Parashat Ha'azinu - Insights and Questions
Read the biblical text and try to understand it on your own, before reading the commentary.
Parashat Ha’azinu is perhaps one of the relatively short parashot in terms of its story, but among the deepest and most dramatic in the Torah. Almost all of it is one great song of Moses, a moment before his death. Instead of another long speech, Moses leaves the people of Israel a kind of song that is meant to accompany them hundreds and thousands of years later as well. The full text of the parashah appears above on this page.
The summary: Moses’ farewell song
Imagine the moment: Moses, the leader who led Israel in the exodus from Egypt and the splitting of the Sea of Reeds, and led them for forty years in the wilderness, knows that he will not cross the Jordan with them.
And he opens his song with a call to the heavens and to the earth to be witnesses.
From here the song takes us on an immense journey: God’s kindness toward Israel, the protection in the wilderness, the abundance in the land, and then the danger that comes precisely out of success. Israel grows fat, drifts away and forgets the source of the blessing. In its wake come the hidden face, enemies and suffering.
But here comes the great twist of the song: the end is not total destruction.
Toward the climax it is said:
“re’u atah ki ani ani hu ve’ein Elohim imadi ani amit va’achayeh machatzti va’ani erpa ve’ein miyadi matzil” (See now that I, I am he, and there is no god with me; I put to death and I give life, I have wounded and I heal, and there is none who can deliver from my hand) (Deuteronomy 32:39).
After the song ends, Moses demands of Israel that they set the words upon their hearts and pass them on to their children. Immediately afterwards Moses is commanded to go up Mount Nebo. He will see the land, but he will not enter it.
And so this great parashah ends almost like a film: a whole people stands on the threshold of a new land, and the one who led them there remains on the other side of the Jordan.
Six insights worth pausing on
1. Moses does not leave only a book. He leaves a song.
This is a fascinating point. Idea and interpretation: it may be that the poetic form was meant to penetrate a place that an ordinary lecture does not always reach. Words can be forgotten. A song can stay in the head for generations. That is why the Song of Ha’azinu is full of images: rain, dew, rock, eagle, fire, sword, blood and healing.
2. One of the great dangers in the parashah is not poverty, but precisely abundance.
In Deuteronomy 32:15 it is described how, after Israel attains abundance, the kicking and the abandonment come. Idea and interpretation: the Torah presents here a very sharp psychological observation. When things are hard for a person, they know they need help. Precisely when they have everything, they can convince themselves that they no longer need anyone. Sometimes the trial of success is harder than the trial of failure.
3. The remedy for forgetting is historical memory.
Moses says:
“zechor yemot olam binu shenot dor vador she’al avicha veyagedcha zekenecha veyomru lach” (Remember the days of old, consider the years of generation after generation; ask your father and he will tell you, your elders and they will say to you) (Deuteronomy 32:7).
This is a tremendous insight: a person who does not know where they came from finds it hard to know where they are going. Moses does not say only to learn history; he describes a human chain: a child asks a father, a young generation listens to the elders. The national memory passes from person to person.
4. The motif of the “Rock”, in its various forms, returns seven times in the song.
In chapter 32 the motif appears again and again: in verses 4, 15, 18, 30, 31 (twice) and 37. That is, seven appearances. Idea and literary interpretation: against human history, which changes without pause, the image of the rock rises again and again: stability, foundation, something one can lean on.
5. Notice the path of the images: from dew and rain, to fire and sword, and back to healing.
The song opens in a soft world of rain, dew, grass and herb. In its middle appear fire, arrows, sword and terror. Toward the climax the possibility of life and healing appears again. Idea and interpretation: the structure itself tells the story: blessing, drifting away, crisis, and finally the possibility of repair.
6. And perhaps the most unsettling thing is found right at the end.
After all this cosmic song, Moses returns to speak about children:
“vayomer alehem simu levavchem lechol hadevarim asher anochi me’id bakhem hayom asher tetzavum et bneikhem lishmor la’asot et kol divrei haTorah hazot” (And he said to them: set your hearts to all the words that I testify against you today, that you may command your children to keep and to do all the words of this Torah) (Deuteronomy 32:46).
That is, after heaven and earth, peoples and enemies, calamity and rescue, the real question becomes very simple: what will pass to the next generation?
And this is perhaps the strongest message of Ha’azinu in my eyes as interpretation: the ending can be read this way: Moses stands a moment before his death, and he is not occupied with the question of how he will be remembered. He is occupied with the question of what they will remember.
The greatest person of the wilderness generation steps down from the stage, but before he goes he tries to leave something that will be stronger than one person: a memory that passes from father to son, a song that passes from generation to generation.
And that is exactly what happened.
Thousands of years later, we are still reading it.
Heaven and earth are not only witnesses, they are part of the message
Moses opens:
“ha’azinu hashamayim va’adabera vetishma ha’aretz imrei fi” (Give ear, O heavens, and I will speak, and let the earth hear the words of my mouth) (Deuteronomy 32:1).
Rashi explains why precisely heaven and earth. He writes that they are “witnesses that exist forever”, and further on adds that if Israel merit it, “the witnesses will come and give their reward”. That is, the heavens will give theirs and the earth its own.
And now notice what happens in the very next verse:
“ya’arof kamatar likchi tizal katal imrati kis’irim alei deshe vechirvivim alei esev” (May my teaching drop like rain, may my speech distill like dew, like showers on the grass and like raindrops on the herb) (Deuteronomy 32:2).
Here comes a possible homily, not a quotation from a source:
Moses is about to die. He knows that his human voice is about to cease.
So to whom does he hand over his voice?
To heaven and earth.
And what is the first thing he says afterwards? That his teaching will be like rain and dew that come down from the heavens and make grass and herb grow from the earth.
As if Moses says:
I am going. But if this song takes root in you, my words will not die with me. They will keep coming down like rain in every generation anew, and growing out of the earth.
And this, in my eyes, is the chilling part:
Heaven and earth are the witnesses that remain after Moses’ death, and at the same time they are also the image of the way his Torah will stay alive.
Moses does not ask that the words be like a stone that can be kept in an archive.
He asks that they be like rain.
Rain disappears the moment it touches the ground, but then you discover it anew inside what grew.
And this is perhaps one of the beautiful pictures of the transmission of Torah:
Sometimes you no longer see the teacher. You no longer hear his voice. But suddenly you discover that the things he said have grown inside you.
Right after the song, and toward the end of the parashah, Moses turns the gaze back to the next generation. That is, the song will not remain with the wilderness generation but will go on living from generation to generation.
Questions on Parashat Ha’azinu
- Why does Moses open the song of his life precisely by addressing heaven and earth, and what changes if we understand that they are not only witnesses but part of the message itself?
- What is the deep connection between the heaven and earth of the first verse and the rain, the dew, the grass and the herb that appear immediately in the second verse?
- Why does Moses, a moment before his death, choose to leave the people of Israel a song rather than an ordinary speech, and what is there in a song that can outlive a thousand speeches?
- Why does the word “Rock” return again and again in the Song of Ha’azinu, and what can be learned from all the places where it appears about the hidden structure of the song?
- How can it be that one of the most dangerous moments for the people of Israel in the parashah comes precisely after it succeeds, grows rich and is sated?
- What lies behind the sharp transition in the parashah from the description of a people guarded and protected like the apple of the eye, to “Jeshurun grew fat and kicked”?
- Why is God described precisely as an eagle hovering over its young, and what is unusual in the behavior of the eagle described here?
- Is there a connection between “the apple of his eye” and the image of the eagle that appears right after it, and what do the two images together say about the relation between protection and independence?
- Why does Moses say “remember the days of old” and not simply “remember the past”, and what is the difference between historical memory and identity?
- Why, right after “remember the days of old”, does Moses send a person to ask their father and their elders, and what does this teach about the way the Torah wants us to know our story?
- What is the exact moment in the Song of Ha’azinu at which the story moves from love and protection to crisis and anger, and does the Torah give us a linguistic sign of it?
- Why does the Torah describe the sin not only as rebellion, but again and again precisely as forgetting? According to Ha’azinu, does a person sin because they are evil, or because they forget?
- What is the deep meaning of “hiding the face” in the parashah, and is the harshest punishment that God acts against a person, or rather that he, as it were, hides?
- Why, precisely within a song full of anger, calamity and war, does the declaration “I put to death and I give life, I have wounded and I heal” appear? What is healing doing precisely there?
- What is special about the doubling “I, I am he”, and why is the Torah not content with “I am he”?
- Is the Song of Ha’azinu built as a circular path: blessing, abundance, forgetting, fall, recognition, healing and return? And if so, where exactly does the circle close?
- Why does Moses describe Torah as rain and dew and not as fire, light or stone, and what is the difference between rain and dew as a parable for Torah study?
- What can be learned from the fact that in the same verse the Torah likens Moses’ words both to strong rain and to gentle dew? Should the same message be said to different people in different ways?
- Why precisely do the enemies of Israel enter into the reckoning between God and Israel, and what does the parashah say about the danger that an enemy will misinterpret Israel’s fall?
- How does the Song of Ha’azinu manage to tell, in effect, the whole history of Israel almost without naming kings, lands or periods?
- Why, after the mighty song that speaks of heaven, earth, nations, God, sword and vengeance, does Moses end precisely with an instruction to pass the words on to the children?
- What is the depth of Moses’ statement that the Torah is not an “empty thing”, and can it be read as if Moses says: if the Torah seems empty to you, perhaps the emptiness is somewhere else?
- Why, right after Moses tells Israel that the Torah is their life, does the Torah tell him of his own death? Is this contrast deliberate?
- What is the dramatic message in the fact that Moses can see the land from Mount Nebo but not enter it, precisely right after he finished handing the Song of Ha’azinu over to the people?
- And the question that is perhaps the most unsettling: is the Song of Ha’azinu in fact a letter that Moses writes not only to the generation standing before him, but to us, to the generation that reads it thousands of years after his death? And if so, which parts of the song prove this from the text itself?
Daily Aliyot
Parashat Ha'azinu - First Aliyah
The aliyah opens the Song of Ha'azinu by calling heaven and earth as witnesses, presents God as the Rock whose work is perfect and whose ways are justice against a crooked and twisted generation, and ends with a rebuke over ingratitude toward the one who made and established the people.
Parashat Ha'azinu - Second Aliyah
The aliyah calls to remember the days of old and to learn from the fathers and the elders, describes Israel as God's portion and inheritance, the care in the wilderness through the image of the eagle hovering over its young, and ends with God's exclusive leadership with no foreign god.
Parashat Ha'azinu - Third Aliyah
The aliyah describes the abundance given to Israel, honey and oil, cattle and sheep, wheat and wine, and the turn that comes precisely out of satiety: Jeshurun grows fat and kicks, forsakes the God who made him, turns to new gods and forgets the Rock that bore him.
Parashat Ha'azinu - Fourth Aliyah
The aliyah describes God's response to Israel's distancing: a hidden face, famine, disease, the sword outside and terror within the chambers, and inside the judgment also a restraint, so that the enemy will not say our hand is high, up to the critique of a nation void of counsel and without understanding.
Parashat Ha'azinu - Fifth Aliyah
The aliyah calls for wisdom and for considering the end, describes the enemies who prevailed and their bitter fruit, the judgment kept for the fitting time, the turn when strength is gone and the collapse of false supports, and ends with the declaration: God puts to death and gives life, wounds and heals, and none can deliver from his hand.
Parashat Ha'azinu - Sixth Aliyah
The aliyah opens with God's oath, as I live forever, describes in the language of sword and arrows the judgment that will repay adversaries and enemies after a period in which the enemies seemed to rule, and closes with a call to the nations to sing with Israel and with atonement for the land and the people.
Parashat Ha'azinu - Seventh Aliyah
The aliyah seals the Song of Ha'azinu: Moses and Hoshea son of Nun recite it to the people, Moses demands that they set the words upon their heart and command their children, for it is no empty thing, for it is your life, and immediately afterwards he is commanded to go up Mount Nebo, to see the land from afar and not to enter it.