Symbolic Significance of the Earth "Opening Her Mouth"

(31) Scarcely had he finished speaking all these words when the ground under them burst asunder, (32) and the earth opened its mouth and swallowed them up with their households, all Korah’s people and all their possessions. (33) They went down alive into Sheol, with all that belonged to them; the earth closed over them and they vanished from the midst of the congregation.

"From within the bush." A Gentile once asked R. Joshua b. Karhah: Why did the Holy One, Blessed be He, see fit to speak to Moses from within a thorn-bush? [R. Joshua retorted]: If it had been a carob tree or a sycamore tree, would you not have asked the same question. However to send you away you without any answer is not possible, [so] why from within a thorn-bush? To teach you that there is no empty place devoid of the Shechinah, not even a [lowly] thorn-bush.

(28) And Moses said, “By this you shall know that it was Hashem who sent me to do all these things; that they are not of my own devising: (29) if these men die as all men do, if their lot be the common fate of all mankind, it was not Hashem who sent me. (30) But if Hashem brings about something unheard-of, so that the ground opens its mouth and swallows them up with all that belongs to them, and they go down alive into Sheol, you shall know that these men have spurned Hashem.”

The 15th question, in the statement "and if Hashem brings about something unheard-of, so that the ground opens its mouth," for why did Moshe pray for this -- that the mouth of the ground should open and devour them, and didn't pray that they should be consumed by the fire? And what did he see to request the "opening of the mouth of the land" to swallow them. What is the correspondence between this punishment and their sin...

Moses requested that the punishment of Datan and Aviram and their cohorts would be that they would be swallowed by the earth, such that they would be punished measure for measure. They sinned by opening their mouths without license, to devour and destroy the master of all prophets, they themselves being despicable and lowly. Likewise, the earth -- which is the lowest of the elements -- would open its mouth, and swallow them.

(12) Moshe sent for Dathan and Abiram, sons of Eliab; but they said, “We will not go up! (13) Is it not enough that you brought us from a land flowing with milk and honey to have us die in the wilderness, that you would also lord it over us? (14) Even if you had brought us to a land flowing with milk and honey, and given us possession of fields and vineyards, should you gouge out those men’s eyes? We will not go up!”

WE WILL NOT GO UP — Their mouth tripped them up (i.e. unwittingly they made mention of their fate) — that they would have only a “descent” (their words are taken to mean: we shall not be going up; we shall go down into the depths of the earth) (Midrash Tanhuma, Korah 6).

(30) But if Hashem brings about something unheard-of, so that the ground opens its mouth and swallows them up with all that belongs to them, and they go down alive into Sheol, you shall know that these men have spurned Hashem.” (31) Scarcely had he finished speaking all these words when the ground under them burst asunder, (32) and the earth opened its mouth and swallowed them up with their households, all Korah’s people and all their possessions. (33) They went down alive into Sheol, with all that belonged to them; the earth closed over them and they vanished from the midst of the congregation.

(32) and the earth opened its mouth and swallowed them up with their households, all Korah’s people and all their possessions.

(32) Thus they spread calumnies among the Israelites about the land they had scouted, saying, “The country that we traversed and scouted is one that devours its settlers. All the people that we saw in it are men of great size;

(1) Korach took...It was decreed upon the entire people to die in the wilderness. As a result, the people were embittered, and they began to feel that all their failures came as a result of Moshe’s leadership. Korach saw his opportunity now to dispute with Moshe, and he reasoned the people would listen to him.