Thoughts for Va-ethanan 5770

This sedra opens with Moshe’s pleading with God to just be allowed to enter the Land of Israel.  As if to say, ‘once I’ve been in the Land of Israel, I can die happy.’  Hashem continually reminds us of the unsurpassed importance of the Land of Israel throughout His Torah; but nowhere like in this last book, D’varim/Deuteronomy.  Despite this ubiquitous presence of the Land of Israel in every matter of Torah, Moshe’s plea here gets some special thought.

In the g’mara in Sota, Rabi Simlai asks, ‘why did Moshe our master so desire to enter the Land of Israel?  Does he need to eat of its fruits or be sated by its goodness?  Moshe thought, many commandments were commanded to Israel, and they are only carried out in the Land of Israel.  I want to go into the Land so that those commandments will be accomplished by me.’

The usual reading of this aggada is that many of the 613 commandments are specific to the Land of Israel, such as the agricultural commandments or the commandments specific to the Temple; and our holy master Moses wanted to be able to carry out all the commandments of Hashems’s Torah, including those that haven’t yet been required.  I would like to suggest another reading.

I think Moshe is referring to ALL the commandments of the Torah; and he is acutely aware that outside the Land of Israel NO mitzvah is done as truly intended by God.  The required context for the Torah is the Land of Israel; that is an inherent part of the Torah.  Consider, as one example of many, the verse in Deut. 4:5 - ‘to do so in the  midst of the land that you are going to, to conquer it.’  Time and again we see this phrase that commandments or laws are given to be done ‘in the land...’

A powerful support for this idea comes in next week’s Torah reading.  In the second paragraph of Sh’ma (the first paragraph is in this week’s reading) we find a warning that we could be ‘quickly lost from the good land that Hashem gives you.’  The very next verse says, ‘put these words/ideas of mine on your hearts and on your selves, and tie them for a sign upon your hands and markers between your eyes.’  Here, the sages tell us in the Sifrei an amazing thing.  ‘The Holy One said to Israel, even though I exile you from the Land to outside the land (the juxtaposed notion of outside, exclusion is quite important here), EVEN SO be marked by the commandments, IN ORDER THAT WHEN YOU RETURN THEY WILL NOT BE NEW TO YOU.’

It is quite clear from the above, the principle intent of the commandments is for them to be done in the Land of Israel.  Doing them outside Israel is a substitute.  The Ramban expands this idea a bit in his commentary to the Torah, and we see that the essential character of the commandments is missing outside the Land of Israel.  This is a glimpse into the real meaning of exile from the Land.  This is a glimpse into the real meaning that we still fast on the 9th of Av, and the completion of the redemption whose beginning we are privileged to see, is yet nowhere on the horizon.  (But, as my dear friend Rav Yeshoshua Dov Kamensky says, ‘the salvation of the Lord comes in the blink of an eye!’)

I suggest our master Moshe sensed this lack very deeply.  Even after standing on Sinai and receiving Hashem’s Torah for all of eternity; even after experiencing the moments that justified the very Creation of the universe; Moshe knew he could only see the Torah completed when it is fully realized in the Land of Israel.  Moshe also knew that the Torah is meant to create a society in the Land of Israel.  For this, he wanted to carry out, just briefly, his role as king at the head of that society.  That is why the aggada says he wanted to enter the Land ‘so that they will be carried out by my agency.’  Just briefly, Moshe wanted to see his role truly complete by leading the Jewish people in a society of Torah in the Land of Israel.  Then, his earthly life would seem truly complete.

Our master models an important lesson for us.  May we be worthy and privileged to experience the fulfillment of the People of Israel in the Land of Israel according to the Torah of Israel.

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