[Avodah] Jewish Women in the Midbar

[Yitzchok Levine]

The following is from the new translation of RSRH's commentary on Bamidbar.

201 The Children of Israel — the entire community 
— came into the wilderness of Tzin in the first 
month, and the people settled down in Kadesh. 
There Miriam died, and there she was buried.

“There Miriam died and there she was buried.”
She had completed her mission on earth. Her grave in Kadesh would
show future generations that she did not leave this world until the new
generation was ready for the future that had been promised to it.

During Israel’s long wanderings, filled with so many difficult experiences,
the women did not take part in the incidents of defection from
God, which resulted from despair. They cheerfully trusted in God and
devotedly waited for Him, and for this reason they were not included
in the fateful decree of death in the wilderness (Bemidbar Rabbah 21:10).
Now, mothers and grandmothers were about to go up with the new
generation to the Promised Land. Bringing with them their personal
recollections of the past in Egypt and of the journey in the wilderness
under God’s guidance, they could refresh the souls of their grandchildren
and great-grandchildren from the spiritual wellspring of their experiences
with God. The fact that these Jewish women were so deeply imbued
with the Jewish spirit may be ascribed in no small part to Miriam,
who set them a shining example as a prophetess (see Commentary,
Shemos 15:20).

This chapter, which describes briefly and simply the deaths of Aharon
and Miriam, is preceded by the great Parah Aduma chapter, which teaches the
Jewish concept of immortality. That chapter is in 
itself an important introduction
to these deaths. It declares that what made Miriam into
Miriam and what made Aharon into Aharon did not die when Miriam
and Aharon died. Just as their work lives on forever in their nation, their
true essence is eternal: it has now departed transient earthliness and returned
to God, the Source of all life. 
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