This week we read the last two parashot From the fourth book of the Torah, Matot and Masei. One of the matters of parashat Matot is the story of the Jewish people's victory in their war against Midian, and the specific divine commandment regarding the spoils: they were to count all the spoils and divide them in two, half for the men of the army and half for the rest of the people. Then they were to set aside a portion from each half for God: from the army half, 1 out of every 500 of each type and give it to the Kohanim, while from the people half, 1 out of every 50 of each type and give it to the Leviim.
The Torah recounts that Moses and Eleazar the High Priest did indeed do as they were asked, and it details the number of each type of animal (so many donkeys, so many sheep, etc.) and the amount they gave to the Kohanim and Leviim. But why include all the details? Wasn't it enough to simply say that they did what God commanded?
Ramban (Nachmanides) explains that the Torah means that from the time they began counting all the animals until they distributed and separated the donations (which must have taken a long time due to the large number), not a single animal died. One might ask: why would God perform this miracle, and what purpose would it serve?
The explanation is that the divine commandment apparently lacked instructions on what to do with the remainder of the divisions. What would they have done if, for example, they had counted 73 sheep? How would they separate 1 out of 50? That is why the Torah details and states that there were no remainders in the divisions. All the plunder could have been divided into two parts, and then 1 out of 500 and 1 out of 50 could have been separated—something completely unusual, and that is precisely why the Torah recounts it. Only in this way could the people fulfill the divine commandment regarding the division of the plunder.
When we analyze this matter, we can understand that it is truly something unique and incredible: for the Jewish people to take the exact, round number of animals from Midian so that they could then distribute them properly, God's hand, so to speak, must have intervened long before the war, so that when the war occurred, there would be such and such a quantity of animals in Midian! All this so that the Jewish people could fulfill God's commandment.
From this, we can learn a wonderful lesson: long before a person has the opportunity to fulfill a mitzvah, God prepares the way, so to speak, to remove all difficulties and obstacles to its observance. Therefore, we should never be discouraged by the difficulties that may arise along life's path. We must trust in Hashem, who arranged everything from the beginning as it should be, so that we can fulfill His mission in the best possible way.