Study this week's Parashah with Rabbi Jordan D. Cohen (your friendly Reb on the Web).

Current Parashah

Ki Tavo

Archived Parashiyot

Parashah: Ki Tavo - Deuteronomy 26:1-29:8

OVERVIEW

Parashat Ki Tavo opens with the commandment to bring the first fruits to the priests. This ritual includes a verse many will recognize from the Passover Seder, recalling that "my ancestor was a wandering Aramean." This is followed by another ritual for the completion of tithing. Both are a statement of God’s domination over the land.

Next we find a dramatic ritual called Tochacha - "admonition" - that is to be performed by the Israelites when they first cross the Jordan and enter into the Promised Land. As a reaffirmation of Israel’s acceptance of the covenant with God, they are to inscribe the Torah upon twelve stones, erecting them as a monument on the top of Mount Ebal. And then the tribes were divided, six to ascend to the top of Mount Grizzim, and six to the top of Mount Ebal. The Cohanim and the Levites, along with the Ark of the Covenant, stood in the valley in between. There, they called out a list of curses that would befall anyone who ignored God’s commandments and a list of blessings that would benefit those who followed God’s way. After each statement, all of the people said, "Amen".

The Parashah concludes with the beginning of Moses's final discourse. He begins by recounting all that God has done for Israel over the past forty years.

IN FOCUS

And God has distinguished you today to be for God a treasured people, as God spoke to you, and to observe all God's commandments, and to make you supreme over all the nations that God made, for praise, for renown, and for splendour, so that you will be a holy people to the Eternal your God, as He spoke. (Deuteronomy 26:18).

PSHAT

This passage is the basis for the notion of Israel being the "chosen people," but, as we shall see, it is not that simple. This is a covenantal statement, one that describes the connection between God and Israel; a connection that goes in two directions. By accepting the covenant, and by observing the mitzvot, Israel has singled-out God as their sole divinity. In turn, God has singled out Israel as unique amongst all the other nations (who are equally part of creation and therefore God’s "children"). Israel’s special status is described here as being an am segulah - a treasured people - clearly a special relationship, which brings with it some special perks. However, what makes Israel special is nothing inherent in them as a people. Rather, it is their decision to accept the obligation of maintaining the mitzvot (and the consequences of their failure to do so).

DRASH

My colleague, Rabbi Stephen Pearce of San Francisco, began a discussion of "choseness" by quoting William Norman Eiver's pithy little verse, "How odd of God to choose the Jews." Cleverly, Rabbi Pearce concluded his discussion with this response: "It isn't odd, the Jews chose God."

That about sums it up. Jews have long felt ambivalence or outright discomfort with the notion of being God's "chosen people," which is understandable. While, throughout history, the notion of being chosen has often served the Jews as a source of hope and reassurance that God will always redeem us, it has also served as a point of contention with the other nations. It was used against us as proof that Jews are haughty and arrogant and see themselves as superior to others. This notion has certainly been used to fuel anti-Semitism.

However, the claim that the Jews are the chosen people does not actually exist anywhere in the Hebrew Bible or in the classical Jewish literature. The closest idea we find to the notion of "choseness" is the passage in this week's parashah, which also appears elsewhere in the Torah (Exodus 19:5, Deuteronomy 7:6, 14:2) when Israel is referred to as an am segulah - "a treasured people" - and an am kadosh - "a holy people". One could argue, as many have, that being a treasured people or a holy people is quite a different thing from being a chosen people. However, all these terms do express a special relationship with God, which, by virtue of the Brit - the covenant - Israel most definitely maintains.

The important thing to remember is that a special relationship does not make anyone better then anyone else. It just means that, through mutual agreement, two parties agree to a relationship that is different or unique from all other relationships. This is the true definition of kadosh - holy - meaning that something, or someone, is set apart and made unique. We all have many special relationships in our lives: spouses, parents, children, partners, lovers, friends and more. We have people in our lives who are special to us, whom we value and treasure for their special status in relationship to us. This does not make them superior to anyone else on earth. It just means that they are special to us.

And this is the nature of Israel's relationship with God. We are no better then anyone else or anything else in creation. As God makes it clear to the Israelites through the prophet Amos, "'To me, O Israel, you are just like the Ethiopians" (Amos 9:7). Such an expression of universalism resonates in the writing of Abraham Joshua Heschel: "God is either the Father of all men or of no man." But Israel does have a special relationship with God. This special relationship is defined by the covenant and expressed though the mitzvot. It is, in fact, an extra obligation we have; some would even say a burden. As Jews, we have to maintain the 613 mitzvot in the Torah, while all the other descendents of Noah must maintain only 7 divine laws. But it was the Israelites themselves who committed to this agreement, and, in return, they received a special share of God's munificence.

But not everyone is comfortable with understanding choseness this way. Rabbi Mordecai Kaplan, founder of the Reconstructionist Movement and one of the most outstanding Jewish thinkers of the 20th century, suggested that the doctrine of choseness has no place in an age that decries inequality of every kind. To emphasize this belief, in the Reconstructionist Siddur, Kaplan removed the words, "who has chosen us from among all peoples," from the blessing recited before the reading of the Torah.

In the end, mainstream Judaism has resolved this tension between universalism and particularism by understanding that the special status of choseness is earned as much as it is granted. God made special demands on Israel for the right to be called "a kingdom of priests and a holy nation" (Exodus 19:6). We must continuously strive to uphold our end of the covenant, and deserve those special titles.

Shabbat Shalom,

JDC