June 25, 2023|ו' תמוז ה' אלפים תשפ"ג Everybody's Somebody in Luckenbach By Rabbi Jonathan Muskat

This past week, Yael and I flew to Chicago for a wedding. I don’t know what your experience is at an airport, but whenever I get a gate assignment, I always feel that my gate number is the one at the end of the airport. This time the gate was really at one end of the airport so I had a long walk with many moving walkways to get to my gate. I happened to behind a big guy with a T-Shirt and on the back of his T-shirt was a picture of a cactus and something else that I don’t remember, but I remember the words that were written on the back of the T-shirt: Everybody’s somebody in Luckenbach. Honestly, I normally don’t pay attention to my surroundings when I’m at an airport, but I was walking behind this guy and this guy’s t-shirt for about ten minutes straight in the airport and this message caught my attention: Everybody’s Somebody in Luckenbach.

I thought that that’s a very nice slogan for a town. In this town, Luckenbach, everybody feels special. Everybody has a place. I was wondering to myself, what is the secret sauce of Luckenbach? How does this town make everybody feel like a somebody. So I googled Luckenbach and discovered that it’s a town in Texas with the slogan “Everybody’s Somebody in Luckenbach,” and I thought, “Wow! How nice!” And then I saw on its Wikipedia page, “Luckenbach, Texas: population three.” Now I understand why everybody is a somebody, because there are only three people in this town. The truth is, in Luckenbach everybody really is a somebody, but isn’t this slogan “everybody is somebody” a goal that we all strive for? Don’t we all want to be a somebody? Don’t we all want to feel that we possess inherent worth and significance? That we matter? That we are not just living on this planet for a number of years for some aimless purpose? Don’t we want to matter?

This feeling of a loss of self-worth and purpose may actually have been the reason for the rebellion of Korach. There is a dispute as to whether the story of Korach is recorded in the Torah in its chronological order, meaning did it really happen after the sin of the spies from last week’s parsha or did it occur earlier. Ramban believes that the story happened after the sin of the spies and Korach took advantage of the fact that Moshe and Aaron’s popularity was lower than usual to lead a rebellion. However, Rav Benzion Firer, who was the av beit din of Rimanov in the beginning of the 20th century and ended up in Eretz Yisrael after 1948, had a different perspective about the connection between the sin of the spies and the rebellion of Korach which I found to be quite compelling. He suggests that after the sin of the spies and the decree that the generation of adults should die in the desert, the Bnei Yisrael’s morale understandably declined. They lost a sense of mission, purpose and self-worth. Korach took advantage of these feelings when he challenged Moshe by saying:

רַב־לָכֶם֒ כִּ֤י כׇל־הָֽעֵדָה֙ כֻּלָּ֣ם קְדֹשִׁ֔ים וּבְתוֹכָ֖ם ה׳ וּמַדּ֥וּעַ תִּֽתְנַשְּׂא֖וּ עַל־קְהַ֥ל ה׳׃

“You have gone too far! For all the community are holy, all of them, and ה׳ is in their midst. Why then do you raise yourselves above ה׳’s congregation?”

Here Korach is playing on their feelings of self-worth. He asserted that everyone is the same so everyone should have the same religious opportunities. Do you see what Korach did? He took their feelings of low self-worth and tied them to limited opportunities. Everyone should have the same opportunities. Why should Moshe and Aaron rule over everyone?

Notice that he used a similar line of argument as Miriam did a few parshiyot earlier. Miriam thought that she and Aaron were similar to Moshe and that’s why she criticizes Moshe for separating from Tzipora according to one version of the story. This is Korach’s argument as well. We are all the same so we should have the same opportunities. Why do you, Moshe and Aaron, raise yourselves about us? Why do you have more opportunities of leadership than us? Korach equated self-worth with equal opportunities.

What is Moshe’s response? It’s the same response as God’s response to Miriam. Korach and the 250 men are not chosen to be the kohen. Aaron is chosen. Datan and Aviram are not chosen to lead the people. Moshe is chosen. A lack of equal opportunities does not necessarily translate into a lack of self-worth. In fact, that’s what Moshe tells Korach. He tells him that you do have a job! But he does more than that. He addresses all the Leviim. The Torah states (Bamidbar 16:8-10):

וַיֹּ֥אמֶר מֹשֶׁ֖ה אֶל־קֹ֑רַח שִׁמְעוּ־נָ֖א בְּנֵ֥י לֵוִֽי׃

Moses said further to Korah, “Hear me, sons of Levi.

הַמְעַ֣ט מִכֶּ֗ם כִּֽי־הִבְדִּיל֩ אֱ-לֹהֵ֨י יִשְׂרָאֵ֤ל אֶתְכֶם֙ מֵעֲדַ֣ת יִשְׂרָאֵ֔ל לְהַקְרִ֥יב אֶתְכֶ֖ם אֵלָ֑יו לַעֲבֹ֗ד אֶת־עֲבֹדַת֙ מִשְׁכַּ֣ן ה׳ וְלַעֲמֹ֛ד לִפְנֵ֥י הָעֵדָ֖ה לְשָׁרְתָֽם׃

Is it not enough for you that the God of Israel has set you apart from the community of Israel and given you direct access, to perform the duties of ה’s Tabernacle and to minister to the community and serve them?

וַיַּקְרֵב֙ אֹֽתְךָ֔ וְאֶת־כׇּל־אַחֶ֥יךָ בְנֵי־לֵוִ֖י אִתָּ֑ךְ וּבִקַּשְׁתֶּ֖ם גַּם־כְּהֻנָּֽה׃

Now that [God] has advanced you and all your fellow Levites with you, do you seek the priesthood too?

Apparently, Moshe was concerned that the entire tribe of Leviim would follow Korach. See, the rest of the Bnei Yisrael didn’t have social media. They didn’t expect much to begin with. They were not jealous of anyone. Yes, Korach got them going about their lack of opportunities, but they were not leaders of the rebellion. But the other Leviim were watching on social media how the kohanim have all the plush jobs and they were perhaps saying to themselves, “We are from the same tribe so why is Elazar or Itamar getting a selfie with a sheep on the outer mizbai’ach. Obviously, we are not worthy.” That is why Moshe tells them, “You have self-worth. You have a unique opportunity!” Now it wasn’t an equal opportunity, but Moshe was pointing out to him that equal opportunity is not a prerequisite for self-worth. Everybody can feel like a somebody if they can focus on their uniqueness and that’s what Moshe was telling Korach and the Leviim.

And I think it’s no coincidence that after the rebellion ended, the rest of the parsha is dedicated towards the roles and uniqueness of the kohen, and the roles and uniqueness of the Levi. The kohen gets korban meat, and the Levi gets maaser. Each individual has self-worth. The Leviim questioned their self-worth, so Moshe assures them of their unique status.

Let me be clear. We should always strive to create more opportunities for everyone where possible in all areas of life – educationally, professionally and religiously. At the end of the day, we find ourselves limited, because Jewish law only allows a kohen to do something or a man to do something or because I cannot afford to pay for the best education possible or I don’t have the connections that someone else has to enable me to get the best job. We live life having more opportunities than some and less opportunities than others for a variety of reasons. But we must not fall into the trap of allowing our lack of opportunities to diminish our own self-worth.

There is a lot of value to social media but I think that social media can also wreak havoc on our feelings of self-worth in a way Moshe saw was happening to the Leviim. Social media platforms promote social comparison, when we compare our real lives with an idealized version of the lives of others on social media. They promote validation seeking, when we only feel good about ourselves if we receive positive feedback form others in response to a post. They also create feelings of pressure to conform or measure up to an idealized image, resulting in a negative self-perception if we don’t feel that we meet those standards.

Once we feel that lack of self-worth, we will look to blame others for lack of opportunity, just as Korach convinced the Bnei Yisrael to do. But we can overcome these feelings. The Torah has provided us tools to help combat these feelings. The Torah has taught us not to seek validation through the community like Korach did, but to cultivate a deep sense of self-awareness. At the same time, practice the midda of gratitude and appreciate. Work hard at complimenting others, at seeing everyone’s unique strengths, at living a life where you truly feel that “Everybody is somebody.” Because once you do that, you realize that we may not all be kohanim, but we are Leviim. Each one of us has a story to tell. When you start seeing that in others, then you start seeing that in yourselves. If we work on our midda of gratitude and self-awareness, we won’t need a Texan town with a population of three to make us realize that everybody is somebody.