Only a few more weeks remain before we finish this round of Torah, and the parsha (weekly Torah portion) we are reading this shabbat is intense to say the least.  It is called Key tavoh, which means, “When you will come,” or, “Because you will come.”

It starts off by telling us about the ritual we are to do with the first, “Fruits of the ground.”  It consists of putting these fruits into a basket and bringing them to the priest at the place of haShem’s (god) choosing and then giving a quick history of how we came to be on the land and producing such vegetables.  After completing the speech and placing the vegetables before haShem, and bowing before haShem, we are told to by happy with all that haShem has given to us and our household, and that the Levi and the sojourner are to rejoice with us.

After this, we are told that after we provide the poor with the second tithe (on the third year), we are to tell haShem that what we have done with our produce is just what haShem asked us to do.  We then continue by telling haShem to bless the people and the land.

Can you believe this?  Our Torah is telling us we get to command haShem to do something!

It is amazing what a person can get away with when one does what is asked of them.  It is also a good lesson:  it is much easier to demand something of somebody if you first do what is required/requested of you by that person.

Moving on, our parsha continues by telling us that we have caused the words to be spoken that haShem is our god/powers and that we will go in his ways and obey her.  HaShem, too, has caused the words to be spoken that we are his treasured people as she spoke to us and we should observe his mitzvot (commandments/connections).

It is an interesting choice of words here, to, “Cause words to be spoken.”

What I find really interesting is that haShem spoke words and creation happened.  So, one could say that the spoken word creates reality.  If so, then the Torah is telling us here, that our actions cause particular words to be spoken which in turn produces a particular reality.

I think this is telling us we should be very careful with word and deed, because word and deed is what gives shape to our world.

Up to now, I think we have seen the ritual and the result of the ritual, which is a binding of haShem and the nation together.  Our parsha continues by telling us that we will be above the other nations which haShem made, to praise and to name, and to glorify and to be a kodesh (holy/separate) nation as haShem spoke.

This is telling me two things.  The first thing it does is harken back to the place where it says that we will be the priests and teachers to the nations.  It also tells us what our purpose in creation is.

In essence, if we do as haShem asks, and follow in his ways, our actions will create a world in which we will be above the nations, as a priest or teacher is above her congregants and students, in order to teach the other nations how to praise (ie have gratitude towards) haShem (and why shouldn’t we praise haShem, considering all she has done for us!).

I do want to point out here, that I do not see this as saying we are above the other nations all the time, just when we are teaching or priestessing.  It is like when you are in school, your teacher is above you.  However, if you are in the supermarket, and you see your teacher, your teacher becomes just another person.  You say hello, and if you get to the checkout line first, you get checked out first.  Your teacher might even ask for your help in getting an item on a high shelf or in finding out the price of something, or its ingredients.  You might even offer your teacher recipe ideas.

In other words, your teacher is only above you for a particular purpose.  So, too, are we above the other nations for a particular purpose:  the purpose of learning how to recognize all that god does for us and to thank god for all that god has done for us.

Alright, back to our parsha.  It continues with Moshe and the elders telling the people to follow the mitzvot, and on the day that we cross the Yardayn (Jordan) river, we are to make an altar (not waving any iron over the stones) and offer up sacrifices.  We are also to erect stones, plaster them, and write the Torah on them, complete with a good explanation.

Then we are told of another ritual to perform which has the nation divided onto two mountains.  One mountain is for curses and the other is for blessings.  The Levis are to announce what causes someone to be cursed and the people answer amen.  We are then told all the blessings that will chase us and catch us if we follow haShem’s ways.  This is followed, in excruciating detail, by all the curses that will chase and catch us if we don’t listen to haShem’s voice.

At the end of all this, we are told that this is another brit (covenant) that haShem commanded Moshe to make with the children of Yisrael in the land of Moab, besides the brit that was made at Chorev.

Moshe then called to all of Yisrael and reminded them of all that they had seen haShem do to Pharaoh and Egypt, and of all the miracles, and that our mind didn’t know, eyes didn’t see, ears didn’t hear until today.  We are told how during the 40 years in the desert our clothes and shoes didn’t wear and we survived without bread and wine, just so we would know haShem, our god/powers.  We are reminded that we defeated the two kings:  Sichon and Ohg, and we took their land as part of our inheritance.  Our parsha ends with us being told to fulfill the words (again with the words!) of this brit so we can prosper in everything that we do.

As I said above, this parsha is very intense, to say the least.  Now, I have already thrown some thoughts that struck me inside the summary.  But I think I might be able to add just a little something extra, just for those who skip the summaries and only read the end of these blogs.

I am looking at the part of our parsha that talks about the ritual we do when we actually enter the land.  We are to build an altar and make sacrificial offering,s and write the entire Torah onto standing stones.  And then we come to verse 27:9 (of D’varim/Deuteronomy) which tells us that Moshe and the cohanim (priests) will tell the people to listen because, “This day you (singular) became a people to haShem your god/powers.”

Wait a minute; didn’t we become a people when we received the Torah at Mount Sinai?  What is going on?

First, I want to mention a similarity between this verse and the verses around haShem speaking to us at Sinai.  The thing they both have in common is that the people are referred to in the singular.  The Torah does this when a group of people are acting together as a unit.  Needless to say, it does not happen very often that so many people (over six hundred thousand) can agree to act as one.  So, when it does happen, it is newsworthy.  There must be some connection.  The connection is that we were in total agreement.   At sinai, 100% of us agreed to receive the torah, and when we enter the land, we will be 100% behind agreeing to follow Hashem’s ways.  To become a people, we must do it together.

So, what is the difference between the two events and why does the torah say that we will become a people when we enter the land, and not when we received the torah?

The answer to that has to do with conscious choice and effort.  At Sinai, we had the Torah dumped on us.  We didn’t really have to do anything, except to say yes.

In order for us to come into the land, we had to endure 40 years in the desert.  We had to actually live by the Torah.  We had to refrain from fighting the Edomites.  And we had to fight and defeat the kingdoms of Sichon and the giant Ohg.

In other words, to enter the land requires conscious choice and effort on our part.

Now, the question that comes to my mind is this:  when is something more dear and precious to you?  When it is given to you on a silver platter or when you have to work and struggle to attain it?

The answer is:  when you work and struggle, because it now has value to you – the value of the effort you put into attaining it.  It also was a conscious choice to attain it, to put the effort in to attain it.  After all, you could have put your energy and time towards something else.

It is for this reason that we didn’t become a nation at Sinai; there was no effort involved.  The Torah was given to us on a silver platter.  When we enter the land however, we are entering it because we, all of us, 100% of us, really wanted to enter.  We, all 100% of us, were willing to sacrifice, to even die, in order live by haShem’s words, and enter into the land.

This complete sacrifice is what makes us a nation, and it is not complete until we enter the land.   That is why, when we finally enter the land and fulfill the first things haShem asks of us to do in the land, can we finally be told we are a people to haShem.

We are only a few weeks away from entering the land.  We enter it the same time that we start to read about the creation of the world.  As I mentioned above, action leads to speech which is how haShem creates the world.  So, when we enter the land, at the beginning of the 6th book of the bible, we are also reading about the beginning of creation.

In other words, our entering the land creates a whole new world.  Are you ready to create a whole new world?  Or do you wish to stay and live in a rerun/recreation of the same old world?  The choice is yours, but you had better make it soon, or the decision will be made for you.

If you want to read what I wrote about this parsha last year, click here.

About the Author

Shmuel Shalom Cohen spent 10 years studying Torah in Jerusalem. Six years ago, he started Conscious Torah to help Jews connect to their tradition in ways they didn’t think possible. Shmuel also started, and is the executive directory of Jewish Events Willamette-valley, a non-profit whose mission is to build Jewish community, pride, and learning. In his free time, Shmuel likes walks in nature, playing music, writing poetry, and time with good friends.