Parshat Pinchas - Of Zealotry and Idolatry

How are we to evaluate Pinhas’s zealous actions and reconcile Moshe’s concern and God’s reward? How are we to approach zealotry in general? We begin by looking at various explanations of Pinhas’s conduct, and continue on to look at zealotry elsewhere in Tanakh – the story of Eldad and Meidad and Yehoshua’s zealous kin’a for Moshe, and the story of Eliyahu and the aftermath of Mount Carmel. We find a fascinating parallel between that story of Eliyahu, the zealous prophet and the story of Moshe, the anti-zealot, during the aftermath of the Sin of the Golden Calf.