I'm a great speaker, God needs my abilities in order to carry out the Divine Plan on Earth - if God asked me to arrange something by speaking to someone important, I could do it, and if I thought I couldnlt I would notify God in case God didn't realize that I coud not.
Oh, wait, you mean that's not so? God doesn't actually need my abilities in order to accomplish anything? And God knows exactly what I am or am not capable of?!
What, you think it is arrogance of me to think God needs me because I am a good speaker and that God might not correctly assess my capabilities!?
So......now we can understand Moses' error - made due to his humility - in telling God that he should not be the emissary since he didn't speak well - it was as if Moses was implying that God needed an eloquent speaker to accomplish the DIvine Mission, and as though God did not acurately assess Moses' ability or disability!
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Helices of Heros: The irony of stuttering Moses dictating an entire book! (Which we start reading this shabbat.)
1. Moses completes his journey: he begins his 'career' saying to God that he can't be the emissary to Pharaoh because "I am not 'a man of words', yet now at the end of his career he speaks long and eloquently.
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2. Now, at the end of his career God dictates his own words to him, word for word dictation from God, in order for it to become an entire written book , the last of the "five books of Moses".
The first words of the book, and the book's Traditional 'name', stress this irony.This last book of the five begins with the words "ve'eleh HaDvarim" " 'and these are the words' which Moses spoke". ['dvarim' means items or words]. And so the book is known as "Dvarim" = 'words'. ie When Moses says "I am not 'a man of words' "the Torah records it as "lo 'ish DVARIM' anochi" לֹא אִישׁ דְּבָרִים אָנֹכִי , the same word 'dvarim' used for the opening of the book now known as 'sefer Dvarim', 'The Book of Words'.
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So contrary to his own earlier protestations, Moses turned out to be much the "ish dvarim" 'man of words', or in this case - 'man who spoke the words comprising the book of Dvarim"!
[Note: In Rabbinic literature, in Mishna/Talmud, it is referred to as 'mishneh torah' = 'reviewing/repeating the Torah', since it is largely Moses' recapitulation, a 'repeating'/re-telling with additional details etc by Moses of prior events. In English/Greek/Latin the book is called Deuteronomy ("deut" meaning 'double or 'second').]
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Another parallel: The word 'dvarim' is also that which is used by God to describe that which in English is called "the 10 commandments" - God refers to them as "the ten utterances" = "aseret haDvarim" (in Hebrew bet and vet are the same letter, and words with one of those sounds transform to the other sound in some cases: we generally refer to the ten Dvarim as the 'aseret ha'dibrot' = the 10 utterances).
[The fact that God refers to them not as 'commandments' also by the way explains the conundrum: Why does Jewish Tradition consider "I am the Lord your God" as the first of the 10 if it is not a command? Answer: they were 10 utterances, not specifically 'commandments' (though it also is a commandment, and much more than that, this first one was experientially profound, a mystical state of prophecy for all of us when we heard it at Sinai....]
Note the irony that at Sinai it is Moses who speaks the nine other 'utterances"! The people asked him to intermediate so that they could bear hearing of God's message without their soul leaving their bodies as started to happen when they heard directly from God the words "I am the lord your God"! So Moses is in this sense too, the man of the utternaces, 'ish dvarim'!
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Note that this ironic development/transformation from unwilling meekness to self-confident leader/orator/teacher resulted from:
i) Moses' humility, which enabled the words he spoke to be straight truth and directly from the heart, and without self-aggrandizement, and thus worthy of inclusion in the Torah. Indeed the entire Torah could only be transmitted via Moses since he had no ego to block part of the message or alter it or color it with his own understanding - in other words, ironically it was via his humility that he rose to the highest levels, and that he could be forever the 'ish dvarim' he was sure he could not be, and so the 'dvarim' irony we pointed out above is not coincidence - it was because he was humble enough to protest that he was not a man of words that he was able to be a reliable channel for the word of God.
ii) Perhaps his merit of being the person whose words filled one of God's books also resulted as fulfilment of God's promise to him "anochi ehyeh im picha" ("I will be with your mouth") [and note God's use in this promise of the word 'ehyeh' as in God's proclamation/message/statement/'name' "Ehyeh asher ehyeh" = literal translation is something like: "I will be that/what/which I will be").
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I would suggest that when God writes in the Torah (via Moses) that "God got angry" at Moses during the burning bush incident, this means that God wanted to help Moses elevate himself even further by learning something about himself and how to respond to divine requests. In this sense I would be bold enough to say that God wanted Moses to understand that he (Moses) misunderstood God at the burning bush encounter - God 'gets angry' at him, meaning God wanted to teach him, and therefore teach all who read the Torah. And what was being taught? How to be "truly humble", rather than humbe in the meek/arrogant(!?!) way he manifested at the bush. Why do I say "arrogant"? (God forbid it is not I that judge Moses this way, but my intepretation of what God and Moses want us to learn from this episode.) I believe that God is telling Moses that by responding "I am not a man of words" he was - though speaking from genuine humility - seeming to imply that God needed human help in getting the Jewish People out of Egypt, as though God feels he needs an eloquent speaker to convince Pharaoh to let the Jews go free, and as though Moses thinks God is not aware that he is not a great speaker!
Of course this response of Moses was due to his humility, God writes clearly that Moses was the most humble person who ever lived, but God wanted to show him - and all of us who read and study the Torah - that there is an implied 'arrogance' behind this humility.
It is as though one thinks that God could not have provided water for the Jewish People without Moses hitting or speaking to the rock, whereas in fact of course God created the universe and all the water and made the flood and so could also make water appear without Moses' intevention. For some reason, somewhat inscrutable as all God's actions are in the end, Moses had to be involved (there are various reasons given for all this, some philosophical etc, but this is not the point here) and Moses needed to internalize that his great humility, though completely sincere, needed to be re-calibrated, so that he would simply follow God's command and do what God asked him to do, without 'second-guessing' God as to what God needed (ie acting as though he knew better than God did what God needed for the task, ie an eloquent speaker). It is "impertinence" of Moses to assume that God needs an eloquent speaker to accomplish the task and "arrogance" to think that God actually thought that Moses was a great or persuasive speaker and that's why he was asked to do this mission....
The point (or at least one point) which God wanted to make (and that Moses being so humble was pleased to be the example that others could learn from, regarding how not to respnd) by having this story spelled out to all of us is that God decides what result will occur, but we humans have to make the effort. And if God asks us to do X so that the sun will stop in the sky, we are not to arrogantly think that God needs our help, and that God thinks we are so powerful and that's why we are being tasked with this, and then meekly with geat sincere humility tell God that we are not up to the task - instead we are to realize that we should remove ourselves in tems of ego from the picture completely, it is not about US, and we should instead simply be the 'front-person' that God needs for whatever inscrutable (or philosophically explainable) reason, and simply carry out God's command/request, to do what we humanly can do in order to make it all happen, and God will take care of the result, making it succeed if this is God's plan, or make it fail if that is God's plan, but we are are meant to try. (eg see the beginning teaching in Pirkei Avot 2:16 (ethics of the fathers) and the famous song "lo alecha hamlacha ligmor" [hear it on eg Youtube])
So with this understanding, let's delve a bit more into the case at hand: God told Moses "anochi ehyeh im-picha" I will be with your mouth. All three of the operative words (I, will be, your mouth) are very loaded:
1) As we mentioned, Moses was the one who spoke over the last 9 of the ten commandments after the souls of the Jewish People almost left them upon hearing the words of the first one, "I am the Lord your God", starting with the word "Anochi", and so that word is very loaded with deep menaing in the context of Moses' relation to God (Moses hears it from God in this personal context).
2) God reveals his secret of "Eh.. asher Eh.." "I will be that I will be" (or whatever it means or is translated as) so the word 'ehyeh' is very loaded in the context of a communication from God to Moses.
3) God tells us in the Torah what he told Moses' siblings, that God speaks to Moses "face to face, mouth to mouth" and so God speaking of Moses' mouth is very loaded.
And so God telling Moses "Anochi ehyeh im pikha" is very deep in implication.
For example, we can think of it as meaning in our context that Moses needs to accept that whatever happens as a result of him talking to Pharaoh is not a result of his efforts, or his ability or lofty stature, but rather that it is God acting, and Moses is meant 'merely' to be the channel, the vessel, to bring this message from God into the physical world. Its efficacy is not at all dependent on his oratorical skills or anything else.
Ironically however, what it WAS dependent on however, was Moses' humility, which made him the perfect clear-vessel to channel God's word, ie with no ego blocking or distorting the message.
So Moses needed to internalize that he was very very humble, as God indeed testified, and that rather than being a reason for him to decline the mission, THIS itself was his qualification - it qualified him to be a vessel for God, and so his speaking ability or any other ability was totally irrelevant. And he needed to know and internalize that as God stated in the Torah later on, he was indeed the most qualified because he was the most humble person who ever lived! Of course it was necessary that this knowledge should not affect his humility and thereby sabotage the mission.
I believe that all this is encoded/hinted at in the use of the words "Dvarim" in these various stories in these different but related contexts, since every word in the Torah is directly from God, as dictated word for word to Moses. [God reveals to us in the Torah that the divine action is manifest according to a sort of karma - mida kneged mida - which of course involves similarity, ie similarity between the action and the divinely-ordained-but-natural-seeming reaction; analogously, it seems that messages are also encoded 'analogically', in the way that stories in the Torah compare and contrast, especially when the same words are utilized. God dictated to Moses to write in the Torah various stories about Moses, as well as those words of Moses which God wanted to keep for posterity - all this in order that all future generations of the Jewish People and others can benefit from it, and God deliberately chooses the words to use in order to provide a deeper message.]
And of course all this is in the Torah in order for us to learn from it, and the very humble Moses served as the vessel for all the words of God to fill the Torah, including those which were about him, and aboout his 'flaws', and which teach this message from God to Moses for the benefit of all of us.
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Helices: coming back, at a higher level: There is a pattern whereby the Torah's heros go through a journey, but they come back to the same point , however itis at a higher level ('helixing'):
Basically, we can see that God needed Moses to be an 'ish dvarim'! God didn't anymore need Moses' ordinary humility but rather after having reached the pinnacle of humility, Moses was needed for his words: as a leader who could cajole, chastise, remind, exhort, warn, saying his words all via humility rather than arrogance or desire to lead, or thirst for honor - and thus granting his leadership success. And to be a pure conduit for the words of God
And now Moses expresses this combination of humility plus leadership right before his death, leaving the Jewish People this quintessential 'ethical Will', an entire book's worth, so that they not go astray after his death. He achieves a return to the same situation and response, but at a higher level - his talking ('dvarim') now completes a spiritual helix.
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And earlier, Moses' fear of the light of God shining at the buring bush at the beginning of his career was transformed much later to the fear of others seeing him when his face shone,('koran or panav'), another helix.
(There are other examples I have given in commentary to other portions.: for example: Jacob (Yakov) grabs the heel of Esav and gets his lower-level name 'Yaakov' = "will heel" thereby, and later becomes 'Yisrael' for doing basically the same thing to the 'man' with whom he wrestled - the higher-level representation of Esav - holding on to him and not letting go until he received his new name, 'Yisrael' 'will /did wrestle with God & man". A return to the same situaiton and achievement but at a higher level - a spiritual helix.)
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Conclusion: May be all be blessed to remember the echo of Moses' words, individually and as a people, especially in this period right before Tish's B'av, in order to merit staying in the Land of Israel, as he wanted his words to achieve, and to be inspired to always act with humility - even (or especially) when called to take necessary action, or have a role of leadership - and to each be able to complete our own 'helical path' to spiritual growth.
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1) The irony of stuttering Moses declaiming the content of an entire book!
2) Why would a rabbi wear sneakers on one of their holy days?
3) What is round, and closed, and doesn't appear in the creation account?
4) Are there perhaps many chosen nations, just chosen for different tasks?
5) Does Judaism require denying the existence of prophets of other religions?
6) The real reason for the holiday of sukkot, arriving in about two months : MAYBE LEAVE THIS FOR SUKKOS TIME
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ADD:
his humility was the cause of the ironic devt, als t is fulfilment ironic of anochi ehyeh im picha
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to connect the vort re samekhand re other nations
this parsha has vanasov in sense like eden, first use ad samekh etc. so this noti of our going around other nations in interesting
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1) Moses begins his career saying "I am not a man of words" (lo ish DVARIM anochi לֹא אִישׁ דְּבָרִים אָנֹכִי) and ends it by speaking an entire book-full of words, the 5th book of the Torah, aptly named "words" (dvarim), which we start reading this shabbat.
See more in the note at the bottom.
2) For Tish'a Ba'v tomorrow night, and for Yom Kippur in 2 months: "Why do Rabbis wear sneakers on both main fast days?!" The reason behind the 5 actions abstained from on Yom Kippur - and therefore, according to the Rabbis, also Tish'a B'av - can be seen as mirroring the changes in our reality after leaving Eden, as it is described in Genesis, so that by refraining from these 5 actions we are attempting to return to the Edenic state of purity. See the full explanation here: https://sites.google.com/a/nyu.edu/avi-rabinowitz/home/yom-kippur-which-shoes-did-adam-wear-when-he-was-run-out-of-the-garden-of-eden-sneakers
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Samekh is the only letter of the 22 in the Hebrew alphabet not to appear in the creation story, which is far longer than it would need to be to contain each letter at least once. It appears only in the next story re the garden of eden, where it has two mentions - note that both of those words in the Eden story also begin with that letter (not just contain it).
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It is very interesting that each of those words has a meaning which signifies one of the two unique features of the letter's shape, ie that it isclosed, and circular: one means 'circles about' (regarding the rivers) and the other means 'closed' (Adam's flesh after the rib-extraction)!
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In this week's portion, the word containing the letter samekh is "vanasov", regarding our path in the desert, "we went around" (note also the term used re Pharaoh's perception when we entered the desert: "the desert closed on them").
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4) Every nation has its unique mission. However when not focused on the mission, they can come into conflict. This week's fast day of Tish'a B'av marks the tragedy of the Babylonian and Roman civilizations clashing with ours, leading to the utter destruction of our Temple and loss of our homeland.
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In this week's portion God commands the Jewish Nation when on its way into the HolyLand to go around two nations - to respect the rights of the people of Esav, who are "your brothers", and also those of the descendants of Lot, "who have inheritance(yerusha)" in that region and are not to be dispossessed. [Ch 2;2:[2:4-5,8-9: respecting the territory of Esav our 'brother', and Moav for Lot. Also 19, 29]
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When all nations will eventually be acting according to their respective national missions, each will be able to reach its full unique potential and there will be a great harmony in the world.
Note: "Harmony" means of course both peace between us all , plus - as in the harmony of an orchestra - the synergy of all our individual unique contributions.
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May we and all nations of the world be blessed to indeed soon achieve this harmony!
5) The Torah makes it clear that there are prophets and very specially divinely-connected individuals among the nations, several being mentioned in the Torah, the prophet Bil'am, and the great Malkitzedek [Shem] "priest ot the most High God", & the very special Yitro, who is considered by the Druze as their founding prophet.
Perhaps there were prophetic messages that were transmitted to other nations which never came to the attention of the Jewish people since it was not relevant to them, eg clearly Bil'am was a known prophet amongst the non-Jewish peoples of that region, so we should not think that our religious beliefs as Jews force us to necessarily disparage claims an ancient nation may make about having had prophets in those ancient times.
An intriguing hint to this: when God says that the people who were in Se'ir beforehand were destroyed, just like God arranged for the Jewish People THEIR inheritance (= 'yerusha': see (2:12).This is a very interesting parallel, so maybe indeed God is implying that there was some covenant with them? The Land vomitted out the earlier nations, but only after their sins reached the ciritical limit , so maybe God had a covenant with them and they violated it? Which perhaps implies that they have prophets?!
One day hopefully all the holy messages ever communicated by God will come to light to the benefit of all.
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re: point # 1) Note the subtlety: God later commands Moses to write a book containing all these statements Moses made, in other words the book's contents were directly dictated by God to Moses, but God dictated to Moses the words Moses had spoken, starting the book with "These are the words Moses spoke...". Indeed at the burning bush when Moses protests that he is not a man of words, God says that God will place the words in his mouth, asking "after all who is it that makes a mouth for humans to speak from?"And indeed God speaks Moses' words back to him when dictating the book of DVARIM. (This also implies that most of what Moses said in the book in any case was inspired, or said at the command of God to the Jewish People, and so in any case was already the word of God.]
Also: Moses is the one who the people ask to intermediate so as to bear the hearing of God's "ten words/items" ('aseret hadvarim', in English usually termed the ten commandments), so Moses turned out to be much the man of words.
May we all merit that the words which we utter will be words which fulfil God's Will, making them "words which I will place in your mouth"!
Emails have material re these topics:
vanasov: samech = closed + circle (see also: "sagar alehem hamidbar"); Similarly:
tish'a b'av: inuyim and gan eden:
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6) I HAVE good MATERIAL FOR THIS: 1:30-34: especially 1:31, & 1:33.The miracles in the desert which I think correspond to the reason for succos, the fire and anan, and also Hashem carried us like a father carries a child.
The words are spoken by M"R to those who enter the land, that's when succos was first celebrated, and it is in remembrance of the things in these psukim so that people don’t forget as did the bnei israel at the point MR is recalling.
Also: see below in Ekev
Re succah and anan: check in Bamidbar? where the parsha talks of the mishkan moving, and Rashi says that the anan was like a succah? This is the only place I remember seeing this type of connection…
Also: succos was the first ‘tachana’ of the Jews in the midbar, according to the list given in the end of sefer bamidbar(?), and so maybe it has more significance than the name of a place, maybe even it was called that because that was he first place they made a succah… but why is it considered so miraculous as to make a holiday centered aobut it? And why is nit not explicitly mentioned?………..
Parshas Dvorim:
Appropriate in general but especially when it is near Tish'a B'av:
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Haftrah: Yeshayahu 1:12: haiku-rhyme: ki taalu layraot panai,
mi bikesh zot miyedchem
remos chatzeiroi.
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File: “:Sefer Dvorim”
Rav lachem sheves (later MR says Hashem told him: 2:3 again 'rav lachem'. And then Hashem says to MR re his begging to enter EY "rav lecha", and of course there's "rav lecho bnei levi") Lech lacha, rav lecha, aseh lecha, ksoiv lecha, kach lecha, …
1:10 "hinchem hayom kekochvei hashamayim larov….yosef aleychem kochem elef peamim viyvarech eschem ka'asher diber lachem'. See also in Ekev 10:22.So the Jews already were like the stars, this was fulfilled, it was not for the far future. But maybe the sand of the shore is more, is for the future? Maybe the the 'yosef' will be the future bracha? Maybe 'ka'asher diber lachem'…