…when all Israel comes to appear before the Lord your God in the place that He will choose, you shall read this Teaching aloud in the presence of all Israel.12 Gather the people — men, women, children, and the strangers in your communities — that they may hear and so learn to revere the Lord your God and to observe faithfully every word of this Teaching. Their children, too, who have not had the experience, shall hear and learn to revere the Lord your God as long as they live in the land… D’varim / Deuteronomy 31:11-13
Moshe speaks with incredible urgency as he tries sum up the Teaching to which he has devoted his life and ensure that it endures into the future. The Torah presents a model for speaking to the Children of Israel in every time and place; messaging in a way that leads our ancestors, and ultimately us, to carry forward the enterprise that Moses presents as God’s intermediary.
Moshe’s inspiring words reach us thanks to generations of Jews who have maintained the covenant, lived Torah in their daily lives, and taught its meaning in their communities. This unbroken chain stretches into the future with Jews millennia from now able to hear Moshe’s voice and keep faith with the covenant articulated in the Torah.
I hear an echo of Moshe’s message as articulated in our Torah portion in a passage we recite daily in our morning liturgy.
Your teaching is true and enduring, Your words are established forever. Awesome and revered are they, unceasingly right; Well-ordered are they, always acceptable. They are eloquent, majestic, and pleasant, our precious, everlasting legacy… God’s teachings are precious and abiding; they live forever. For our ancestors, for us, for our children, for every generation of the people Israel, for all ages from the first to the last, God’s teachings are true, everlasting.
– Siddur Sim Shalom, Shacharit (Morning) Service
Unstated, but essential, is the role of the Jewish people in preserving, transmitting, and maintaining the magnificence of these teachings. Implicit in the prayer is Moshe’s urging the people to, “Follow the path of Torah. It is made for you, for human beings, not for angels.” Given the reality of our being human beings we will inevitably err and stray from the path. We will make mistakes. There will be things we regret having done and things we regret leaving undone. Embedded in Moshe’s teaching is the reassurance that if we stray, we can return. God offers us a second chance, and a third, hopeful that we will eventually become better versions of ourselves. In emulation of the Holy One, individuals and communities can extend forgiveness to one another.
Rambam, Maimonides, in his Hilchot Teshuvah (Laws of Repentance), urges us not to doubt that we human beings have the capacity to choose good over evil. We cannot change the past but there is much we can change into the future. We can grow into the person God envisions us to be, a person who receives and bestows blessing, an active member of a community that practices goodness and mitigates suffering.
Our Torah portion on this Shabbat Shuvah, and our daily liturgy crafted by Cha”zal, our ancient, blessed sages, urge us to recommit ourselves to a path of Torah and loving-kindness; to walk the pathway of our ancestors and point the way for our descendants.
Shabbat Shalom –
Rabbi David M. Eligberg
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