Torah: Deuteronomy 1-3:22; Triennial 2:2-30

Haftarah: Isaiah 1:1-27

In this week's Torah Sparks, you'll find a D'var Torah on the Parashah by Ilana Kurshan called "Not Just a Second Torah", Vered Hollander-Goldfarb poses questions titled "It´s Lonely at the Top" and Bex Stern Rosenblatt writes about "The Widow and the Whore" in the Haftarah.

Moshe begins his final address to the people by reviewing several episodes from the previous three books of the Bible, including the appointment of magistrates to help Moshe judge the people, the sending of spies to scout out the land of Canaan, and the journey through the lands belonging to the Moabites and Amorites. In each case, Moshe offers a slightly different take on these events than the one found earlier in the Torah. For instance, while in the book of Numbers it is God who tells Moshe to send out spies, here in Deuteronomy, Moshe states that it was the Israelites who had the idea to send out spies, implying that the people were to blame for the crisis of confidence that followed the spies’ return. Here as elsewhere, Moshe refracts the events of the past through the lens of his own perspective, commenting and critiquing rather than just repeating and reviewing. Perhaps it should not come as a surprise, then, that in introducing Moshe’s address, the Torah explicitly describes it as commentary rather than repetition: “On the other side of the Jordan, in the land of Moab, Moses undertook to expound (ba’er) this teaching” (1:5). Moshe is not merely chronicling all that came before, but “expounding” a teaching, interpreting the past so as to glean lessons and insights from it.

The very first words Moshe speaks to the people in our parashah—the words with which he opens his final address—also indicate that Moshe was offering an account of the past that reflected his own preoccupations. We might have expected him to start at the very beginning, with the inauguration of his own prophetic career at the burning bush, or with the story of the flight from Egypt. But instead, Moshe seems to start in media res: “The Lord our God spoke to us at Horeb saying: ‘You have stayed long enough at this mountain. Start out and make your way to the hill country” (1:7). Moshe begins his address by quoting God’s charge to the people to depart from Sinai, suggesting that this was a key moment in Moshe’s understanding of the events of the past. Perhaps for Moshe, the departure from Sinai represented the first time the people had to learn to take Torah with them. Having just received the Torah at Sinai, the people who traveled away from the mountain had to find a way to carry Torah inside of themselves and ensure that it became a part of them once the fiery experience of revelation was over. This is also the challenge that Moshe faces when he expounds on the Torah in Sefer Devarim: How can he review and teach Torah in a way that the people will remember it and will carry it around with them always?

9And I spoke to you… saying: ‘I am not able to bear you alone; 10the LORD your God has multiplied you, and, behold, you are… as the stars of heaven for multitude… 12How can I alone bear your cumbrance, and your burden, and your strife? 13Get you people who are wise, understanding, and known, from your tribes; and I will place them as heads over you.’

How can I alone bear your cumbrance, and your burden, and your strife? Moshe… eluded to them the three things which he told Jethro that he was doing for the people... He said “cumbrance” corresponding to "and I make known to them the statutes of God and His laws", for it was a cumbering task to teach those who had come forth from Egypt the statutes and the laws of God, their meanings, interpretations, and secrets. He mentioned “burden” corresponding to “the people come me to inquire of God”, a reference to prayer, for he used to pray on their behalf… “Your strife” [meaning]…— matters of judgments. He said: Get you people who are wise…, and known, from your tribes — referring only to [their qualities as] judges. But he said, “and I will make them heads over you” by way of humility.

We map ourselves onto Jerusalem, using the city as a mirror to reflect what we see and want to see in our own souls. Jerusalem contains for us both an image of heaven on earth and of the loss of heaven. And the way we choose to portray Jerusalem is as a woman. We look to see the best of ourselves and the worst of ourselves as a woman in relationship with God. 

The prophetic books are full of these descriptions of Jerusalem, presenting her glory and her ruin. In this week’s haftarah from the Book of Isaiah, we find both. We read in Isaiah 1:21,

Alas, how can she have become a whore, the faithful city?

Full of justice, righteousness dwelt in her, 

Now murderers. 

She is both perfect and ruined, more ruined for the perfection that she once held. Her current state is unimaginable, remembering who and what she once was. This style is typical in laments such as this verse: starting with the word eikhah, “alas, how?!” they present the complete reversal of states, the bringing low of the high. It is a style perhaps most familiar to us from David’s lament over Jonathan and Saul “how the mighty have fallen!” which might be better translated as “alas, how could the mighty have fallen?!” 

Often, laments begin with the former good state and then bring up the current fallen state, contrasting it as nearly unbelievable, beyond imagination. Here, Isaiah does the opposite. He starts with her whoredom. Her whoredom is presented as not quite the lowest of states but rather as an explanation for how she could reach the lowest of states. As in so many of the prophetic books, we explain our wrongdoing, we justify being punished, by imagining ourselves as one of the most powerless members of society, the whore. In this metaphor, Jerusalem is in relationship with God. She whores by turning astray after other gods, after other nations. Therefore, any punishment is justified - the whore has no rights. 

There is another type of powerless woman who appears frequently in the Tanakh - the widow. Like the whore, the widow is defenseless. She has no man to protect her or to provide for her. But crucially, the Tanakh does not blame her for her existence. Rather, the Tanakh sees it as imperative that society should become her “husband,” should protect and provide for her. Our haftarah passage presents us with the image of the widow as well. She is presented to us not as Jerusalem, but rather as proof that we have done well. Verse 17 reads, “Learn good-doing, seek justice, righten the ruthless, judge for the orphan, argue for the widow.” If only we do these things, if only we form a society capable of taking care of our most vulnerable, then all good things will come to us. But Jerusalem is not included here. She is the harlot, the cause of our going astray, rather than someone in need of help. 

When we arrive at the Book of Lamentations this Tisha b’Av, we read Jerusalem as the defenseless one, the one who is suffering, rather than the one who causes suffering. In a complete reversal from Isaiah 1:21, the Book of Lamentations opens:

Alas, how can the city sit alone?

Once great with people, she has become like a widow.

Once great among nations, princess among provinces, she has become a slave.

We read first her greatness and her status which rose from us, from her being full of people. And then we encounter the most blood chilling line, we encounter Jerusalem as “like a widow.” She has lost her people and perhaps her God. We who are called upon to protect the rights of the widow in Isaiah are absent in Lamentations, unable to offer Jerusalem the support she needs. Yet we have taken an important first step. We are no longer reading Jerusalem as a whore, no longer reading her as the other, the part of ourselves we wish to punish. Rather we read her as the part of ourselves which has become distanced. As we proceed to read the Book of Lamentations, we can accept the invitation to hold up Jerusalem as a mirror to ourselves, choosing to read her as ourselves, capable of returning and full of the capacity to “learn good-doing.” 

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