Devarim – Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star

Twinkle, twinkle, little star How I wonder what you are Up above the world so high

Like a diamond in the sky Twinkle, twinkle little star How I wonder what you are

Moshe Rabbeinu assembles the entire nation to deliver a series of farewell messages.  Looking out at the multitudes of people, he joyously proclaims:

The Lord your God has multiplied you until you are today as numerous as the stars in the sky.

ה אֱלֹקיכֶ֖ם הִרְבָּ֣ה אֶתְכֶ֑ם וְהִנְּכֶ֣ם הַיּ֔וֹם כְּכוֹכְבֵ֥י הַשָּׁמַ֖יִם לָרֹֽב׃

[Devarim 1:10]

 

A mere seventy Hebrew souls descended to Egypt.  Now, two centuries later, on the last leg of their long journey home, Moshe gazes upon six hundred thousand Israelites.  He recalls a promise made four hundred years earlier by God to Avraham:

And He [God] took him [Avraham] outside, and He said, “Please look heavenward and count the stars, if you are able to count them.” And He said to him, “So will be your seed.”

וַיּוֹצֵ֨א אֹת֜וֹ הַח֗וּצָה וַיֹּ֨אמֶר֙ הַבֶּט־נָ֣א הַשָּׁמַ֔יְמָה וּסְפֹר֙ הַכּ֣וֹכָבִ֔ים אִם־תּוּכַ֖ל לִסְפֹּ֣ר אֹתָ֑ם וַיֹּ֣אמֶר ל֔וֹ כֹּ֥ה יִֽהְיֶ֖ה זַרְעֶֽךָ:

[Gen. 15:5]

 

As explained by Ibn Ezra, Moshe’s reference to the stars in the sky was not meant to be mathematically accurate.  It was spoken דרך משל, figuratively.  It was praise of God for having kept His Word so many years earlier.  Rashi agrees that Moshe was not being literal, but neither is he prepared to dismiss Moshe’s words as mere poetry, puffery or praise:

But were they [the Israelites] on that day as [many as] the stars of the heavens? Were they not only six hundred thousand? What, then, is [the meaning of] “And, behold, you are today…?” [It means]-Behold, you are compared to the sun, [signifying that you will] exist forever as do the sun, the moon, and the stars.

וכי ככוכבי השמים היו באותו היום, והלא לא היו אלא שישים רבוא, מהו והנכם היום, הנכם משולים כיום, קיימים כחמה וכלבנה וככוכבים:

[Rashi on Devarim 1:10]

In Rashi’s reading, Moshe was being literal – perhaps not about the quantity of Jews before him but certainly about the shining and eternal quality of Bnai Yisrael.  Just as the stars are (for all practical purposes) eternal, so too is the nation of Israel.  Looking out, Moshe knew that his people, and the Torah he had taught them, would forever shine and illuminate the world.  In the words of the Prophet Isaiah, HaSHem made us לְאוֹר גּוֹיִם, a light onto the nations of the world.

Rabbeinu Bachya and Shach echo this idea, stating that God’s Promise of vast numbers of Jews would one day be fulfilled.  On this day, however, Moshe was extolling the brightness and eternal character of the assembly.

We, of course, know that our Milk Way has between ‎250–500 billion stars and that the universe has millions of galaxies.  But these are modern discoveries.  Galileo Galilei did not point his newly invented telescope to the night sky until the seventeenth century, and humans did not learn that there was more to the universe than visible night sky until Edwin Hubble deduced it only one hundred years ago.

Indeed, an Israelite listening to Moshe Rabbeinu’s encore could count only about 2,000 stars!  So how does Rashi, who lived in the eleventh century, know that there are far more than 600,000 stars in heaven?  Why isn’t Rashi impressed that the sheer number of assembled Jews exceeded the visible stars in the sky by a factor of three hundred?

My chaver and chavruta, Isaac Seinuk[1] suggested[2] that we can resolve the problem by applying the transitive law of mathematics.  God first assured Avraham that his descendants will be as numerous as the dust of the earth:

And I will make your seed like the dust of the earth, so that if a man will be able to count the dust of the earth, so will your seed be counted.

וְשַׂמְתִּ֥י אֶת־זַרְעֲךָ֖ כַּֽעֲפַ֣ר הָאָ֑רֶץ אֲשֶׁ֣ר | אִם־יוּכַ֣ל אִ֗ישׁ לִמְנוֹת֙ אֶת־עֲפַ֣ר הָאָ֔רֶץ גַּם־זַרְעֲךָ֖ יִמָּנֶֽה:

[Gen. 13:16]

As we’ve already seen, God also Promises Avraham that Jews will equal the number of stars in heaven.  Algebra teaches that “if a is equal to b and b is equal to c, then a is equal to c.”  Dr. Seinuk suggested that since Avraham’s descendants are compared to both the dust of the earth and the stars in heaven, it must mean that there are far more stars in the sky than the 2,000 that can be seen and counted.  Problem solved.

Except it isn’t.  Our universe contains at least 70 septillion stars.  That’s 7 followed by 23 zeros. Scientists estimate that there exist roughly 10,000 stars for each grain of sand on Earth.  Dr. Seinuk is right lyrically but not literally.

I do not know when humankind actually divined that there are unseen stars in the sky but they surely knew it well before they could prove it with scientific methodology and equipment.  I know this because on the verse in Breishit, when God first Ordered Avraham to “look heavenward and count the stars”, Rashi, paraphrasing an ancient midrash, remarks:

He took him out of the terrestrial sphere and lifted him above the stars. This explains the expression of הַבָּטָה, looking down from above

הוציאו מחללו של עולם והגביהו למעלה מן הכוכבים, וזהו לשון הבטה מלמעלה למטה

[Rashi on Gen. 15:5]

Avraham Aveinu looked at the sky and counted to about 2,000.  “OK”, he may have thought, “that’s a lot of descendants, especially for a childless, elderly man like me, but it doesn’t really comport with HasShem’s enthusiasm.  What am I missing?”[3]  It’s kind of like winning $2,000 on a lotter ticket; it’s nice pocket change but hardly spectacular and remarkable.

Sensing that Avraham was missing the big picture, HaShem freed him from the limitations of his human senses by elevating him up to the heavens.  With an unobstructed view, Avraham saw what he could not see while standing on a desert dune.  “So will be your seed” was an enormous bequest.

We may think that stars are only giant, round, nuclear reactors fueled by hydrogen gas, but Chazal knew better.  They offered a far more compelling explanation of the “kochavim” that keep the moon company.  In describing the creation of the sun and moon, the Torah tells us:

God made the two great lights, the greater light to dominate the day and the lesser light to dominate the night, and the stars.

וַיַּ֣עַשׂ אֱלֹקים אֶת־שְׁנֵ֥י הַמְּאֹרֹ֖ת הַגְּדֹלִ֑ים אֶת־הַמָּא֤וֹר הַגָּדֹל֙ לְמֶמְשֶׁ֣לֶת הַיּ֔וֹם וְאֶת־הַמָּא֤וֹר הַקָּטֹן֙ לְמֶמְשֶׁ֣לֶת הַלַּ֔יְלָה וְאֵ֖ת הַכּוֹכָבִֽים׃

[Gen. 1:16]

When HaShem Created the Heavens, He introduced the sun and moon as co-equal luminaries.  Immediately afterwards, one is termed “greater” and the other “lesser”.  Rabbi Shimon ben Pazi (Chullin 60b) explains the change in God’s Attitude:

[When God first created the sun and the moon, they were equally bright.] Then, the moon said before the Holy One, Blessed be He: Master of the Universe, is it possible for two kings to serve with one crown? ]One of us must be subservient to the other.[	אמרה ירח לפני הקב”ה רבש”ע אפשר לשני מלכים שישתמשו בכתר אחד
God therefore said to her, i.e., the moon: If so, go and diminish yourself.	אמר לה לכי ומעטי את עצמך

As punishment for being reluctant to share the spotlight, the moon is reduced in size and stature.  Saddened by being demoted, she pleads to God and in an act of Divine Mercy, God give her numerous stars as an entourage.[4]

And what are these “kochavim”, stars?  R. Yitzchak Caro[5], who died a generation before the birth of Galileo Galilei, taught that they are the scraps that were cast off by the Moon when she became diminished[6].  Normally such embers would quickly burn out, but these bits and pieces were Holy, having been created by HaShem on Day 4.  They therefore continue to glow in the night sky for eternity.

1. Yitzchak Caro notes that the Hebrew word for star, “kochav” comes for the fact that these tiny sparks defy natural law by burning in the heavens without being extinguished, “ולכן יקראו כוכבים לפי שכבו מלשון לא תכבה”.

The Psalmist praised God thusly:

He reckoned the number of the stars; to each He gave its name.

מוֹנֶ֣ה מִ֭סְפָּר לַכּוֹכָבִ֑ים לְ֝כֻלָּ֗ם שֵׁמ֥וֹת יִקְרָֽא׃

[Tehillim 147:4]

The comparison of the Children of Avraham to the stars in the sky is not merely a promise great numbers in the distant future.  It is a promise of brightness and of survival now and tomorrow.

But it is also a direct challenge to us.  Just as there are sparks of holiness in the night sky, so too are there embers of Jewish souls that are adrift, flickering far from their source.  We cannot see them, but we know they are there.  And still they cling.  Some may call this clinging gravity.  We call is Holiness.  HaSHem Knows the names of each of these sparks.  Therefore, one of our missions is to learn those names and help them shine.

We are left with one last problem.  Are we like stars in the heavens or grains of dust?  When God punished Adam after the incident of the eating from the Tree of Knowledge, He Decreed:

With the sweat of your face you shall eat bread, until you return to the ground, for you were taken therefrom, for dust you are, and to dust you will return.”

בְּזֵעַ֤ת אַפֶּ֨יךָ֙ תֹּ֣אכַל לֶ֔חֶם עַ֤ד שֽׁוּבְךָ֙ אֶל־הָ֣אֲדָמָ֔ה כִּ֥י מִמֶּ֖נָּה לֻקָּ֑חְתָּ כִּֽי־עָפָ֣ר אַ֔תָּה וְאֶל־עָפָ֖ר תָּשֽׁוּב:

[Gen. 3:19]

Perhaps HaSHem uses both the “stars in the sky” and the “grains of dust on the earth” metaphors because He is offering us a stark choice.  We will be numerous, for sure, but it is up to us to decide whether we will be burning embers, longing to rejoin the Light of creation, or a large collection of “dust”, the very material we are destined to revert to when we perish.  The choice is ours.

Shabbat Shalom!

[1] He’s also my dentist!

[2] We continue to talk Torah in shul on shabbos, even with social distancing and masks.

[3] This is the same Avraham that as a boy logically deduced the existence of HaShem.  See, Rambam, Hilchot Avodah Zarah 1:3:

As soon as this giant [Avraham] was weaned he commenced to busy his mind, in his infancy he commenced to think by day and by night, and would encounter this enigma: How is it possible that this planet should continuously be in motion and have no leader—and who, indeed, causes it to revolve, it being impossible that it should revolve itself?  Moreover, he neither had a teacher nor one to impart aught to him, for he was sunk in Ur of the Chaldeans among the foolish worshipers of stars, and his father, and his mother, like all the people, worshiped stars, and he, although following them in their worship, busies his heart and reflects until he attains the path of truth, and, by his correct thinking, he understood when he finally saw the line of righteousness. He knew that there is One God; He leads the planet; He created everything; and in all that is there is no god save He. He knew that the whole world was in error, and that the thing which caused them to err was, that their worshiping the stars and the images brought about the loss of the truth from their consciousness. And, when Abraham was forty years old he recognized his Creator.

https://www.sefaria.org/Mishneh_Torah%2C_Foreign_Worship_and_Customs_of_the_Nations.1?lang=en

[4] The Torah contains numerous examples of God consoling those punished by tempering His punishments.

[5] R. Yitzchak Caro was the uncle of R. Yoseph Caro, author of the Shulchan Aruch.

[6].  See, Toldot Yitzchak on Gen 1:16.