Shalom Friends;
This week, our Parshat HaShevua, Devarim is being sponsored by Mutti and Michele Frankel of Ramat Beit Shemesh dedicated for a Refuah Shleyma for Civia Chaya bas Alta Mishket, Rav Shmuel Yehuda Ben Baruch Mordechai, for kol Cholei of Am Yisrael and for the safety of the Chayalim and the liberation of all remaining hostages and that they’re brought home without experiencing any further harm, as well as for the good health and security of kol Am Yisrael. To the Frankel family, many thanks for your sponsorship and your continued kindnesses.
You can celebrate a Simcha — a birth, a Bar/Bat Mitzvah, a Chassuna or other Simcha event in your life, or commemorate a Yahrtzeit of a loved one, or for whatever other reason by sponsoring a Parshat HaShevua.
Please forward to your relatives and friends and encourage them to sponsor a Parshat HaShevua. And please be in contact with me with any questions, or for further details.
Best Regards,
Moshe Burt
olehchadash@yahoo.com
skype: mark.burt3
*********************************************
We open our Parshat Devarim with an excerpt from Rabbi Shmuel Goldin’s Parsha Summary in his Sefer, “Unlocking the Torah Text,” Sefer Devarim (page 1) :
Moshe opens his first address by recalling events experienced a generation earlier: ….He reminds the people of the sin of the spies and of the painful aftermath of that event, resulting in the nation’s long years of wilderness wandering.
Torah relates Moshe Rabbeinu stating to Am Yisrael:
“All of you approached me and said, ‘Let us send men ahead of us and let them spy out the Land, and bring word back to us: the road on which we should ascend and the cities to which we should come.'” (Sefer Devarim, Perek 1, posuk 22 rendered to English in the Artscroll Stone Edition Chumash)
Rabbi Artscroll (i.e. the Artscroll Stone Edition Chumash) provides commentary regarding the word – kulchem: “All of you” (page 945) :
In this word [kulchem], the Sages find a key to the disastrous outcome of the mission. The people approached Moshe in a disorderly, disrespectful manner, with the young people pushing ahead of elders, and older people pushing ahead of leaders. This was in sharp contrast to Perek 5, posukim 20 – 23, when the entire nation came with a request [where they requested that Hashem speak to Moshe, and that Moshe convey Hashem’s words to Am Yisrael, lest “we die when this great fire consumes us], but with decorum and dignity. (Artscroll Chumash citing Rashi) When there is no respect, the approach must be suspect. Alternatively, such an important proposal should have been put forward by the leaders, not as a raucous, mass demand. (Artscroll Chumash citing Sforno)
Ostensibly, the request for spies was not based on a lack of faith, but on a logical desire for the information that was needed to plan military strategy: which road, i.e., route, to choose and which cities to subdue first. (Artscroll Chumash citing Rashi)
Rabbi Zelig Pliskin brings additional clarity in commenting on Sefer Devarim, Perek 1, posuk 22 in his Sefer “Growth Through Torah, (pages 384 – 385) :
At first glance, this lack of orderliness seems to be just a small lack of derech eretz, why was it mentioned together with the severe offense of the acceptance of the slander of the spies and the refusal to listen to the Almighty’s will to enter the land? Rabbi Naftali Tzvi Berlin cited the reply of his father-in-law, Rabbi Yitzchok of Volozhin. This lack of derech eretz of the people is attached to the transgression of the spies to increase the severity of their offense. The people might have tried to lessen the offense by saying that their original plan to send the spies was correct, but that later on they were negatively influenced by the evil report of the spies. Therefore Moshe showed them that right from the start something was seriously wrong. When people are involved in a project that is really proper, they will have appropriate derech eretz at the very beginning of the venture. Since in the matter of sending the spies they acted rudely and unruly they should have realized that they were doing something wrong. (Rabbi Pliskin citing HaAmek Davar)
….Getting off to a good start is crucial in spiritual matters for it is a strong sign of one’s true inner attitudes toward what one is planning to do.
This author views what seems to be parallel between the disunity of Am Yisrael over the past near year and a half leading up to 7 October — the War of Simchat Torah, through today, and the disrespect and disorder of how the Am approached Moshe Rabbeinu requesting for spies to scout the Land, the way in which the spies returned, ignoring protocol (noun: customs and regulations dealing with diplomatic formality, precedence, and etiquette) in bypassing Moshe and Aaron, and going directly to the Am with their evil report and the subsequent crying and wailing reaction of the Am.
We recall how factions of the Am, among them two former prime ministers, protested and demonstrated in such a discordant (adjective: disagreeable to the ear; dissonant; harsh) and disrespectful manner against the proposed judicial reform legislation such as soldiers and reservists of these factions threatened the government and the nation with mass violations of military activation orders, with air force pilots threatening not to fly their jets, etc.
And this discord among the Am connected with the hubris, the evolution among Israel’s military high command of a galut mentality, arrogance, power-hunger and subservience to the will of a morally corrupt so-called “great ally” due to virtual addiction to American foreign aid, weaponry and the resultant strings attached,
The result of this confluence (noun: a coming together of people or things; concourse) of events was a perception of Israel’s weakness by terrorists such as Hamas, Hezbollah and their Iranian sponsors. This perception has led to the catastrophic Gaza War of Simchat Torah.
The perceived weakness on the part of Israel’s governance, due to the discord among the Am, has brought us to the state of affairs we are facing and continue to face today, and conjures up ways in which today’s state of affairs could parallel the event of the miraglim.
And the same exact discordant factions who opposed the proposed judicial reform legislation (laws which would create checks and balances on Israel’s Supreme Court and judiciary which are appointed by groups of lawyers not representative of the governed) were the very factions which, once the war hostilities began, hijacked segments of the hostage families such that they demand a ceasefire and end to the war, at all costs, perceiving that the barbaric Hamas animals and their collaborators — the “innocent Gazan civilians” — will then release all the remaining hostages.
Such a disastrous ceasefire, at all costs — were it to come to pass, would undoubtedly mean that all terror fatalities and fatalities among the Chayalim would have been in vain and Israel’s security and wellbeing would be in dire peril.
Rabbi Pliskin posited (adjective: claimed or assumed as a fact or principle, especially as a basis for argument or further investigation) in his above citing of Rabbi Naftali Tzvi Berlin that when the disorderly crowd charged Moshe Rabbeinu asking for spies: Moshe, retrospectively (verb — used with an object: to look back upon) in our Parshat Devarim, informed the people that something was amiss (adverb: out of the right or proper course, order, or condition; improperly; wrongly; astray) and that they, therefore, should have realized that they were doing something wrong and that the lack derech eretz of the people is attached to the transgression of the spies to increase the severity of their offense. So too, these contemporary discordant factions have sinned against The Almighty, just as the Am Yisrael sinned in BaMidbar. Perhaps due to the divisiveness and threats regarding military service made by these factions of Am Yisrael, that these divisive factions share responsibility for the vulnerability perceived by the barbarous, sub-human Hamas, Hezbollah terrorists and their “innocent Gazan civilian” collaborators and Iranian sponsors which led to 7 October — the War of Simchat Torah as well as the flawed actions of the military high command at the outset, as well as in the seemingly politically-oriented conduct of the war.
May it be that our Chayalim, regardless of the machinations of their high command, emerge totally victorious — eradicating from the face of the earth Hamas, their terrorist buddies and the so-called “innocent civilians” of Gaza who joined with Hamas in their murderous deeds, that the Chayalim return home whole — physically, mentally and spiritually and that the Chayalim Liberate and bring home all remaining hostages. And may we see the restoration of true unity within Am Yisrael.
May we, the B’nei Yisrael be zocha that our brethren — the refugee families from Gush Katif be permanently re-settled in Gush Katif, once the IDF, by the Yad Hashem, destructs and eradicates the wild beasts of Hamas, Islamic Jihad, Hezbollah, all other terror entities, and if necessary Iran, and that our brethren be made totally whole — be totally restituted for all that was stolen from them, that the thrice expelled families of Amona be restored to their rebuilt homes and the oft-destroyed Yeshiva buildings in Homesh be rebuilt, as well as the buildings of Yishuv Elchanan, all at total government expense. May our Chayalim return from battle unharmed — physically, mentally and spiritually and may all of the remaining hostages brutally taken by the wild beasts of Hamas be liberated and brought home to their families. Baruch Hashem that our dear brother Jonathan Pollard is now in his fourth year at home in Eretz Yisrael and continues in a new chapter in his life. May Esther Yocheved bat Yechiel Avraham have an aliyah in Shemayim and may her spirit and memory continue to lift Jonathan to at least 120 years. May the MIAs be liberated alive and returned to us in ways befitting Al Kiddush Hashem — as with the return in April, 2019, via Russia, of the remains of Zachariah Baumel, as should the remains of the two chayalim from the Gaza War of nine years ago. May we have the courage and strength to stand up and physically prevent the possibility of Chas V’Challila any future eviction of Jews from their homes and prevent Chas V’Challila the handing of Jewish land over to anyone, let alone to enemies sworn to Israel’s and Judaism’s destruction and eradication. May we see, in 5784, the REAL Jews from the Ukraine and Russia as well as the US and Canada, the real Jews via matrilineal descent, make Aliyah enmass — via thorough review by Misrad HaPanim. And may we soon and finally see the total end to the Communist Chinese Wuhan Lab corona virus pandemic and all like viruses and variants. May we fulfill Hashem’s blueprint of B’nei Yisrael as a Unique people — an Am Segula, not to be reckoned with as with “the nations” and may we be zocha to see the Moshiach, the Ge’ula Shlaima, as Dov Shurin sings; “Ki Karov Yom Hashem Al’Kol HaGoyim”, the Ultimate Redemption, bimhayrah b’yamainu — speedily, in our time”, — Achshav, Chik Chuk, Miyad, Etmol!!!
Chodesh Tov and Good Shabbos!
———————————————————
Moshe Burt, an Oleh, is a commentator on news and events in Israel and Founder and Director of The Sefer Torah Recycling Network. He lives in Ramat Beit Shemesh.
*********************************************************