Parshat Matot

You can read the basics here.

• It's rather sad that a woman of the biblical era had to be protected from the right and ability of her father, or, after marriage, her husband, to prevent her from keeping her vows. But I suppose that her being excused from keeping a vow was better than being held responsible for actions that she was not allowed to take. Apparently, the only females of any age who were considered independent agents free to make and carry out their own decisions were widows and divorcees. (See Numbers, chapter 30, verses 2-17.)
• Isn't there something missing in Numbers, chapter 32? The tribes of Reuven and Gad promised to lead the battle to conquer the promised land in return for the right to remain on the east bank of the Jordan, where they'd found good land for grazing, but the half-tribe Menasheh/Manasseh made no such promise. So how did Menasheh get cut in on the deal?
• As of Tuesday's sunrise-to-sunset fast, the 17 of Tammuz, we're now in the Shalosh HaShavuot/Drei Vachen/Three Weeks preceding the full-day (25-hour) fast of Tisha B'Av, so we'll read the first Haftarah of Rebuke (Yirmiyahu/Jeremiah 1:1-2:3) this Shabbat/Sabbath. (Some communities may have other traditions as to what text[s] they read for the haftarah.)