Parashath Nitzavim-Va-Yélech (Deuteronomy XXIX,9-XXXII,30) 9/22/11

A.

In this week’s double parasha, as the Holy Nation prepares to enter the Holy Land, Moshe promises: ד' אלקיך הוא עבר לפניך הוא ישמיד את הגוים האלה מלפניך וירשתם יהושע הוא עבר לפניך כאשר דבר ד': ועשה ד' להם כאשר עשה לסיחון ולעוג מלכי האמרי ולארצם אשר השמיד אתם: ונתנם ד' לפניכם ועשיתם להם ככל המצוה אשר צויתי אתכם: חזקו ואמצו אל תראו ואל תערצו מפניהם כי ד' אלקיך הוא ההלך עמך לא ירפך ולא יעזבך: (“Ha-Shem your G-d is the one passing before you; he will destroy these nations from before you and you will inherit them; Yëhoshua‘ is the one passing before you, as Ha-Shem has spoken. And Ha-Shem will do to them as He did to Sihon and to ‘Og, kings of the Emori, and to their land, in that He destroyed them. And Ha-Shem will give them before you, and you will do to them according to all the mitzva which I have commanded you. Be strong and be brave, fear not and tremble not before them, for Ha-Shem your G-d is the one Who goes with you, He will neither let you down not abandon you”; XXXI, 3-6).

The alert reader אשר לו חוש חי לשפה העברית (“who has a living sense of the Hebrew language”), as one of my rebbe’im was wont to say, will already have noticed several peculiarities in our passage, which is the bulk of a paragraph in the original text and thus forms an organic whole, which may not be immediately obvious in English translation:

1. For instance, all of the second person pronouns in the first verse are in the singular; the third verse abruptly shifts to the second person plural, and the final verse begins in the second person plural, but ends (beginning with the word Eloqecha, “your G-d”) in the singular once again; why?

2. Moshe first promises that Ha-Shem will destroy Israel’s enemies, as He has done before, then suddenly admonishes them that they are to be the vehicle of the Canaanites’ downfall and destruction; how are those two statements compatible?

3. Having already promised that Ha-Shem would destroy the Canaanites, Moshe adds “as He did to Sihon and ‘Og; what does that add to the promise, which He already made?

4. Finally, given that the promise was already made that Ha-Shem would fight their war for them, why is it necessary to say and repeat that they should be strong, courageous, and so on? Why should they not be strong and courageous, knowing that the Divine power which had laid low the world’s superpower of the day, Egypt, was on their side?

The entire passage begs: Dorshéni! (“Interpret me!”). So let us do so.

B.

We begin by considering a midrash: מצינו תינוקות בימי דוד עד שלא טעמו טעם חטא היו יודעין לדרוש את התורה מ"ט פנים טמא מ"ט פנים טהור כו' אחר כל השבח הזה יוצאין למלחמה ונופלין אלא שהיו בהם דילטורין היו נופלין כו' אבל דורו של אחאב כולן עובדי ע"ז היו ועל ידי שלא היו בהן דילטורין היו יוצאין למלחמה ונוצחין וגו' (“We find little children in David’s day who had not yet tasted the flavor of sin, who knew how to research Torah in order to find 49 ways to declare [a given case] tamé’ and 49 ways to declare it tahor... After all this praise, they would go out to war and there would be casualties, for there were amongst them dilatorin... But Ah’av’s generation were all idolators, but because there were no dilatorin amongst them, they would go out to war and win [bloodless] victories....”; ויקרא רבה פכ"ו סי' ב' ). The Mattë-noth Këhunna defines dilatorin as בעלי לה"ר ורכילות, slanderers and tale-bearers.

This may be compared with another midrash: גדול השלום שאפי' ישראל עובדי' ע"ז ושולום ביניהם אמר המקום כביכול איני יכול לשלוט בהם כיון ששלום ביניהם שנא' "חבור עצבים אפרים הנח לו" וגו' אבל משנחלקו מה הוא אומר "חלק לבם עתה יאשמו". הא למדת גדול השלום ושנואה המחלוקת (“Great is shalom for even if Israel are idolators and there is shalom amongst them, G-d says, as it were, I cannot control them since there is shalom amongst them, as it is said: ‘Efrayim [a metaphor for the northern kingdom of Israel, over which Ah’av ruled] is attached to idols; leave him be’ [Hoshéa‘ IV, 17]. But as soon as they are divided, what does it say? ‘Their heart is divided; now they are guilty’ [ibid., X, 2]. So you have learnt: Great is shalom, and hated mahloqeth”; בראשות רבה פל"ח סי' ו').

Shalom is commonly translated “peace”, but it means much more than that; its root connotes “whole, complete, perfect.” In Eretz Yisra’él people are commonly greeted with the question , Ma shëlomëcha? “How are you?” “How is your health, your well-being, your general situation?” By juxtaposing these two midrashim, then, we see that the secret of military victory is unity of purpose amongst the units and the individual soldiers in the army. So long as all of them are whole-heartedly devoted to the task at hand, they cannot be defeated; but when their ranks are riven with mahloqeth, with strife and division such that there is no unity of purpose then, as we have seen, there are casualties.

C.

Now, in this light, let us reëxamine our passage.

It begins in the second person singular: If there is single-minded unity of purpose, if each member of the nation is absolutely dedicated to Torah u-mitzvoth such that Ha-Shem is Eloqecha, your individual, personal G-d, then you need have no fear. G-d will fight your battles for you; “He will destroy these nations from before you and you will inherit them.” Incredible miracles will happen, and there will be no necessity for war; Yëhoshua‘ will go before you, simply as the rav and poséq, the leader and halachic authority for your generation.

Was there ever such perfect unity amongst Israel? There was indeed, at Mattan Torah. The Torah itself tells us: ויחן שם ישראל נגד ההר (“And Israel camped there before the mountain”, when they arrived at the foot of Sinai; Exodus XIX, 2). My alert reader with the living sense of Hebrew will note that the verb is third person singular, prompting Rashi to comment: כאיש אחד בלב אחד (“like one man with one heart”). a unity so perfect and so wonderful that we celebrate it every year at the Passover séder, when we sing: אילו קרבנו לפני הר סיני ולא נתן לנו את התורה דיינו (“Had He brought us near Mt Sinai and not given us the Torah, it would have been enough for us!”). And not given us the Torah?!

To that extent is so perfect a unity transcendent, the utter solidarity elevating everything around it to sanctity, uniting this world with the next; as the Be’ér Moshe notes several times, Yisra’él is a notreiqon, an acronym for Yésh Shishim Ribbo’ Othiyoth La-Torah (“The Torah has 600,000 letters – counting the spaces between words, which therefore also carry meaning, as letters; this is the same as the number of men who stood at Sinai). Had that perfect unity lasted, it would have brought out the Torah which was inherent in Israel’s genotype from the Patriarchs (עיי' מה שכתבתי בא"ז ישיר לפרשת לך לך משנת תשס"ו עפ"י בראשית רבה פנ"ט סי' א' שאכן היתה התורה כעין ירושה גופנית מהאבות עד א"א). This is what such perfect unity can accomplish.

אבל שאר כל החניות בתרעומת ובמחלוקת (“But the rest of all the encampments were with murmuring and dispute”), Rashi continues, following the Mëchilta. Such unity is not the norm; so the Torah was given to Israel externally, through the medium of Moshe.

Which leads us to the second part of our passage. If there are differences in Israel, if the unity is not perfect and seamless (as the plural pronouns indicate), but there is at least no lashon ha-ra‘ to exaggerate and exacerbate the differences, such that they are respected, then the victory is not openly miraculous: It is instead like the campaign against Sihon and ‘Og, a conventional war with casualties, but it is no less assured. It is still G-d delivering the victory, but under cover of “nature,” behind the scenes, as it were.

Such differences must be, in short, differences which conform to Torah. The Mishna tells us that such a mahloqeth is possible, and terms it a mahloqeth lë-shém shamayim, a “dispute for the sake of Heaven” (אבות פ"ה מי"ז). As Rabbi ‘Ovadya mi-Bartenura goes on to comment, such a mahloqeth is characterized by a pure and genuine search for truth, for the best and most perfect form of Divine service. Such a mahloqeth is sofah lë-hithqayyém, destined to continue. The army of Ha-Shem may be divided into different regiments, but the regiments must be part of the same army.

D.

On the last clause in our passage, lo’ yarpëcha vë-lo’ ya‘azvekka, Rashi comments: לא יתן לך רפיון להיות נעזב ממנו (“He will not give you weakness, not to be forsaken by Him”). Weakness is not normally compatible with the concept of giving or granting; rather, it results from something being taken away; so what does Rashi mean?

Elsewhere we read: כי א-ל רחום ד' אלקיך לא ירפך ולא ישחיתך (“For a merciful G-d is Ha-Shem your G-d, he will not weaken you [lo’ yarpëcha] and will not destroy you”; Deuteronomy IV, 31), and there Rashi comments: להחזיק בך בידיו ול' לא ירפך ל' לא יפעיל הוא (“To hold you in His hands’, and the expression lo’ yarpëcha is a causative form”).

G-d’s support, Hazal tell us, is כאבא דאחיד בבנו (“like a father holding his son”; זוה"ק ח"ג קי"ב:); there is no chance of “accidental” weakness, just as a father is ever conscious that his child depends on him, and so maintains a firm and tight grip so as not to let him fall, so, too, were G-d to “let us fall”, it would be a deliberate, positive action (implied, Rashi hints, by the causative verb), and that, Rashi assures us, will never be.

This is the nature of the covenant we have entered into: If we move with perfect unity, perfect cohesiveness, as we did at Mattan Torah, all of the veils vanish before our eyes, the true underpinnings of the universe become apparent, and open miracles, without the concealing curtain of nature are the norm. If, being merely human, we differ, but differ within the frame of Torah, in the sincere and earnest search for truth on both sides of the dispute, the same things still happen, but this time behind the curtain of “nature,” with plausible deniability.

For so long as Israel remain Israel, remain true to the covenant of Sinai, however much we may differ over details and customs, He will not let us fall; He will not abandon us.

A comforting thought, in the wild and uncertain world before us, as we approach the new year.

Parshath Nitzavim-Va-Yélech (Deuteronomy XXIX,9-XXXI,30) 9/3/10

A.

In this year’s discussion of parshath Ki Thétzé’, we mentioned the Gra’s scheme for ordering the events of world history according to the text of the written Torah, in which its course was laid out in advance. Under the rules of this scheme, our present century, which began on Rosh ha-Shana of the secular year 1940, is represented by this week’s double parasha. As Rosh ha-Shana fast approaches, we are about to enter into the eighth decade of the eighth century of the sixth millennium, the world-year 5771.

It will be asked how such a scheme is consistent with the notion of human free will. The answer, I believe, lies in a term discussed in last week’s essay, the word hadash. Hadash, we discovered, means something “new” resulting from a process by which the essence of a previous phenomenon becomes available for further productive use. Last week, we applied this concept to Torah-learning.

In the physical realm, this process manifests itself with the selection of one of an array of choices generated by a Schrödingerian probability wave, collapsing the wave and bringing about a new node from which the next series of events, ranked by probability, is generated. In my humble opinion, such a node is called in the Holy Language a hadasha (the feminine ending indicating a single exemplar of the general class, following the example of, e.g., shoshan, “lily motif,” and shoshana, a single lily, or dema‘, “weeping, tears,” and dim‘a, a single tear.

This, I believe, is what we mean when we praise G-d every morning as ‘osé hadashoth, “Maker of hadashoth,” and again, when we call Him המחדש בטובו בכל יום תמיד מעשה בראשית, “Who makes new in His goodness, every day, always, the act of the beginning.” All of the nodes, all of the choices, were laid out beforehand; which ones we choose, and which as a result present themselves to us, is our function.

It is on this basis, I believe, that the Talmud observes איזהו חכם הרואה את הנולד (“Who is wise? One who sees what is/has been born”; תמיד ל"ב.), which, the Hatham Sofér explains, refers to the ability correctly to interpret history and the events unfolding around us.

With the Gra’s scheme as our guide, then, let us explore what the parasha has to tell us about our times.

B.

Our parasha opens with Moshe’s reminder to each and every member of Israel, from the highest to the lowest, of his mission לעברך בברית ד' אלקיך ובאלתו (“to enroll you in the covenant of Ha-Shem your G-d and in His ala”; XXIX, 11). As Hazal demonstrate on the basis of the phrase shëvu‘ath ala which occurs in Numbers V, 21, ala is a technical term denoting a curse which falls upon a party who swears falsely, or violates an oath (already in effect (ירושלמי סוטה פ"ב ה"ה).

The purpose of the covenant? למען הקים אתך לו לעם והוא יהי' לך לאלקים כאשר דבר לך ונשבע לאבתיך וכו' ולא אתכם לבדכם אנכי כרת את הברית הזאת ואת האלה הזאת: כי את אשר ישנו פה עמנו עמד היום לפני ד' אלקינו ואת אשר איננו פה עמנו היום: (“In order to establish you as His people, and He will be your G-d, as He spoke to you and swore to your forefathers.... And not with you alone am I cutting this covenant and this ala. But with those who are here with us, standing today before Ha-Shem our G-d, and with those who are not here with us today”: ibid., 12-14). Thus, as Rashi elucidates, the covenant is binding on Israel for all time, ואף עם דורות העתידות להיות (“even with generations destined to come into being”). Every soul which would ever be implanted in Israel was present at Sinai (ע"ע שבועות ל"ט., נדרים כ"ה., ושבת קמ"ו..).

Then Moshe warns of what happens, not to ordinary sinners driven by their appetites and the surrounding temptations, but to anyone who בשמעו את דברי האלה הזאת והתברך בלבבו לאמר שלום יהי' לי כי בשרירות לבי אלך למען ספות הרוה את הצמאה (“on hearing the words of this ala blesses himself in his heart to say, 'I shall have peace, for I shall go in the vision of my heart, in order to deny satisfaction to the thirsty'”; ibid., 18). G-d will enable and encourage such a rasha‘ to progress along his chosen path (so long as he has not changed his mind) until: לא יאבה ד' סלח לו כו' ורבצה בו כל האלה הכתובה בספר הזה וגו' (“Ha-Shem is not inclined to forgive him... And the entire ala written in this book awaits him”; v. 19).

This is, in fact, a fairly precise description of the spiritual pathologies which led to, and fed, the Holocaust: The rise of the falsifications of religious heterodoxy, the infatuation with totalitarian socialism, and the attempt to substitute European nationalism for Israel’s true national basis in Torah. The rest of the chapter discusses the horrific, monumental, even proverbial destruction which came about in the first few years of our century.

C.

The parasha then veers rather abruptly. After all of these horrors: ושבת עד ד' אלקיך ושמעת בקלו ככל אשר אנכי מצוך היום אתה ובניך בכל לבבך ובכל נפשך (“And you shall return to Ha-Shem your G-d and you will listen to His voice according to everything which I am commanding you today, you and your sons, with all your heart and with all your soul”; XXX, 2).

We are today in the midst of this phase. After the mass destruction of the European Jewish communities, the survivors came primarily to North America and Eretz Yisra’él, where the seeds of the next phase had already been planted; as Hazal tell us, הקב"ה מקדים את הרפואה למכה (“The Holy One, Blessed is He, anticipated to blow with the cure”; מגילה י"ג: ). In the decades immediately before the Holocaust, a handful of brilliant American young men – such legendary figures as R’ Nëthan’él Quinn, R’ Mordëchai Gifter, R’ Avigdor Miller, R’ Gëdalya Shorr, and a few others – went to Europe to absorb the best of Ashkënazi Torah culture. At the same time, a few European pioneers established outposts of the yëshiva world in North America, such as Torah va-Da‘ath, Nér Yisra’él, and Hafétz Hayyim. Also already active in the United States at the end of the previous century were such Hassidic dynasties as Lubavitch (in Brooklyn), Ozherov (in the Bronx). and the Bostoner Rebbe, זצ"ל.

In the immediate post-war years, these were joined by, e.g., the Telzer yëshiva in Cleveland, Béyth Midrash ha-Gavoah in Lakewood, and the transplanted Mir in Brooklyn, as well as the relocation of German Orthodoxy in Washington Heights and the re-ëstablishment of such Hassidic powerhouses as Ger, Szatmár, Vizhnitz, etc. Those seeds blossomed into the luxuriant growth of the Torah-world we see around us now, which makes ever greater efforts to reach out to our estranged brethren.

ושב ד' אלקיך את שבותך ורחמך ושב וקבצך מכל העמים אשר הפיצך ד' אלקיך שמה (“And Ha-Shem your G-d will return your returning and have mercy on you and gather you back from all the nations whither Ha-Shem your G-d has scattered you”; v. 3). This phase, the beginning of yëmoth ha-Mashiah, will follow on the present period. It’s seeds are already planted. Even though there was never a period since the Shivath Tziyyon from the Babylonian Exile when there has not been a Jewish presence in the Holy Land, never since the Hurban Bayith Shéni has that presence been as large as it is today, and this is especially true of the Torah yishuv across the length and breadth of the country.

D.

At this point, since we are not prophets, the trail being blazed grows uncertain. What is very clear from our text is that the present phase must reach a level, a critical mass of Torah-learning, Torah-observing Jews in order for the next phase to go into effect. What appears to be the case is that we are on the cusp of that happening, that some time in the next three decades it seems likely to begin.

As every reader with a living sense of the Hebrew language will attest, with few exceptions the second person pronominal forms used throughout our parasha are singular. This unremitting, relentless singularity, it seems to me, serves to remind us that a këlal consists of many përatim, individuals. It is incumbent on each and every one of us to what we can to bring about the necessary critical mass of לומדי תורה ומקיימי מצותי', those who learn Torah and uphold its mitzvoth, to bring us to the next stage. Now, entering on a new year, is a good time to start.
כי קרוב אליך הדבר מאד בפיך ובלבבך לעשותו (“For the matter is very close to you in your mouth and in your heart [all singular pronouns!] to do”; XXX, 14).