Parashat Va-etchanan Shabbat Nahamu July 28, 2007 / 13 Av 5767

This week's commentary was written by Rabbi Marc Wolf,
Senior Director, Community Development, JTS.

As a people we sat in mourning this week commemorating the destruction of the Temple on the Ninth Day of Av. But in a world where our spiritual life revolves not around the Temple in Jerusalem, but our synagogue down the street, experiencing a meaningful fast is difficult if not impossible. This is so much the case that even rabbis question their connection to the tragedy. Rabbinic legal authorities have grappled over the relevance of the ninth of Av and have discussed whether we should even continue to fast. With the existence of the Jewish State and the unification of Jerusalem as her capital, what relevance does this day hold?

Over the many generations between the destruction of the Temple in 70 CE and today, we have engaged in a continuous search for a thread of relevance that would connect us to this moment in history almost 2,000 years ago. There seems to be no end to the litany of rationales Judaism gives for maintaining our observance. Even in the times of the Mishnah, codified just over 100 years after the destruction of the Temple we read:
Five misfortunes befell our ancestors . . . on the ninth of Av . . . On the ninth of Av it was decreed that our ancestors should not enter the promised land, the Temple was destroyed the first and second time, Bethar was captured and Jerusalem was ploughed up (M Ta'anit 4:6).

The Mishnah offers a laundry list of tragedies that happened on the ninth of Av including the destruction of both the first and second Temples. However, bookending the destruction of the Temples with the fateful date twelve spies returned from scouting the Promised Land, the end of the Bar Kokha revolt, and the final decimation of Jerusalem in 71 CE is somewhat intriguing.

We see with the Mishnah—so close to the momentous loss—that the destruction of the Temple was not a trump card; even then it was not compelling enough to categorically declare the ninth of Av a day of mourning and fasting, so the rabbis expanded the relevance of the date on our calendar.

Throughout history, this list has expanded to include the expulsion of Jews from England (1290) and Spain (1492); the beginning of the extermination of Jews in Treblinka and the Warsaw Ghetto (1942); the bombing of the Asociación Mutua Israelita in Argentina (1994); and just last year the war between Israel and Lebanon eerily coincided with this period of mourning.

For the skeptics out there who doubt the possibility of all these calamities occurring on one specific date, I offer as evidence the journey of a book.

Of the volumes of priceless works in the rare book collection of The Library of The Jewish Theological Seminary, what I can safely share is a personal favorite, is a manuscript Bible written in Spain at the tail end of the fifteenth century. This beautifully crafted work contains not only the Hebrew text in Abraham Kalif, the famous scribe’s able hand, but the Masoretic notes for vocalization and pronunciation. Generally the scribe had the privilege and duty of crafting the colophon on the last page of the work, recognizing his patron and sharing a few key comments on the work itself. However, with this particular Bible, it is not the voice of the scribe that issues forth from the pages, but the sage who added the Masoretic notes, Hayyim ibn Hayyim. In this departure from the norm, Hayyim ibn Hayyim is writing for Kalif’s voice; writing not in Spain, but in Constantinople. The date is 1492.

What makes this work incredible is that Hayyim ibn Hayyim personally witnessed the Alhambra decree of Ferdinand II and Isabelle of Castile that expelled all the Jews from Spain. While the edict was signed at the end of March, it insisted that the Jews leave Spain by the end of July. Hayyim ibn Hayyim concurs not only with the fateful year, but the actual date he packed this Bible on his back and left Spain was recorded as the seventh of Av. While many Jews did not make it out of Spain, this Bible did. Hayyim ibn Hayyim carried with him much more than the precious work of Abraham Kalif; he carried with him a witness to history. As history continued to unfold, we follow the Bible as each owner jots his name around the colophon of Hayyim ibn Hayyim.


This is the force of the litany of “misfortunes” the rabbis began in the aftermath of the destruction of the Temple. When the Mishnah was codified in the year 200, the wounds were still fresh and the pain still present—but the sages began to teach the lesson that would continue through to our generation. Their lesson through the pages of the Mishah was that the sorrow may fade, but relevance must never cease. We must continue to commemorate. The genuine tragedy of the ninth of Av is that we need not look to the Temple for our sorrow. Unfortunately, in every generation, destruction returns. Relevance is renewed.

Shabbat shalom,
Rabbi Marc Wolf

Parashat D'varim Shabbat Hazon July 21, 2007 / 6 Av 5767

This week's commentary was written by Arnold M. EisenChancellor, JTS.
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Maybe it's because I write this column on a JTS mission to Israel, but my attention, when reading the opening parashah of the Book of Deuteronomy this year, has been riveted by a single little word in the first line of the first chapter. Describing the site of Moses' final oration to the Israelites—the book in its entirety comprises that address—the Torah recounts that it took place be-ever ha-yarden, across the Jordan, (Deuteronomy 1:1). The narrator's point of view is not that of the events described. We are instead placed inside the Promised Land, looking outward, across, to the place where the Israelites heard Moses' speech. Only after hearing it did they take the final steps toward the land promised to their ancestors—and inherited by us. What to them was faith, hope, expectation, is to us, the Torah's readers, fact, history, achievement. They did get to walk the land. So, too, in 2007, can we. The little word be-ever, across, is crucial to all that Deuteronomy comes to teach us.

I know, of course, that for some scholars of Bible there is a much simpler explanation of the word. It proves, in their view, that Moses did not write the Torah, and God did not dictate it. The point of view adopted by the text is quite naturally not that of the Israelites in the wilderness, for whom "across the Jordan" would have meant inside the Land of Israel. It expresses the standpoint of much later authors, who simply "told it as they saw it."

Maybe so. I am not here to contest matters of authorship. My point is rather the spiritual power stored up in one little word in the first line of this book that has a lot to teach us about the power of words. The book's name after all is Devarim (Words). Moses must use words to unique effect in this address because it is the final speech he will give. Israel must listen to special effect ("shema Yisra'el," he urges more than once; "Hear, Israel!") because Moses cannot accompany them across the river. He cannot refine his words to suit the circumstances they will encounter. He cannot raise his voice or modulate it, speak to the rock or hit it with his staff, summon signs of divine confirmation or offer proof of divine displeasure. All the Israelites can take with them from now on are his words.

His message has to be more than good. When Moses finishes this speech he will die, and they will cross the river. Depending on how well they hear him, they either will or will not inherit the land in its full promise. Their days upon it will be numbered accordingly. Never have words mattered more. It cannot be coincidence that the name of the book means not only words, but things: realities, facts on the ground. The words Moses speaks have to be adequate to the realities that Israelites/Jews will face in every generation, beginning with the one he addresses directly. Their actions, the facts they build on the ground, literally and figuratively, in turn have to be worthy of the words that Moses transmitted to them. The davar in each case, on each side of the river, must be true to the davar on the other.

This remains the case in every generation and in every radically new situation; the need to hear well is acute each time that we set out, or send out others, to cross whatever river currently separates us or them from new possibilities. It could be graduation, a job, marriage, or retirement; it could be a task one has long avoided or long sought; it could be the start of another month, another year, which beckons with the chance to do a better job at hearing God's voice or the Torah's or our own. In each case one needs to turn one's back on wilderness wandering, while not forgetting—as Moses, in this parashah, tries to make sure the Israelites will not forget—the errors and misfortunes that made that place wilderness and kept us captive there.

We know, if we are adults, that we will likely never reach the Promised Land. Our children will, or theirs after them. But we know, too, that they have no chance of attaining it, and we won't get anywhere worth being either, unless we set out for that Promised Land and do all we can to make it there.

Moses takes pains to fix the current location of the Israelites with precision. It is as if he is saying to them,
Here we are, you and I. Eleven days from Sinai, after traveling thirty-eight long years. Near Suph. Between Paran and Tophel, Laban, Hazeroth, and Di-zahab. After Sinai and the golden calf, devotion and provocation, bickering and nobility of spirit—here is where we are. Now let's get moving. It's time to take God's devarim and make them into yours, to shape realities worthy of the potential stored up in you by God. Hear well for a change, O Israel. Enter the land that is your inheritance. Taste the life of fulfillment that no human being before you has been privileged to know. It starts here, right here, where you are.

The opportunity is positively terrifying. One feels it even now, especially now, nearly sixty years into renewed Jewish possession of the land and responsibility for what is accomplished there. No more whining about what others do to us in exile (or so one hopes). No more critique from outside the halls of power—across the river, as it were, from agency and action. The "subjects of history" are now us, where this state is concerned. Never in 2,000 years has the opportunity to transform devarim into devarim been greater—and, as a consequence, never has the disparity between the two been more glaring.

The responsibility is terrifying. That is why, I think, this first parashah in the Book of Devarim concludes with Moses' reminder to the Israelites of the wonders that they "have seen with their own eyes," and the injunction not to fear. "For it is the Lord your God who will battle for you." Let me avoid for now the vexing matter of God's role as warrior—one aspect of the larger theological issue we call providence—and read the verse this way. Now as ever we want our lives aligned to whatever plan God has for us and the world. We hope to use our time well. We want to make God's words real in the world. As Deuteronomy will remind us before Moses concludes his address, these things and words are not beyond reach across the sea or up in heaven, but "Very close to you, in your mouth and in your heart, to do them" (Deuteronomy 30:12).

It helps a great deal, as we undertake that task, inside or outside the land of Israel, by imagining ourselves on the far side of achievement, looking back. These are the words that Moses addressed; now ours is to speak and do.

Shabbat shalom,
Arnold M. Eisen

Parashat B'midbar

Numbers 1:1 - 4:20
May 19, 2007/2 Sivan 5767
Numbers always stands in pointed contrast to Leviticus. The overarching order of the book of the Torah that we have just completed — the routines of sacrifice, the hierarchies of priesthood, the distinctions between purity and pollution, permitted and forbidden — all this soon gives way to B’midbar, "in the wilderness," to challenges of a different sort. The book starts by counting the people and arranging the camp for travel. But soon, we know, all those counted will be held responsible for the spies’ rebellion. Moses' cousin Korah will attempt insurrection. The camp will wander without hope of reaching the Promised Land. We turn from Leviticus to Numbers, aware that the real world awaits us there: the one in desperate need of sacred order. We, like the Israelites, clearly have a lot to learn.

JTS Weekly Torah Commentary

-hoping to bring some of my spiritual life into my blog, not to be preachy but to find strength.-
Parashat B'har/ B'hukkotaiLeviticus 25:1 - 27:34 May 12, 2007/24 Iyyar 5767

These two portions unite with the promise of blessings and the warning of curses.
Blessings, curses, reprieve, curses, consolation. The ups and downs of life — the highs and lows of our existence. The challenges and successes, the failures, and what we will learn from them. And all the while, וזכרתי את בריתי— God will remember us.
And above all, remember that after you experience life’s blessings and curses, there is always the beautiful חזק חזק ונתחזק waiting for you.
---This week's commentary was written by Hazzan Henry Rosenblum,Dean, H.L. Miller Cantorial School and College of Jewish Music.