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July 30, 1999/17 Av 5759, Vol. 51, No.43
Doing it God's way
Torah Study
RABBI SHLOMO RISKIN
Ekev/Deuteronomy 7:12 - 11:25
Visitors to Niagara Falls are awestruck by the beautiful setting and the torrent of water surging before their eyes. When Israelis return from seeing this magnificent site, they often comment that if Israel were blessed with such a volume of water, our problems would be solved.
Yet in this week's Torah portion, Ekev, is evidence that the holiness of Israel comes precisely from the fact that we have no expanse of water like Niagara Falls.
The portion reveals the Torah's seemingly contradictory approach to the land of Israel. On the one hand, Israel is blessed with luscious and luxurious fruit; it is a great and satisfying land, "a land of wheat and barley, of vines, figs and pomegranates, a land of olive trees and honey, a land where you may eat food without stint, where you will lack nothing" (Deuteronomy 8:8-9). Could any words be more positive, more comforting for the Israelites' troubled, wandering souls? But as we read on, we learn that Israel is a tough land, where eking out one's daily sustenance from the earth is fraught with unknowns and uncertainties.
The text highlights the contrast between Israel and Egypt, the land of the Nile: "For the land that you are about to enter and possess is not like the land of Egypt from which you have come. There the grain you sowed had to be watered by your own labors, like a vegetable garden, but the land you are about to cross into and possess, a land of hills and valleys, soaks up its waters from the rains of heaven. It is a land (that) God looks after ... from year's beginning to year's end" (Deuteronomy 11:10-12). And so the sky above is where the farmer's gaze, prayers and dreams begin and end.
These images sharpen our sensitivity to the significance of the land of Israel and to how the land itself provides a personal approach to the Divine and engenders a sense of humility.
The ancient Israelites could work their fingers to the bone, and sell their heirlooms to buy a team of oxen, and yet nothing could make the land yield its blessings unless God sent the requisite rain from heaven to fructify the earth. The gap was vast between one's own efforts, no matter how energetic, and putting bread on the family table. An Israelite who believed exclusively in his own power and strength could starve in a drought. "I did it my way" was not a popular ballad sung by Jewish farmers. The song they sang went something like this: "I had to do it God's way."
In Egypt, it was possible to overlook the ultimate source of the Nile River while involved in developing and maintaining an elaborate irrigation system to divert it to one's own use. It was easy to believe that, "My own power and the might of my own hand have won this wealth for me" (Deuteronomy 8:17). This belief in one's own power invariably led to arrogance and fostered a corrupt system that controlled the distribution of wealth - water - culminating in the office of the Pharaoh, who quite naturally believed that as the most powerful human in the world, he was a god. The Egyptian farmers' abundant water created a scarcity in a true faith.
In contrast, the nature of sustenance in the land of Israel inculcated in the Jewish farmer a sense of humility and sensitivity toward every other creature living under God. In the land of Israel, where the heavens are scrutinized by God, the scarcity of water creates abundant faith. With a loving and moral God, one need never be afraid.
It is helpful to examine additional verses in our portion, specifically Deuteronomy 10:12-13, which teach that God demands of the people of Israel that they revere God, walk only in God's paths, love and serve God "with all your heart and soul," and keep God's commandments and laws.
These requirements to revere God and follow the commandments are introduced here almost casually, yet they are essential. All our God requires is our reverence and love, and that we perform the commandments of ethical monotheism.
If we listen to God's voice and observe the commandments, God will provide rain for the land in its proper time, and "you shall gather in your new grain and wine and oil" (Deuteronomy 11:14).
Rabbi Shlomo Riskin is the spiritual leader of the Jewish community in Efrat, Israel.
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