In the Exodus version of the Ten Principles, Commandments, the reason given for keeping one day a week devoted to God, is because in the creative process of the world God rested on the Seventh Day. Active creativity requires a counterpoint. The physical needs the spiritual to complement it. It is not just a matter of a negative day off…
Sefer Devarim
The Shema
This week’s reading includes the Shema. “Listen Israel, God is your God and there is only One God.” Here we have the very core of Jewish ideas. We do not have complicated theologies telling us in detail how and what to believe, just these very basic general concepts. In the Shema we are asked simply to accept the existential reality…
Different Versions
Why are there different versions of the Ten Principles? Or different versions of what happened on mount Sinai. Who spoke to whom and who heard what is not at all clear. Or repeated stories? Take Shabbat, at one stage we are commanded to “remember.” On another to “keep.” In The song we sing on Friday night, Lecha Dodi, we say…
History
The Book of Devarim, Deuteronomy, is the farewell message of Moses after forty years in the wilderness, before he dies and before he passes the baton on to Joshua. It contains two parts. The first is the apparent recapitulation by Moses of the history of the past forty years. As he tells it. As he remembers it. And the great…
Repetition Helps Learning
Devarim is the last book of the Torah and in general terms it repeats all the essential laws, ideas and history of the first four books. You might well ask why is it necessary to repeat the Torah? There are several answers our rabbis give. Not least is that over the forty-year period different situations and new circumstances required modifications,…
Horma
After the Children of Israel are told in the Book of Numbers that they must delay a generation before invading Canaan, a group of them decide to go and attack regardless. They called the ma’apilim. Those who dare, but not in a good sense. Moses warns them not to and tells them in advance they will not succeed. They go…