A Taste of Torah - Parashat Pinchas

A fair amount of this week's Torah portion details a census of the Israelites. One of the details of the census is the division of land among the tribes of Israel. According to the Torah (Numbers 26:54), the larger tribes would be given more land while the smaller tribes would be given less land. But the next verse says that the land would be given out by lottery. Rashi looks at these two verses that seem to contradict one another and sees a nuanced lesson. He writes, citing a midrash from Sifre, that since some areas were superior to others, the land was not divided solely according to measurements, but it was assessed; an smaller piece of land sufficient to grow crops well was equivalent to a larger piece sufficient to grow fewer crops. It all depended on the value of the soil. These two verses, when read together, teach us that while the Israelite's land was divided up by size based upon the size of the tribe, the real value of the land was in its quality, not its quantity, a lesson that we could well apply to our daily lives, as well. It's not about how much we have, but about how good it is.