Almond Branch Leadership
“Trust is the glue of life. It’s the most essential ingredient in effective communication. It’s the foundational principle that holds all relationships.” (Stephen R. Covey, renowned expert on leadership.)
Parshat Korach holds great wonders: for instance, after Korach assembles a number of disgruntled Israelites and challenges the leadership of his cousins, Moses and Aaron, God then opens a hole in the ground and hurls some of the rebels down to the underworld, before smiting the rest with divine fire.
But right after this comes an even more astonishing moment. “The next day the whole Israelite community railed against Moses and Aaron, saying, “You two have killed God’s people!” (Bamidbar 17:6)
Not the type of response you hope for when earning the public endorsement of no less an impressive figure than God Godself.
So great is the crisis of trust.
Moses and Aaron have dedicated themselves to the people of Israel, and at great personal cost. Aaron lost two of his sons to an improperly performed ritual. Moses (according to the midrashic subtext) has essentially abandoned his family in order to be the leader the people need. I do not want to valorize sacrifice of this sort, but these details give us, the readers of the story, an awareness of just how much Moses and Aaron care for the people they lead. Indeed, in just a few more verses, God is ready to annihilate the rest of the people, and once again it is up to Moses and Aaron to save the people from destruction.
Knowing the depth of Moses and Aaron’s integrity and commitment, it breaks my heart that the people empathize not with their leaders but with the duplicitous challengers. “You two have killed God’s people.” As if Korach and his band were on God’s side, as if God weren’t the one who had personally demonstrated divine disfavor.
A part of me wonders if the very willingness of Moses and Aaron to sacrifice to be leaders signals some quality that the people become wary of. If Aaron remains silent as his sons die in service of the Eternal, if Moses pushes away the people closest to him in order to do his job, maybe they will remain silent and isolate themselves as people further away from them suffer and perish. Rather than the vice of nepotism, perhaps they embody the vice of ruthless ambition that destroys families in the name of success? If so, no wonder they find themselves in a crisis of trust in their leadership. If relationships matter, they matter at home and in public, in meetings and at dinner tables. Trust can’t be asserted, it must be demonstrated, and how people treat those closest to them reveals a lot about their character as leaders as well.
How does this crisis resolve itself? How do Moses and Aaron regain a measure of trust?
This story began with a challenge to their leadership. We don’t know to what degree Korach and company represented the quiet thoughts of others, but after Moses and Aaron defeat them through literal scorched-earth politics, we do know that the people bitterly complain about their leaders.
By the end of the chapter, Moses and Aaron hold another event to establish the legitimacy of their leadership. Each tribal chieftain brings a staff, and they leave them in the holiest place in the Mishkan. “The next day Moses entered the Tent of the Pact, and there the staff of Aaron of the house of Levi had sprouted: it had brought forth sprouts, produced blossoms, and borne almonds” (Bamidbar 17:23).
According to the biblical story at least, the best way to regain the trust of your people is not to focus on the opposition and do everything in your power to stoke fear and anger about how awful they are. Rather, it is to demonstrate the possibilities of growth. It is to make new flowers grow from what seem to be dead branches. A leader, above all, must be a tender of life, a steward of the forces of nurture and nourishment.
May we - in our families, communities, organizations, and political affiliations - grow trust through practicing almond branch leadership.
Shabbat shalom!
Rabbi Jay LeVine
