Parashat Balak: Prayer in the Parashah
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Devash: Prayer
Illustration credit: Rebecca Kerzner

Prayer in the Parashah תְּפִלָּה

The Mah Tovu prayer appears in siddurim at the beginning of Shaharit, and it’s customary to say it when entering a prayer space. The opening line of this prayer comes from our parashah. Bilam is trying to curse Benei Yisrael, but instead he says:
במדבר כ״ד:ה׳
מַה טֹּבוּ אֹהָלֶיךָ יַעֲקֹב
מִשְׁכְּנֹתֶיךָ יִשְׂרָאֵל:
Numbers 24:5
Mah tovu (how nice) are your tents, Yaakov,
Your dwellings, Yisrael.
It’s an example of parallelism, a feature of biblical poetry we’ve seen before in Devash! The same idea is repeated twice, using different words.
But according to a midrash, the repetition here actually indicates two different kinds of places:
מדרש לקח טוב, במדבר כ״ד:ה׳:א׳
אֹהָלֶיךָ יַעֲקֹב - אֵלּוּ בָּתֵּי מִדְרָשׁוֹת.
מִשְׁכְּנוֹתֶיךָ יִשְׂרָאֵל - אֵלּוּ בָּתֵּי כְּנֵסִיּוֹת.
Midrash Lekach Tov, Numbers 24:5:1
“Your tents, Yaakov” – these are batei midrash (places to study Torah).
“Your dwellings, Yisrael” – these are batei knesset (synagogues).
  • The first line is about an אֹהֶל (ohel, tent) and the second line is about a מִשְׁכָּן (mishkan, dwelling). How does ohel relate to Torah, and how does mishkan relate to prayer? What does it mean that the mishkan, God’s sanctuary in the wilderness, was also called the אֹהֶל מוֹעֵד (ohel mo’ed, tent of meeting)?
  • When we go into shul, why might we quote Bilam, a prophet who was trying to curse Benei Yisrael but ended up blessing them? (Fun fact: Maharshal actually objected to saying Mah Tovu because it came from the mouth of Bilam! See Shut Maharshal 64.)
  • How do you feel when entering a synagogue? What hopes do you have?
  • How is a synagogue like a beit midrash? How are these different?
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