User:Elipongo

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Elipongo
Working, Editing, Bicycling

— Wikipedian ♂ —
In my "office" at work.
Name	Elias Friedman (Hebrew: אליהו מתתיהו בן צבי )
Born	(1969-09-05) September 5, 1969 Hebrew: כב אלול תשכ"ט Mount Sinai Hospital, Hartford, Connecticut United States
Current location	Upper West Side, Manhattan New York, United States
Blood type	O+
Sexuality	Heterosexual
Family and friends
Marital status	Single & looking for my bashert.
Education and employment
Occupation	Critical care paramedic
Employer	SeniorCare EMS
Education	A.S. Mechanical Engineering
High school	Ellington High School
College	Manchester Community College
University	University of Connecticut
Hobbies, interests, and beliefs
Religion	Modern Orthodox Judaism
Politics	Libertarian, Republican
Aliases	Elipongo
Interests
Wikipedia Wikignoming Vandal Watch Reviewing pending changes Welcoming committee Emergency Medicine Judaism Bicycling Connecticut New York City
Contact info
Blog	Elipongo's Blog
Email	elipongo@gmail.com
Elipongo subpages
Subpages, Userboxes
Userboxes
This editor is a Veteran Editor IV and is entitled to display this Gold Editor Star. This user helps out newcomers. This user observes Shabbat. It is approximately 2:01 AM where this user lives. Language enThis user is a native speaker of the English language. USThis user uses American English. he-0משתמש זה אינו מבין עברית (או מבין אותה בקשיים ניכרים).‏ Hebr-2 ש‎This user has an intermediate understanding of the Hebrew alphabet. la-1Hic usor simplici latinitate contribuere potest. Wikipedia AAWThis user is a member of the Association of Apathetic Wikipedians. WPC This user will get around to being a member of the Wikipedian Procrastination Club This user is a member of WikiProject Fraternities and Sororities. This user participates in WikiProject Judaism. This user participates in WikiProject Connecticut. This user regularly reads and responds to Requests for feedback. This user was a member of WikiProject Orthodox Judaism. This user is a member of the user warnings wikiproject. This user is proud to be a member of the Harmonious Editing Club. This user participates in WikiProject Wikipedia Awards. This editor is a WikiGnome. This user reserves the right to completely screw up his own edits. This user tries to do the right thing. If they make a mistake, please let them know. Elipongo has been active on Wikipedia for 20 years, 8 months and 19 days. This user scored 7755 on the Wikipediholic test (revision 181768688). DGAFThis user does not give a fuck. This user is a donor to the Wikimedia Foundation. You can be one, too. This user has rollback rights on the English Wikipedia. (verify) AWW DMBJ AWGC AWAI FDSP BATD MTADThis user is a member of the Association of Wikipedians Who Dislike Making Broad Judgments About the Worthiness of a General Category of Article, and Who Are in Favor of the Deletion of Some Particularly Bad Articles, but That Doesn't Mean They Are Deletionists. This user believes free images should be moved to the Commons. This user fights vandalism with Huggle and Twinkle. Sometimes simultaneously... Thank the IPThis user believes that vandal–reverting IP address editors should be rewarded or thanked for their efforts. This user enjoys cleaning up vandalism. User scriptsI'm using these userscripts: Popups, Friendly, Twinkle, WikEd, FURME → In necessariis unitas, in dubiis libertas, in omnibus caritas. This user knows that replacing one bias with another is not cleanup. Wikipedia is not censored. This user respects copyright and other intellectual property rights. This user finds edit/revert wars disruptive. This user encourages the peaceful correction of vandals. UARThis editor believes that account creation should not be required on Wikipedia. This user welcomes new users with Twinkle! This user thinks that peacocks and weasels should be extinct in Wikipedia. This user thinks that Wikipedia is the best thing since sliced bread. ± strong support/ oppose This user thinks that when people support or oppose a proposal, they should dispense with the notion that by writing Strong Support or Strong Oppose, rather than simply Support or Oppose, their support or opposition counts more. WTF?This user ALWAYS leaves an edit summary. This editor uses AutoWikiBrowser to automate tedious repetitive tasks. <ref>This user would like to see everyone using inline citations. Please... This user doesn't own anything. This user is signed up for the Feedback Request Service. This user participates in WikiProject Freemasonry. This user is a member of WikiProject New York City assessments | recent changes | talk Location This user is a citizen of the United States of America. This user lives in, or hails from, New York City. This user lives in New England. This user lives in the U.S. State of Connecticut. This user grew up in a rural area. Indep homeThis user lives on his own. This user has left the planet Earth 0 times. This user has never left the Northern Hemisphere. 3This user has set foot in 3 continents of the world. 6This user has visited 6 of the 205 countries in the world. This user's time zone is EST. I am... This user is Jewish. This user is of Ashkenazi Jewish ancestry. This user is Modern Orthodox. This user is male. This user is single. 55YThis Wikipedian was born on 5 September 1969 and is 55 years, 9 months, and 6 days old. This user is a Freemason. This user is a Paramedic. This user is near sighted. This user has astigmatism. XThis user is a member of Generation X. This user is heterosexual. This user is not a biological parent. This user is right-handed. 18+This user is an adult. saneThis user is relatively sane and will not stab you when you sleep FS&CThis user is a brother in Triangle Fraternity. This user is a bicyclist. This user is car-free.‡ This user does not smoke. This user is drug-free. This user observes Shabbat. This user observes the dietary laws of Kashrut. This user is NOT known for taking themself too seriously. This user has a blood type of O (Rh) Rhesus Positive. This user was born during the Nixon administration. Activities This user overuses userboxes. This user tracks his money on Where's George? This user releases books at Bookcrossing. Beliefs Non nobis solum This user is not afraid of being wrong. This user is skeptical of the Zodiac. This user is a committed advocate of democracy. This user believes it is every citizen's duty to vote. This user does NOT support abortion except when a woman's life is at serious risk. This user is a skeptic. GOPThis user supports the United States Republican Party This user is against the war on drugs. I would say I'm a cynic but I bet you just wouldn't believe me. This user is interested in the belief that death is an acceptable part of life. This user believes that life is good. User:Lawyer2b/CCW This user is a masculist. This user is against DRM. Hanlon's RazorThis user never attributes to malice that which is best explained by stupidity. † This user respects women and rejects any violence against women. This user supports the troops in Iraq. This user supports flat taxes. This user is opposed to communism in both theory and practice. This user is skeptical of anthropogenic global warming. This user supports public transit. This user supports the use of nuclear energy. > This user knows that genetically modified food has saved over a billion lives, and that all agriculture is "genetic modification", what we do today is just faster. This user opposes monarchism. In Memoriam: 9/11 Lest we forget… EuThis user does NOT support euthanasia and is strongly opposed to all forms of eugenics. This user knows that free trade protects more jobs than tariffs do. This user supports jury nullification.‡ This user finds censorship offensive. This user was against the Disengagement Plan in Israel. This user supports President George W. Bush. LEGALThis user supports LEGAL Immigration. This user will never forget. This user supports Sarah Palin and John McCain !! Technology @This user can be reached by email at elipongo@gmail.com. This user maintains a facebook profile as Elias Friedman. + This user posts on X as @elipongo. G talkThis user's Google Talk screenname is elipongo. BThis user keeps a weblog at Blogger as elipongo's blog. This user has a profile on MySpace as elipongo. This user is an editor on Wikivoyage. BASICThis user can program in BASIC. This user uses Google as a primary search engine. This user uses Wikipedia as a primary point of reference. This user uses Gmail as a primary email service. C++This user can program in C++. BASICThis user can program in BASIC. forThis user can program in Fortran. This user can fairly easily contribute using either Firefox or Google Chrome. This user contributes using Microsoft Windows Vista. This user contributes using Notepad. This user contributes using a laptop. This user contributes using a wireless connection. BBThis user contributes using a broadband connection. This user uses Google Maps. This user has a LinkedIn profile as user elipongo. This user likes the Dogpile search engine. This user's Internet service provider is Verizon. intel CoreThis user contributes with a computer based on the Intel Core 2 Duo microprocessor. IPThis user has a dynamic IP address. This user's mobile phone and data-services provider is Verizon. This user writes with the OpenOffice.org suite. This user loves using Google Earth. This user's Casio Waveceptor watch is set to 3:01am. Preferences This user is attracted to red hair. ALLThis user is a fan of all kinds of comedy. This user eats bagels. This user eats chicken. This user prefers rare steak. This user enjoys their egg with the sunny side up. This user loves brownies. This user likes Chocolate Chip Cookies. This user's favorite ice cream flavor is mint chocolate chip. This user drinks chocolate milk. C2H5OH-1This user drinks relatively infrequently. he is probably the better for it. This user enjoys klezmer. This user likes most types of music. This user enjoys reading science fiction. This user enjoys comics. This user prefers warm weather. This user is interested in politics. This user is an omnivore. BM This user is repulsed by most forms of body modification. This user dislikes mosquitos. met?This user prefers metric units, but, having grown up in the United States, cannot relate to them. they he or sheThis user considers the singular they to be substandard English usage. snukThis user says snuck. to¦goThis user chooses to sometimes use split infinitives. byThe passive voice may be used by this user. …in.Ending a sentence with a preposition is something that this user is okay with. man- kindRegarding gender, this user prefers the vernacular, not what is politically correct. to too twoThis user thinks that too many people have no idea how to use words that they should have learned in grade two. whomThis user insists upon using whom wherever it is called for, and fixes the errors of whomever he sees. their there they'reThis user thinks that there are too many people who don’t know that they're worse than their own children at spelling! your you'reThis user thinks that if your grammar is incorrect, then you're in need of help. their, to, your, its, ... This users english is far from being perfect!. its it'sIt's really not that hard to use each word in its proper manner. ANAL 4This user advocates good grammar usage. This user enjoys the big band sound This user enjoys classical music. This user enjoys jazz music. This user enjoys reading Fantasy. This user reads science fiction. This user loves sunny days This user loathes, but is forced to observe, daylight saving time. Interests This user is a history buff. $\int e^{x}dx$ | I | N | T | E | G | R | A | L | S | My antiderivative $0.{\bar {9}}$=1 This user knows that 0.9...(repeating) is exactly 1 and can prove it, but wishes that other people could understand it the way he does. This user knows how to travel 1 mile due south, due east, then due north and end up where he started.† $\textstyle {\frac {\partial }{\partial x}}\,\;$ This user only partially understands mathematics. Three, plus a hair This user likes trigonometry. This user is interested in space sciences. Favorites This user's homeworld is mostly harmless. Narnia This user loves The Chronicles of Narnia. This user enjoys the works of Sherlock Holmes. HPThis user is a Harry Potter fan. This user is a hoopy frood who really knows where his towel is. This user enjoys the works of Robert A. Heinlein BB This user is on a mission from God. FCThis user does not talk about Fight Club. This user is a fan of the Austin Powers film series. Yeah, baby, yeah! 007This user likes martinis shaken, not stirred. ND This user voted for Pedro. This user's got a case of the Mondays. This user has a feeling that we're not in Kansas anymore. A person is smart; people are dumb, panicky, dangerous animals and you know it! This user thinks 2001: A Space Odyssey is the best science fiction film ever made. STAR WARSThis user is a Star Wars fan. PRODUCERSThis user keeps it gay! This user rejects your reality and substitutes their own! d'oh!This user thinks The Simpsons is simply... excellent. This user enjoys Star Trek. MWC A fat woman came into this user's shoe store today. M*A*S*HThis user understands: "the M stands for mobile". C&HThis user reads Calvin and Hobbes. SThis user fights for truth, justice and the American way! This user is a Monty Python fan. This user is a Marxist of the Groucho variety. This user knows Who's on First. This user likes George Washington. This user likes Alexander Hamilton. This user likes Thomas Paine. This user greatly admires Abraham Lincoln. This user thinks Ronald Reagan was an excellent president. This user knows the Ultimate Answer. This user enjoys music by Giovanni Pierluigi da Palestrina. This user enjoys music by Antonio Vivaldi. This user enjoys music by George Frideric Handel. This user enjoys music by Johann Sebastian Bach. This user enjoys music by Ludwig van Beethoven. This user enjoys music by Joseph Haydn. This user enjoys music by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart. This user enjoys music by Antonín Dvořák. This user likes music by Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky. This user visits Astronomy Picture of the Day every day. † This user is an Americophile. This user enjoys the works of David Brin. OSCThis user enjoys the works of Orson Scott Card. This user believes there ain't no such thing as a free lunch. This user's looking at you, kid. This user wants to make you an offer you can't refuse. 🐦 This user is the stuff that dreams are made of. This user believes any answer I give will be wrong and the Senior Drill Instructor will only beat this user harder if I reverse myself. Frankly my dear, this user doesn't give a damn. "Surely this user can't be serious?" Clue This user killed Yvette. This user hated her... so... much... It- It... the f-- It... Flame... Flames. Flames... On the side of my face... Breathing... Breathle-- Heaving breaths... Heaving... This user is a man-eating talking plant. This user will be back. FGThis user thinks Family Guy is freakin' sweet. LTIThis user embiggens Wikipedia with their cromulent editing! CheersSometimes you wanna go where everybody knows your name. This user has just crossed into... The Twilight Zone. STAR TREKElipongo is a fan of Star Trek: The Original Series.TOS xkcdStand back! This user is going to try science with xkcd. Education This User attends or attended the University of Connecticut. ASThis user has an Associate of Science degree. Miscellaneus This user remembers using a rotary dial telephone. Ceci n'est pas une boîte utilisateur. This user needs more userboxes. MORE, I tell you, more!!! Muhahaha! This user's dog(s) died. This user's parents are dead. Wheaties, Cheerios, and Rice Chex This user prefers the cereal comma. Iи Sоviэт Яцssiд, Цsэяьож дdd УОЦ!! All your base are belong to this user. Put the number 25 in a calculator. Multiply by 800. Multiply by 266. Subtract 1,992. Then look at the calculator upside-down... This user loves tricks like this. This user would have liked Green Eggs and Ham, but will not eat them due to religious dietary laws. This user passed GO! (…so where is my $200?) This user knows how to Find x. KAZOOThis user plays the Kazoo. This user knows the dire side effects of dihydrogen monoxide. Do you? This user enjoys siesta.

Bio

My name is Elias Friedman (Hebrew: אליהו מתתיהו בן צבי). I'm a critical care paramedic living in the Upper West Side section of Manhattan in New York City. I moved here at the end of December 2008 from Connecticut.

I'm a 55 year old, single, Modern Orthodox Jewish male. I grew up in Ellington, Connecticut where I was the president of Congregation Knesseth Israel.

I got into EMS in 1997 when I started volunteering in Coventry. I got a job at a commercial ambulance service in 1999 when I was laid-off from my previous job as a Pellet mill operator in a feed mill. I got my Associate's degree from Manchester Community College in Mechanical Engineering in 2000 which was also the year I became an EMT-Intermediate. I was working on completing my B.S. in Mechanical Engineering at the University of Connecticut when September 11th made me re-think my priorities. I entered Hartford Hospital's Paramedic program and graduated in April 2004. My precepting was delayed to September due to my father's death that July, and I've had med-control since December 2004. In the first week of September 2008 I was laid off from my job at the Ambulance service of Manchester, but since I was already in the process of getting reciprocity of my paramedic license for New York, it didn't let it upset me too much. In December of 2008 I started to work for SeniorCare EMS which has bases in both the Bronx and in Brooklyn, I quite enjoy working there! In the Summer of 2012 I became a volunteer paramedic member of West Side Hatzolah so I can better help my local community as well.

Ready for a bicycle ride!

The second half of my username is derived from my Dalmatian, Pongo, who died in March 2006, just a week shy of his sixteenth birthday.

I really enjoy my working in EMS, my friends have remarked (positively!) that I love to talk about my work. Getting up out of bed to go to work isn't an effort of willpower like it had often been at my previous jobs. My health and stress level are better than they have ever been, of course that's partly attributable to my taking up year-round bicycle commuting the eleven miles to work. I really think that I've found my niche.

I am a member of the Connecticut Chapter of Triangle Fraternity, the Republican Jewish Coalition, the Republican National Committee, and the NAEMT. I am a master Freemason. I am a former member of the ASME

Wikipedia ads	file info – show another – #195

float

Wiki stats

N.B. These edit counts tend to move down over time as pages (and my edits) get deleted.

• My first (registered) edit diff. Awww, they're all so cute when they're young!
• My 500^th edit diff. Just wikignoming around.
• My 1,000^th edit diff. Wouldn't you just figure it would have to do with vandalism...
• My 5,000^th edit diff. Yeah, a pretty dumb one...
• My 10,000^th edit diff. Cleaning up incoming links to disambiguation pages.

Things I'm working on

Feel free to help out on any of these items!

Existing pages

float

• Bulkeley Bridge
• Captain John Bissell Memorial Bridge
• Congregation Knesseth Israel— I can't do too much more here because I have a conflict of interest, but I hope that others will help out.
• Connecticut
• Dexter Coffin Bridge
• Ellington Airport (Connecticut)
• Ellington, Connecticut
• Ellington High School
• Etiquette in Latin America, orphaned references etc from unfixed deletions of citations.
• Hartford, Connecticut
• History of Connecticut industry
• Icebiking
• List of beaches in New England
• List of Lieutenant Governors of Connecticut
• List of U.S. state songs
• Manchester, Connecticut
• Manchester Road Race
• Motorola#Trivia
• Neighborhoods of Hartford, Connecticut
• Nullification— Dab page that needs cleanup per MoS:DAB and has a whole article on its talk page that should go somewhere, if it hasn't already.
• Park River (Connecticut)
• Papoose
• Sean Sullivan
• The Shoppes at Buckland Hills
• Thomas Joseph Meskill
• WikiProject Connecticut— lots of work to do here!

Pages yet to be created

• History of racism in Connecticut
• List of U.S. state heroines— I think that only CT & MA have one.

To do

• Write up report on Lord & Taylor vandal for WP:LTA
• Create navigation template for Investment banks

Community

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Events and projects [add]

Yearly or infrequent events

• WikiProject Unreferenced articles is holding a month-long Unreferenced articles backlog drive beginning 1 June 2025, 00:00 (UTC).
• The Core Contest. April 15 - May 31, a contest to improve broad and important articles, together with others or alone. Sign-ups are open until the end of the competition.
• Wikidata and Sister Projects. May 29 - June 1, an online event exploring the different ways Wikidata is connected and used in the other Wikimedia projects, including Wikipedia. We are currently accepting session proposals for the event program, you can submit them here, or ask any questions you may have!

Monthly or continuous events

• Monthly contest, WikiProject Military history. The contest department of the Military history WikiProject aims to motivate increased quality in military history articles by offering a form of friendly competition for project members making improvements to them. The primary contest available is a simple rolling competition that awards points for improving articles. The contest runs from the first to last day of each month.
• Guild of Copy Editors' editing drive. The May 2025 backlog drive was a one-month-long effort by the Guild of Copy Editors to reduce the backlog of articles that require copy editing: those carrying the {{copy edit}} tag (also {{awkward}}, {{copy edit section}}, {{inappropriate person}}, and {{copy edit inline}}, and their redirects) or are listed on the GOCE Requests page. It began on 1 May, 00:00 (UTC), and ended on 31 May, 23:59 (UTC). Stay tuned for the next event.
• Wikipedia:WikiProject Women in Red 2025 Events:

Recently completed:	Revolutionary women Alphabet run: I & J
New this month:	LGBTQ+ women Alphabet run: K & L
Ongoing initiatives:	Music #1day1woman
Upcoming events:	Ideas

Meetups for June 2025 +/-

Melbourne 48	June 2, 2025 (2025-06-02)
London 217	June 8, 2025 (2025-06-08)
Lez Wiki Edit-a-thon	June 8, 2025 (2025-06-08)
Singapore 22	June 13, 2025 (2025-06-13)
Brighton 5	June 14, 2025 (2025-06-14)
Oxford 112	June 15, 2025 (2025-06-15)
San Diego 123	June 21, 2025 (2025-06-21)
Cape Town 49	June 21, 2025 (2025-06-21)
Johannesburg 18	June 21, 2025 (2025-06-21)
Exeter 4	June 28, 2025 (2025-06-28)
Lez Wiki Edit-a-thon	June 29, 2025 (2025-06-29)

Meetups for July 2025 +/-

San Diego 124	July 12, 2025 (2025-07-12)
Minnesota Wiknic	July 19, 2025 (2025-07-19)

WikiProject notices [add]

Also consider posting WikiProject, Task Force, and Collaboration news at The Signpost's WikiProject Report page. Please include your signature when adding a listing here.

• WikiProject Kabbalah is re-activating as there are a lot of maintenance templates on these articles and new references and inline citations are needed. See Kabbalah Books Online. New participants welcome!! Nnev66 (talk) 23:07, 26 May 2025 (UTC)
• WikiProject Christianity is back and running! We are looking for new and interested editors to join. We look forward to working with you! Sheriff U3 12:51, 5 April 2025 (UTC)
• WikiProject Outlines news:
  • New outlines:
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    • Outline of Leeds
    • Outline of Glasgow
  • Another outline has been nominated for Featured List status:
    • Outline of caves
  • The following outline covers an ongoing situation, please help keep it updated:
    • Outline of the Russo-Ukrainian War
  • The Outline of the week is Outline of archaeology.
  • Please help improve them. —The Transhumanist 11:59, 29 March 2025 (UTC)
• WP Unreferenced articles is trying to clear the decades-long backlog of unreferenced articles. The backlog recently reached under 67,000 -- down from 90,000 half a year ago. Come contribute! Mrfoogles (talk) 21:44, 12 March 2025 (UTC)

Technical news

Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.

Weekly highlight

• The Trust and Safety Product team is finalizing work needed to roll out temporary accounts on large Wikipedias later this month. The team has worked with stewards and other users with extended rights to predict and address many use cases that may arise on larger wikis, so that community members can continue to effectively moderate and patrol temporary accounts. This will be the second of three phases of deployment – the last one will take place in September at the earliest. For more information about the recent developments on the project, see this update. If you have any comments or questions, write on the talk page, and join a CEE Catch Up this Tuesday.

Updates for editors

• The watchlist expiry feature allows editors to watch pages for a limited period of time. After that period, the page is automatically removed from your watchlist. Starting this week, you can set a preference for the default period of time to watch pages. The preferences also allow you to set different default watch periods for editing existing pages, pages you create, and when using rollback. [1]

Example of a talk page with the new design, in French.

• The appearance of talk pages will change at almost all Wikipedias (some have already received this design change, a few will get these changes later). You can read details about the changes on Diff. It is possible to opt out of these changes in user preferences ("Show discussion activity"). [2][3]
• Users with specific extended rights (including administrators, bureaucrats, checkusers, oversighters, and stewards) can now have IP addresses of all temporary accounts revealed automatically during time-limited periods where they need to combat high-speed account-hopping vandalism. This feature was requested by stewards. [4]
• This week, the Moderator Tools and Machine Learning teams will continue the rollout of a new filter to Recent Changes, releasing it to several more Wikipedias. This filter utilizes the Revert Risk model, which was created by the Research team, to highlight edits that are likely to be reverted and help Recent Changes patrollers identify potentially problematic contributions. The feature will be rolled out to the following Wikipedias: Afrikaans Wikipedia, Belarusian Wikipedia, Bengali Wikipedia, Welsh Wikipedia, Hawaiian Wikipedia, Icelandic Wikipedia, Kazakh Wikipedia, Simple English Wikipedia, Turkish Wikipedia. The rollout will continue in the coming weeks to include the rest of the Wikipedias in this project. [5]
• View all 27 community-submitted tasks that were resolved last week.

Updates for technical contributors

• AbuseFilter editors active on Meta-Wiki and large Wikipedias are kindly asked to update AbuseFilter to make it compatible with temporary accounts. A link to the instructions and the private lists of filters needing verification are available on Phabricator.
• Lua modules now have access to the name of a page's associated thumbnail image, and on some wikis to the WikiProject assessment information. This is possible using two new properties on mw.title objects, named pageImage and pageAssessments. [6][7]
• Detailed code updates later this week: MediaWiki

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General notices

• WMF wanting to pilot AI-generated summaries of articles
• Community position on WMF AI development

• Voting period of the U4C election

Parsha

Weekly Torah Portion

Behaalotecha (בהעלותך)

Numbers 8:1–12:16

The Weekly Torah portion in synagogues outside of Israel on Shabbat, Saturday, 18 Sivan, 5785—June 14, 2025

“Is there a limit to the Lord’s power?” (Numbers 11:23.)

God told Moses to tell Aaron to mount the seven lamps so as to give light to the front of the lampstand in the Tabernacle, and Aaron did so.

God told Moses to cleanse the Levites by sprinkling on them water of purification, and making them shave their whole bodies and wash their clothes. Moses was to assemble the Israelites around the Levites and cause the Israelites to lay their hands upon the Levites. Aaron was to designate the Levites as an elevation offering from the Israelites. The Levites were then to lay their hands in turn upon the heads of two bulls, one as a sin offering and the other as a burnt offering, to make expiation for the Levites. Thereafter, the Levites were qualified for the service of the Tent of Meeting, in place of the firstborn of the Israelites. God told Moses that Levites aged 25 to 50 were to work in the service of the Tent of Meeting, but after age 50 they were to retire and could stand guard but not perform labor.

At the beginning of the second year following the Exodus from Egypt, God told Moses to have the Israelites celebrate Passover at its set time. But some men were unclean because they had had contact with a corpse and could not offer the Passover sacrifice on the set day. They asked Moses and Aaron how they could participate in Passover, and Moses told them to stand by while he listened for God’s instructions. God told Moses that whenever Israelites were defiled by a corpse or on a long journey on Passover, they were to offer the Passover offering on the 14th day of the second month — a month after Passover — otherwise in strict accord with the law of the Passover sacrifice. But if a man who was clean and not on a journey refrained from offering the Passover sacrifice, he was to be cut off from his kin.

Starting the day that the Tabernacle was set up, a cloud covered the Tabernacle by day, and a fire rested on it by night. Whenever the cloud lifted from the Tent, the Israelites would follow it until the cloud settled, and there the Israelites would make camp and stay as long as the cloud lingered.

God told Moses to have two silver trumpets made to summon the community and to set it in motion. Upon long blasts of the two horns, the whole community was to assemble before the entrance of the Tent of Meeting. Upon the blast of one, the chieftains were to assemble. Short blasts directed the divisions encamped on the east to move forward, and a second set of short blasts directed those on the south to move forward. As well, short blasts were to be sounded when the Israelites were at war against an aggressor who attacked them, and the trumpets were to be sounded on joyous occasions, festivals, new moons, burnt offerings, and sacrifices of well-being.

In the second month of the second year, the cloud lifted from the Tabernacle and the Israelites set out on their journeys from the wilderness of Sinai to the wilderness of Paran. Moses asked his father-in-law (here called Hobab the Midianite) to come with the Israelites, promising to be generous with him, but he replied that he would return to his native land. Moses pressed him again, noting that he could serve as the Israelites’ guide.

They marched three days distance from Mount Sinai, with the Ark of the Covenant in front of them, and God's cloud above them by day. When the Ark was to set out, Moses would say: “Advance, O Lord! May Your enemies be scattered, and may Your foes flee before You!” And when it halted, he would say: “Return, O Lord, You who are Israel’s myriads of thousands!”

The people took to complaining bitterly before God, and God ravaging the outskirts of the camp with fire until Moses prayed to God, and then the fire died down.

The riffraff in their midst felt a gluttonous craving and the Israelites complained, “If only we had meat to eat! Moses in turn complained to God, “Why have You . . . laid the burden of all this people upon me? God told Moses to gather 70 elders, so that God could come down and put some of the spirit that rested on Moses upon them, so that they might share the burden of the people. And God told Moses to tell the people to purify themselves, for the next day they would eat meat. But Moses questioned how enough flocks, herds, or fish could be found to feed 600,000. God answered: “Is there a limit to the Lord’s power?”

Moses gathered the 70 elders, and God came down in a cloud, spoke to Moses, and drew upon the spirit that was on Moses and put it upon the elders. When the spirit rested upon them, they spoke in ecstasy, but did not continue. Eldad and Medad had remained in camp, yet the spirit rested upon them, and they spoke in ecstasy in the camp. When a youth reported to Moses that Eldad and Medad were acting the prophet in the camp, Joshua called on Moses to restrain them. But Moses told Joshua: “Would that all the Lord’s people were prophets, that the Lord put His spirit upon them!”

A wind from God then swept quail from the sea and strewed them all around the camp, and the people gathered quail for two days. While the meat was still between their teeth, God struck the people with a plague.

Miriam and Aaron spoke against Moses, saying: “He married a Cushite woman!” and “Has the Lord spoken only through Moses? Has He not spoken through us as well?” God heard and called Moses, Aaron, and Miriam to come to the Tent of Meeting. God came down in cloud and called out to Aaron and Miriam: “When a prophet of the Lord arises among you, I make Myself known to him in a vision, I speak with him in a dream. Not so with My servant Moses; he is trusted throughout My household. With him I speak mouth to mouth, plainly and not in riddles, and he beholds the likeness of the Lord. How then did you not shrink from speaking against My servant Moses!” As the cloud withdrew, Miriam was stricken with snow-white scales. Moses cried out to God, “O God, pray heal her!” But God said to Moses, “If her father spat in her face, would she not bear her shame for seven days? Let her be shut out of camp for seven days.” And the people waited until she rejoined the camp.

Hebrew and English text
Hear the parshah chanted
Commentary from the Ziegler School of Rabbinic Studies at the American Jewish University (Conservative)
Commentaries from the Jewish Theological Seminary of America (Conservative)
Commentary by the Union for Reform Judaism (Reform)
Commentaries from Project Genesis (Orthodox)
Commentaries from Chabad.org (Orthodox)
Commentaries from Aish HaTorah (Orthodox)
Commentaries from the Jewish Reconstructionist Federation (Reconstructionist)
Commentaries from My Jewish Learning (trans-denominational)

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The Weekly Torah portion in synagogues in Israel on Shabbat, Saturday, 18 Sivan, 5785—June 14, 2025—is Shlach.

Commentaries from Aleph Beta Academy

Thanks!

Awards & barnstars

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On 4 January, 2008, Did you know? was updated with a fact from the article Republic of Lakotah, which you created or substantially expanded. If you know of another interesting fact from a recently created article, then please suggest it on the Did you know? talk page.

--Royalbroil 16:43, 4 January 2008 (UTC)

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