Today, let's talk about counting, specifically, the census in the Book of Numbers, Bamidbar in Hebrew.

We find ourselves in Numbers 26, right after a devastating plague. God tells Moses and Elazar, the son of Aaron the priest, to take a census of the people. "Take a census of the entire congregation of the children of Israel, from twenty years old and above, by their patrilineal house, all those fit for military service in Israel" (Numbers 26:2).

Why now? Why, after such a tragedy, is the first order of business to count everyone?

Bamidbar Rabbah, a collection of rabbinic teachings on the Book of Numbers, offers some powerful explanations. It poses the question: “It was, after the plague.… Take a census” – why is it that “every place that they fell, they required a census?" The answer lies in analogy, in stories that help us grasp the bigger picture.

Imagine a wolf attacks a flock of sheep. What's the first thing the shepherd does? He checks the damage. He counts the remaining sheep to see who's missing. In this analogy, the plague is the wolf, and the census is the shepherd's grim task of assessing the loss.

But there's another, more comforting way to look at it. The Midrash, specifically Bamidbar Rabbah, also compares Moses to a shepherd entrusted with a flock. : When Israel left Egypt, God entrusted them to Moses "by number," as it is written in Numbers 1:1–2. The children of Israel traveled from Rameses to Sukkot, "some six hundred thousand [men] on foot" (Exodus 12:37). Moses received them in Egypt, each one accounted for.

Now, as Moses is nearing the end of his leadership, about to "take his leave of the world in the plains of Moav," (the land of Moab), he needs to return them, again, by number. It's a matter of responsibility, of fulfilling a sacred trust. He’s saying, “Here’s the flock You gave me, safe and sound, accounted for.”

So, which is it? Is the census a somber accounting of loss, or a triumphant declaration of responsibility fulfilled? Perhaps it's both. Perhaps, in the act of counting, we acknowledge the pain of what's been lost, but also celebrate the resilience of what remains. We recognize that each individual life matters, each one is precious, and each one is part of something larger than themselves.

It makes you wonder, doesn't it? In what ways are we being counted today? And what story will our numbers tell?