Jealousy and fanaticism
Rav David Silverberg teaches us that God gives his clear approval to the act of Pinchas, which, as Rashi writes, generated great controversy and was condemned by many among the children of Israel. Let us remember that the reading of the week begins with the proclamation of God rewarding Pinchas when he killed Zimri and Cozbi when they publicly offended the rules during the Baal Peor incident in Shitim.
Numerous sources identify Pinchas with the prophet Eliyahu, during the First Commonwealth who zealously opposed the worship of Baal in the Northern Kingdom of Israel, and even killed its prophets on Mount Carmel (Melachim I 18).
The Midrash (Yalkut Shimoni, Melachim II 2:15) comments that God said to Eliyahu: “You are always jealous! You were jealous in Shitim for sexual scurrility, and now you are jealous too!
It appears that God criticized Eliyahu both for his fanaticism in Shitim, in the time of Baal Peor, and for his fanaticism in opposing Baal worship in the time of Ahav and Izevel.
The obvious question then arises, why did God now express his disapproval of Elihau's zealous act, after emphatically congratulating Pinchas and even promising him a reward for his fanaticism. Rav Yehuda Leib Ginsburg, in his Musar Haneviim, points out the different contexts of these two acts of bigotry. The act of Pinchas in Shitim occurred during the transfers of the children of Israel through the desert, when they lived miraculously and were accompanied at all times by the Divine Presence.
The Gaon of Vilna commented that although normally the Cohen gadol is permitted to enter the Holy Sanctuary on the Kodesh Hakodashim, the innermost chamber of the Mikdash, only on Yom Kippur, Aharon was permitted to enter the Kodesh Hakodashim and perform the Yom Kippur service. any day of the year. During the time that the children of Israel spent in the wilderness, each day of the year had the status of Yom Kippur, given the intensity of the Divine Presence during that period, and therefore, Aharon could perform the Yom Kippur service at any time. day.
Under such conditions, Pinjas' violent response to Zimri and Cozbi's act was, in principle, appropriate. When Benei Israel lived at an especially high spiritual level and the Divine Presence was palpable, a grave sinful act like that committed by Zimri and Cozbi called for an extreme response. In the time of Eliyahu, however, the people were very far from the observance of the Torah and the Divine Presence. Their condition bore little resemblance to the atmosphere of holiness felt in the Israelite camp in the wilderness, so a gentler and more patient approach was warranted. The fact that Eliyahu acted with zeal at that time called into question his fanaticism in Shitim, as it demonstrated that he did not take into account the broader context and circumstances. If he was zealous in the times of Ahav and Izevel, this showed that his fanaticism in Baal Peor appeared without due consideration.
This insight reminds us that different circumstances and contexts justify different responses. Solutions that are used effectively in one situation are not necessarily appropriate for solving the same problem in a different situation. Eliyahu's failure was to react in the times of Achav and Izevel in the same way that Pinchas reacted in the times of Moshe Rabbeinu. Each generation and set of circumstances presents unique challenges and requires different strategies, so measures that were appropriate in the time of Baal Peor were not necessarily appropriate in the time of Ajav and Izevel.
This subtle comment gives us a gigantic lesson.
There is no point in repeating an action that could have been useful at a given time under different circumstances. What was successful in that context is of no use if things changed.
It is better to invest creatively to find different solutions.
Within the lesson, there is a subtext that is worth remembering: actions taken without reflection, unexpectedly and untimely usually succeed only by chance. In the greatest number of situations they can lead us to catastrophe and the divine reaction to the prophet Elihau is more than evident.