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And the israelites journeyed
onward from beeroth-bene-jaakan
To moserah. There aharon died and he
was buried there,
And eleazar his son served
as priest in his stead.
From there they journeyed on to gudgod
and from gudgod to jotbath, a land of brooks of water.
(Devarim 10:6-7)
From there
- [The Hebrew for "from there" is "misham"]
"Misham" begins with the
letter 'mem' and ends with 'mem'. [The numerical value of mem is forty]. This tells that us that all forty
years the well accompanied them. At that time God separated the tribe of
Levi. The adjacency of this passage to the previous one comes to teach that
the Levites returned
(Baal HaTurim, ibid., ibid.)
The death of Aharon will not delay the nation's fate and its destiny on its path to its future. Aharon departs from their midst, his son serves in his stead and the nation continues to march towards its destiny.
(RaSHar Hirsch, ibid., ibid.)
That there exist a community or individuals whose mission in the service of God is most important, but let them not in conceit think that the service of the Lord cannot exist without them and that therefore they will not be punished for their sins. ... God's providence continues to advance towards its goals, and in this process it passes over the generations and the personal of every era, be they as great as they may be.
Aharon, too, is called to depart from his era in order to
be buried at the peak of the mountain, whereas the people encamped in the
valley continued on its journey towards its goals (see
10:6-7). And when Moshe recalls the death of his brother, perhaps he
also thought about himself and his imminent death. His death is a warning to
all future personages in
(RaSHar Hirsch, Devarim 9:7)
The purpose of stipulations in the observance of mitzvoth
Studying parashat ekev
Gili Zivan
Translated into English, the opening world of our parasha is "If". If you observe My commandments, you will merit an abundance of goodness, but if you do not observe My commandments, terrible calamities will befall you.
If you do obey these rules and observe them carefully, the Lord your God will maintain faithfully for you the covenant that He made on oath with your fathers. He will favor you and bless you and multiply you; He will bless the issue of your womb and the produce of your soil, your new grain and wine and oil, the calving of your herd and the lambing of your flock, in the land that He swore to your fathers to assign to you. (Devarim 7:12-13)
Our parasha also ends with the famous stipulation:
If, then, you obey the commandments [...] I will grant the rain for your land in season, the early rain and the late; you shall gather in your grain and wine and oil" (Ibid 11:13-16).
How to understand the relation of this stipulation to observance of the mitzvoth? Is this the preferred motivation to be employed in our education to mitzvoth? Do we not preach "the reward of the mitzvah is the mitzvah itself"?
This is not only an educational issue; it is also a question of harmonizing our world view with that of Scripture. Does our behavior really determine barometric lows? Can we indeed identify the sin which brings the blistering eastern wind or the mitzvah which brings rain in its season? Humidity and aridity of regions are determined by geographic location; the behavior of their inhabitants cannot change their meteorological nature.
Many commentators and thinkers have dealt with these questions. I should like to suggest two modern understandings of this issue.
Prof. Yeshaayahu Leibowitz related to the first query, even intensifying the educational problem by comparing the words of the "Shema Yisrael" which command - with neither rationale nor stipulation - "And you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your might" [...] (Ibid. 6:4-9) with the words of "And it shall be that if you obey". Leibowitz writes:
In absolute contrast to all that is implied in the "Shema" is "Vehaya im shamoa" "And it shall be that if you obey". [...] How is it possible that the two be combined in the mitzvah of reciting the Shema?
His answer, based on his understanding of Maimonides, seeks to differentiate between the goals of the relative commands. Observance of the mitzvoth with conditions attached is intended for those having an immature theological perception, whereas the command which is independent of provisos and promises of reward is the expression of the ideal faith:
The answer - in its deepest and most penetrating formulation, reaching down to the bedrock of religious faith - is given by Maimonides. [...] There are two levels of serving the Lord: There is the level of "lishma" - for its own sake [lit. "its own name" - K.G.] and there is the level of "lo lishma"- not for its own sake [...] The first part of the Kriyat Shema is the expression of faith lishma, which is termed 'love' ...its objective is itself. Therefore it lacks any rationalization; were it possible to give justifications for it, it would lose its meaning as a categorical imperative [...] Maimonides knew that the goal stated in the first portion of the Kriyat Shema is "a very high and difficult level, achievable only to a few after very much preparation ... therefore they permitted the masses - so that they remain steadfast in their faith - to perform the mitzvoth in the hope of reward and to refrain from sin out of fear of punishment ... until the percipient perceives and knows the truth ... "they permitted" is the key to understanding "And it shall be that if you obey" ... (Leibovitz, Emunah, Historia, Vearachim, pp. 13-14)
A different approach to coping with these questions is suggested by Leibowitz's friend, Prof. Eliezer Goldman, z"l, who was disturbed by the chasm between our secular-scientific consciousness ("the world functions according to its rules") and the Torah's commands, which attribute natural disasters (famine, flood, etc.) to Man's transgressions. As an avowed "Maimonidian", he begins with a quote from Maimonides's "Laws of Fasting":
Biblical law
obliges us to cry out and to sound the trumpets at impending disaster [...] and
this is part of the repentance process [...] but if they should not cry out and
not sound [the trumpets], but say rather that this happened because this is the
way of the world [...] this is a cruel path and causes them to adhere to their
wicked ways". Maimonides (in "The Laws of Fasting"), in
explaining the ways of
According to Goldman, then, rain which fails to fall in its season, or other misfortunes befalling man are the results of acts of nature which operate according to nature's laws. Jewish tradition, however, chose not to leave these tragic events without normative significance; it transformed them into catalysts in the religious and moral development of the individual and/or community:
A Jew whom calamity has befallen must consider ... how is he to link the misfortune to his actions, the calamity is the trigger for self-examination... We are commanded to relate to these events from a specific point of view. This is not a substitute for the causal perception, but a totally different perception which is not causal and does not seek to compete with natural causality. [...] The halacha obligates us to relate to certain revelations of the natural world surrounding us or the historical world in which we live, not only as they are in reality, but also from a different point of view. (Ibid, p. 356)
Goldman was very concerned about the duality of our religious-secular life, in which we speak the language of causality in the field, in the hospital or on the road, but the religious language when we read the portion of the week or when we learn the laws of fasting during famine. In contrast to Leibowitz, he did not agree to present a life of compartmentalization between man in the laboratory and man in the synagogue; he sought a solution to the conflicting perceptions which we hold simultaneously.
When pests infest our fields, Goldman (who was once farm manager of Kibbutz Sde Eliyahu in the Beit Shean Valley) argues, we hurry to seek pesticides, and when, forefend, a serious illness affects our loved ones, we go to the doctor and seek a medicine to cure the disease, and when, forefend, a truck swerves on the road and causes an severe accident, we check the condition of the brakes, the speed of travel and the safety railing. On the other hand, when rain is late in appearing, we add prayers, call for public fasting, and ask "What is our sin?"
In order to cope with this duality, Goldman suggests a new reading of the religious commands. He seeks to preserve both the religious and the causal-scientific languages as two languages which relate to the same event but react in two ways. One language is pragmatic, the second - educational. One language exists in the world of causality, the second in our moral and inner world. The "secular" language seeks the cause of the disaster; the religious seeks not the cause, but comes to tell us that if misfortune (such as famine) befalls us, we are to regard it as an opportunity for social repair.
In the beginning of his book, he explains his complex world, saying:
In a lecture
on
The words of the Mishnah "One who is afflicted by suffering must
examine his actions" (Berachot, 5) -
were not intended, in his view - to provide an explanation for
suffering; their purpose was to guide man how to react to, and cope
with, his suffering. Thus, drought and barren soil are, according to this
reading, opportunities for examining our lives and determining whether we have
not strayed too far from "these laws", whether our hearts have not
become haughty, whether we have not forgotten the Lord our God who took us out
of the
Befriend the stranger - practice the similar attitude which God shows, in the reception
which the stranger entering your midst from outside receives at your hands, that you place the highest value simply on what
a man is worth as a man. The complete equality before the law, more, the love
the stranger is to find in the Jewish nation characterizes most strikingly the
land and the people as the Land of God, and the People of God, that there the
pure character of a man acknowledging God gives him that which, in other
circles, riches and origin acquire for him.
(Rabbi S.R. Hirsch on Devarim 10:19, Levy translation)
...Note that anywhere that a stranger is praised for
fearing God or criticized for lacking fear of God, "fear of God"
finds expression in behavior towards a member of a different nation, towards a
member of a minority. One's attitude towards the stranger, the powerless and
unprotected is the litmus test of one's own fear of God.
(Nehama Leibowitz, Iyyunim Be-Sefer Shemot, pg. 33)
"It was not by
their sword that they took the land, their arm did not give them the
victory"
"Remember that it is the lord your god who gives you the power
to get wealth" - It is known that that Israelites are brave,
courageous in battle, for they have been compared to lions and to rapacious
wolves, and they vanquished the kings of Canaan in war, therefore He said, if
you think "My own power and the might of my own hand have won this
wealth for me," remember that it was God who took you out of
Egypt, and there you had no strength and power whatever. Remember further that
in the desert you have not the wherewithal to live, there He provided you with
all your needs. So also this wealth which you made with your strength, it is
God who gave this strength to make it. If you forget God, your strength and
might will wither and you will be lost just like them, for all who abandon God
will be lost... and this is what
(Ramban, Devarim 8:18)
It is written "When you enter the land of Canaan that I give you
as a possession" - "It was not by their sword that they took the
land, their arm did not give them the victory" but rather "The
right hand of Lord is exalted!" in order to give them the
inheritance of nations, and it is out of place for the begrudging to say "My
own power and the might of my own hand have won this wealth for me", because
it is God who gives you strength and this [wealth], therefore it is proper that
you give of His to the poor of His people. And if you disobey his word, and
become one of those begrudging people who credit themselves for their
possession, then "I will inflict an eruptive plague upon a house in the
land you possess," meaning: In that place where you attribute the
possession to yourself as if you are holding on to it with the strength of your
hand...
(Kli
Yakar, Vayikra 14:34)
The temptation mentioned here (Devarim 8:12-17) is
not one that could trap
(Prof. Nehama Leibowitz z"l, Iyyunim b'Sefer Devarim pg. 95)
A Land of Which Demands are Made, and Which Makes
Demands of those Who Living Within It
But the land you are crossing into to possess is a
land of hills and cleft-valleys; from the rain of the heavens it drinks water;
a land of which God always makes demands, the eyes of the Lord your God are
upon it from the start of the year until the end of the year.
(Devarim 11:1-12)
A land of
which God makes demands. A land of which demands may be made, e.g., to set aside challah, heave-offerings,
and tithes.
Could it be possible that such demands be made of other
lands as well? We derive from the passage of
which demands may be made
- but not of other lands.
(Sifri, Ekev,
40)
For the land which you are entering to possess; it is not like the
land of Egypt, from which you went out, where you sow your seed and water it
with your foot like a garden of greens; But the land you are crossing into to
possess is a land of hills and cleft-valleys; from the rain of the heavens it
drinks water; a land of which God makes
demands... The Yalkut,
on Ekev, (860) concludes
that "it alone is
subject to demands, such as the giving of halla, heave-offerings,
and tithes - but not other lands...." and whosoever has eyes to see and
heart to understand must wonder at what he sees - what is the connection of hallah and terumah to the subject at hand? And how are we
to understand the word ota ("it" - the land) as
implying exclusion of all other lands with regard to teruma and tithes? And why is this exclusion mentioned
here? But, he [the editor of the Yalkut] must have wanted to give
a rationale for the
(Kli Yakar, Bamidbar 26:64)
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