#eikev

Eikev

THIS IS THE YEAR

… the eyes of the Lord your God are always upon [the land], from the beginning of the year until the end of year. (Deut. 11:12)

In this week’s Torah portion, Moses describes God watching over the Holy Land "from the beginning of the year until the end of year." Why does it say "beginning of THE year" but then say simply “end of year” rather than "end of THE year?"

The Satmar Rav explains that at the beginning of each year, we tell ourselves that this is going to be THE year. The year I become a better person, the year I stop procrastinating, the year I achieve my dreams. But by the end of the year, it’s just another year. You didn’t achieve the greatness you envisioned twelve months earlier. The Rav said that we should pray that the end of the year should be like the beginning of the year, so we can look back and say, this really was THE great year I imagined! 

The Torah portion Eikev begins with the verse, “Because (eikev) you listen to these laws and safeguard and keep them, G-d your L-rd will keep His covenant and kindness that He swore to your fathers.”1

The Hebrew word eikev not only means “because,” but also “heel.” Thus Midrash Tanchuma2 explains that “these laws” refers to mitzvos that seemingly lack significance, so that people tend to “ignore them and cast them under their heels.”

Superficially, it would seem that the Midrash is inferring that these seemingly unimportant commandments are treated so lightly by some individuals that they do not observe them at all.

However, if this were indeed so, what is the connection between their non-performance and their being “cast under the heel” — if they are not performed at all then they are “cast out entirely,” not merely “cast under the heel”?

Truly, the Midrash is not referring to people who maintain that these “insignificant” mitzvos need not be performed, and surely it does not allude to those individuals who defile them by casting them under their heels.

Rather, the Midrash is making reference to those persons who recognize that all mitzvos are to be performed, no matter how inconsequential they may seem, only that these individuals prioritize the order of their performance, delaying the performance of mitzvos that they treat lightly — they cast their performance “under their heels.”

These persons maintain that they will first see to it that the “head,” i.e., the most important and stringent matters, will be performed properly. Afterward they will see to those mitzvos that are in close proximity to the head — mitzvos that are slightly less major. Only at the very last will they think about observing “heel mitzvos ,” and surely going above and beyond the letter of the law through the beautification and enhancement of these mitzvos will be put off to the very end.

Such individuals contend that one cannot possibly begin with the “heel”; order dictates that one must first do those things that are of greatest import and only then can one begin to think about deeper piety, enhanced performance, beautification of mitzvos , etc.

Although such thinking has a certain validity,3 it is absolutely vital that divine service begin with faith and acceptance of G-d’s yoke, not with the dictates of logic. And the Jewish faith exhorts the individual to be as scrupulously observant of the seemingly minor mitzvos as the major ones.

For the quintessential aspect of all mitzvos is that they unite the individual with G-d.4This applies to all the mitzvos , without the slightest difference between “major” and “minor” mitzvos , “head mitzvos ” or “heel mitzvos.” It is therefore out of place to think about a sequential order to the performance of mitzvos.5

Thus we also observe that the condition which enabled the Jewish people to receive the Torah and become a nation was their prefacing “We shall do” to “We shall hear” — a totally illogical sequence.6

For a Jew’s spiritual beginning, similar to the beginning of the Jewish nation as a whole, must be with faith and acceptance of the divine yoke and not with intellect; even those matters that are readily understandable must be performed out of a sense of faith and G-dly submission.

So too, children — people at the beginning of their lives — should know not only about the natural, i.e., logical, events that transpired with the Jewish people, but the miraculous, i.e., faith and belief, as well. This instills a firm foundation of faith in G-d.

This manner of conduct is especially important in times of exile, when the Jewish people are “like a sheep surrounded by 70 wolves”7 : When we transcend our self-imposed order and are equally fervent in our performance of all commandments, then G-d too foregoes the “order” of natural events, and the “Great Shepherd protects His sheep,”8 and abundantly provides them with children, health and sustenance.

Based on Likkutei Sichos Vol. XIX, pp. 89-93.

FOOTNOTES

1. Devarim 7:12.

2. Ibid.

3. See Mo’ed Kattan 9a.

4. Likkutei Torah , Bechukosai 45c; Rebbe Omer 5700 , conclusion of ch. 1 and onward.

5. See Kuntres U’Mayon p. 22.

6. See Shabbos 88a.

7. Tanchuma, Toldos; Esther Rabbah 10:11; Pesikta Rabosi ch. 9.

I did not climb for the angels. This is not their book.

Who are the stars of heaven, but you? this is your land and this your word.

I am Joshua ben Nun; orphaned in Egypt—my parents perished while building the pyramids that dotted the Valley of the Kings. It was Jochebed, mother of Moses, who took me in, may she rest in peace. I recall being a small child, when Moses was already a teenager—Jochebed often took me to the Pharaoh’s Palace to visit him. I thought of him as a mix of an older brother and a kindly uncle. I wept when she told me Moses that had fled from Egypt, fearful of the punishment that would follow his having killed a slave driver.

Moses has been my mentor and guide for all these years in the Wilderness; I was fortunate to be with him when he climbed Mt. Sinai, there to commune with the Almighty and receive the Ten Commandments. I did not join him on the mountaintop; I hid amid the boulders along the path. There, I witnessed the battle between Moses and the Angels who did not wish to relinquish the Torah, until God intervened.

The Generation of the Exodus is gone; now, he and I lead the Generation of the Wilderness. I was happy to hear that My Lord Moses wished to teach Torah to these youngsters. He and I had had such high hopes for them! After all, they were not tainted by the slavery experience; they had been nurtured in freedom, under God’s protection, who fed them with manna, and so much more. Unfortunately, it is not unusual for headstrong young people to spurn their elders’ instruction, and these Israelites had not hesitated to participate in the riotous orgy brought on the Midianites and their god, Baal Peor. Sadly, many of them paid for their sins with their lives.

Nonetheless, could there not be a time for reconciliation? I looked forward eagerly to Moses’s Torah lecture; surely he would find a way to make peace between the people and their somewhat testy deity. Was He not a God full of mercy and compassion, extending forgiveness to the thousandth generation? Instead, Moses lectured them about their backsliding:

 “If you do forget the LORD your GOD and follow other gods to serve them... I warn you this day that you shall certainly perish... because you did not heed the Lord your God.”

--Deut. 8:19-20

 And that was not all: Moses recounted all of their sins for them, and laid it on very thick. It disturbed and frightened me.

When Moses was done with his teaching, bitter as it was, I gave him my strong right arm on which to lean, as I escorted him to his tent.

“What think you of my address to the people, hey Joshua?” Moses asked me.

“May I speak frankly, My Lord?” I answered. When he nodded, I responded to him quickly and precisely: “It seems to me, Rabbi Moses, that you might have sweetened your words a little. When I behold this people, the work of God’s hands, I consider that they are unlettered, unsophisticated—have they not been living in the wilderness for all of their lives? Since their parents perished in this great and savage desert, they have no one except you, Sir, to teach them the proper way for Jews to live.”

Moses stopped walking, and looked directly at me: I swear, it was as though he could see straight into my heart and soul.

“You are right, my disciple, to question me; never fear—I am not angry. Yes, you are right; I did speak harshly with the people. But life is very hard, and one must be steeled to difficulties in order to overcome them. Hear me, Young Joshua: in days to come, there will be many Jews who behave un-Jewishly, who cheat and lie and forget their heritage. My duty is to warn them of the consequences. And those who heed me will understand how to act.”

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Eikev