
than to a Golden Calf allegiance,
turning from epiphany to farce.
destroying it, and not the rabble,
prevented harm caused by their sin.
he was emotionally aberrant,
Meribah microphonic rock.
to anger he became adherent,
speaking from his bully pulpit.
caused Moses by God to be smitten.
Rabbi Jonathan Sacks, in an article called “Anger Management”, suggested that Moses’ fatal flaw was lack of emotional intelligence, which caused him to succumb to anger at Meribah (Num. 20:10-1) where he suffered from the same emotional incoherence that caused the Israelites to worship the Golden Calf. In his article, Rabbi Sacks cites what Maimonides wrote in Shemoneh Perakim, the “Eight Chapters” that form the preface to his commentary to the Mishnah, Tractate Avot, the Ethics of the Fathers:
Gershon Hepner is a poet who has written over 25,000 poems on subjects ranging from music to literature, politics to Torah. He grew up in England and moved to Los Angeles in 1976. Using his varied interests and experiences, he has authored dozens of papers in medical and academic journals, and authored “Legal Friction: Law, Narrative, and Identity Politics in Biblical Israel.” He can be reached at gershonhepner@gmail.com.