A.
ומקנה רב היו לבני ראובן ולבני גד עצום מאד ויראו את ארץ יעזר ואת ארץ גלעד והנה המקום מקום מקנה: ויבאו בני גד ובני ראובן אל משה כו' ויאמרו אם מצאנו חן בעיניך יתן את הארץ הזאת לעבדיך לאחזה אל תעבירנו את הירדן: ויאמר משה לבני גד ולבני ראובן האחיכם יבאו למלחמה ואתם תשבו פה (“And the bnei Re’uvén and bnei Gad had abundant livestock, very many, and they saw the land of Ya‘zer and the land of Gil‘ad and behold, the place was a place for livestock. And the bnei Gad and bnei Re’uvén came to Moshe.... And they said, 'If we have found favor in your eyes, let this land be given to your servants for a holding; do not make us cross the Jordan.' And Moshe said to the bnei Gad and bnei Re’uvén, 'Will your brothers go to war and you will sit here!?'” XXXII, 1-7).
The incident cries out to be explained. Whatever could have been the thoughts of the bnei Gad and bnei Re’uvén in making this request, not least in light of their certain knowledge (as Moshe went on to point out) that their parents’ generation had perished in the desert because they had disparaged the Holy Land and mutinied against the idea of conquering it? It seems unlikely that the real issue was their abundance of cattle; after all, all of the tribes of Israel had abundant cattle. Rather, it appears that the issue at hand was their reluctance to cross the Jordan, and it is that, and not their cattle, which Moshe seems to address in his rebuke.
Why, then, were these two particular tribes reluctant to cross the Jordan? And whilst we are asking questions, what is the significance of the change in order, the first verse referring to Re’uven and Gad, but the subsequent ones to Gad and Re’uven?
B.
Ramban asks our second question, and suggests that the bnei Re’uvén are mentioned first in the first verse as a matter of right, כי הוא הבכור ובן הגבירה וכן כשיספר הכתוב המעשה הזה יאמר "ולראובני ולגדי נתתי" (“For [Re’uven] was the first-born, and son of the senior wife, and so when Scripture tells this story [elsewhere] it says, ‘And to the Re’uveni and to the Gaddi I have given....’ [Deuteronomy III, 16]”). However, he goes on, the actual idea of settling in Transjordan had originated with Gad, and it was therefore the bnei Gad who took the lead in speaking to Moshe about the matter. Furthermore, he notes, Gad was militarily stronger than Re’uven (cf. ibid., XXXII, 20), and unafraid to dwell alone east of the Jordan (ע"ע אבן עזרא ובעל הטורים כאן).
The Kli Yaqar, for its part, notes the juxtaposition of the phrase עצום מאד, “very many” to the bnei Gad, and sees in it an allusion to the fact that Gad was richer in cattle than Re’uven, adding that their relative wealth imparted to them a certain chutzpa, a forwardness or assertiveness which was not altogether seemly, כי ע"י העושר הוא מתרומם (“for because of [their] wealth they were exalting themselves”).
This should serve to set the stage for understanding the first question.
C.
The Torah appears to mark the center of the epic conflict between Ya‘aqov’s original twelve sons by referring to the kthoneth ha-passim, the “striped coat” which Ya‘aqov had awarded Yosef (Genesis XXXVII, 3). Talmudic sources, for their part, tell us that the conflict centered on Ya‘aqov’s appointing Yosef his bechor, his “first-born” (עיי' למשל ברכות ז:). The nexus between the two may be found in Rashi’s comment on Genesis XXV, 31 that, before Mattan Torah, the principal issue at stake in primogeniture was the kehunna, and the Chazal confirm that Yosef’s distinctive garment was meant to mark that office (עיי' תורה שלימה לבראשית ל"ז ג' בשם מדרשים וירושלמי מגילה פ"א הי"ב דבגדי עשו היו בגדי כהונה וכתונת הפסים שנתנה ליוסף היתה ביניהם, וע"ע ערכין ט"ז.).
If we turn next to Numbers III, 12 we learn that a bechor for purposes of the kehunna, is defined as a פטר רחם, i.e. first-born not so much from the father’s side as from the mother’s (ועיי' רש"י שם). This means that Ya‘aqov had, in fact, four possible bechoroth: Re’uven ben Le’a, Gad ben Zilpa, Yosef ben Rachel, and Dan ben Bilha. Since Zilpa and Bilha were originally the maidservants of Le’a and Rachel, respectively, we can discern that the essential conflict over the bechora was between the “house of Le’a” (on the grounds that she was Ya‘aqov’s first, principal wife and Re’uven her bechor), and that of Rachel (on the grounds that she was Ya‘aqov’s true love, the only woman whom he had wished and intended to marry). It was Ya‘aqov, of course, who decided the winner of the argument.
The relevance of this ancient dispute to our parasha becomes clear from a comment of the midrash on Psalms LXXXVII, 13: הירדן לא נקרע אלא בזכותו של יוסף ותולדות יעקב לא באו אלא בזכותו של יוסף (“The Jordan was split only in the merit of Yosef, and Ya‘qov’s descendants came [across the river into the Holy Land] only in the merit of Yosef;” ילקוט שמעוני ח"ב רמז תתי"ז).
D.
Now we can understand the reluctance of Re’uven and Gad to chance crossing the Jordan.
Aware that the crossing was dependent on the merit of their old antagonist, Yosef, they could hardly be certain that that merit extended to them. They might never get across the river; worse, they might be caught in it and drowned.
Inspired by their abundant cattle, Gad looked around them at the lush pastures of Transjordan and conceived a solution to the problem. They convinced Re’uven, and took the matter of staying east of the river with Moshe.
Hearing their case, Moshe assured them that their fears were groundless; like their brothers, did they not wish to participate in the great mitzva of kibbush ha-aretz, the conquest of the Holy Land? If so, they could rest assured that שלוחי מצוה אינן ניזוקין, those embarked upon a mitzva are not harmed (עיי' זוה"ק ח"ג רע"ג. שמאמר זה הלכה למשה מסיני, וע"ע פסחים ח: ).
The bnei Gad and bnei Re’uvén responded enthusiastically that, if so, they would spearhead the assault, leaving behind their women, children, and cattle in Transjordan. But what of their return? After completion of the conquest, at war’s end, they would be making yerida, leaving the Holy Land for the pastures which had been wrested from Sichon and ‘Og. What zechuth would they have to see them safely back over the river?
ויתן להם משה לבני גד ולבני ראובן ולחצי שבט מנשה בן יוסף וגו' (“And Moshe gave [the land] to the bnei Gad, the bnei Re’uvén, and half of the tribe of M’nashe ben Yosef....” v. 33). If they would not have safe passage over the river in their own merit, they would surely have it accompanied by. Yosef’s descendants. This, I believe, is why M’nashe was added to the Transjordanian settlers, and why the verse seemingly unnecssarily mentions M’nashe’s father, as though we did not already know who M’nashe was.
Our story is a cautionary tale which goes to show how deep machloqeth, strife and division within Israel, can run, how its echoes can reverberate, even amongst succeeding generations, centuries later, in circumstances of which the original ba‘alei ha-machloqeth could hardly conceive.
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