The first of this week's two Torah portions, Chukat,

The first of this week's two Torah portions, Chukat, describes the Jewish people's impatience with their long journey through the desert. Despite the manna from heaven, the fresh water from Miriam s well and the Clouds of Glory which protected them wherever they went, they were dissatisfied.Why did you bring us up out of Egypt to die in the wilderness? they complained.
Because of their ingratitude, G-d sent a plague of fiery serpents to punish them. The serpent, to whom all food has the same taste, became the vehicle for punishment against those who complained that the manna, which acquired any taste the individual desired, was insufficient. The fiery snakes, so called because their poisonous venom burns like fire, bit the people, and many died.
Chastised, the Jews came to Moses and admitted that they had sinned. They begged him to pray to G-d to remove the terrible plague from their midst. G-d's answer to Moses' prayer was the following: Make for yourself a fiery serpent, and set it upon a pole... everyone that is bitten - when he sees it - he shall live. Moses followed G-d's command and fashioned a serpent out of copper (nechoshet in Hebrew, from the same root word as serpent nachash), and set it high upon a pole where it could be easily seen. The Torah tells us that when an afflicted person looked up at the serpent, he was healed and did not die.
Rashi, the great Torah commentator, explains that merely looking at the copper serpent was not enough. A person had to look up in the spiritual sense as well, accepting the yoke of heaven and subjugating his heart to G-d above. Only then would the bitten person be restored to health.
The serpent itself, symbolic of the primordial serpent in the Garden of Eden, responsible for bringing evil into the world, alludes to this concept of transforming the negative into the positive. The bitten person had to subjugate his whole heart, the evil as well as the good inclination, and dedicate his entire being to the service of G-d.
Another example of this concept, the transformation of evil into a positive force for good, is also found in the beginning of the Torah portion. The ashes of the red heifer, although making unclean whoever prepared them, brought purity to the sinner on whom they were sprinkled.
This is the goal of every Jew - to utilize both of our inclinations in the service of G-d and serve Him with a whole heart.

Adapted from the works of the Lubavitcher Rebbe.