Devarim
Where Are You?
Inspired by Gitit Nahaliel-Rotberg and Rabbi
Pinchas Winston
The Jewish calendar of
sacred readings places Parshat Devarim on the Shabbat before Tisha B'Av.
On Tisha B'Av, the date commemorating the destruction of the Beit
Hamikdash, the Holy Temple in Jerusalem,
Megillat Eichah/ The Scroll of Lamentations is read.
In Devarim, Moshe begins to retell the story of the Israelites'
adventures in the wilderness. He
begins the story by telling of his realization that he could not lead a nation
without help and needed to appoint tribal leaders. "Eichah," he says, "HOW can I alone carry your burdens and your
quarrels?" (Devarim/Deuteronomy
1:12).
Megillat Eichah, describing
Jerusalem after the destruction of the first Temple, begins with an
exclamation. "Eichah
– HOW can it be – the
city that was full of people is now empty?" (Eichah/Lamentations 1:1)
In Gan Eden/the Garden of Eden, after Adam and Chavah had eaten
from the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil, God calls to Adam. "Ayecah – WHERE ARE YOU?" (Bereisheet/Genesis 3:9).
The Hebrew word ayecah and
the Hebrew word eichah are
spelled with exactly the same letters: aleph, yod, caf, hey.
Our sages teach that the
second Temple was destroyed because of sin'at chinam – senseless hatred. Historical sources confirm this: the Jews of Jerusalem were
so preoccupied with internal politics and civil war that they failed to join
together against the Roman threat until the troops were at their gates.
Each time we ask eichah, HOW did something happen, we must also ask ourselves
ayecah, WHERE ARE YOU in this
situation? Pehaps we can learn
from the example of our teacher Moshe, who asked himself Eichah? -- and then concluded that he himself needed to
change.
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