PARSHAS BAMIDBAR
Divrei Yair

(1:17) And Moshe and Aharon took these men who were cited by name.

Rashi explains here “who were cited to him here by name”.

It seems to me that what Rashi intended by the addition of the words “to him here”, can be understood according to what Rashi explained in Parshas Shelach (Bamidbar 1:17) “Everywhere that the Torah uses the word אנשים, it denotes importance, and at that time the twelve spies were virtuous”.

And the gemora in Sanhedrin 82b says that Zimri had five names: Zimri, the son of Salu, Shaul, the son of the Canaanite woman, and Shlumiel the son of Tzuri Shaddai – each of the first four names indicate an aspect of his sexual immorality. The gemora concludes by asking which one was his real name, and answers that Shlumiel the son of Tzuri Shaddai was his real name.

With this we can now understand Rashi. Rashi had a problem with our verse: How could the Torah write here “these men”, which implies that all of them were virtuous, when one of them was Shlumiel who was wicked!

Rashi resolves this problem by explaining that they “were cited to him here by name”, that is, according to the name just mentioned in this parsha, which was not given to him on account of his sexual immorality. Therefore, it is quite possible that at that time he was virtuous, but became wicked later on, and was only then given these four other names. Therefore, the Torah was correct in using the expression “men” at this earlier time.

And therefore Rashi chose his words carefully, and wrote the word לו – “him”, and not the word “them”, to hint that he was targeting Shlumiel the son of Tzuri Shaddai with his explanation. (According to this last comment, Rashi would be understood to mean “who was cited here by name”).