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Evanthia Bernitsas, MD
Parshat Devarim/Shabbat Hazon:
Deuteronomy 1:1-3:22; Isaiah 1:1-1:27.
I
t has always seemed to me that the
juxtaposition of parshat Devarim
and Tisha b'Av is more than mere
coincidence.
The fashioners of the cycle of weekly
Torah readings recognized that the
essence of Moses' oratory in this week's
Torah portion speaks directly to the
meaning of this fast day,
which begins at sundown,
Saturday, July 28, as much
as it spoke to the needs of
his immediate audience, the
Children of Israel.
In the opening chapters
of Devarim, more than any-
thing else, Moses rehashes
past events — a grand
rehashing, to be sure, but
still rehashing. And yet this
recounting of the trials and
travails of the generation
condemned by God to die in
the desert reveals not only Moses' ability
as an orator, leader and lawgiver, but also
his sensitivity as a teacher and his ability
to inspire.
Rather than dive directly into the
extensive array of rules and regulations
that, beginning a few chapters later, will
comprise the lion's share of the Book of
Deuteronomy, Moses begins with a care-
fully and deliberately selected series of
memories designed to ready the younger
generation for the challenges of the
future and provide answers to two press-
ing questions: How did we come to be
here in the foothills of Moab, and what
lies ahead?
In answering these questions, Moses
resists the temptation simply to enumer-
ate the sins of the fathers and, instead,
reiterates God's unconditional promises to
Abraham — a multitude of descendants
and possession of the Land of Israel.
Further, rather than dwelling on the
lapses of faith that precluded entry into
the Promised Land, Moses embeds the
mistakes of the past in the achievements
of the past.
The generation of the Exodus, when
they were not bemoaning a lack of food
and waxing nostalgic about life in Egypt,
created a system of justice, faced the
menacing threats of powerful and antag-
onistic neighbors, and even expanded
the borders of the Promised Land.
Thus, Moses explains, the Children of
Israel are camped in Moab still awaiting
the moment when they can enter the
Promised Land not only as a result of
Divine retribution but also at the culmi-
nation of a generation of preparation.
After all, we know that once
they crossed the Jordan River,
their two most pressing tasks
— conquering the land from
hostile inhabitants and estab-
lishing a just and fair society
— did not entail reinventing
the wheel, but, as Moses has
just reminded them, emulating
that which their forbears had
accomplished in the desert.
Thus, Moses links the past
and the future, and transforms
the former into an inspiring
pep talk for the latter.
So, too, as we lament the misfortunes
of the past on Tisha b'Av, we borrow
a page from the playbook of Moshe
Rabbeinu by not only lamenting, but also
by drawing inspiration from our ances-
tors who were able to survive and rebuild
in the aftermath of these misfortunes.
As our sages keenly understood, even
though the Temple in Jerusalem and the
Kingdom of David lay in ruins for cen-
turies, Judaism and the Jewish people
did not, not least of all because, even
before the destruction of the Temple
and the end of independence, those
who experienced the traumatic destruc-
tion of Temple had inherited a Jewish
way of life that could withstand such
adversity.
And so, in hindsight, it not surprising
that, already by the time of the Talmud,
our sages built into the observance of
Tisha b'Av an element of redemption,
the ability and willingness to look
beyond adversity to a more positive and
hopeful future.
Professor Howard N. Lupovitch is the
Waks Family Chair of Jewish History
discuss
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at the University of Western Ontario in
London. He is an adult education lecturer
in Metropolitan Detroit and reads Torah at
Congregation Beth Ahm in West Bloomfield.
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