## Da'at Zekenim on Numbers Chapter 25

###### Da'at Zekenim on Numbers 25:1:1
[Da'at Zekenim on Numbers 25:1:1](https://torahapp.org/share/book/Da%27at%20Zekenim%20on%20Numbers/r/25:1:1)

**וישב ישראל בשטים ויחל העם לזנות.**[כ"מ שנאמר וישב כתיב אחריו פורענות] וישב יעקב ויבא יוסף את דבתם רעה ונמכר. וישב יוסף במצרים ויאמר יוסף אל אחיו הנה אנכי מת. וישב ישראל בארץ מצרים וסמיך ליה ויקרבו ימי ישראל למות. וישב ישראל ויהודה בטח וסמיך ליה ויקם ה' שטן לשלמה וגו':

**Yalkut, Sifsei Chachomim Chumash, Metsudah Publications, 2009:**
וישב ישראל בשטים ויחל העם לזנות, “Israel had settled down at a place known as Shittim, when the common people profaned themselves by whoring.” It is well known that whenever the Torah commences a paragraph with the word: וישב, what follows is some kind of disaster. Compare Genesis 37,1 when Yaakov “settled” down and the disaster with Joseph followed and he was sold by his brothers. When in chapter 50,22 of Genesis Joseph is described as having settled down, this is followed by his announcing to his brothers his premature death. (Genesis 50,24) When Israel is described as having settled down in Egypt, (Genesis 47,27) this is followed shortly by the report about Yaakov’s (premature) sickness and death. (verse 29) In Kings I,5,5 we read that the people of Israel including the tribe of Yehudah had settled securely, this is followed by a report in chapter 11,14, by: G–d arranging a revolt by the King of Edom against Solomon’s kingdom. [The Edomites had paid annual tribute to the state of Israel since David’s time. G–d had arranged this as His response to Solomon allowing his wife to erect an altar to the Moabite idol chemosh. Ed.]


###### Da'at Zekenim on Numbers 25:1:2
[Da'at Zekenim on Numbers 25:1:2](https://torahapp.org/share/book/Da%27at%20Zekenim%20on%20Numbers/r/25:1:2)

**בשטים.**אמר רבי אלעזר שטים שמה ור' יהושע אומר שעסקו במעשה שטות:

**Yalkut, Sifsei Chachomim Chumash, Metsudah Publications, 2009:**
בשטים, according to Rabbi Elazar this had been the name of that place already previously. Rabbi Yoshua disagrees and says that it was so named after what happened there, i.e. that many Israelites committed the ultimate folly, shtuss, of sleeping around with gentiles and prostrating themselves to idols; [in order to please their partners who considered this as payment for granting them sexual favours. Ed.]


###### Da'at Zekenim on Numbers 25:1:3
[Da'at Zekenim on Numbers 25:1:3](https://torahapp.org/share/book/Da%27at%20Zekenim%20on%20Numbers/r/25:1:3)

**ויחל העם לזנות.**נעשו חולין ע"י הזנות בעצת בלעם ולכך הוא נדון בשכבת זרע רותחת כדאיתא במס' גיטין פרק הניזקין מדה כנגד מדה:

**Yalkut, Sifsei Chachomim Chumash, Metsudah Publications, 2009:**
ויחל העם לזנות. They profaned themselves by falling victim to the advice Bileam had given to Balak to lure them into harlotry, a great sin the eyes of the Jewish G–d. (Compare Talmud tractate Gittin, folio 56)


###### Da'at Zekenim on Numbers 25:11:1
[Da'at Zekenim on Numbers 25:11:1](https://torahapp.org/share/book/Da%27at%20Zekenim%20on%20Numbers/r/25:11:1)

**פינחס בן אלעזר.**כלומר אין להם לשנאתו אם הרג זמרי שהרי על ידי כן השיב את חמתי מעליהם ולא כליתי אותם:

**Yalkut, Sifsei Chachomim Chumash, Metsudah Publications, 2009:**
'פינחס בן אלעזר הכהן וגו, “Pinchas son of the High Priest Eleazar, etc.” although this was not news to anyone, the Torah had to repeat his genealogy so that the reader would not think that he could be hated for having taken the law into his own hands by killing Zimri. On the contrary, by doing so he had succeeded in arresting the vengeance G–d was in the process of taking from the sinners. Had he not done so, the people criticising him might themselves have been killed by the plague G–d had sent.


###### Da'at Zekenim on Numbers 25:12:1
[Da'at Zekenim on Numbers 25:12:1](https://torahapp.org/share/book/Da%27at%20Zekenim%20on%20Numbers/r/25:12:1)

**לכן.**שעשה דבר הגון לפני הנני נותן לו את בריתי שלום ואם ישנאוהו ישראל לא יחוש ואין לו לירא לא מקרובי זמרי ולא מקרובי כזבי שהיתה בת מלך ובקידושין פרק האומר מסיק וי"ו דשלום קטיעה היא למדרש כשהוא שלם ולא כשהוא חסר מכאן לכהן בעל מום שעבודתו פסולה:

**Yalkut, Sifsei Chachomim Chumash, Metsudah Publications, 2009:**
לכן, because (he had performed this deed of valour) on My behalf; הנני נותן לו את בריתי שלום, “I am forthwith giving him My covenant “peace.” G–d assures Pinchas that even if either relatives of Zimri and Cosbi will hate Pinchas, He will protect him against any act of overt or covert hostility. In the Talmud, tractate Kidushin, folio 66, attention is drawn to the fact that the letter ו in the word שלום is written with a break in the stem of that letter, to indicate that when a priest is not totally whole in all of his limbs, he is not fit to perform the service in the Temple. His service would be rendered invalid retroactively.


###### Da'at Zekenim on Numbers 25:13:1
[Da'at Zekenim on Numbers 25:13:1](https://torahapp.org/share/book/Da%27at%20Zekenim%20on%20Numbers/r/25:13:1)

**והיתה לו ולזרעו אחריו וגו'.**שיהא משוח מלחמה מכאן ואילך וזש"ה במלחמת מדין אותם ואת פנחס בן אלעזר הכהן לצבא וכו' מכאן אמרו רז"ל דלא נתכהן פנחס עד שהרגו לזמרי. ובהכי ניחא מה שהעולם מקשים היאך הרג פנחס את זמרי ונטמא למת דאיכא למימר דעד עכשיו לא נתנה כהונה אלא לאהרן ולבניו אבל לבני בניו לא וגם במלואים תמצא כתיב לאהרן ולבניו תעשה כתנות ולא לבני בניו. ועוד י"ל דהניחו לזמרי גוסס ולא מת ממש וגוסס אינו מטמא ועל זה הקשה הר"ר שמואל שהרי משמיני למלואים היה פנחס משוח מלחמה שכן מונה שמחה זו בשבע שמחות שהיתה אלישבע אשת אהרן יתירה על האחרות שהיה בן בנה משוח מלחמה ושמא משם נתן לו להיות משוח מלחמה אבל לעבודה ולדורות לא וכאן ניתנה לו הכהונה לכל מילי ולזרעו אחריו ברית כהונת עולם:

**Yalkut, Sifsei Chachomim Chumash, Metsudah Publications, 2009:**
והיתה לו ולזרעו אחריו, “and both he and his descendants will enjoy the status of being priests.” This is the case with the descendants of all priests, but what is meant here is that the special priest assigned to soldiers before setting out on a war of conquest will always be one descended from Pinchas. (Compare both Numbers 31,6 and Talmud Zevachim, folio 101)It also follows that prior to Pinchas’ having killed Zimri in an act of zealousness he had not been a priest although he was the son of a priest.This also explains how Pinchas could have permitted himself to kill Zimri as by doing so he would defile himself, something forbidden for a priest to do? We would have been able to answer that up until now only Aaron himself and his sons had been forbidden to defile themselves through contact with a corpse.We find that also during the description of the consecration of Aaron and his sons as priests the Torah had emphasised the anointment of him and his sons, (not any grandsons. Compare Exodus 28,40-41.)It is also possible to answer that when Pinchas withdrew his dagger from Zimri and Cosbi, they had not yet been quite dead. [These speculations are necessary as there is a debate between the sages as to when Pinchas had become a priest. His priesthood might not have been hereditary to his descendants prior to here. Ed.] Concerning this interpretation, Rabbi Sh’muel raises the point that Pinchas must have been a priest in the full sense of the meaning of the word no later than on the eighth day of the consecrations rites, [38 years earlier. Ed.] or the Midrash could not have included him in the seven joyful events that Aaron’s wife Elisheva was supposed to have enjoyed on that day. It is possible that Moses appointed him to that position although he did not permit him to perform service in the Tabernacle until after he had earned that right by being zealous on G–d’s behalf at the right time at the right place. Only now had all the privileges of the priesthood been bestowed upon him and his descendants after him.


###### Da'at Zekenim on Numbers 25:13:2
[Da'at Zekenim on Numbers 25:13:2](https://torahapp.org/share/book/Da%27at%20Zekenim%20on%20Numbers/r/25:13:2)

**ויכפר על בני ישראל.**וראוי הוא לעשות כפרות אחרות:

**Yalkut, Sifsei Chachomim Chumash, Metsudah Publications, 2009:**
ויכפר על בני ישראל, “now that he had achieved atonement on behalf of the whole Jewish nation, he would henceforth be an instrument gaining atonement on other occasions.”


###### Da'at Zekenim on Numbers 25:15:1
[Da'at Zekenim on Numbers 25:15:1](https://torahapp.org/share/book/Da%27at%20Zekenim%20on%20Numbers/r/25:15:1)

**ושם האשה המוכה.**לא נכתב אלא להודיע שגדולים היו ואעפ"כ לא נמנע פנחס מלהרגם ולכך הוצרך להבטחתו של הקב"ה וכן מצינו באברהם לאחר שהרג המלכים שאמר לו הקב"ה אל תירא אברם:

**Yalkut, Sifsei Chachomim Chumash, Metsudah Publications, 2009:**
ושם האשה המוכה, “and the name of the woman who had been slain, etc,” the reason that the Torah bothered to name the woman in question was only in order to tell us that she was of the elite of the women in Midian, and although Pinchas was aware of this, and the possible political implication of killing her, this did not stop him from acting zealously on behalf of Hashem, as he remembered that G–d said to Avraham, after he had killed four prominent kings in order to free his nephew Lot, that he should not be afraid of the relatives of those kings seeking revenge. (Genesis 15,1).