Week 253, Day 1

 Printable Version

22 Elul 5768

Nitzavim, Deuteronomy 29:9?30:20
Shabbat, September 27, 2008 / 27 Elul, 5768
The Torah: A Modern Commentary, pp.1,537?1,545; Revised Edition, pp.1,372?1,381;
The Torah: A Women's Commentary, pp. 1,217–1,234
Seventh Haftarah of Consolation, Isaiah 61:10?63:9
The Torah: A Modern Commentary, pp.1,618?1,622; Revised Edition, pp. 1,382–1,385

To listen to this commentary, please click here.

D'VAR TORAH |

Nitzavim : The Mitzvah of Choosing
Lewis M. Barth

This week's Torah portion, Nitzavim , or large sections of it, are well-known in Reform congregations. On Yom Kippur morning, we read Deuteronomy 29:9–14 and 30:11–20, the opening and concluding paragraphs of Nitzavim .

I have never ceased being moved by the mood in the congregations I have attended or the services I have sometimes led when these passages are read. Through the wisdom of what we might call the liturgical process, ancient and modern; the sense of the holiness of the day; the impact of being in a packed sanctuary; and the openness of each member of the congregation to the meanings of the Day of Atonement—our capacity to listen is heightened. We become available to receive the power of the passages.

What touches us in these sections, and why are we touched? Without arguing that everyone listening has the same thoughts and feelings—an impossibility—there are aspects of these Torah verses that have a particularly powerful impact as we read and listen:

You stand this day, all of you, before the Eternal your God—you tribal heads, you elders, and you officials, all the men of Israel, you children, you wives, even the stranger within your camp, from woodchopper to water drawer—to enter into the covenant of the Eternal your God, which the Eternal your God is concluding with you this day, with its sanctions; in order to establish you this day as God's people and in order to be your God, as promised you and as sworn to your fathers, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. I make this covenant, with its sanctions, not with you alone, but both with those who are standing here with us this day before the Eternal our God and with those who are not with us here this day. (Deuteronomy 29:9–14)

We don't hear these verses within their biblical setting, the narrative context of the final address of Moses to the Children of Israel (Deuteronomy 29:1–8). We hear because we are addressed directly, as if by an unseen voice. This unseen and authoritative voice doesn't allow even one of us to claim we were and are not there. As an "audience"we are all included—whether physically there or not. The text gives us no wiggle room for denial. We are there to enter the covenant that God is making with us. It is the fulfillment of the promise to the ancestors—invoking history and memory—and it is for us and all our descendants—establishing a future of trust, obligation, and relationship.

For these reasons, embedded in the passage itself, our modern and postmodern cynicism, struggle with belief, and living so much in the contemporary world are all obliterated, and we are taken out of ourselves to feelings of timelessness and living beyond history.

That "out-of-time"dimension is paralleled by an "out-of-space"dimension as our reading jumps to the concluding section:

Surely, this Instruction which I enjoin upon you this day is not too baffling for you, nor is it beyond reach. It is not in the heavens, that you should say, "Who among us can go up to the heavens and get it for us and impart it to us, that we may observe it?"Neither is it beyond the sea, that you should say, "Who among us can cross to the other side of the sea and get it for us and impart it to us, that we may observe it?"No, the thing is very close to you, in your mouth and in your heart, to observe it. (Deuteronomy 30:11–14)

The description of location here is extraordinary, given the ubiquitous biblical myth of revelation at Sinai. In the passage just quoted, the word translated as "Instruction"is mitzvah , usually understood as a commandment, and traditionally "heard"as a specific law or rule, one of the 613 mitzvot composing halachah, the Jewish system of law. And we know that the myth of revelation at Sinai itself is understood in Jewish tradition as including both the Written Law and the Oral Law, both Torah and Rabbinic tradition.

However, our text is saying something very different!

In stressing that the mitzvah is not in heaven or beyond the sea, but rather "in your mouth and in your heart, to observe it,"the biblical text seems to mean that the mitzvah is part of our being, embedded within us. It cannot get more individual, more personal, or more concrete than this.

This notion that the mitzvah is a dimension of our being helps us to understand why the text then specifies what exactly that mitzvah is:

See, I set before you this day life and prosperity, death and adversity . . . I call heaven and earth to witness against you this day: I have put before you life and death, blessing and curse. Choose life—if you and your offspring would live—by loving the Eternal your God, heeding God's commands, and holding fast to [God]. For thereby you shall have life and shall long endure upon the soil that the Eternal swore to your fathers Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, to give to them. (Deuteronomy 30:15, 30:19–20)

The mitzvah to "choose life"is grounded in the belief that we can make moral choices. Deuteronomy 30:15–20 does talk about "God's commandments, God's laws, and God's rules." It specifically discusses the prohibition against idolatry and that it leads to death and adversity. Such prohibitions and the punishment for their violation, as well as blessings and curses, do, in fact, fill a good deal of the rest of the passages of Nitzavim that we read on this Shabbat, but not on Yom Kippur (Deuteronomy 29:15–30:10).

The specially chosen passages for Yom Kippur morning (Deuteronomy 29:9–14, 30:11–20) stick in our minds. It is not the power of the myth of revelation at Sinai that speaks to us at that moment, but the power of the myth of choice that Yom Kippur represents. Because we have the mitzvah to choose life within ourselves, as part of our being, it shapes our capacity to overcome shame and adversity and to push on, renewed for the year ahead.

Rabbi Lewis M. Barth is professor emeritus of midrash and related literature, Hebrew Union College–Jewish Institute of Religion, Los Angeles, California.

DAVAR ACHER |

Nitzavim : Life and Death
Josh D. Zweiback

"I have put before you life and death, blessing and curse. Choose life—if you and your offspring would live . . ."(Deuteronomy 30:19). Rabbi Eliezer Davidovits (1878–1942, Slovakia) asks the obvious question: "Is there a person who would choose death?"( Ed Ya'aleh, Commentary on the Pentateuch [Bne-Brak, Israel: Lipa Friedman, 1988]). What kind of choice is really being offered here? Wouldn't most everyone prefer life to death, blessing to curse?

Here is his insight: There are two ways to "choose life."The first way is the "I"way. If we want, we can choose to think of ourselves first. We can worry about our needs and our desires and our wishes, and only later—much later sometimes—will we consider the needs, desires, and wishes of others.

But there is another way to "choose life,"another way to live our lives. This is the "you" way. Before we act, before we decide, before we speak, we can choose to think about how our actions, decisions, and words will affect others. We can think about how our behavior will affect future generations, including our own children and grandchildren.

A real choice is in fact being offered. Do we live in a way that supports life in the broadest sense, or do we live in a way that serves only ourselves, only our own narrow interests? This narrow way, this second choice, ultimately leads not to life but to death.

"Choose life"is the message at the heart of Yom Kippur. May it be the message that guides us all the days of our lives.

Josh D. Zweiback is a rabbi at Congregation Beth Am in Los Altos Hills, California.

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