Deuteronomy 27:11 - 29:8 (third triennial)
We’re in the middle of a very long speech which started three weeks ago with, “See, this day I set before you blessing and curse” and concludes next week, in Sage Green’s portion, with “I have put before you life and death, blessing and curse. Choose life.” In today’s portion, we actually get to the blessing and curse...but I’m not going to talk about that.
Instead, I’m going to talk about the location, Mount Gerizim and Mount Ebal. In Genesis 12:6, parashat Lech-Lecha, we read: “Abram passed through the land as far as the site of Shechem… The LORD appeared to Abram and said, ‘I will assign this land to your offspring.’” Shechem was in a valley between Mount Gerizim and Mount Ebal. Today the town is called Nablus.
Today, the Israelites have come full circle, but it is a different generation and they are doing things differently. As Dena Freundlich writes, “Gone is the passive experience of the generation that leaves Egypt through God’s miraculous intervention and lives by God’s protection and sustenance in the wilderness. Enter the new generation that will conquer the Land utilizing military ingenuity, and then invest herculean efforts to farm that Land. Similarly, the focus is no longer on the laws themselves, as it is at Mount Sinai, but the consequences for observing or violating the laws. This generation will forge their own destinies.”
Rabbi Uri Sherki of Jerusalem echoes this theme: “The ceremony at Mount Gerizim and Mount Ebal can be seen as a kind of negative image of the revelation at Sinai. At Mount Sinai, the people who had only recently left Egypt, who now subsist on manna in the wilderness; all that is asked of them is to listen to the voice of God. Upon entering the land, however, their hierarchy of values is turned on its head. In the land of Israel, nature takes the place of miracles; God’s voice does not emanate from within the fire; rather we must broadcast God’s voice on our own. In the land of Israel, the divine word does not come from some mountain that towers above us; quite the opposite, the Levites stand in the valley and call out God’s message.” Instead of God inscribing the two tablets, Israel is enjoined to “set up large stones. Coat them with plaster and inscribe upon them all the words of this Teaching.” (Deuteronomy 27:2-3)
Rabbi Hillel Lieberman, who was murdered 19 years ago in Nablus, took two triangles, one pointing up to represent Mount Sinai, the other pointing down to represent the valley between Mount Gerizim and Mount Ebal. When combined, he said, “the two triangles form the basis for the essence of the covenant between the nation of Israel and God. Is it coincidence that this combination of the upright triangle and the inverted triangle was chosen as the symbol of the nation of Israel?”
Dena Freundlich continues: “The covenant to be enacted on Mounts Gerizim and Ebal upon entry to the Land is the second generation’s Matan Torah, the revelation of the Torah, of establishing their unique relationship with God. The message is this: Matan Torah is not an event frozen in time to be pulled off the shelf of our collective memory every so often, dusted off, and remembered wistfully as something that occurred long ago for our ancestors.”
(I would also argue that the differences between revelation at Mount Sinai and revelation at Mounts Gerizim and Ebal is not a typo, nor the faulty memory of a 120-year-old Moses, but the deliberate evolution of interpretation and engagement by the people. This is a proud progressive tradition that stretches all the way back to Torah.)
Our Matan Torah occurs every week. If we follow the triennial, and attend every shabbat, we should hear it all every three years. What a far different experience that is from the visceral, awesome experience of our ancestors! The advantage of reading it in small, easily-digested bites is that it lets us dwell on the details, to draw parallels with modern life, to tease out lessons. The disadvantage is that we forget this is part of an epic tale told to a young nation to inspire, to bind together and to create a foundation for society. We lose the forest for the trees. Torah was not meant as a series of vignettes. And it was meant for every generation to experience again in their own way, on their own terms.
As we head into the high holy days, I invite you to read one book of the Torah, beginning to end. Reconnect with this central tenet that connects us all. You don't have to discuss it with anyone; you don't have to derive any deep meaning; you just have to experience it, one-on-one...as our ancestors did...as they intended us to do.
Shabbat shalom.
https://www.etzion.org.il/en/parashat-ki-tavo-mount-gerizim-and-mount-ebal
https://blogs.timesofisrael.com/the-real-message-of-mount-gerizim-and-mount-ebal/
https://m.jpost.com/Travel/Around-Israel/Sites-and-Insights-Mount-Ebal-and-Mount-Gerizim
https://mfa.gov.il/MFA/ForeignPolicy/Terrorism/Victims/Pages/Hillel%20Lieberman.aspx
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