In this final entry of “spooky midrash” (at least for 2020) we return to the Sinai desert for another adventure with our buddy Rabbah bar bar Hannah. In the last story, his trusty Arab guide showed him the desert dead. These were the gigantic corpses of the generation of Hebrews that died in the wilderness after rebelling against God and refusing to enter the Promised Land. Right after that story, in the Babylonian Talmud the guide offers to show Rabbah bar bar Hannah another group of Israelite rebels who suffer God’s vengeance, Korah and his associates.
BT Batra 74a (translation of Jacob Neusner)
“He said to me, ‘Come and I will show you those who were associated with Korah
who were swallowed up (Num. 16:32ff.). I saw two cracks that emitted smoke. I
took a piece of clipped wool and soaked it in water, put it on the point of a spear,
and pushed it in there. When I took it out, it was singed. He said to me, ‘Listen
closely to what you will hear,’ and I heard them say, ‘Moses and his Torah are
truth, and we are liars.’ He said to me, ‘Every thirty days Gehenna causes them to
turn over as one rotates meat in a pot, and this is what they say: “Moses and his
Torah are truth and we are liars.’’
Korah and His Associates in Hell
The desert dead were granted a kind of grace from God. The Babylonian Talmud depicted them clutching their prayer shawls until the day of resurrection. In contrast, Korah and his associates enjoy no such mercy. To understand why they are punished so severely, you really have to read about their rebellion in Numbers 16.
Even so, this story probably actually is about grace in its original Jewish context. In Judaism, Gehenna is usually purgative, not punitive. That may be why we hear Korah and his associates confessing their sin against “Moses and his Torah.” That is not the bitter cry of someone confirmed in their rebellion and wickedness, but the moan of anguish expressed by a broken heart.
Perhaps there is hope even for Korah and his associates. And if so, perhaps there is hope for me, as well.
