A few days ago, in the Today Programme on Radio 4,  veteran newsman John Humphrys asserted, while discussing religion with a Christian minister, that the Old Testament is a load of rubbish. Well, here are a few examples of such rubbish taken from last week’s parsha of R’eih and this week’s, Shof’tim:

Political rubbish

When you come to the land that God your Lord is giving you, so that you have occupied it and settled it, you will eventually say, “We would like to appoint a king…. He, however, must not accumulate many horses…. He must not have many wives, so that they do not make his heart go astray. He shall likewise not accumulate very much silver and gold.

Judicial rubbish

Appoint yourselves judges and police for your tribes in all your settlements that God your Lord is giving you, and make sure that they administer honest judgment for the people.

Do not bend justice and do not give special consideration (to anyone). Do not take bribes, since bribery makes the wise blind and perverts the words of the righteous. 

Social welfare rubbish

Therefore, make every effort to give to him (your impoverished brother), and do not feel bad about giving it, since God you Lord will then bless you in all your endeavours, no matter what you do. The poor will never cease to exist in the land, so I am commanding you to open your hand generously to your poor and destitute brother in your land. 

Religious rubbish

Among you there shall not be found anyone who passes his son or daughter through fire, who practises stick divination, who divines auspicious times, who divines by moments, who consults mediums and oracles, or who attempts to communicate with the dead.

Military rubbish

The lower officers shall then continue speaking to the people and say, “Is there any man among you who is afraid or faint-hearted? Let him go home rather than have his cowardliness demoralise his brethren. 

Environmental rubbish

When you lay siege to a city and wage war against it a long tome to capture it, you must not destroy its trees, wielding an axe against any food producing tree.

And finally, from the Haftorah for Shoft’tim, some poetic rubbish

How beautiful upon the mountains are the feet of the messenger of good news, who announces peace, the harbinger of good news, who announces salvation; who says to Zion: “Your God reigns!” Listen! Your watchmen lift up their voices and sing together; for eye to eye they will see God’s return to Zion. Break forth joyously together, you wasted places of Jerusalem. For God has comforted His people, He has redeemed Jerusalem. God has bared His holy arm before the eyes of the nations; and all the ends of the earth will see God’s salvation. 

To hear some more such rubbish come along this Saturday at 10:30, when Pat  Lipert will show us piles of the stuff. 

Can a woman forget her nursing child, not having compassion on    the son of the womb? Yes, they may forget, yet I will not forget you. Behold, I have engraved you on the palms of My hands;

These words are not from the parsha of Eikev, but from its accompanying haftorah, words by Isaiah, prophet of doom and of hope. Why quote them, rather than a text from Eikev itself? Well, as we know, all of the haftorot are, in one way or another, commentaries on their respective parshiyot. The seven haftorot of consolation which come just before Rosh Hashanah, however, are so profoundly linked they serve as continuations of the texts they follow on from. They are a fulfilment of the words of Moses. In much of Devarim he swings continually between promises of reward for good behaviour and warnings of dire punishment for bad. The descriptions of disaster and ruin are so heavy and detailed they augur ill for the future. And, with the benefit of painful hindsight, we know that disaster and ruin did come, not once, but repeatedly. Isaiah’s words of comfort, the promise that God will never completely forget His people, are, therefore, both poignant and vital to our sprit and survival. 

Eikev, and Va-etchanan before it, are rich with text, meaning and resonance. As they unfold, Moses gathers oratorical strength and purpose, like the first movement of a symphony, which sets in motion the sounds and echoes of the grand themes which will be picked up and developed in the following movements. Many of these themes resonate regularly for us in our services. prayers and blessing, particularly from the Shema, the Commandments, even from the Seder. Moses also continues to remind the people of the story to date, some of it good, but much of it embarrassingly bad, especially the episode of the golden calf. So let us return to Isaiah and thank God for His mercy. 

For God has comforted Zion. He has comforted all her waste places and had made her wilderness like Eden, and her desert like God’s garden. Joy and gladness will be found there, thanksgiving, and the voice of song. 

And let us remember to turn up on Saturday at 10:30, when Harvey Kurzfield will lead us away from disaster and ruin.

With the last two parashot of B’midar, we conclude the first four books of Torah. The second law of Torah (Devarim Mishneh Torah), which we call Devarim and the Latin name, Deuteronomy, which means the same thing, begins the concluding section of Torah. Mishneh Torah means  that this final book is a ‘Copy’ of the contract made between God and the Jewish people at Sinai, and is “renewed again,” according to R. Jonathan Sacks, as “the written record of the agreement.” The children of Israel  await on the Plains of Moab for the  crossing over the Jordan into the Promised Land. The journey from Kadesh-Barnea to the Plains of Moab should have taken 11 days according to God’s original plan; instead it took 38 years which is clearly explained in B’midbar.

And so, the last two Parashot, Mattot-Mas’ei, bring us to and prepare us for this momentous point in time of the religious history of the Jewish people. The books in the Tanakh which follow Devarim, comment on what happened subsequent to the crossing over the Jordan.

The final two Parashot in B’midbar, wrap up the  proclamations for the Jewish calendar and secular obligations  set down in PInchas which we discussed at the last Shabbat service:  the obligation of women who inherit property to marry within their clan, the war against the Midians and the moral obligations upon the victors in dealing with captives, the settlement in the Transjordan, the listing of important place-names to highlight the power of God and His divine intervention at the various places of encampment along the 38-year journey when the children of Israel rose and fell, slipped and redeemed themselves time and time again.

This Shabbat parsha, then, is a dramatic and poignant point in Torah; we have finally arrived to begin to manifest the Divine plan God has laid out for us. Will we slip? Will we fall? Will we be worthy of inheriting the land which God promised us all those generations ago  to Abraham? Will we listen to Moses’ final discourses and acquire the spiritual strength to begin the conquering and settlement of Eretz Yisrael? Will we become a ‘nation of priests’? Tune in and listen to Pat this coming Shabbat to find out what our prospects are.

Pat Lipert

At the last service, we left the children of Israel on the Plains of Moab overlooking the Jordan after their monumental 40 year journey from Egypt into the wilderness and their arduous struggle to reach the Transjordan. Generations have died off; as they settle here, the ups and downs of their final months of camping out before Joshua leads them into the Promised Land is about to be narrated in the final few chapters of B’Midbar. The wonderful story of Balaam and his ass takes place, and to tell the truth, the ass, operating on much higher moral ground than either Balaam or the Israelites at times, must set the example. But, because God is in control, as Balaam looks down upon the Israelite encampment, he utters the famous lines which begin most of our Shabbat services: How good are you tents O Jacob! But are they? For this maybe God’s story and plan being enacted, but the children of Israel seem unable to allow the rest of the narrative to go without a hitch. No sooner do they settle in, than the temptations of Moabite women and false gods enter the picture. Again! This, of course, leads us to the next series of conflicts when another heroic figure in our history, Pinchas, must try to save the day. To learn more about the whys and wherefores, another heroic figure, our own Adam Feldman, will be on hand to let you know the details at this next Shabbat service. Be there!

(Pat Lipert)

After all the rebellions and unrest Moses has recently suffered, he must have needed a good Shabbat. The number and intensity of the revolt has been enough to drive any leader to despair. First of all, the food is not good enough. Next, Aaron and Miriam complain. That must have been a real shock to their unassuming brother, who has consistently honoured both of them. Then the spies’ fearful reports provoke the people to turn against him and demand another leader. No sooner has Moses interceded yet again for them than they rebel the other way and insist on mounting an attack, despite Moses’ plea for them to remain still. And now Korach starts one of the most evil rebellions of all, clothed in the words of equality but, in fact, embodying envy, greed and the lust for power. Surely, the destruction of Korach and his fellow conspirators is enough, but no, the people begin to grouse again, this time claiming that Moses has “killed God’s people!” On this occasion, Aaron saves the people. Only a demonstration by God, who makes Aaron’s staff burst into leaf and blossom, puts an end to the spate of almost continuous revolt. We are not told how Moses, and Aaron and Miriam for that matter, spent their Shabbats, but the one that came after the Korach episode must have seemed particularly blessed. 

Unfortunately, the spirit of revolt is not completely quelled, and the next episode will lead to Moses and Aaron themselves losing the right to enter the promised land. The parsha of Chukkat does not end badly, however. The people finally discover courage and burst into song when they next come across water. There is also the little matter of the red heifer to consider, and to consider it more deeply, come along on Saturday at 10:30, when Pat Lipert will lead us once again.