page_title: Chukat
section_title: Modern
hierarchical_section_title: Chukat / Further reading / Modern
caption_attribution_description: Sara Paretsky at Bouchercon 2009 in Indianapolis, Indiana.
context_page_description: Chukat, Hukath, or Chukkas is the 39th weekly Torah portion in the annual Jewish cycle of Torah reading and the sixth in the Book of Numbers. The parashah sets out the laws of corpse contamination and purification with the water of lustration prepared with the Red Cow. It also reports the deaths of Miriam and Aaron, the failure of Moses at the Waters of Meribah, and the conquest of Arad, the Amorites, and Bashan. The parashah constitutes Numbers 19:1–22:1. The parashah is the shortest weekly Torah portion in the Book of Numbers, and is made up of 4,670 Hebrew letters, 1,245 Hebrew words, 87 verses, and 159 lines in a Torah Scroll.
  Jews generally read it in late June or July. In most years, parashah Chukat is read separately. In some years when the second day of Shavuot falls on a Sabbath in the Diaspora, parashah Chukat is combined with the subsequent parashah, Balak, in the Diaspora to synchronize readings thereafter with those in Israel.
  Jews also read the first part of the parashah, Numbers 19:1–22, in addition to the regular weekly Torah portion, on the Sabbath after Purim, called Shabbat Parah.
context_section_description: Isaac Abravanel. Commentary on the Torah. Italy, between 1492–1509. In, e.g., Abarbanel: Selected Commentaries on the Torah: Volume 4: Bamidbar/Numbers. Translated and annotated by Israel Lazar, pages 189–237. Brooklyn: CreateSpace, 2015. ISBN 978-1508721437.
  Obadiah ben Jacob Sforno. Commentary on the Torah. Venice, 1567. In, e.g., Sforno: Commentary on the Torah. Translation and explanatory notes by Raphael Pelcovitz, pages 746–63. Brooklyn: Mesorah Publications, 1997. ISBN 0-89906-268-7.
  Moshe Alshich. Commentary on the Torah. Safed, circa 1593. In, e.g., Moshe Alshich. Midrash of Rabbi Moshe Alshich on the Torah. Translated and annotated by Eliyahu Munk, volume 3, pages 875–91. New York, Lambda Publishers, 2000. ISBN 965-7108-13-6.
  Avraham Yehoshua Heschel. Commentaries on the Torah. Cracow, Poland, mid 17th century. Compiled as Chanukat HaTorah. Edited by Chanoch Henoch Erzohn. Piotrkow, Poland, 1900. In Avraham Yehoshua Heschel. Chanukas HaTorah: Mystical Insights of Rav Avraham Yehoshua Heschel on Chumash. Translated by Avraham Peretz Friedman, pages 265–71. Southfield, Michigan: Targum Press/Feldheim Publishers, 2004. ISBN 1-56871-303-7.
  Thomas Hobbes. Leviathan, 3:33; 4:45. England, 1651. Reprint edited by C. B. Macpherson, pages 417, 675–76. Harmondsworth, England: Penguin Classics, 1982. ISBN 0-14-043195-0.
  Shabbethai Bass. Sifsei Chachamim. Amsterdam, 1680. In, e.g., Sefer Bamidbar: From the Five Books of the Torah: Chumash: Targum Okelos: Rashi: Sifsei Chachamim: Yalkut: Haftaros, translated by Avrohom Y. Davis, pages 328–88. Lakewood Township, New Jersey: Metsudah Publications, 2013.
  Chaim ibn Attar. Ohr ha-Chaim. Venice, 1742. In Chayim ben Attar. Or Hachayim: Commentary on the Torah. Translated by Eliyahu Munk, volume 4, pages 1529–67. Brooklyn: Lambda Publishers, 1999. ISBN 965-7108-12-8.
  Samson Raphael Hirsch. Horeb: A Philosophy of Jewish Laws and Observances. Translated by Isidore Grunfeld, pages 514, 574, 582. London: Soncino Press, 1962. Reprinted 2002 ISBN 0-900689-40-4. Originally published as Horeb, Versuche über Jissroel's Pflichten in der Zerstreuung. Germany, 1837.
  Emily Dickinson. Poem 168 (If the foolish, call them "flowers" —). Circa 1860. Poem 597 (It always felt to me — a wrong). Circa 1862. In The Complete Poems of Emily Dickinson. Edited by Thomas H. Johnson, pages 79–80, 293–94. New York: Little, Brown & Co., 1960. ISBN 0-316-18414-4.
  Samuel David Luzzatto (Shadal). Commentary on the Torah. Padua, 1871. In, e.g., Samuel David Luzzatto. Torah Commentary. Translated and annotated by Eliyahu Munk, volume 3, pages 1072–88. New York: Lambda Publishers, 2012. ISBN 978-965-524-067-2.
  Yehudah Aryeh Leib Alter. Sefat Emet. Góra Kalwaria (Ger), Poland, before 1906. Excerpted in The Language of Truth: The Torah Commentary of Sefat Emet. Translated and interpreted by Arthur Green, pages 249–55. Philadelphia: Jewish Publication Society, 1998. ISBN 0-8276-0650-8. Reprinted 2012. ISBN 0-8276-0946-9.
  James Joyce. Ulysses, chapters 7 (Aeolus), 14 (Oxen of the Sun). Paris: Shakespeare and Company, 1922. Reprinted, e.g., Ulysses: The Corrected Text. Edited by Hans Walter Gabler with Wolfhard Steppe and Claus Melchior, pages 122, 322. New York: Random House, 1986. ISBN 0-394-55373-X. (“No, Stephen said. I call it A Pisgah Sight of Palestine or the Parable of The Plums.”; “Look forth now, my people, upon the land of behest, even from Horeb and from Nebo and from Pisgah and from the Horns of Hatten to a land flowing with milk and money.”).
  Alexander Alan Steinbach. Sabbath Queen: Fifty-four Bible Talks to the Young Based on Each Portion of the Pentateuch, pages 123–26. New York: Behrman's Jewish Book House, 1936.
  Julius H. Greenstone. Numbers: With Commentary: The Holy Scriptures, pages 200–22. Philadelphia: Jewish Publication Society, 1939. Reprinted by Literary Licensing, 2011. ISBN 1258107201.
  John R. Bartlett. “The Brotherhood of Edom.” Journal for the Study of the Old Testament, volume 2 (number 4) (February 1977): pages 2–27. (Numbers 20:14–21).
  Peter C. Craigie. The Problem of War in the Old Testamen
caption: Paretsky
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