Jeremy Rosen
Making Sense of the Bible: Deuteronomy 26, Samaritan Secrets
Jeremy Rosen | Making Sense of the Bible, Deuteronomy 26: Samaritan Secrets
- Ladies and gentlemen, that was Beethoven’s Triple Concerto for cello and violin and one of my favourite pieces of music. So bright and lively. So it puts me in a good mood. So we did Bach in the past and now we’re going to Beethoven. There’s so much to choose from, so it’s just quite random what I pick. And if any of you have any suggestions, please feel free. So we are officially up to Deuteronomy chapter 26. We have finished the lists of laws which make up the constitution of the Jewish people. And like all constitutions, it has gone through changes and developments, but the core ideas are there and they are the first step when one goes to deal nowadays with Jewish legal issues, whether civil or religious, we start with the biblical text. We go on to the Talmudic text, and from there we pursue the law through the various generations of legal scholars that are constantly examining and challenging. One might suggest that they’re not challenging enough and one might also suggest, as I do, that there’s a male chauvinist strain running through which, in my view, has a deleterious effect on the development of the law. But the other side is that things do move slowly and ultimately and eventually they get things right. Now in chapter 26 we have two laws that concern what’s going to happen when they get to the land of Israel. So now we’ve shift our subject to the future of the people about to enter the land and what they’re going to do in the land.
And in this chapter 26, we are going to deal with two laws which I will pass through without spending too much time on looking at the actual text. But if I can describe them, the first one in the first fruits is when you get to the land and you have your first harvest, you should take your first fruits and you should put them in a nice basket and bring the basket to whichever place will be the religious centre, whether it’s the tabernacle or later on the temple. And you will appear before the priest and you will make a declaration. And the declaration will be that, “I am coming and dedicating the first fruits of the land. But I am so grateful how we’ve got to come here.” We started off with the famous phrase, you’ll know from the Haggadah Pesach, that, “My father was once an Aramean and we went down to Egypt and we came out of Egypt. And here we are today in a home of our own and we have to be grateful to God for that.” And so this is a very, very important custom. And just jumping on ahead for a moment, when the kingdom split after Solomon died between the south, Judea, with Jerusalem of the temple, and the north with two pagan temples in the north, that’ve been set up by Jeroboam, Jeroboam was very, very worried that in this new country of his, if they keep on going down to Judea to the temple, then that would undermine his autonomy. And therefore as the Bible says, the first thing he did was to prevent people going from the north down to the south for the temple and for the ceremony. And this was a problem for first fruits ‘cause a lot of people in the north were agricultural and wanted to bring their first fruits to the temple. And so as the Bible and as the Talmud explained, there was a whole method of disguising what they were coming down to Jerusalem for. They were allowed to go to and fro but not bring their fruits.
That would be a betrayal. So all this goes back to the principle of first fruits. And the second law that’s mentioned here is the law of tithes. Tithes, essentially, are taxes. And there are three kinds of tithes that are mentioned in the Torah and carry on through Talmudic era. There’s the tithe for the priesthood, which, essentially, maintains the religious institutions of the country. There are different kinds of tithes. Masseteric the first, marsheceni, and then there is the third maseroni. The tithe has to be given to the poor. And this was on rotation. So this deals basically with the obligation to support the institutions of the state. And at the same time it’s part of the important system of charity. So those are the two laws mentioned in chapter 26. And now I want to turn to chapter 27. And now Moses is preparing them for the transition. Verse one, Israel and Moses and the elders of Israel together come and they declare, “Remember you’ve got to stick to the constitution.” And verse two, , “And when you cross over the river, Jordan, , to the land that God is giving you, you must put up two big stones and and then plaster over them.” Now big stones we know from previously, from the Assyrians, from the Babylonians, from Oer, that these big stone tablets were carved in with declarations and with laws and rules. So what they’re going to have are these two big stones of witnesses. In other words, everybody is going to see these stones. Verse three, “And you should write on them the whole of the Torah.” That’s a lot of writing and that’s a lot of stone.
“So you should write all the words of the Torah when you come into this land, this land flowing with milk and honey which God has given you.” “And therefore, in verse four, "it’s very important that when you cross the river Jordan,” and once again this is the triple repetition of things, you establish these stones. on Mount Aval.“ Now there are two mountains that are specifically mentioned in the Torah, in the land of Israel there’s Mount Aval and there’s Mount Gerizim. And it’s going to emerge over time, as we’re going to see, that each one of these mountains represented the Jewish people in terms of their identity and in terms of their obligations. So these stones are going to carry the Torah. They’re going to be on stone with plaster on top in which they will be written or possibly carved in the way that cuneiform was carved into stone with these little chips. ” And you will also have an altar there, an altar of stones in which you will not be using anything metal in order to make the stones fit.“ Rather like the first altar that was described on Mount Sinai giving the Torah no metal because metal is a symbol of war and we want this to be a symbol of peace. ” this altar you’ll be with full stones and that’s where you should offer up sacrifices to your God. you should offer up sh'lamim.“ Now sh'lamim are those sacrifices which everybody shares. ” And you will eat there together. And you should be happy. “ So happiness is recurring theme here. Always be happy, always look on the bright side of life. ” And once again I repeat,“ here’s your third time, "On these stones everything in the Torah that is very, very clear and distinct.”
Although the term can also mean interpreting it well. And that is the name of one of the major commentaries on the . The a good explanation, we’ve got to understand it and it’s got to be there accessible to everybody. This is the important thing that in other cases the law is hidden away. It’s only for export, it’s only for lawyers. Here we are saying we want everybody to have access to it. How long those stones were built and how long they lasted, we have no idea and no trace of them. But clearly from this mount Aval was supposed to be the mountain where you sacrificed. So one must assume that Mount Aval was the equivalent of the temple, but the temple hasn’t been built yet. And so once we do this, verse nine, “ Moses and the priests and Levites will declare to everybody, be very quiet. Listen carefully, this is your commitment. We are committing you to be a people loyal to God. You shall listen to God. I command you today. ” And now we have an important ceremony. And the ceremony consists, I’ll just broadly describe it to you in advance. These two mountains, Gerizim and Aval, mentioned in the Torah. No mention of Mount Zion or anything like that yet. It hasn’t come about. Aval for sacrifices and Gerizim, they are two mountains. There’s a valley in between. The children of Israel are going to be divided, six tribes on one mountaintop, six times on the other mountaintop and in the middle they’re going to be the priests. And obviously the acoustics must have been fantastic because the priests are going to turn one side and declare the blessings and another side they’re going to turn and declare what they call the curses.
But I dislike this use of blessing and cursing because it has so many other connotations. And rather what they’re saying is we are pointing out that in life there is a good side and a bad side. You can choose, “Are you going to be good, are you going to be bad?” So in verse 12, “They will stand, these priests in the middle and to bless the people who are standing on Mount Gerizim. When you go over the Jordan and the tribes there will be in the other half will stand while they listen to what’s going wrong, what can go wrong. And it’s going to be the Levites who are going to speak in a good voice. Why the Levites? Interesting. 'Cause the Levites are going to be the singers, they’re going to be the guys with the voices, the operatic basses and tenors, the loud voice, and they will be heard very clearly. And now we’re going to start off with the curses. ” Cursed be the person, or bad news for the person, who makes any kind of an image, which is something that God cannot bear.“ This term abhor, dislike, It goes against everything God is standing for. ” anything that is craft and made the and doesn’t put it publicly, but keeps it privately in his house.“ So we are dealing with a private secret action. "And then having said that, all the people will then answer , yes.” And the term amain comes from this word, to be firm. It’s translated as a belief, but basically it means we agree, we are firm, we’re committed. Then something else. “ , Bad is the guy who insults or attacks his parents.
"And everybody will say yes.” Well that’s obviously what’s something going on in the house? What’s going on secretly at home, something bad at home going on? 17: , Cursed is the person who moves the boundary of his neighbour. In other words, steals his land by moving the marks by, in other words, not respecting the property of the other person. Respect the property and avoid taking that out in deception. 18: , Bad news for the guy who misdirects, who leads somebody off the track, we had it before this law about “Don’t put a stumbling block in front of a blind man.” Don’t mislead people. Try to be honest with people. Everybody says yes. And then 19, , We curse or bad news for those people who distort the law, who pervert the law, who use the law to remove something or to oppress the stranger. Very important, this stranger. Very open to strangers. the orphan. the widow. So again, people can bribe, can do things quietly and secretly to get the law to do what they want to do, curse them. And then we have somebody who lies with, who takes advantage of the father’s mother, the wife, rather. Because this in a sense is a lack of respect for the parent, for the father. But again, it is symbolic of sexual immorality, which is usually carried out in secret. And then, strange thing here, but it must have been very common at that stage, somebody who sleeps with animals. Well yes, unfortunately that was very, very common. And there are some people who think it’s still common today. And if I may be so bold as to tell you a rather off-color joke, if somebody comes across a sheep tied up in the Welsh mountains, what do you call it?
The answer is you call it a leisure centre. Now I make this joke because I just read horrible stories about how in the University of Wales, anybody who is discovered to be Jewish is not only attacked, but driven out of the university. So they deserve that bad reputation. Okay, 22: Cursed is the person who sleeps with his sister, family, he has incest, somebody who sleeps with the in-laws. And then somebody, in verse 24, who hits somebody, attacks somebody, strikes somebody. And then in number five, cursed it is the person who takes a bribe. And then, 26, a more generic term, the person who does not adhere to the constitution. And everybody says amen. Now the big question of course is, “Why those specific laws?” I mean we’ve already had the laws given before and why just pick on those? You’d thought they’d pick on Shabbat, you’d thought they’d pick on kushrich if they were religious, you thought that would come into it. But no, these are all universal civil issues that basically depend on secrecy and not being in the open. And so the stones are giving you the law. What this special ceremony is saying, it’s over and above the law. There’s the spirit of the law, there’s the way you relate to each other. And if you are going to come into a land and be a people with a sense of identity, you must work together. And I wonder how much that resonates with us now in the state of Israel. But this was this ceremony that Moses is describing now for them to do when they cross over the river. The interesting thing that I’ve mentioned before in some of my blogs and other things is that the Samaritans, to this day, have their temple on Mount Gerizim. Actually their temple on Mount Gerizim was destroyed several times, first of all by the Byzantine Christians.
And then the Muslims didn’t like it there either, but they still go up to Mount Gerizim. There are not many of them left, but there are some of them live on the West Bank, some of them live in Holon in Israel, some of them live in the United States of America. They go there to sacrifice their peschal lamb. Every Pesach, they take a lamb up that mountain and they sacrifice it on Gerizim. Interesting that they chose to put their temple on Gerizim and not Aval. Because the Torah here says Aval was the place where they were supposed to have their sacrifices. But the Samaritans, as you know, just briefly to go over, when the Assyrians destroyed the northern kingdom, the 10 northern tribes, and scattered them around the empire, they imported other people from the empire to come and settle there so as not to let the land be abandoned and also to make sure that the others didn’t come back again. And because the area was called Samaria, that’s why they were called Samaritans. And initially they had a tough time and the reason why they had a tough time was because there were plagues or whatever it was. And they turned to the king of Assyria and said, “Look, we are suffering here because we don’t know the local gods. There must be a local God. So please go down to send somebody from Judea, the priest there, to teach us what the religion is.” And so the Samaritans therefore adopted the Torah and the Jewish tradition in the north, even though they were separated from the Judeans in the south.
When the Babylonians came along and conquered the south and they took the Jews over there to Babylon, there were only the Samaritans left. And eventually when the Jews wanted to come back, the Samaritans said, “No, you can’t come back. We are here, we are the Jews now, this is us.” Again ringing a bell. And they try to block building the temple in Jerusalem and they try to undermine everything. And although Cyrus is the king who gave permission, it wasn’t until Darius that they got permission again to rebuild and get on. And finally they coexisted with the Samaritans and continued through the Talmudic period. Sometimes friendly, sometimes not. But the interesting thing is that the Samaritans have a text of the Torah, very similar to ours to this very day, but written in the earlier script and there are minor differences. But the one thing that Samaritans do not accept, the rabbinic law, which they say was imported from Babylon and doesn’t belong to them. So they follow the Torah and the Torah talks about Gerizim and Aval. So they follow one part of it in having their temple on Gerizim, but they ignore the other part of having sacrifices on Aval. Just an interesting footnote of history. And so now we’re going to carry on in verse 28. And verse 28 is now going to be this declaration, and a long declaration in which Moses says, “If you listen to the words of God, everything’s going to be fine. But if you don’t listen to the words of God, it’s going to be an absolute disaster. Everything’s going to go wrong, you’re going to lose everything.”
And it’s amazing, this constant theme that Moses, as he is about to die and leave them, is saying time and time again. And over the next four chapters we’re going to hear the same theme being repeated again and again and again. And I don’t think it is obviously very interesting to go over each one of these verses and I suggest that if you are interested, you can read it for yourselves. But essentially the message really boils down to what I’ve been saying. If you are bad, you’re going to have a bad time and if you’re good you’re going to have a good time. And this is the message. Now of course we know it doesn’t always work out that way, but that is an important element of the Torah and it is common. Many constitutions and tribes and peoples at that time had this similar sort of declaration that was read out publicly all the time. And I don’t enjoy it when this part is being read out in the Torah. It’s usually done very quietly or get through it very quickly because it doesn’t make pleasant reading. So I want instead to turn now to one of the selections I’m going to make as we go through this. And if you’d like please to turn to Deuteronomy 29. Deuteronomy 29, a Nitzavim, which happens to be my Bar Mitzvah Cedera, has a very interesting introduction which also creates theological problems in the same way that the previous ones do. This whole question of, “Does God reward or does God punish?” So here we are, verse nine: I’ve gathered you all together, says Moses, before God, the heads, heads of your tribes, your elders, your officers, Israel, everybody. And here notice it says Israel, but it says your your babies, your women, the stranger, from the lowest, from those who chop wood to those who draw water, you are all gathered today for a ceremony, a public ceremony to confirm your commitment, the covenant with the Lord of your God, which God is remaking with you today.
And the purpose, in verse 12, is in order to establish you as his people, God will be your God as He promised to your fathers, Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. Verse 13: But not just with you lot am I making the covenant, and giving you the sanctions and the punishments as you go if you abandon it. But with those who are here standing with before God and those who are not here, future generations, this covenant is a covenant for future generations. “I’m thinking in the long term,” says God. you know very well. verse 15, that you are in the land of Egypt and we passed through these away from this nation. 16: You saw how corrupt it was and how they worshipped idols. Now I want to say, in verse 17, I want to give you a choice. Do you want to be like them or do you want to be like I’m suggesting? Maybe there’s a man or a woman or even a family or even , a tribe who doesn’t want to be part of this to go and serve these other nations. These other nations may be somebody they are lacking in some way. There’s something not quite right And, in verse 18, when they listen to these words that I’ve been telling you, he will be able to feel good about the fact to say it’s okay, I’ve been allowed to go my own way because God has given me a choice. “Will you adhere to me or will you not? Will you accept my covenant or will you not?” And thank you very much. I don’t want to. In order to confuse what is dry and what is wet, what is good and what is bad. Now it’s true, I am saying that you do have a choice and it’s clear that you do. And this is an interesting issue because our question of whether humans have choice is under philosophical attack and scientific attack all the time. But the assumption here is you have a choice to disobey and clearly people do.
Verse 19, God will not forgive him. God will be very angry. All the bad things that happen in this book will happen and his name will disappear. Well we don’t know if everything happens that way. After all, we see that people who abandon Judaism do very well often. And the whole question of reward and punishment is something for another day and another discussion. But nevertheless, this is an interesting point of view that the Torah accepts. And basically what he is saying is you can choose, you can choose not to adhere, but if you do, you will disappear. And think over the years how many Jews have disappeared either through oppression or voluntarily through assimilation. It has happened throughout our history and that is the reality and that’s why only a few people are left. and such a person will then be cut off, not part of the tribes of Israel because of everything we’ve done. , 21, And later generations who come afterwards. And not only that, but even foreigners from parts of the world will see what terrible things happen that have befallen us because we weren’t together, we divided. And sulphur and salt and bile and bones and explosions will come down just as they did on Soddom and Gomorrah, Admah, Zeboiim, those countries of the Dead Sea. 23: Until the nations will say, “ why did God let this happen? Why this anger?” and they will say clearly, “ They abandoned the covenants of their God.” So this is the continuation of this speech in which God is saying, Moses is saying, “You have the choice. You can do this if you want to. If you don’t, you will disappear and that will be the punishment, your disappearance.”
And in verse 28, In verse 28, you have a strange line. So this is verse 28 of chapter 29. And there is so much disagreement about this, I can’t begin to tell you: Those things which are hidden, which are secrets, they are God’s concern. But those things which are clear are for us and our obligation is to keep the Torah. Now one way of looking at this is to say, “Look, God is secret.” That is to say, “We don’t know how God works. We’ll never work out because we’re humans and God is God. So there’s a world out there that is secret, that is God’s. So don’t try to understand God.” But what we can know is how we should behave our constitution, so to speak, that is there in black and white for us. That’s the only thing we know for certain, which, in a way, almost allows for the controversial issue of whether it’s possible, if you don’t believe in God, to still be a good Jew. And, in certain respects, I’m sure that’s right. Then there’s another area here. And the other area here is those who want to say this is really talking about secular and religious. That is to say, “The secrets of the universe, how the universe works, that’s God’s work and nothing we can do about it. The only thing we can do about it is adhere to the Torah.” And they use this as a way of saying, “And therefore let’s leave that to other people.
Other people can be the scientists, other people can do other things. We’ve got to focus on Torah.” Now of course, I don’t think that is correct and along with Maimonities I think it is, and Sajugayon, and many of the great mediaeval rabbis, it is essential for us to explore the scientific and the rational world as much as it is for us to commit ourselves to the spiritual. But there is another word, , which I think is very important. And it’s mentioned that several times in the Torah, in this area that we’re talking about God saying that, “If you leave me, I will leave you. If you abandon me, I will hide, I will hide my face from you.” So that is when we detach ourselves from God, then in a way God detaches God’s self from us. And if we want to find our way to God, that involves a kind of reconciliation, an attempt. So if you want to master something, you have to work at it and try to make it work. So then the message goes on with exactly the same theme of what will happen if you don’t adhere. But then I’d like you to go to chapter 30, verse 12. And chapter 30, verse 11 has again a repetition of a theme, but framed in a very interesting way. Verse 11: This command, these things. It’s not as though it’s too irrational or too impossible to understand. And it’s not so far and beyond that you can’t reach it. The heavens, it’s not in the heavens. And to say, “Let’s go up to the heavens and see if we can find it. And then that’s what we are going to do.” And it’s not across the sea in some other civilization, another part of the world say, “ Who will cross the seas and bring it back to us and teach us and maybe then we will have an alternative way of living.”
This is very close to you to do it if you want to do it. Now this is interesting because ,it’s not in the heavens, is an important phrase. In verse 12: Not in the heavens, it was the title of a book by famous previous generation, rabbi Berkovitz, very much underestimated, in which he is saying Jewish law is not in the heavens, it’s been given to us and Jewish law is for us to develop and for us to work on. So this concept of , it’s not in the heavens, it’s a very important theological issue for Jewish life and for theology. And so we continue through this same evidence and this same thing that in the end you have to do as God tells you. And this is the Torah and we continue. And I’m skipping intentionally quite a long way because this is still beautiful poetry. And here we have the idea in which God says, “I will hide from you.” In verse 18 of 31, You can mention that or look at that particular item, “ I will hide my face from you, I will abandon you.” Looks as though that’s happened in the Holocaust. It looks what had happened on October the 7th. And therefore I am going to give you a song that I want you all to learn in order that you should be constantly reminded. And now I’m turning to chapter 32. You notice we are running here towards the end of the book and chapter 32 takes everything we’ve said up to now and turns it into a poem. And you can see it’s a poem by the way it’s printed on the page with the gaps between as all poems have. And the idea of course is that people are more likely to remember a song because a shair, or poem, is the same word for a song and it’ll be sung round campfire. And we remember the rhyme and the words.
And so I’m going to go through some of the words here with you. The poetry in Hebrew is wonderful. Listen to me, heavens, while I speak. And let the earth give ear to what I have to say. So this repetition, repeating the same thing is a style of poetry in the Bible. It’s amazing that something written so long has this phenomenal poetry. May the words that I have, may they drop like the rain refreshing. And what comes out of my mouth shall be like the Jew. Fine rain over the fields. And like refreshing drops of rain on the plants. God is calling to you. Appreciate God. The rock. Another way of talking about God. Israel, the rock of God, of Israel, something you rely on. God is perfect. God’s not a human. Everything in the law is true. Doesn’t say true, is just. There is a just law. God can be trusted. There’s no distortion. Straight and righteous. Lovely idea. Do you think God is responsible for bad things that happen? No. The fault is in the children. A generation that is perverse and valueless. Do you think it’s God’s fault? When people become crude and rude and not wise. After all, He is the God who gave birth to you. He educated you. Remember the days of old. Understand what happened in previous generations. Ask your father and he’ll tell you. your elders. And they’ll say what’s , what happened. Once upon a time, God removed nations to give the Jews a place. And divided people into different functions and cultures. And each nation had its own culture, its own boundary. And then in Israel it had its numbers. And a portion of God was its inheritance. Jacob was his patrimony, or his inheritance. God found them wandering in a desert. An empty howling waste. He took them in his care. He looked after them. And he looked after them.
Now is often translated as the apple of a person’s eye. The apple of your eye, the most precious thing. But doesn’t mean an apple in any way. means the little man. And the little man you see in the pupil of the eye. When you look at an eye, you see a reflection, you can see a little man. So that is the most valuable thing. It gives sight, it’s the most thing you want to protect. So that’s how God will protect you and God will protect you like an eagle who looks after his little babies, his nest. hovers over his fledglings. Spreads his wings. And takes them and carries them on his back as he takes them from place to place while they’re young. God leads the people as unique as alone, alone, not like anybody else. There’s no room in Israel for a strange God. He will ride them over the best places of the land. 13: And give them the produce of heaven. Giving him honey from a rock. And oil coming through stone. The butter of the oxen of the cows, of the cows. And the fat of the sheep. With all the best herds of , of the wild west of the prairies. With the best of the grain. And you will drink the foaming blood-like wine. But in verse 15, having said that that’s what God is going to do, comes this famous line: Jeshurun is another term that’s used to describe Israel. Jeshurun. will grow fat and kick over the traces. you’ll go fat, you will go coarse, you will be corrupt. You will reject your God. and you will therefore reject the source, the rock, that could have helped you. And that’s where I want to stop for today and answer your questions. Then next week we will be heading to the last part of the book and towards the death of Moses and the end.
Q&A and Comments:
So let me then stop sharing and turn to the question and answers and start with Bernice Stern.
Q: “Did anyone stand up for the Jewish students from the University of Wales?”
A: No. No. Nothing happened. No reaction. It was allowed to pass unfortunately, because most of the academics have been brainwashed and they, in turn, have brainwashed the students.
Q: Israel Donshec. “Don’t you think Darius and Cyrus were the names used for the same person? I’ve read that many scholars think the two names refer to the same person.”
A: I personally don’t believe this. And besides there were lots of Darius’ and I agree there were lots of Cyrus’, but there was a progression from whichever Cyrus it was that let the Jews go back. There is a record in our record that it didn’t work. The first time was with Zerubavael. It wasn’t later, much later under a later King Darius. And there were several Darius’s that looked in the records and saw what Cyrus had given permission for the Jews to go back. And he then sent Ezra and Ahemya to go and rebuild the temple and establish the Jewish community. So yes, like the term Pharaoh, there are general terms that apply to many different pharaohs and kings and Georges and so forth. Shelly. And, by the way, academics disagree about everything all the time. So there are plenty of theories.
Q: Shelly, “I thought that when Jews came back from Babylon and Samaritans wanted to join them and Israel said no. A mistake? An instance of our subgroups don’t getting along?”
A: That’s a good point. I mean that’s certainly true that initially they asked to be the same, but the Babylonians said, “Yes, but we’ve got rules that you don’t have.” And that’s what the problem was, that in Babylon they had evolved. And the fact that Judaism evolved and the basis of the oral law and that those who rejected the oral law disappeared, or more or less disappeared over time, I think historically proves who made the right decision.
Q: Shelly, “What brothers God more, worshipping other people’s gods or behaviour of these cultures?
A: A good question. I think both of them bother. I think that what He’s trying to say is, "Look, their way of worshipping gods is a mistake. That people do it, that’s their right I suppose, but it’s not what we want them to do.” But on the other hand, the cultures, and it depends what the culture is, because, as I’ve mentioned before, where you have a culture which is a culture based on law and ethics, then it doesn’t matter what the religion is. What matters is behaving in an ethical way. Now those cultures in those days did not. The amount of cultures that led an ethical life did not really begin until, you might say, the Greek period, and even the Greeks, for all they tout their being rational, they still went on worshipping gods that were non-rational. But at least they introduced ethics. And its ethics that mattered.
Faith, “Climate change, slow moving consequences that may devastate the earth might be said to be the consequence of not throwing biblical edicts, living honourably, ethically, taking care of environment and each other. I’m just postulating.” Look, I certainly think that’s part of it. There’s no doubt that part of the decline of many things comes from human greed, wanting too much, misusing our facilities, destroying our forests. You cannot say that we are not responsible. We are responsible. You might say on the other hand, “But hold on the earth and the world and the universe works according to God’s laws. Why isn’t God doing anything about it?” And the fact of the matter is over time that does happen. We’ve had ice ages when one era destroyed and another one then grew up after it. So in fact, you see both elements at work. Part of it is the nature of the universe and part of is it our greed as human beings in not… How can I put it? In not realising ahead of time how much destruction we are responsible for. Thank you, Rita.
Q: Marsha, “Torah is such an amazing combination of legalese and poetry. Is this a way of speaking to the various sides of the human mind?”
A: Precisely. That’s what it is, Marsha. That we are, humans are different. Some of us like poetry, some of us like prose. We need both. They’re part of our culture. And different people respond differently to different means of communication.
Clara Kivatch says, “Yousef for quoting Rabbi Ellie as a Berkovitz. He’s always been a hero. One of mine. Yes, indeed, his granddaughter, Rabbi Rachel Berkovitz, do you ever meet?
A: I’ve never met, but she must be as wonderful as her father or Grandfather.” Thank you Clara.
Carla B, “How nice to start it right at the Pasha coming Shabbat. So give you ready for it?” And
Jill, “The words of the poem are prophetic for today.” They are so prophetic. I can’t believe how prophetic they are.
Q: Then, Lance Philipas, “What are the dots over the , these three words for us?”
A: I should have mentioned that. You’re quite right and thank you for mentioning it. Basically they are scribal dots that were put in at some stage by people who said, “This is so important.” I want you to realise this is remarkable, that this is ours. To develop the law and to look after the law and take care of everything and not expect somebody else to do it.“
Q: Judy asks, "When did the Jews become a nation and ivri come to cross over? When did they cross?”
A: Well, a nation, they were called the nation of Israel, Benet Israel. They were children of Israel and remain the children of Israel. And we remain the children of Israel to this very day. But what happened was when the kingdom split between Judea in the south around Jerusalem and Samaria in the north, the kingdom of Israel, that’s where you had the kingdom ascribed to Israel. But Israel disappeared. It was destroyed by the Babylonians. And therefore when the Jewish people came back and rebuilt the temple, they were the Judeans who had been exiled in Babylon and came back. So Judean, , in Greek, moved into Jewish in our term. But parallel with that was the term ivri. And ivri is a term used in the Bible and in many places, ivri also, which is translated as a Hebrew, and it means somebody who moves from place to place, and in one way is prophetic about us because we continually move from place to place back and forth.
Q: Rose, “In the last poem, do you not see a parallel prior to October 7th of arrogance?”
A: Yes, I’m afraid I do. I’m afraid I do. Both in our internal divisions, the religious not valuing the secular. The secular, not valuing the religious, the various ethnic groups in conflict with each other. I’m afraid I do see this as very prophetic, horribly so. And yet it was written 3000 years ago and more, so frightening, isn’t it?
So everybody at that note, I will see you, please God, next week.