the appointment of Yehoshua

1) The most depressing thing about the affairs of the world is how little anyone cares. Whether there is an agreement signed with Iran today or no agreement signed is just a technicality. Does anyone believe that after extending “deadline” (a word, like “red line,” that has no meaning anymore) after deadline, Kerry will walk away without an agreement, even if getting one means complete capitulation to all that Iran wants?

I hate repeating myself, but I can’t help it – so where are the protests? Where are the rallies? Did anyone’s shul have a tehillim gathering last night? Is even that too much to ask for?

It makes me sick.

2) Was Yehoshua on his own up to the task of leading Klal Yisrael? Most certainly not. Moshe was told, “V’nasata mei’hodcha alav,” that he had to give over some of the majesty and glory that enveloped himself to Yehoshua. Without this, apparently Yehoshua was lacking something.

Chazal tell us that Moshe had thought that his own children would take over for him, but Hashem revealed that Yehoshua was the preferred candidate. The Sochotchover asks (in Ne’os Desheh): if even Yehoshua needed the “hod” of Moshe, why couldn’t Moshe’s own children take over? Even if they were lacking in some way, just as Yehoshua got the gift of Moshe’s hod, they too could have been given whatever it took for them to succeed?

The Sochotchover answers that Moshe could give of himself, of his “hod,” but only if there was something to receive it in. Becoming a “kli kibbul” is something the individual has to accomplish through his own efforts; filling the kli afterwards can be done with the help of others.  Yehoshua put in hours to become the vessel that could absorb what his rebbe would pour into him; Moshe’s own children did not.

(My wife suggested that even if Moshe had to give over something to the next leader for him to succeed, there are still degrees. Yehoshua may not have been another Moshe, but he was still a better choice than Moshe’s own children.)

3) We’ve touched a few times on the connection between Yehoshua’s appointment and the parshiyos that immediately follow that deal with the korbanos ha’mussafim. An idea that came to my mind (based on R’ Tzadok haKohen in Pri Tzadik) this year is that perhaps the connection is meant to speak to this transformation of Yehoshua.  Just as beis din can sanctify a day that would otherwise be an ordinary weekday and transform it into a day of kedusha that requires bringing korbanos (which would otherwise be chulin b’azarah), so too, Moshe through his giving of smicha to Yehoshua was able to transform him into the new leader of Klal Yisrael.