Torah -Portion '!*'
In Biblical Poetry:
New Light, New Meaning
through the experience of 40 years
in the wilderness before being ready,
at long last, to enter the promised
land. This is the subject of Haazinu.
It is fascinating to notice the clos-
ing lines of the drama link up with
the opening verses. "Give ear, Oh,
heavens, let Me speak; let the earth
abbi Avraham Kook (the - hear the words I utter."
first chief rabbi of Eretz
"The heaven and earth" are famil-
Yisrael, 1865-1935), once
iar to us; did we not encounter them
declared, "Just as poetry
at the very beginning, "in the begin-
has its laws, so do laws, as well, have
ning God created the heaven and the
,=,heir poetry." We get a distorted pic-
earth," which is the foundation of
ture of the laws of the
the biblical world concept
Torah when we fail to see
with everything that fol-
the poetry throbbing
lows being commentary.
beneath the surface.
This world, says the
This idea was developed
Bible and later on Jewish
by a great scholar of the
teaching to this day, is not
19th century, the "Natziv,"
a haphazard, senseless acci-
who concludes that the
dent; it has meaning. The
\---, ntire Torah should be con-
Almighty who created it
sidered as poetic master-
had a plan. The world was
piece. One of the distin-
built according to expecta-
RABBI IRWIN
guishing marks of poetry,
tions. We, as humans, and
GRO NER
he said, is that, unlike
especially Israel, the Jewish
Spec ial to
prose, it always possesses
people, are part of these
The Jew ish News
more than a single mean-
expectations. Torah tells us
ing. In fact, the search for
what they are and what we
the discovery of new meanings is
are supposed to do to realize them.
endless; so is Torah.
No less important a message is
It is clear that the powerful con-
hidden in the removal of the
cluding poem of Haazinu does not
dichotomy between heaven and
stand alone as a poetic composition
earth, between spiritual and physi-
isolated from the rest of the Torah.
cal. The great revolutionary idea,
It rings with endless associations
which the Torah teaches in all its
with the rest of the Torah. It brings
five books, is epitomized in the
to a climax the long odyssey we have
drama of our patriarch Jacob, "A
traveled with the Five Books of
ladder standing on earth and its top
Moses from their very beginning,
reaching heaven." The presence of
when
we were introduced to the
heaven and earth together first intro-
•
emergence of cosmos out Of chaos
duced in the opening verse of Torah
and the beginning of humanity, up
echoes in the opening verse of its
to this point, when Israel as a people
closing poem.
is ready to enter the promised land.
The story of creation, which we
read so many months ago, now
shines in a new light. It is illuminat-
ed by Torah.
11 gill
National Council of Jewish Women
Greater Detroit Section
FALL
OPENING
MEETING
Shabbat Haazinu:
Deuteronomy 32:1-52;
II Samuel 22:1-51.
R
featuring author
FAYE KELLERMAN
"A Woman of Intriguing Diversity"
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-
Laws have
their poetry.
What is the quintessence of Torah
if not the gradual unfolding of a
divine-human drama which takes us
from creation, via several failures of
humanity in achieving the ideal soci-
ety, to the shaping of the people of
Israel, first enduring bondage then
-liberation and instructions of how to
live the good life — the life of
mitzvot. The story continues
Irwin Groner is senior rabbi of
Congregation Shaarey Zedek.
PRESENTS
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GARFIELD & MARKS
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Conversations
For Shabbat
What are the implications of
considering Torah and its laws
as an expansion of poetry?
How would you interpret the
reference to heavens and earth
in Haazinu in relation to their
inclusion in the creation story at
the beginning of Bereshit?
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Detroit Jewish News
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