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The Land of Israel is in sight and the nation is about to enter and conquer it.  Moses and the people know this mean that Moses must die very soon. And so Moses is giving his last speech to the nation to encourage them to keep the commandments when he will no longer be around. The speech begins with Moses saying, “Today you are all standing before God your Lord… You are thus being brought into the covenant of God your Lord, and [accepting] the dread oath that he is making with you today.”(D 29:9-11)  The word used to mean “standing” is nitzavim.  This is not the normal way to say standing.  The normal word would be omdim.  And in fact, this word is use later, in verse 14 . So why does Moses use this unusual word here to tell the people they are standing before him?

And there is even a more essential question that needs to be answered, there have been several previous events where a covenant was made between God and the Jewish people (not counting the pacts between God and the forefathers), why the need to do this again?  There was the communal pact of the Pascal Lamb in which blood was use as a sign of the pact. There was the pact at mount Sinai.  And now there is this pact which is referred to as brit arvot moav. What is it’s purpose? It cannot be a pact to keep the commandments, that was already done at mount Sinai. And our being His people was already established with the Pascal Lamb. Commenting on verse 12, Rashi offers an answer to this question:

‘He will be your God’: He spoke with you and swore to your forefathers that He would not exchange their progeny with another nation, therefore He makes you take these oaths so that you do not provoke Him to anger [knowing] that He is not able to abandon you. This is the literal explanation. In the Midrash it is asked, why is this section subsequent to the curses? Because the Israelites heard 98 curses (not counting the 49 in Leviticus)  they turned pale, saying ‘who can withstand these [curses]?’ So Moses began to comfort them:  You are standing today even though many times you have angered Him. He has not destroyed you. You still exist before Him. [So too in the future if you anger him, you will survive.] – Rashi

The Jews’ covenant with God that has now gone through 3 phases and intensifications is an unusual pact.  Even if the Jews break their side, God will never leave them for another nation.  They might take advantage of this situation and ignore their side of the agreement knowing full well they will face no consequences.  Hence the preceding curses and blessing are integrally tied into to this pact. Since God cannot throw them out, and He is stuck with them, He makes the Jewish people swear not to violate his covenant.

But what use is an oath? The Jewish people already agreed to the covenant. What extra purpose does the oath to keep the covenant serve? Why should  a person obey his own oath more than the original agreement to the covenant? And what is the meaning of the Midrash that Rashi also mentions? If Moses is pronouncing all these curses to scare the Jewish people into keeping the covenant, why after achieving the intended emotional  reaction would he comfort them and tell them they will survive?  He wants to frighten them into keeping the laws.  Leave them scared!

The intent of the curses was not to scare the people but was an expression of their own commitment to the laws. Rabbi Shmuel Bornsztain in his book Shem MiShmuel explains what is the purpose and meaning of an oath. When a person experiences an extraordinary event he can gain new clarity about his life and his behavior. For example a smoker may visit the cancer ward of a hospital and see the patients dying from lung cancer and suffering terribly.  He then resolves to never smoke again.  He throws away his cigarettes.  He rushes home and throws away all his packs of cigarettes.  He tells his neighbors to never give him a cigarette.  He calls all the shops in town and tells them not to sell him any more cigarettes again. But several hours pass and the shock of the experience begins to wear off and his desire for a cigarette increases until at last he goes to his neighbor and ask for a cigarette.  The neighbor says, I can’t give you a cigarette, you yourself told me not to.  The smoker responds, Yes, that was 5 hours ago and now I am telling you to give me a cigarette! Do my previous words have any more weight than my current words?  Rabbi Bornsztain says Yes, they do!

The smoker had clarity of the truth and knew that some time later this clarity would wear off.  He took every precaution to ensure he would keep his commitment. In the Torah this is done by swearing an oath. In so doing, one creates a certain level of commitment that can outweigh future views and opinions. Rabbi Bornsztain compares this to the oath of marriage. You are dating someone and at a certain point you realize all your thoughts are only about them and you want to be with them always – you are in love.  So you commit yourself to this person through marriage.  Much later an outside viewer might not see any signs of love. But you know that there is a deeper you, from an earlier time that was truly committed. So even now you are love.  If you could penetrate to that previous level, you would see it. Your oath of marriage is the reminder of your true feeling even if they are not visible now.

The law in the Torah of nazir, neder and shavua are legal structures which are founded on this principle. Why is there an oath at all? If I feel strongly now I will probably feel strongly next year too. And if I don’t feel strongly next year, why should I commit myself now? Because you know that now you have a special insight that might not last till next year.  You use the oath to tell your future self that your past level of commitment outweighs any future opinions.  This same concept can be applied to a nation and its future generations.

As long as Moses was alive, the Jewish people had a high level of clarity of God and their responsibilities to Him. They knew that with Moses’ death their clarity would fade. Therefore they took these oaths to create a level of commitment that would stand for them in all future times, even when that clarity fades.  This it the reason for the use of the word nitzavim instead of omdim. Nitzavim is related to the word matzeiva,  monument.  The monument is a constant reminder of some great event or person from the past.  Even if today we don’t remember how great that event or person was, when we see the monument we realize that it must have been very significant if they built this monument.  The standing of the Jewish people here was to create a similar monument by means of taking an oath. In this way, future generations should know that at one time the presence of God was clear and that the nation’s level of commitment to Him was without fault.  Even if today we do not readily see this commitment the oaths remind us that on a very basic level we are committed to God.

The people’s fear of the oaths was a fear that perhaps future generations would be so far removed from the events that the oath would not serve its purpose and the curses would crush the people.  To this Moses comforted them and responded that the current generation is just as much lower than the preceding generation as any future generation will be lower than they are. Just as the current generation is far removed from the actual generation that left Egypt and experienced that high level of awareness of God that was a result of being involved in the great miracles first hand and yet, they are still here and committed to God, so will any future generation be committed to God.

A similar clarity and oath followed the Flood.  After such a great event, Noah committed himself to keep for himself and all future generations the 7 Noahide Laws.  The monument to remind us of that commitment from a state of intense clarity is the rainbow.

 

Nachum Danzig