So here we are again, having moved all the way around the world, we're back at the edge of a new year, about to enter a new land along with our people on the edge of Eretz Yisrael in this week's parashiyot. About to bid farewell to Moshe - no, that's impossible and to welcome, can it be, Yehoshua?? Goodbye sun, hello moon?
At this precarious point of being, Moshe has a few choice words for us. Yes, us, as he insists: "You, all of you, are stationed before Hashem, your G-d... Not with you alone am I cutting this covenant and this curse, rather with everyone here today before Hashem your G-d, and with everyone not here with us today".
Moshe goes on and warns, lest anyone think himself free of the implications and the responsibilities of this covenant, and thinks to worship alien gods in secret, saying. "peace will be mine though I I go off according to my own whims..." Uh-uh. Hashem will punish not only that individual, or family, or clan, but the entire people who harbored such an element, turning a blind eye, whether conscious or unconscious. The entire land with be blighted, so that "passers-by" in history will wonder, what caused such destruction and fury, and the answer will come forth, it's because they forsook the covenant they cut with Me that I became furious with them and tossed them out on their ear.
It is at this point that the passage ends with a most curious verse: "The hidden things are for/to Hashem our G-d and the revealed things are for/to us and our children for ever, to do all the words of this Torah" (Devarim 29:28).
The verse in itself is curious, as it comes a bit out of left field, but even more curious is the fact that there are eleven dots over the letters of the words, "for/to us and our children", as well as the ayin of the subsequent word, ad. What do those dots signify, and how do they affect (and effect) the interpretation of the verse.
There is a dispute in the Talmud (Sandhedrin 43b) between Rabbi Yehuda and Rabbi Nechemia (one of the great battling pairs in matters of Aggadah) as to the implication of the dots. Rabbi Yehuda explains that they tell us that that Hashem only punished for the hidden transgressions after crossing theJordan Jordan
Crossing theJordan
The dots, ah, the dots. Rashi and Tosafot on this passage both explain that the dots here mean "explain as though the words indicated were not there" - as though the dots erase the letters upon which they reside as a kind of anti-crown. Further, they explain that the dots are not over the letters they are suppose to "erase". They SHOULD be over the eleven letters of the words, "For/to Hashem our G-d". The verse would then read, "the hidden things and the revealed things are for us and our children forever, to do all the words of this Torah".
Hashem blesses us by giving over responsibility even for those things which we cannot know directly, but only by indirection. You can't read your fellow mind by looking directly at him, but if you take in everything about him, the fullness of his life as it impinges upon his world which is also your world, you'll know when things are going in a very unexpected direction. Hashem blesses us by retracting His sunlight (Moshe) and replacing it with His moonlight (Yehoshua), a leader who knows how to gauge the spirit of each individual where he is at, a leader whose mind is sweetly mixed with all creatures (da'ato me'orevet im habriyot), who leaves room for the corporate entity to begin to stand out.
And how does Hashem achieve this? By retreating into the eleven self-effacing dots that should crown His Name but for our concern for His honor. Those dots are now crowning "us and our children..." Hashem has allow His crown of concentrated self-effacing presence to rest on our heads, in our souls - it is the "pintele yid" at the core of our Jewish being.
Points. Each one mathematically indicating a single, dimensionless place. Ultimately immobility, with no dimensional hinterland to beckon. Yet those points, joined together, form a line, marching off to infinitely and all that waits, yearning, beyond a suddenly visible horizon.
Stationary and Moving - that's the contradiction built in to the dual name of this week's parashiot: NItzavim and Vayelech. Standing at the Jordan, as though forever, basking in the last protected bliss of our childhood as Hashem's people, never wanting to move, and yet gazing across the dotted line of a wet-and-dried Jordan, joined together, the urge to move ,to go, to create surges forth into a newly conceive space. A new land awaits, a new year unfolds in our minds.
This week's parashah is the locus classicus for the mitzvah of teshuva on a national and personal scale. Teshuva is precisely that paradoxical movement toward a firm stance at once new and old. Let us each take up our dots, each containing a "de-high-drated" letter of a divine name awaiting re-high-drating in our souls joined together as the end comes around again to open into the beginning, "na'utz sofan bit'chilatan", and the circle-point of oneness is motionless in its everflowing perfection.
At this precarious point of being, Moshe has a few choice words for us. Yes, us, as he insists: "You, all of you, are stationed before Hashem, your G-d... Not with you alone am I cutting this covenant and this curse, rather with everyone here today before Hashem your G-d, and with everyone not here with us today".
Moshe goes on and warns, lest anyone think himself free of the implications and the responsibilities of this covenant, and thinks to worship alien gods in secret, saying. "peace will be mine though I I go off according to my own whims..." Uh-uh. Hashem will punish not only that individual, or family, or clan, but the entire people who harbored such an element, turning a blind eye, whether conscious or unconscious. The entire land with be blighted, so that "passers-by" in history will wonder, what caused such destruction and fury, and the answer will come forth, it's because they forsook the covenant they cut with Me that I became furious with them and tossed them out on their ear.
It is at this point that the passage ends with a most curious verse: "The hidden things are for/to Hashem our G-d and the revealed things are for/to us and our children for ever, to do all the words of this Torah" (Devarim 29:28).
The verse in itself is curious, as it comes a bit out of left field, but even more curious is the fact that there are eleven dots over the letters of the words, "for/to us and our children", as well as the ayin of the subsequent word, ad. What do those dots signify, and how do they affect (and effect) the interpretation of the verse.
There is a dispute in the Talmud (Sandhedrin 43b) between Rabbi Yehuda and Rabbi Nechemia (one of the great battling pairs in matters of Aggadah) as to the implication of the dots. Rabbi Yehuda explains that they tell us that that Hashem only punished for the hidden transgressions after crossing the
Crossing the
The dots, ah, the dots. Rashi and Tosafot on this passage both explain that the dots here mean "explain as though the words indicated were not there" - as though the dots erase the letters upon which they reside as a kind of anti-crown. Further, they explain that the dots are not over the letters they are suppose to "erase". They SHOULD be over the eleven letters of the words, "For/to Hashem our G-d". The verse would then read, "the hidden things and the revealed things are for us and our children forever, to do all the words of this Torah".
Hashem blesses us by giving over responsibility even for those things which we cannot know directly, but only by indirection. You can't read your fellow mind by looking directly at him, but if you take in everything about him, the fullness of his life as it impinges upon his world which is also your world, you'll know when things are going in a very unexpected direction. Hashem blesses us by retracting His sunlight (Moshe) and replacing it with His moonlight (Yehoshua), a leader who knows how to gauge the spirit of each individual where he is at, a leader whose mind is sweetly mixed with all creatures (da'ato me'orevet im habriyot), who leaves room for the corporate entity to begin to stand out.
And how does Hashem achieve this? By retreating into the eleven self-effacing dots that should crown His Name but for our concern for His honor. Those dots are now crowning "us and our children..." Hashem has allow His crown of concentrated self-effacing presence to rest on our heads, in our souls - it is the "pintele yid" at the core of our Jewish being.
Points. Each one mathematically indicating a single, dimensionless place. Ultimately immobility, with no dimensional hinterland to beckon. Yet those points, joined together, form a line, marching off to infinitely and all that waits, yearning, beyond a suddenly visible horizon.
Stationary and Moving - that's the contradiction built in to the dual name of this week's parashiot: NItzavim and Vayelech. Standing at the Jordan, as though forever, basking in the last protected bliss of our childhood as Hashem's people, never wanting to move, and yet gazing across the dotted line of a wet-and-dried Jordan, joined together, the urge to move ,to go, to create surges forth into a newly conceive space. A new land awaits, a new year unfolds in our minds.
This week's parashah is the locus classicus for the mitzvah of teshuva on a national and personal scale. Teshuva is precisely that paradoxical movement toward a firm stance at once new and old. Let us each take up our dots, each containing a "de-high-drated" letter of a divine name awaiting re-high-drating in our souls joined together as the end comes around again to open into the beginning, "na'utz sofan bit'chilatan", and the circle-point of oneness is motionless in its everflowing perfection.
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