The Book of Vayikra, also known as Toras Kohanim, or Leviticus. It deals with the Tribe of Levi, the kohanim, their roles, and duties throughout. The Book of Shemos, or Exodus, deals with the Exodus and all that ensued.
The Book of Bamidbar is known as Sefer Pikudim, the Book of Numbers, after the census numbers.
But the census occurs only twice, in Bamidbar and Pinchas. The numbers aren’t actually a theme of the book!
So why is the whole book called Pikudim?
R’ Matis Weinberg explains that the book is not called Numbers for the counting, but context and logistics. The theme of every section is about the development, establishment, and formation of society – the מחנה.
Part of building a society is finding space for the people who don’t seem to fit.
Among the guidance for the different clans of Levi and their respective roles, there are four interceding sections before the main discussion continues; how certain types of sick people, the metzora and zav, must leave the camp and quarantine before we can rehabilitate them; that when a convert dies with no family, his assets are distributed to kohanim; the law of Sotah; and the law of Nazir.
R’ Matis Weinberg explains that these laws aren’t interrupting the discussion of establishing a society; they are an essential part of it. Any decent society needs to find a place to deal with the exceptions, the people who don’t fit.
The laws of metzora and zav don’t pertain to the sick person so much as ourselves, society. The Torah teaches that his presence impacts our society while he is a part of it, and that is why he must quarantine.
The convert who dies with no family poses a difficulty. The Torah is concerned with the orderly distribution of his estate, so no property lapses into limbo. While Jewish communities tend to have tightly integrated setups with shared common ancestry, this person has no relatives in his family tree. The classical inheritance system fails, so the Torah explains what our society is supposed to do.
The Sotah tramples on society’s norms and violates the marriage by associating with men after direct warnings not to. She’s not an adulteress per se, so the Torah explains the procedure of how society resolves this with an attempt to either punish or rehabilitate this misbehavior.
The Nazir, despite all his noble commitment, has sharply deviated from the norm as well. In our society, drinking wine and cutting hair are normal things to do; abstaining is abnormal. The Torah teaches us that our society isn’t just for people who are the same as us and share our values; we must tolerate odd people and have a place for them in our society.
The Book is called Numbers because God does not ask us for homogeneity. Everyone is part of the setup, even those who don’t quite fit. The establishment of an ideal society is interrupted specifically to include the less than ideal people, too, reflecting the grounded realism that there can probably only be an imperfect but still ultimately no less ideal society; odd people are part of our numbers too, and we have to know how to deal with them.
The presence of undesirables does not detract from a community’s wholeness; it’s an essential part of it.