Tag: WeeklyTorah

Vezot Ha-Berakhah: A Path to Follow

“So Moses the servant of the LORD died there…” 34:5

Did Moses record this and the final eight lines of the Torah?

This question has engendered an intense, millenia-long conversation on the nature of Torah and prophecy. It is one of the topics covered in depth in Abraham Joshua Heschel’s Heavenly Torah: As Refracted through the Generations. And his text is a great place to begin exploring this concept.
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Haazinu: Language and Translation

Given the poetic nature of Ha’azinu [“Give Ear”], language and translation are pervasive topics for this portion. One set of phrases to consider appears in 32:18:

You neglected the Rock who begot [y’lad’cha] you,
Forgot the God who labored to bring you forth [m’chol’lecha] — Plaut/Stein

or

The Rock that birthed you [y’lad’cha], you neglected,
you forgot the God that produced-you-in-labor [m’chol’lecha]. — Fox

Fox includes a footnote: “produced-you-in-labor: A reminder that God is not always perceived in exclusively male imagery in the Bible.” The Torah: A Women’s Commentary (Plaut/Stein) offers extensive notes on the two verbs here — both of which are sometimes used in a gender-neutral or masculine context, but most often “to describe the mother’s role in giving birth.”
Continue reading Haazinu: Language and Translation

Haazinu: A Path to Follow

As we near the end of Deuteronomy/Devarim and prepare to begin the cycle again, I think it’s worth taking a few moments to notice the differences between translations/commentaries. Even when the English does not appear to vary much, each translation/commentary shifts the focus slightly. Take, e.g., Devarim/Deuteronomy 32:2:

May my discourse [likchi] come down as the rain [matar],
My speech distill as the dew,
Like showers [se’irim] on young growth,
Like droplets [re’vivim] on the grass. — Plaut/JPS (also Plaut/Stein)
Continue reading Haazinu: A Path to Follow

Haazinu: Something to Notice

The Song of Moses, Devarim/Deuteronomy 32:1-39, also known as Shirat Ha’azinu [“Give Ear”], ranges over past, present and future in Israel’s relationship to God. In outlining the poem’s structure, Nechama Leibowitz cites Moses Mendelssohn‘s Biur and an early 20th Century article published in German.
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Nitzavim: Something to Notice

This portion contains oft-quoted verses about Torah’s accessibility:

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. Continue reading Nitzavim: Something to Notice

Nitzavim: Great Source(s)

…Rabbi Mordechai Joseph Leiner of Izbica interpreted the verse “Then the Lord your God will open up your heart and the hearts of your offspring to love the Lord your God with all your heart and soul, in order that you may live (Deuteronomy 30:6) to indicate that God doesn’t want us to neutralize our passion, but to channel it into the service of committed, ethical, godly living. Only thus, claimed the nineteenth-century Hasidic master, can we model engaged, sanctified life that can enliven both us and our descendants.
— from “A Few Choice Gifts,” by Howard Avruhm Addison. p.294, Continue reading Nitzavim: Great Source(s)