Shabbat Va-Ethanan

Written by Rabbi Professor Marc Saperstein Thursday, 03 August 2006

Parashat Va-Etchanan

No parashah has more familiar material from the liturgical life of the Jewish community than Va-Ethanan. It contains the most famous of all Jewish utterances: Sh'ma Yisra'el, followed by the ve-ahavta paragraph (Deut. 6:4–9), the repetition of the ‘Ten Commandments’ (5:6-18), the question of the ‘wise son’ and avadim hayyinu (‘We were slaves to Pharaoh in Egypt . . . ‘) from the Pesach Haggadah (6:20-21), the final sentence of the first paragraph of alenu (‘Know then this day, and take it to heart: the Eternal One is God in the heavens above and on the earth below; there is none else’ (4:39).

Yet with all the resonance of these passages, I find the most poignant verses to come at the very beginning of the parashah. In one of his magnificent orations, Moses informs the people of a private interaction with God. Having heard the divine decree that he would not lead the people into the promised land (Num. 20:12), he discloses to the assembly that he had pleaded with God to moderate the sentence: ‘Let me, I pray, cross over and see the good land on the other side of the Jordan’ (Deut. 3:23 – 25). Joshua had already been appointed as Moses’ successor; here he seems to be asking for permission just to cross the Jordan River as one of the people, simply to set foot on this land of destiny and to behold its wonders up close.

Who could deserve an act of judicial clemency more than Moses? Yet he reports that God’s anger with him remained unabated, and the divine response unambiguously closes the issue forever: ‘Enough! Never speak to Me of this matter again! . . . You shall not cross over this Jordan’ (3:26-27). Moses must be content with a view of the land from afar. There is to be no further appeal.

This passage teaches us that even Moses could not set the terms for the end of his career. His forty years of faithful leadership were of no avail; even a request for compassionate leniency was rejected. The passage teaches us that no matter how sincere our prayer, no matter how good we may have been, no matter how much we believe we deserve things to work out the way we want them, not every prayer receives an affirmative response. Sometimes God says ‘No’.

Our generations have been privileged to achieve something Moses never did: to enter the land of Israel, to settle it and build a vibrant and flourishing new State that has provided a home for Jews all over the world who need one, that has become a centre for a dynamic Jewish culture rooted in tradition yet on the cutting edge of modernity. Will we ever be privileged to see this State live in full peace with its neighbours? Moments when this possibility seemed almost at hand now appear to be a cruel delusion. Will our people never cross this spiritual Jordan?

Moses had to settle for a Pisgah view of the promised land. But that vision sustained him in the belief that the future, though full of challenges, would lead toward the fulfilment of God’s plan. In these days of anguish and disappointment, our glimpses of the promise of peace seem agonizingly distant. Can we believe that this promise will indeed be fulfilled, if not for our generation, then for the generations yet to come?

Rabbi Professor Marc Saperstein
August 2006