Re'eh (Midrash)

Blessing and Curse, Rebuke and Promise

The opening group of midrashim on this week’s Torah portion relate primarily to a subject developed by the Torah later on, in Parashat Ki Tavo. One of the first verses in this week’s portion—“When the Lord shall bring you into the land… then you shall place the blessing on Mount Gerizim and the curse on Mount Ebal” (Deut 11:29)—alludes to a ceremony described later on, in Deut 27:11-26, in which the entire people is to gather on the slopes of these two mountains overshadowing the town of Shechem, while the Levites utter blesses and curses for those who will or will not observe the commandments of the Torah. This section is followed by an admonition, describing the good recompense that will be their due if they keep the laws of the Torah, and the dire punishments and catastrophes that will overtake them if they do not. This chapter (Deut 28), along with its counterpart in Leviticus 26, is known as the Tokheha, or Rebuke. The Midrash utilizes this verse as the point of departure for a discussion of these chapters, and the theological issues they imply. Thus, Deuteronomy Rabbah 4.1:

Halakhah: Shall a person from Israel be allowed to read the Rebukes in many readings? Thus taught our Sages: One does not interrupt the curses, but rather one person reads all of them.

As is the way of Devarim Rabbah, we begin with a ritual question, in this case about the reading of the Torah in the synagogue. May the chapters of the Rebuke in Deut 28 and Lev 26 be divided into several portions, as one may do in almost all the other portions of the Torah, whether to avoid overlong aliyot, or simply for convenience? The answer given here is that these two sections are indivisible, and must be read in one fell swoop. I imagine that the reason for this rule is that these chapters, intended to convey a basic moral and religious lesson, will be more powerful and efficacious if read, and heard, without interruption. Literary study of these chapters reveals that they are written in a way intended to create a cumulative effect. (Incidentally, the use of the terms “Rebuke” and “Curses” here is somewhat inexact. The two terms, which properly refer to distinct chapters of the Torah, are used here interchangeably.)

Our Rabbis taught: Why does one not interrupt the Curses? R. Hiyya bar Gamda said: Because it is written: “The admonition of the Lord, my son, do not despise, nor be weary [ve-al takotz] of his rebuke” [Prov 3:11]. Do not make the reproof bits and pieces [kutzin kutzin; a word-play on takotz], but one [person] should read it all at once.

Another thing. Why does one not interrupt the Curses? R. Joshua of Sikhnin said in the name of R. Levi: The Holy One blessed be He said: I wrote concerning my Glory: “I am with him in his trouble” [Ps 91:15]. It is not proper that my children should be cursed and I be blessed. How so? If one were to read the Rebukes in many readings [i.e., divided into several aliyot], each person called up to read would recite a blessing twice, before and after it; rather, one person should read all of it.

We find here the idea of Divine pathos: the participation of the Shekhinah, the Divine Presence or Glory, in the suffering of the Jewish people (“I am with him in his trouble”—an important midrashic leit-motif). God not only commands, judges, and metes out retribution, but also feels profound empathy for and emotional engagement with Israel, His covenant nation. (See the profound discussion of this concept of divine anthropopathy in A. J. Heschel’s The Prophets.) Therefore, even as He utters curses and imprecations, and is ready to punish His people where needed, He is reluctant to do so, and does not want to be “blessed,” even in a routine, ritualized way, for something so negative and frightening to the Jews.

Indeed, in many Jewish communities the reading of these chapters is viewed with much fear and trepidation; the aliyah is often given to the Gabbai or the Torah reader, so that none of the congregants will feel individually cursed by being called to its reading. On the other hand, some rationalist rabbis, such as the late Hakham Moses Gaster of London, were personally called up for this reading, so as to counter such superstitions.

Our Rabbis said: Thus said the Holy One blessed be He: It was not for their harm that I gave them Blesses and Curses, but to make known to them which is the goodly way, so they might choose it and receive a reward. From whence? From what we read concerning this subject: “See, I place before you this day blessing and curse” [Deut 11:24].

This concluding section stresses that the Curses and Rebukes are not to be viewed as something bad, to be apprehended with terror, but should properly be seen as beneficial: to teach Israel the correct way, so that they adhere to it. If they follow the good, the curses will in any event never be activated, so why should one fear them?

Another, very short midrash on these same verses present an interesting and unexpected formulation concerning the nature of God’s conduct of world, and the existence of an innate moral law within the world. Thus, in Deuteronomy Rabbah 4.3:

Another thing. “See, I have placed…” [ibid.] R. Eleazar said: When the Holy One blessed be He said that word on Mount Sinai, at the same time, “From the mouth of the Most High there do not come forth the evil and the good” [Lam 3:38]. Rather, evil comes by itself to those that do evil, and good comes by itself to those that do good.

Taken at face value, this is a surprising, if not shocking theological statement. Does this verse really imply that God is not the author of good and evil? (I leave aside the issue of the peshat reading of this verse, which was probably intended as a rhetorical question, “Do not the evil and good both come from the mouth of the Almighty?”) Our midrash tries to describe here a kind of natural causality. Good befalls good people in a natural way, just as evil befalls evildoers. In other words, a person brings upon himself his own destiny; it is not a matter of arbitrary Divine fiat.

But read on a deeper level, I see here no more than a variant on the basic Judaic axiom that the world is a moral place, and that God rewards good and punishes evil. However, this is done, not through direct Divine judgment or individual decree, but through the structure of the universe. Just as God has set up the various physical and other natural laws governing the universe, so has He set up the moral law: a mechanism by which good begets good and evil begets evil; an innate moral structure to the way the world operates. Perhaps one might even describe this as a kind of Jewish counterpart to the idea of Karma—the idea found in Eastern philosophies and religions that every action contains the inescapable seeds of its own consequences. (The existence of this concept in non-Jewish cultures need not bother us; on the contrary, the existence of similar or parallel ideas in different civilizations that developed independently of one another, expressed in each one in its own peculiar nuance and lexicon, is if anything proof of their universal validity—an idea I hope to develop further on another occasion). As I wrote several weeks ago, an immoral society contains the seeds of its own downfall, in the form of corruption, mistrust, and lack of social cohesion—which ultimately lead to disintegration, until it falls to its enemies like a ripe fruit. This is the core idea embodied in the statement that the Second Temple was destroyed by sinat hinam, needless hatred, or internal dissension. He who has eyes will look about him with trembling.

Another thing. Said R. Haggai: Not only have I given you two paths, but I went beyond what was required by law, and I told you: “You shall choose life” [Deut 30:19].

What is the point here? Isn’t it obvious, when we speak of life as a series of choices between good and evil, which is the proper one? Evidently, it is not so clear. One may have a life philosophy which sees the act of choice itself, without any clear or absolute values, as the ultimate. Such was the case, for example, of the mid-twentieth century philosophy of existentialism. Sartre and Camus, who lived in the aftermath of the modernist “refutation” of traditional religious faith, in a world emptied of all inherent meaning, saw the act of choice itself as giving life its significance. They were highly intelligent and sensitive men—but for that very reason lived with a sense of moral cloudiness, finding it impossible, within their world-view, to state clearly and with philosophical rigor that any particular thing was good or evil. This, notwithstanding the heroic positions taken by Camus and Sartre during the Second World War. Their choice of anti-Nazi resistance seemed to have been based, not on a deeply rooted, universally applicable moral system, but on an almost instinctive, intuitive choice.

And indeed, there were pro-Nazi, German existentialists, such as Martin Heidegger, whose philosophy may have been articulated in clearer, more elegant, systematic and philosophically convincing terms—but this didn’t prevent him from supporting the vilest regime in the history of the world. Heidegger may have been the hero of the story about the professor of ethics known for his unethical behavior who, when questioned about this inconsistency, quipped “And does a mathematician need to be a triangle?” That is, his was a philosophy that allowed for total separation of theory and actual life. Sartre, too, wrote a book celebrating the rather sordid life of Jean Genet, thief and homosexual, for its “authenticity.” All that was left for the existentialists was the elevation of autonomy and “authenticity” to the highest possible value. One is reminded of the remark by Dostoevsky’s character Ivan Karamazov: “If God does not exist, anything is permissible.”