The Korach Mutiny

I thank R. Maroof and more recently David Rinde for the inspiration to write on politics as election season nears.

For Americans, Korach's motive for mutiny against Moshe seems obvious. Every election season we witness the spectacle of seeing our leaders degenerate into bitter competition and mudslinging. Needless to say, the combatants will dress up their ambition in moral terms or “the issues”. They claim to diparage each other in the name of “principles”, “the little guy” or “the children”-not pure power interest. But at the end of the day, commentators and ordinary people alike are in consensus -men will do anything to attain power.

Given this reality, the ordinary people tend to look past the details of political accusations and counter accusations, to an underlying theme of “leadership ability”. There is a common sense approach taken to politics, one chooses a leader based upon a “gestalt intuition” of his vision to deliver material good- security, economic success etc rather than careful analysis of policy arguments. There is no need to examine the arguments of Korach to know what his mutiny was about- he was a leader competing for power.

In the Jewish system, the ordinary man is raised with a keen awareness of the danger of following intuitions about the visions of leaders. Every seder we reiterate that unexamined visions of Pharoahs are enslaving. It is beneath us as mature adults to guide our social action based upon feel good slogans and unexplained visions which have no basis in reality. Such immaturity can only lead to one result- policies that benefit the power fantasy of elites and enslave the populace. Chazal therefore view the formulation of “the issues” of Korach's mutiny as anything but window dressing. Far from being limited to ordinary citizens, the mutiny involved the most mature among the people as well- 250 leaders from the Sanhedrin according to Rashi.

א וַיִּקַּח קֹרַח בֶּן-יִצְהָר בֶּן-קְהָת בֶּן-לֵוִי וְדָתָן וַאֲבִירָם בְּנֵי אֱלִיאָב וְאוֹן בֶּן-פֶּלֶת בְּנֵי רְאוּבֵן. ב וַיָּקֻמוּ לִפְנֵי מֹשֶׁה וַאֲנָשִׁים מִבְּנֵי-יִשְׂרָאֵל חֲמִשִּׁים וּמָאתָיִם נְשִׂיאֵי עֵדָה קְרִאֵי מוֹעֵד אַנְשֵׁי-שֵׁם. ג וַיִּקָּהֲלוּ עַל-מֹשֶׁה וְעַל-אַהֲרֹן וַיֹּאמְרוּ אֲלֵהֶם רַב-לָכֶם כִּי כָל-הָעֵדָה כֻּלָּם קְדֹשִׁים וּבְתוֹכָם יְהוָה וּמַדּוּעַ תִּתְנַשְּׂאוּ עַל-קְהַל יְהוָה. ד וַיִּשְׁמַע מֹשֶׁה וַיִּפֹּל עַל-פָּנָיו.

רשי
עמד וכנס מאתים חמישים ראשי סנהדראות, רובן משבט ראובן שכיניו, והם אליצור בן שדיאור וחביריו וכיוצא בו, שנאמר נשיאי עדה קריאי מועד, ולהלן הוא אומר (במדבר א, טז) אלה קרואי העדה, והלבישן טליתות שכולן תכלת.באו ועמדו לפני משה, אמרו לו
?טלית שכולה של תכלת חייבת בציצית או פטור
.אמר להם: חייבת
התחילו לשחק עליו, אפשר טלית של מין אחר חוט אחד של תכלת פוטרה, זו שכולה תכלת לא תפטור את עצמה

How could Korach have hoodwinked a populace raised on skepticism to political visions? What was so appealing in his argument?