Nitzavim-Vayeilekh
Jan 1, 1980
9 You stand this day, all of you, before the Lord your God — your tribal heads, your elders and your officials, all the men of Israel, 10 your children, your wives, even the stranger within your camp, from woodchopper to waterdrawer — 11 to enter into the covenant of the Lord your God, which the Lord your God is concluding with you this day, with its sanctions; 12 to the end that He may establish you this day as His people and be your God, as He promised you and as He swore to your fathers, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.
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Choose Life and Torah
Sep 19, 2014 By Arnold M. Eisen | Commentary | Nitzavim | Vayeilekh
The Torah wants to speak to Children of Israel in every time and place, in a way that leads them—leads us—to carry forward the project that Moses has directed. It succeeds in that effort: we too are stirred by Moses’s language, compelled by his vision, moved to undertake responsibility for his Torah. Four passages in Parashat Nitzavim seem to me especially crucial to Moses’s teaching and our response.
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Love in Hiding
Sep 11, 2015 By Arnold M. Eisen | Commentary | Vayeilekh
When I prepared to chant Parashat Vayeilekh at my Bar Mitzvah, I don’t think I paid much attention to the theological import of the announcement that God would “hide My countenance” from the children of Israel. Nor is it likely that I felt the pathos of Moses giving up the mantle of leadership, on the far side of the Jordan, as his life’s journey came to an end.
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