This week’s Torah portion, Beha’a lot’cha (Num. 8:1 – 12:16)
speaks about Pesach sheini, “The second Passover”. In chapter 9, Moses instructs the Israelites
to commemorate the events of the exodus from Egypt, which had occurred exactly
one year earlier, on the fourteenth day of Nisan. However, there were some men who were impure
because they had come into contact with a corpse, and they could not offer the
Pesach sacrifice. They came to Moses,
who consulted God, and God responded that anyone who was unable to offer a
sacrifice on the fourteenth of Nisan might offer it one month later, on the fourteenth
of Iyar.
In the Etz Hayim commentary, Rabbi Harold Kushner reflects
on this interaction, “To the sincere individual, life often does offer second
chances for spiritual fulfillment that may have been missed when the
opportunity first presented itself”. How many times have we looked back on an
opportunity not seized, on something prized that we were not able to grasp? Rabbi Kushner uses this verse to provide both
a comfort and a challenge. The comfort
is that the chance may likely come again.
The challenge is to look out for it.
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