A.
וידבר משה אל ראשי המטות לבני ישראל לאמר זה הדבר אשר צוה ד': איש כי ידר נדר לד' או השבע שבועה לאסר אסר על נפשו לא יחל דברו ככל אשר יצא מפיו יעשה: (“And Moshe spoke to the heads of the tribes, to the bënei Yisra’él to say, 'This is the thing which Ha-Shem has commanded. A man, for he will vow a vow [neder] to Ha-Shem or swear an oath [shëvu‘a] to forbid a prohibition [issur] upon himself, will not void his words; according to all that comes out of his mouth will he do”). So begins our parasha.
Rashi quoted the Sifrei on our passage: משה נתנבא ב"כה אמר ד' בחצות הלילה" והנביאים ב"כה אמר ד'" מוסף עליהם משה שנתנבא בלשון "זה הדבר" (“Moshe prophesied with ‘Thus said Ha-Shem [ko amar Ha-Shem], "At about midnight...."’ [Exodus XI, 4], and the [other] prophets prophesied with ko amar Ha-Shem; Moshe as greater than they, for he prophesied with the expression, ‘This is the thing’ [ze ha-davar]”).
What is there about the phrase ze ha-davar that indicates a higher level of prophecy than ko amar Ha-Shem? And why do we first encounter it here?
B.
The Maharal mi-Prag in his Gur Aryé distinguishes between the two levels of prophecy as follows: המדריגה הראשונה בדברים אשר יחדש ויעשה בעולם כו' וזה תמצא מבואר בכל הנביאים שלא היו מתנבאים רק בענינים אשר הוא יתברך פועל ועושה ומשנה וגו' (“The first level concerns things which He innovates and does in the world... and this you will find explicitly with all of the prophets, that they would only prophesy concerning things which He effects and does and changes....”).
והמדריגה של משה רבינו עליו השלום היא התורה מה שהשם יתברך רוצה שיהי' נוהג תמיד בעולם מבלי שינוי והוא סדר מציאות כללי בעולם כי בתורה אשר נתן השם יתברך על ידי משה סידר את ישראל בסדר כללי לא בענינים המתחדשים בפרטים מן הסבה הראשונה (“And the level of Moshe our teacher, peace be upon him, is the Torah, what Ha-Shem wants to be continually functioning in the world without change; and it is the general order of reality in the world, for through the Torah which Ha-Shem gave through Moshe He set up Israel in a general order, not like the matters which are innovated in the details of the first cause....”).
So, in the Maharal’s view, the higher level of ze ha-davar govens the entire fabric and structure of the universe, the way in which its affairs are administered and how human beings are to interface with it. This is what Hazal mean in their famous interpretation of Havaqquq’s pronouncement "הלכות עולם לו" אל תקרא "הליכות" אלא "הלכות" (“‘The ways [halichoth] of the world are His’ [Habakkuk III, 6]; read not halichoth but halachoth”; מגילה כ"ח:).
This level includes and contains the lower level of ko amar Ha-Shem, describing only temporary singularities of the sort we are inclined to call “miracles” only because they appear to deviate from what we consider “normal,” though both “normality” and the miraculous, temporary singularities are expressions of Ha-Shem’s will. Moshe was enabled to see that overarching reality and, to some extent, transmit it to us in the form of the Torah, an ultimate reality which provides for the temporary “changes” the other prophets are able to perceive and communicate.
The specific example cited by the Sifrei is a precise case in point: Moshe’s prophecy with ko amar Ha-Shem concerns the final blow suffered by Egypt before the Exodus, the death of their first-born. Death is surely a commonplace event in our world, paet of its normal rhythm; the simultaneous deaths of an entire class of people defined by their ethnicity and the order of their births, without regard for their relative health and ages just a moment before, is a miraculous singularity. When Moshe divulged it, therefore, he used the expression ko amar Ha-Shem.
This would appear adequately to explain the Sifrei’s point, but why does it first appear here, when we are discussing nëdarim and shëvu‘oth, “vows” and “oaths”?
C.
The Talmud establishes that if a person vows that, for instance, he will not sit in a sukka, then he is abjured from sitting in a sukka, even on the holiday of Sukkoth, when he is obliged to do so. Why? Because our passage states "לא יחל דברו" דברו לא יחל אבל מוחל הוא לחפצי שמים (“‘he will not void his word’ – his word he will not void, but he voids those things pertaining to Heaven [i.e., mitzvoth such as sitting in a sukka]”; נדרים ט"ז: ועיי' שמובא להלכה ברמב"ם הל' נדרים פ"ג הל' ט"ו ושו"ע יו"ד סי' רט"ו סעיף א' וסי' רל"ט סעיף ד').
But this prompts the Pele’ Yo‘étz to observe that there is another well established princi-ple: אתא עשה ודוחה לא תעשה, a positive commandment (‘asé) comes to override a lo’ tha‘ase, a prohibition.
For example, there is a specific mitzva that one circumcise his son on the eighth day of the boy’s life. Assuming that the baby is healthy and strong and able to stand being circumcised, the ceremony takes place on the eighth day, even when that day occurs on the Sabbath, when such an operation would otherwise be prohibited. The ‘asé of circumcision (mila) on the eighth day comes to override the lo’ tha‘ase of shabbath. So why, in the Talmud’s case cited above, does the mitzva of yëshivath sukka not override the prohibition incurred by the man’s vow?
משום דנדר הוי בשם וכנודר בחיי המלך כמאחז"ל וע"כ העובר על הנדר הוא כברכת השם ח"ו וע"כ אפי' ב"נ מצוין על הנדר משום דברכת השם הוא בז' מצות ב"נ ומובואר בריש יבמות דעשה שלפני הדבור עדיפא וא"כ הל"ת דנדר שהוא לפני הדבור אינו נדחית מפני העשה וגו' (“Because a neder is taken with Ha-Shem’s name, and is similar to one who vows [nodér] by the king’s life, as Hazal tell us, and therefore one who violates a neder is like cursing Ha-Shem, G-d forbid; and therefore, even bënei Noah are commanding concerning a neder, because [the prohibition of[ ‘cursing G-d’ is one of the seven mitzvoth bënei Noah, and it is explained near the beginning of Yëvamoth that an ‘asé which precedes the pronouncement has precedence, and if so, the lo’ tha‘ase of the neder, which came before, is not overridden by the ‘asé”).
The question is one of sequential of effectivity: Did the pronouncement of the neder precede the effectivity of the mitzva, or vice versa? In our case of mila, the mitzva was actually born with the boy: from the moment of birth, on the eighth day of his life, mila is required. The prohibition of mëlacha came into existence and was effective only later, on that eighth day; therefore, mila supersedes shabbath. In the case of sukka, though, the prohibition pronounced with the neder preceded the holiday on which yeshivath sukka became obligatory; hence, the neder has precedence.
This seems clear, but elsewhere the ba‘alei Tosafoth cite a ruling of the Yërushalmi which suggests the reverse. The case under consideration is the potential conflict between the mitzva of eating matza on Passover and the prohibition (issur) of hadash (“new” winter wheat, to be harvested in the spring). Hadash is prohibited from the cutting of the ‘omer (which takes place on the second day of Passover) until Shavu‘oth, when the bikkurim are brought to the Béyth ha-Miqdash (cf. Deuteronomy XXVI, 1-20). The Yërushalmi rules that in a case in which the only matza available would be made from hadash, it would be forbidden (קידושין מ' תוספות שצ וע"ע שאגת ארי' סי' צ"ו המאריך בענין זה).
So it would appear that the two rulings conflict.
In my humble opinion, though, there is no conflict or difficulty when it come to the effectivity of a neder on a mitzva. The reason is that, as soon as one makes such a neder, a specific mitzva becomes operative, that being the mitzva or lo’ yahél dëvaro, “he may not void his word.” Since that mitzva comes into existence the moment he has pronounced the neder, it becomes a gëzérath ha-kathuv, a decree inherent in the verse, as we have seen, that the neder overrides or supersedes whatever activity the nodér has prohibited himself. Hence it is built into the very wording of the verse that what the nodér has prohibited himself remains prohibited; otherwise, the phrase lo’ yahél dëvaro would be effectively meaningless.
D.
And so this is why Moshe’s exclusive authority to prophesy the principles and precepts of Torah occurs here, specifically, at the head of the passage concerning nëdarim and shëvu‘oth, both to teach us the tremendous power which lies in human speech, in that one can create by one’s word additional prohibitions which are completely effective regarding one’s subjective person, prohibitions which take effect for the infividual nodér as though they were part of the Torah itself, and also to warn us that such a power must be used only with great care, and sparingly.
The Hatham Sofér asks why, in this specific teaching about nëdarim, the Torah chooses to emphasize that it was delivered first to the rashei ha-mattoth, the tribal leaders, then to the bënei Yisra’él. He notes the universal propensity amongst political leaders (which the rashei ha-mattoth surely were) to make public promises which they cannot keep, or worse, have no intention of keeping, whether such promises are made to pacify the public, or to ensure the leader’s popularity with the people for whom he is responsible.
It was such leaders, he concludes, who needed to get this message the most, and so they were warned first.
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