Who knows five? I know five! Five are the books of the…Torah.
We all know the song, but what if it’s inaccurate?
We grow up believing that the Torah consists of five books: Bereishit, Shemot, Vayikra, Bamidbar, and Devarim. Yet hidden in the middle of Parashat Beha'alotecha is a remarkable rabbinic tradition that challenges that familiar assumption.
The Jews seem
to be on a roll. The Mishkan is complete, the camp is organized, everyone knows
their unique role. Moshe literally says, “Nos’im anacnu - We’re
traveling now.” Yet, just before a series of tragic episodes unfolds in the
wilderness, the Torah inserts two brief verses (Bamidbar 10:35-36):
Vayehi binsoa ha-aron vayomer Moshe: Kuma Hashem v'yafutzu oyvecha
v’yanusu mesan’echa mipanecha. Uv'nucho yomar: Shuvah Hashem rivevot alfei Yisrael.
When the Ark was to set out, Moses would say: “Advance, Lord. May
Your enemies be scattered, and may Your foes flee before You!” And when it
halted, he would say: “Return, Lord, to dwell among Israel’s myriads and
thousands!”
These verses are set apart by two inverted Hebrew letters, nun’s, one before and one after. They are visually isolated from the surrounding text as though the Torah itself wishes to call attention to them.
The Talmud (Shabbat 116) records a startling teaching: These verses constitute a separate book unto themselves. As a result, Bamidbar is not one book but three: the section before these verses, the verses themselves, and the section that follows. The Torah therefore contains not five books but seven.
Why? What is so significant about these two verses that they merit their own book?
Many commentators explain that these verses describe the ideal state of the Jewish people. The Ark leads the camp. God guides the journey. Enemies scatter. The Divine Presence rests among Israel. These two verses portray a nation moving confidently toward its destiny under the direct guidance of Torah and the presence of God.
The irony is that immediately afterward everything begins to unravel.
The section following the inverted nuns contains a seemingly endless series of crises: complaints, dissatisfaction, the craving for meat, challenges to leadership, the episode of the spies, Korach's rebellion, and much more. The ideal quickly gives way to the real.
Rabban Shimon ben Gamliel teaches that these verses do not actually belong here. They were inserted into this location to separate one tragedy from another. They function as a pause, a buffer, and a reminder of what might have been.
But perhaps these two verses and the seven books they create serve an even deeper purpose. Rabbi Menachem Mendel Schneerson explains that the distinction between five books and seven books reflects two different ways of understanding Torah itself.
According to Kabbalah, the number five represents Torah as God's wisdom and holiness, the blueprint for personal refinement and spiritual growth. The number seven includes two additional dimensions that bring inner spirituality outward into the world. Seven represents not merely becoming holy but bringing holiness into places where holiness is not immediately apparent.
The Rebbe’s distinction helps explain the structure of the “Sven Books of the Torah.” The first four - Bereishit, Shemot, Vayikra, and the opening portion of Bamidbar - describe the formation of a holy nation. They are about revelation, covenant, law, worship, and preparation. Then comes the fifth book, the two brief verses describing the Ark moving forward and clearing the path. Only afterward do we encounter the sixth and seventh books containing the failures, rebellions, disappointments, struggles, and rebukes that occupy the remainder of Bamidbar and Devarim.
If the Torah were merely a guide to spiritual perfection, perhaps it would have ended with the idealized vision represented by the two verses set off by nuns. But Torah is not only interested in creating holy people. The Torah is interested in transforming an unholy world. The Torah therefore follows the Jewish people into the wilderness of human experience. It accompanies them through confusion, failure, conflict, and disappointment. It teaches not only how to stand at Sinai but how to live afterward.
How does one move from the ideal world represented by the first four books into the imperfect world represented by the final two? The answer is the fifth book, and the Ark goes first. The two verses enclosed by the inverted nuns describe the Ark leading the camp and overcoming the forces that stand in its way. The message is that before confronting the complexities of life, Torah and truth must be at the center. Before entering a flawed world, one must carry the Ark.
This idea feels especially relevant today. We live in a world that has lost its moral compass and ability to distinguish between right and wrong, truth and lies, good and evil. The Torah's answer is very clear. At the precise center of the seven-book Torah, the real world, stands not a philosophical treatise, not a legal code, and not a narrative of triumph. At the center stands the Ark. The center must be moral. The center must be sacred. The center must be guided by Torah.
Perhaps this is why these verses are recited every time the Torah is removed from the Ark. We are not merely recalling a moment from the desert thousands of years ago. We are reenacting a critical strategy for a thriving Judaism: Before we leave the sanctuary and enter the complexities of life, the Ark goes forth. Before we engage the world, Torah leads the way.
At the very center of Torah stands two short verses surrounded by two inverted letters, reminding us that before confronting the wilderness, the Ark must move forward. And when the Ark leads the way, even the wilderness can become holy.
