במדבר

העלו מסביב למשכן קרח דתן ואבירם. היה ראוי שיזכיר עמהם און בן פלת, כי כן הוזכר בראש הפרשה בכלל הנכנסים במחלוקת שנחלקו על משה ועל אהרן, אבל רז"ל דרשו שחזר בו ונסתלק מן המחלוקת, וכך אמרו במדרש און בן פלת אשתו הצילתו, אמרה לו מה אכפת לך, אי משה כהנא רבא את תלמידא, אי קרח כהנא רבא את תלמידא, ועליה נאמר (משלי י״ד:א׳) חכמות נשים בנתה ביתה, זו אשתו של און, ואולת בידיה תהרסנו, זו אשתו של קרח, שהיא פתתו ובעצתה בא כנגד משה והיתה סבת כל המחלוקת ורבים חללים הפילה.

העלו מסביב למשכן קרח, דתן ואבירם, “get yourselves up from around the dwelling of no one, and Datan and Aviram respectively!” Actually, the Torah should have included in its call for the people to remove their presence from the vicinity of Korach, On, son of Peles, seeing he had figured by name as one of the instigators of the rebellion in verse one of our chapter. Our sages view the failure of the Torah to mention On at this point as proof that he had withdrawn from the rebellion and had done תשובה, had repented his former part in it. Tanchuma Korach 10 claims that On had been saved by his wife who had said to him: “what difference does it make to you personally if Moses is High Priest or whether Aaron is High Priest seeing that in either event you will only be the student, i.e. subordinate to either of them? Concerning the wife of On (and others like her) Solomon said in Proverbs 14,1: “the wisest of women builds her house, i.e. the wife of On, whereas “folly tears it down with its own hands,” a reference to the wife of Korach who had inflamed his ego when she first belittled the halachah about a blue woolen talit requiring tzitziyot. She became the immediate cause of the rebellion and the death of hundreds (compare Proverbs 7,26).