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At present I'm writing parshat Naso.
Parshat Naso is very, very boring.
Now, you know normally I wouldn't say such a thing, because there's something interesting in nearly everything if you look for it, but this really is very boring.
Parshat Bemidbar, the one previous to Naso, had the census, which listed the leaders of the tribes and counted how many people were in the tribe. That wasn't so interesting, but it's okay; you can play the name game, so the leader of the tribe of Zevulun goes from being Eliav ben Helon to My-god-is-my-dad son of Window. Naso goes through all the same names again, though, and the name game's less fun when you only played it last week.
Worse, it does it like this:
OK, fine, right? Jolly interesting. But it says it TWELVE TIMES, once for each tribe. I tell you, after about the fourth time it's pretty old, and by the ninth time you're desperate for it to be over.
It's not just me, either. Here we have some pages from Torat Hayim, a set of books containing the Torah plus the traditional commentaries. The top image is what an average sort of page looks like; a couple of verses of Torah, the Aramaic translation of Onkelos (a throwback to the days when Aramaic was the vernacular), and a bunch of commentators' contributions, some wordier than others.The bottom image is what our section of Naso looks like - days three, four, five and six. You see the Torah text and the Aramaic translation? and NOTHING ELSE. Even Rashi couldn't find any nits to pick, and Rashi is Mr Nit-Picker Extraordinaire. Even the Ramban, who can sometimes take up a whole page just rambling on his own, couldn't find anything to say about this. No-one has anything to say at all! When even Rashi and the Ramban can't think of anything to say, you're pretty justified in thinking it dull. 
In fact, it strikes me as like nothing so much as a temple honours list. You know when the shul does its thank-you list after the fundraising drive? And it says, "The following donations are gratefully acknowledged: Millie Cohen, twenty siddurim, in memory of Irving Cohen; Phil Stein, twenty siddurim, in memory of Sadie Leib; Valerie and Max Miller, twenty siddurim, in memory of Irving Miller," and so on. I've written a few of those, too, and there is not an awful lot of difference between that and this.
This feeds into another problem, which is better saved for another post. But I've written the other post already, so you don't have to wait for it. Here it is. Blogs being what they are, you probably read that one first.
Parshat Naso is very, very boring.
Now, you know normally I wouldn't say such a thing, because there's something interesting in nearly everything if you look for it, but this really is very boring.
Parshat Bemidbar, the one previous to Naso, had the census, which listed the leaders of the tribes and counted how many people were in the tribe. That wasn't so interesting, but it's okay; you can play the name game, so the leader of the tribe of Zevulun goes from being Eliav ben Helon to My-god-is-my-dad son of Window. Naso goes through all the same names again, though, and the name game's less fun when you only played it last week.
Worse, it does it like this:
On the first day, the leader of the tribe of Yehudah, Nahshon ben Aminadav. His offering was one silver dish, of a hundred and thirty shekels' weight; one silver bowl, seventy shekels by the shekel of the sanctuary; both of them full of fine flour mixed with oil as a meal-offering. One spoon, ten gold, full of incense; one young bull, one ram, one lamb in its first year for an olah offering; one kid from the flock as a hatat offering; for the shelaimim offering, two oxen, five rams, five male goats, five lambs in their first year. This was the offering of Nahshon ben Aminadav.
OK, fine, right? Jolly interesting. But it says it TWELVE TIMES, once for each tribe. I tell you, after about the fourth time it's pretty old, and by the ninth time you're desperate for it to be over.
It's not just me, either. Here we have some pages from Torat Hayim, a set of books containing the Torah plus the traditional commentaries. The top image is what an average sort of page looks like; a couple of verses of Torah, the Aramaic translation of Onkelos (a throwback to the days when Aramaic was the vernacular), and a bunch of commentators' contributions, some wordier than others.The bottom image is what our section of Naso looks like - days three, four, five and six. You see the Torah text and the Aramaic translation? and NOTHING ELSE. Even Rashi couldn't find any nits to pick, and Rashi is Mr Nit-Picker Extraordinaire. Even the Ramban, who can sometimes take up a whole page just rambling on his own, couldn't find anything to say about this. No-one has anything to say at all! When even Rashi and the Ramban can't think of anything to say, you're pretty justified in thinking it dull. In fact, it strikes me as like nothing so much as a temple honours list. You know when the shul does its thank-you list after the fundraising drive? And it says, "The following donations are gratefully acknowledged: Millie Cohen, twenty siddurim, in memory of Irving Cohen; Phil Stein, twenty siddurim, in memory of Sadie Leib; Valerie and Max Miller, twenty siddurim, in memory of Irving Miller," and so on. I've written a few of those, too, and there is not an awful lot of difference between that and this.
This feeds into another problem, which is better saved for another post. But I've written the other post already, so you don't have to wait for it. Here it is. Blogs being what they are, you probably read that one first.
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