Parashat Naso: Community, Prayer, and Responsibility

Naso is the longest parashah in the Torah. Its thematic richness is striking. At first glance, it appears to be a scattered mosaic of unrelated topics. Yet, if we look more deeply, we discover a consistent effort to offer a way back, even for those who stray from the norm, whether by choice or by necessity. It extends a path of return, reintegration, and love. Those on the margins are not rejected but gently welcomed back into the sacred fabric of communal life. If that was vital then, how much more so today.

Among the many themes in Naso, we find the detailed, and seemingly repetitive, description of the offerings brought by the leaders of the twelve tribes during the dedication of the altar. Each one brought the exact same offering. And yet, the Torah doesn’t summarize or condense. Instead, it repeats each offering twelve times, word for word.

Wouldn’t it have been enough to list the names of the leaders and mention that their offerings were identical?

The Torah even goes on to mention that, together, the leaders donated six wagons and twelve oxen to help transport the Mishkan and its components.

Rabbi Shmuel Avidor HaCohen z”l, in his work Likrat Shabbat, writes:

“There is no doubt that the offerings brought by each of the tribal leaders were identical. Each one brought the same sacrifices and the same elements (Numbers 4:13–17). Yet, although the physical content was the same, the intentions and personal experiences of each leader were not. Human thought is never identical, and each person’s inner world is unique, even when their actions look the same on the surface. Perhaps this is the message the Torah wants us to absorb in Parashat Naso. Yes, the details are the samebut the inner world behind each offering is distinct. That’s why each one deserves to be described in full.” (Likrat Shabbat, p. 147)

Bringing this insight into our own time, we might say the same about prayer. Technically, the words and melodies of our tefillot (our prayers) are the same. We repeat them day after day, Shabbat after Shabbat. But each person recites them with their own intention, their own heart, shaped by whatever moment they are living through. Some days we feel more ready to open up; other days, less so. The outer form may be the same, but what each of us pours into it is uniquely our own.

What seems repetitive at first glance, whether in sacrifices or in prayer, reveals, in truth, a message of deep respect: a recognition of individual value within the collective whole.

This, in turn, leads me to reflect on what allows a community to grow spiritually: when its leaders inspire not only with words, but by example; when they awaken within others a sense of responsibility, not as a burden, and not for visibility or status, but as an expression of shared purpose. From the outside, community work may look demanding. But from within, it becomes a labor of love and commitment transformed into joy. That’s what true leadership looks like.

Later in the parashah, we read the following verses:

"Command the children of Israel to remove from the camp anyone with tzaraat (a skin disease), anyone with a discharge, and anyone who has become impure by contact with a corpse. Remove them, male and female alike; send them outside the camp so they will not defile the camp where I dwell among them."(Numbers 5:2–3)

Who are these individuals deemed “impure”?

The metzora: afflicted with tzaraat—a skin condition understood by our sages to be spiritually rooted, often linked to harmful speech.

The zav: a man with abnormal seminal discharge (and, by extension, women with irregular discharges).

The tamei nefesh: literally, someone whose soul has become impure—explained as a person who has had contact with a corpse.

They were required to remain outside the camp for seven days and then return following a ritual immersion. It was a way of preserving the sanctity of the collective, with the understanding that reentry was always possible. This was never about exclusion for its own sake: it was about healing, accountability, and reintegration.

Rashi deepens this understanding, describing concentric circles of holiness: the innermost camp, the Mishkan itself, was the domain of the Shechinah, the Divine Presence. Around it was the camp of the Levites, and beyond that, the camp of the Israelites. Those with tzaraat were sent outside all three; those with a discharge were excluded from the first two; those who had touched a corpse were sent only from the camp of the Shekhinah. (Talmud, Pesachim 67a)

Through these laws, Rashi invites us to imagine the structure of a community that protects its spiritual core while always holding the door open for return.

In this same parashah, we find Birkat Kohanim, the Priestly Blessing, fifteen carefully chosen words that contain the world and its hope. It’s the same blessing we continue to offer as parents and grandparents, with deep emotion: a prayer that our children, and those who follow, keep moving toward a horizon we may never fully reach: wholeness, repair, tikkun. But even if we never arrive, the journey is holy. It is in the walking, the intention, the shared prayer, and the act of blessing that the soul of our people endures.

As I write these lines, I cannot help but feel the weight of the present moment. Fifty-six of our brothers and sisters remain captive in Gaza, held by Hamas now for over 20 months. Their families live in agonizing limbo suspended between hope and heartbreak.

The world’s indifference wounds us. And worse still is when that indifference mutates into hostility and hate. Just this past week, we’ve seen hateful rhetoric erupt into violent acts, hate crimes and the list keeps growing…

What, then, is the tzaraat of our own time? What is the spiritual impurity we must confront? Where does it truly reside and how do we recognize it?

We are walking through a time of great darkness. And perhaps that is exactly why we must return, more than ever, to the words of the Torah, to its call for dignity, for responsibility, for compassion, for blessing, for care for the whole; a time that calls for more and better leaders, guided by a healthy and grounded vision of what true leadership means. Even when that means temporarily stepping back, taking stock, healing from whatever form of spiritual illness we may be carrying, so we can one day reenter the community with new strength and clarity.

We bless and pray for the day when we can embrace, one by one, all those who have not yet returned. May the captives come home. May our soldiers return safely. May the broken be rebuilt with steady hands and open hearts. And may a day come when neither pain nor fear becomes routine, when justice triumphs without hate, when truth finds its voice, and the world, in all its diversity, becomes a place not of exclusion, but of shared belonging.

Shabbat Shalom 

Rabbi Gustavo Geier