In the morning you will say, 'would that it were

evening,'

And in the evening you will say, 'Would that it were

morning,' from your heart's fright with which you will be afraid

and from the sight of your eyes that you will see.

(Devarim 28:67)

And your life will dangle

before you, meaning to say, because of the danger in which they live, to

the point where they fear day and night, and have no confidence in their lives.

For they will constantly think that death and bereavement have climbed through

their windows and into their palaces, such that "In the morning you will

say 'Were that it were evening', and in the evening you will say, "Were

that it were morning". There is a reason for both: If their desire in the evening

is "Were that it were morning', this is because of "Your heart's

fright with which you will be afraid', meaning to say that during the hours of

darkness or dawn, they will look forward to morning in order to remove from

themselves the fear of the frightening sights which are born in their imaginations

and scare them in their homes. And "In the morning you will say "Were

that it were evening" – because of the sights which your will see",

meaning that during the daylight hours they will pine for nightfall, that they

may hide from those who oppress and kill them. And all that is said with

reference to fear and cowardice is not said regarding Jews [alone], but also

regarding those who left the faith and worship other gods. For even though they

live in wealth and respect and standing among the nations of the world, and are

worthies and ministers in their nations for many years, the fear and

trepidation have never left them, their lives always dangle before them. This

is because the nations will forever be their enemies, and throughout the day

the sword rests on their neck.

(Abarbanel, ibid.,

ibid.)

Would that it were evening – The

Talmud expounds "the previous evening", and similarly, the previous

morning, but the plain sense of the passage implies the future, for this the

nature of those in present danger, they despite the present and yearn for a

future which may change their sorrowful plight. And the terms "evening"

and "morning" are repeated in order to teach us that their morning

yearning for evening is pointless, because in the evening they will return to

pine for the morning.

(R. Yitzchak Shmuel Reggio, ibid., ibid.)

From your heart's fright etc. Even

in a place where there is no [objective cause for] fear, but fear of what your

heart imagines. And from the sight of your eyes which you

will see. You will actually see, for you are in danger.

(Haamek Davar

ibid. ibid.)

Regarding the right and the duty

Of moral defiance of heaven

Reuven Nimdar

It is difficult to think of a more painful

and harsh parasha than Ki

Tavo, with its passages of the Great Admonition (the Tokheha). The impressive ceremony of ratification of

the oral covenant, in which half the nation stands on Mt. Gerizim,

the mountain of the blessing, and the other half on Mt. Eval,

the mountain of the curse – this dramatic, even cinematic, scene diminishes and

pales in comparison with the literary scenes of terror depicted in the curses

of the Great Admonition – just as do the beautiful blessings of the parasha: "Blessed will you be in the town, and

blessed will you be in he field. Blessed the fruits of your

womb and fruits of your soil and fruits of your beasts, the get of your herds

and the offspring of your flock. Blessed your basket

and your kneading pan. Blessed you will be when you come in and blessed

you will be when you go out" (Devarim 28:3-6)

The sweeping hail of the terrible and awesome

litany of plague is engraved deeply in the individual and collective consciousnesses,

searing itself into them like a burn. There is something hypnotic in the detail

of the mercilessness of the horrors and the dread which the furious god showers

upon his terrified children – something paralyzing and incapacitating like

standing before a violent parent who is in a murderous frenzy, cursing and

threatening his offspring in his fury. How different this image of the father

as reflected in the Admonition from that of the merciful father in whom the

prayer books and High Holyday machzorim place

their trust. The grisly and addictive descriptions of the horrors of the Admonition

became, in the Jewish historic consciousness, a self-fulfilling prophecy. The

depictions of the dreadful days of the siege and destruction are saturated with

direct and indirect quotes from the Admonition. The collective awareness,

stunned by the intensity of the catastrophe which befell us, made desperate

attempts to bridge over the cognitive dissonance which it experienced and to

position it within the world of Jewish meaning. The verses of the Tokheha provided an inexhaustible reservoir of

images and quotes for this painful attempt at clarification. The Admonition's

description of the hunger, the dread and the powerlessness are woven into the

legends of the destruction and its various narratives – beginning the Armaean siege of Shomron (II Kings, 6:24-30), through the pictures of merciful mothers cooking and devouring their

children during the Babylonian siege (Lamentations

4:6), and ending with the direct

quotes from the Admonition interspersed in the Talmudic description of the

Roman siege of Jerusalem (Bavli, Gittin 50a-b).

Jewish tradition attempted to cope, in

various and strange ways, with the established ritual of reading of the parasha of Ki Tavo in public – with the requirement to repeat loudly (along

with recitation of blessings referring to His Name and His kingship) the terrible

curses included in it. It is customary until this day in many communities to

read the verses of the Admonition sotto voce, hurriedly and in a

whisper. Some congregations refrain, if possible, for assigning aliyot for this parasha;

others give the undesirable aliya to the "unwanted"

of the congregation – to stutterers, lunatics, deformed, and abject paupers. In

some places extreme caution is employed in assigning the reading of this parasha, as though to ridicule the parasha and empty it of its tragic and prophetic

influence and efficacy. Devora Baron's famous and

touching story, "The Admonition Man" deals with an unfortunate

indigent who is torn from his town and occupation and becomes a marginal member

of the congregation and recipient of the questionable honor of being called to

the Torah for the Admonition. Baron's "Admonition Man" embodies in

his tragic and bleak biography all the ills of the exile and, in effect, all

the curses appearing in the parasha which provides

his terrible designation.

In order to cope with the theological-moral

challenge presented by the God-image reflected in our parasha

and with his difficult and violent relations with creation and the chosen

people, many strategies evolved, mostly apologetic in nature. I should like to suggest

here a different direction, one based not upon the terrified submission to

divine whims, but, on the contrary, upon a courageous stand struggle to parry

them, for the sake of the nation, the world, and the Lord Himself. This model

is not as new or radical as it may seem. The first to exemplify this position was

our father, Abraham, who argues with the Lord – in what seems to me to be a

much more successful test of faith than was the Akeida

to do such a thing, to put to death the innocent with the guilty, making

innocent and guilty the same. Far be it from You! Will

not the Judge of all the earth do justice?" (Genesis 18:25).

Rabbinic literature, too, does not lack for instances of moral criticism of

Heaven – the most widely-known of which is R. Yehoshua's

not overly polite rebuke of God when the latter attempted to raise His voice

and intervene in the famous halachic dispute

regarding the ritual cleanliness of the oven of Aknai:

"We pay no attention to a Heavenly Voice, for at Mt. Sinai You wrote in

the Torah (Shemot

23) "After the majority

must you incline" (Bava Metsia 59b).

In Hassidic folk literature there appears the

captivating character of R. Levi Yitzchak of Berdichev,

who summons the Lord before a court because of His unfair treatment of His

people. This activist, critical model, which does not accept as self-understood

the divinity's unruly behavior and outbursts of fury, is very appropriate for

the spirit of our age, and I feel that it is important to ponder the subject

and study it as we listen to the horrifying words of the Great Admonition

speedily whispered in Parashat Ki

Tavo.

Reuven Nimdar, born in Yerushalayim (1964) currently resides in New York, where he teaches Judaism and

Hebrew Literature. His first book "Haviv"

was awarded the "Sefer HaBikkurim"

prize by the Ministry of Science, culture and Sport for the year 2000. His

latest work, "The House that Was Destroyed", which surprisingly

integrates a modern plot based entirely Manhattan with a secondary plot which

takes place in the Temple, narrated in Mishnaic

idiom, was published recently by Z'mora Bitan.

"You Shall Be Happy – You Shall Make Others Happy" – Joy As a

Spiritual and Social Challenge

R' Yehoshua

of Sakhnin said in the name of R' Levi: In the merit

of two things Israel

purifies itself before the Omnipresent, in the merit of the Shabbat and in the

merit of tithes. From where the merit of Shabbat?

"If you refrain from trampling the Shabbat" (Isaiah 58:13), and what follows? "Then I will set you aside the heights of

the earth" (Ibid. 14). From where the merit of

tithes? "You are to rejoice in all the good things that the Lord

you and the Levite and sojourner that is in your midst" (Devarim 26:11)

(Pesikta

D'Rav Kahanah, Mandelboim ed., Parasha 10)

"You shall rejoice on

your festival" (Devarim 16:14)

You find three references to joy in regard to the