PRINCES BELONG IN THE PALACE

I entreated the Lord at that time, saying: “O Lord God, You have begun to show Your servant Your greatness and Your mighty hand… Please let me cross over and see the good Land that is on the other side of the Jordan, this good mountain and the Lebanon.” (3:23-25)

As is well known, Sefer Devarim recounts Moshe Rabbeinu’s last speech to B’nei Yisrael before they entered the Promised Land. It is full of rebuke for previous misdeeds and exhortations for the future. So where does the beginning of this week’s parashah fit in? Moshe tells the Jews who are about to enter the Land that he begged HaShem to let him enter, too, but was rejected. Is that part of the rebuke or does it have significance for the future? The answer is: it’s a machloket (a dispute).

The Ramban writes explicitly: “He mentioned this here to inform [them] that he loved the Land very much but was not privileged to [enter] it, because of them. All of this is part of his rebuke.” The Ibn Ezra, on the other hand, asserts that Moshe’s goal was to teach the Jews a lesson for the future: “The purpose of this section is to make them cherish Eretz Yisrael. For if they love the Land, they will keep God’s commandments, in order not to be exiled from it.” In other words, Moshe was trying to show the Jews how badly he wanted to enter the Land, so that they would realize how special it is. Then, the threat of exile would serve as a true deterrent to sin.

A parable might help illustrate this better: A young child can easily be convinced to trade a twenty-dollar bill for a quarter, because he doesn’t appreciate the value of the bill. To him, the glittering, silver quarter is far more valuable that the dingy, green, paper bill. And if the parent of such a child threatens to take the bill away from him, it would not deter him from misbehaving. Similarly, if the Jews do not understand the true value of Eretz Yisrael, threatening them with exile will not deter them from sinning. Moshe, therefore, emphasized how badly he wanted to enter the Land – to show them how special it is.

How timely this idea is just a few days after Tish’a B’Av. The story is told of a king who became so angry with his son that he banished him from the palace. The prince went to a small village, built himself a small hut, and lived there in abject poverty. One day, a rumor spread that the king was coming to the village and whoever had a request could write it down and submit it to the king. The prince, along with everyone else, wrote a note and handed it to the king’s servant. While looking through the letters, the king recognized his son’s handwriting. He read his request and began to cry. “O merciful king,” wrote the prince, “I have a small hut with a straw roof. The winter is approaching and my roof has a leak in it, but I do not have the means to fix it. Please give me some straw so that I can fix my roof.” Said the king to himself, “How did it happen that my son has forgotten that he is a prince? Instead of asking to return to the palace, all he cares about is his straw roof.”

Similarly, we, the Jewish people, have gotten so used to exile that we have forgotten that we are princes. Instead of asking (and striving) to return to the King’s Palace (i.e., Eretz Yisrael and the Beit HaMikdash), we are concerned about our mundane, daily affairs. We are even quite comfortable with our present conditions. Unlike the prince in the story, most of us don’t have leaky roofs, so why should we pray (or strive) to return to our true Homeland? We don’t realize what we are missing, because we don’t truly appreciate how special and how vital Eretz Yisrael is to our national, and even individual, existence.

We must, therefore, learn more about the uniqueness of Eretz Yisrael and thereby heighten our appreciation for God’s Chosen Land. One need not look far for sources on the topic. The entire Torah (especially the next few parshi’ot) is full of praise for the Holy Land. All you need to do is open your eyes and heart and let the message sink in: Eretz Yisrael is where we belong.

Reprinted from Eretz Yisrael in the Parasha by R’ Moshe Lichtman

Daily Archives: August 2, 2017

Va’etchanan

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