ON THE PARSHA Parshas Pinchas by Dovid Lipman, Israel THE "STRANGE FIRE" When Nadav and Avihu were killed by a heavenly fire, the Torah describes their sin as bringing a "strange fire", which Hashem had not commanded. Why does the Torah make the same point twice? Isn't it enough to say they brought a fire which Hashem didn't command? Why bother also calling it strange? Are we trying to throw insults here? Another question, which is more related to our Parsha, is about the sin of the Jews with the women of Midyan. There's a thread of contradiction in the whole story. The Jewish men were gulity of immorality, but the Torah reports that they also worshipped the idolatry of Ba'al Pe'or. When this story is referred to later, sometimes the idolatry is recalled, other times the immorality, but almost never both. Why? To begin to understand, we examine the words of Bil'am in his advice that led to this story. "The G-d of these people hates immorality..." Clearly the emphasis is on that sin. So why were the women told to tell the men, "First bow down to this idol?" That wasn't their goal! We find another puzzling point in our Parsha (25:15), where the Torah reveals that the woman with whom Zimri the Nasi sinned was Kozbi, Princess of Midyan. [By the way, do you know what we call this story of the Torah? the Bil'am - Kozbi show!] Rashi explains the reason we need to know her identity: To show how much they hated the Jews, that they were willing to degrade a princess to cause the Jews to sin and be destroyed. This implies that her being a princess helped the "cause" of enticing the Jews. Why? What does the desire for immorality care about social status? To explain this story, we turn to later in the Parsha, where the Torah mentions the rift caused by Korach, in which he, with Dasan and Aviram of Re'uvain, incited a group to challenge Moshe and Hashem. The word used for "inciting" here is "hitzu", and it's repeated in the pasuk three times. The root word "lehatzos" literally means to start or fan a flame. Why the slant on fire? Fire is the key to all of this. People think being idealistic means to be "on fire", and indeed the Torah is compared to fire. But to tune in to the Torah is not like fire. One has to be cautious and calm, to rationally examine the issues one faces in order to conclude what Hashem wants one to do. The "fire" of personal emotion is a "strange fire", and the Yetzer Hora can get a person to do almost anything using this fire. For example, Nadav and Avihu wanted to bring k'tores. Why? Because THEY wanted to - Hashem had not commanded it. So these feelings - which were themselves a "strange fire" - distorted their reason until they entered the Holy of Holies without permission. Korach and Dasan and Aviram "fanned a fire" that the Jews on their own might have managed to "put out". Whatever personal resentments they had about their situation - after Korach spoke it was enough to make them all bring k'tores. Suicide! Where were their minds? Were they crazy? No - they were just "on fire". What was the key to Bil'am's plan? Emotion. Caught off guard, the Jews were sure to fall in love with his temptresses. But why should they totally lose control? From Zimri's argument with Moshe, we see that he expected to convert Kozbi. (Otherwise, what was the comparison to Moshe's wife?) So we can assume all the men who sinned did so for that reason. They saw an opportunity for "kiruv" - a relationship with these women would surely enable the men to teach them that it's desirable to be a Jew! And when they converted, what a Kiddush Hashem it would be! Obviously, it was worthwile to do ANYTHING the women wanted to bring about such a Kiddush Hashem. There are two possible ways to make such a mistake. One - honestly, out of confusion and unclear thinking. Two - because of a "strange fire". If the idea came from the "personal" side in their love, it could take over, leading to the worst sins. Bil'am was afraid that if the mistake was honest, the act of immorality might even be considered a mitzvah in Hashem's eyes, an "Aveirah Lishmah". Only if the mistake stemmed from personal desires would the men incur Hashem's anger. So Bil'am threw in a test. The "Kiddush Hashem" logic obviously could not justify idol worship, even to the most confused mind. But a man whose real motivation was personal desire would manage to rationalize even THAT. So the women were told to demand idol worship before the immorality. Now we understand why the princess was helpful. The whole trick was to get the men to rationalize their acts in the name of the "Kiddush Hashem" of converting the women. The higher the status of the woman, the more people would be impressed if she would convert, and by extension, the better the chance of the Jew falling for this "logic" in the heat of a "strange fire". So the sin at Shittim was not two. It was one sin: The sin of going after personal desire, not Hashem's will. If it leads to rationalizing immorality, it will do the same for idol worship. Which actual sin is committed is not the point when it comes to the blame. The blame is for not being HONEST - for pretending the "strange fire" is the same as the "fire of His law".