.  There were no opposites -- there were only complementary pesachim.  

At the beginning of the parsha we have the word "am" again and again: וַיָּ֨גׇר מוֹאָ֜ב מִפְּנֵ֥י הָעָ֛ם , לְכָה־נָּ֨א אָֽרָה־לִּ֜י אֶת־הָעָ֣ם הַזֶּ֗ה,  הִ֠נֵּ֠ה עַ֣ם יָצָ֤א מִמִּצְרַ֙יִם֙  But when the messengers of Balak spell out the danger they think they face, that's not the term they use.  What they say is עַתָּ֞ה יְלַחֲכ֤וּ הַקָּהָל֙ אֶת־כׇּל־סְבִ֣יבֹתֵ֔ינוּ.  An am is when people hang out together for convenience; a kahal is when something deeper than utilitarian need unites them.  An am is where opposites join forces for a purpose -- just like Midyan and Moav did to fight their shared enemy, Klal Yisrael.  A kahal is where opposites don't exist.