Parashat Netzavim
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A New Covenant
A New Covenant
The name of our Parasha is Netzavim and it means standing, stemming from the fact that the people of Israel are said to be standing together. But where are they standing? They are standing before the Lord. This is significant because it speaks to an official meeting between the nation and her God. In fact, verse 1 of chapter 29 tells us that the nation was standing in the land of Moab across from the promised land and they were making another covenant with Adonai.
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These are the words of the covenant which the Lord commanded Moses to make with the sons of Israel in the land of Moab, besides the covenant which He had made with them at Horeb.
Your translation may say that these are the words of the covenant which Adonai commanded Moses to make with the people, which is true, but to be specific, the Hebrew says these are the words of the covenant that Adonai commanded Moses to cut with the people of Israel.
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אֵלֶּה֩ דִבְרֵ֨י הַבְּרִ֜ית אֲֽשֶׁר־צִוָּ֧ה יְהוָ֣ה אֶת־מֹשֶׁ֗ה לִכְרֹ֛ת אֶת־בְּנֵ֥י יִשְׂרָאֵ֖ל בְּאֶ֣רֶץ מֹואָ֑ב מִלְּבַ֣ד הַבְּרִ֔ית אֲשֶׁר־כָּרַ֥ת אִתָּ֖ם בְּחֹרֵֽב׃ פ
I prefer to keep the sense of cut because first of all it forces us to investigate from our modern lens what does it mean to cut a covenant. Does anyone know what it means to cut a covenant? To cut a covenant is a graphic description of the ceremony that often accompanied these forms of oaths taken between parties in which an animal was physically cut in two to make an agreement legally binding. It was as a representation of what would happen to the parties should they decide not to abide by the terms of the agreement they were making and was common in the Ancient world. This language - cutting a covenant - I think is valuable in understanding the formality of what was happenin in our Parasha. This is a formal and important moment in time for the nation as they are about to enter the land.
In fact, we the text says this was a covenant separate from the covenant made at Horeb aka Mt Sinai. This was a new generation entering the land. A generation that needed their own oath, their own visual, enacted and formal entrance into an agreement with the living God who was about to prepare the land before them. It was a new covenant or a second covenant hence the name deuteronomy - second law.
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A Covenant Community
A Covenant Community
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Ye all stand to-day before the Lord your God, the heads of your tribes, and your elders, and your judges, and your officers, every man of Israel, your wives, and your children, and the stranger who is in the midst of your camp, from your hewer of wood even to your drawer of water, that thou shouldest enter into the covenant of the Lord thy God and into his oaths, as many as the Lord thy God appoints thee this day; that he may appoint thee to himself for a people, and he shall be thy God, as he said to thee, and as he sware to thy fathers, Abraam, and Isaac, and Jacob.
So in cutting this covenant what I’d like us to see is who is present. Who are the ones said to be standing? And what significance might that have? The text says that heads of tribes, elders, officials, men, women, chidlren, and foreigners were all standing and gathered. In other words, all the people, from the most esteemed to the least esteemed were cutting this covenant. So what is the Torah teaching us here? All were equally responsible to uphold their part. Covenant responsibility is up to each of us. If they wanted to avoid the curses as a nation, as a redeemed community, as a new covenant community, they needed to uphold both personal and collective obedience to the terms of the covenant. I believe this is what the text is emphasizing in this Parasha. Communal and individual responsibility to the covenant.
In your translation it may say “you are standing here today” but in the Hebrew it says אַתֶּ֨ם נִצָּבִ֤ים “y’all are standing”. Or if you have the KJV it will say “Ye”, which is not a reference to Kanye West but the old English way of rendering the second person plural. But without the Hebrew this point is still obvious because it says “all of you” and “each of you”, so the collective responsibility is evidently being emphasized here. What’s more, the second person plural “y’all”, shifts into a second person singular “you and your” very subtly and seamlessly as the verses continue which you would not see in the English. This switches happens from the plural ‘y’all’ to the singular collective ‘you’ in the middle of verse 11 where it says “your stranger who is in your camp”. What comes before is second person plural and what comes after down to verse 14 are collective second person singulars. In other “you” as a singular collective group”.
So, What’s the point of all of this? The point is what I made before. This covenant is one in which all for one and one for all really means something. Do you think there were some righteous people that went into exile when Babylon invaded? Of cousre, even Ezekiel was sent into exile with the people. The communal nature of the covenant is why the entire nation suffered for Achan’s smuggling of the idols in Joshua 7. One man smuggled all men suffered. By one man we die and through one man Yeshua many live. What we have here is a Torah cantered Biblical view of the community and this understanding should inform our communities.
Of coures Israel was a nation not just a religious commiunity, but there are principles we can glean, no just from this parasha, but from all Scripture as to what our Torah communities should look like today. Consider this:
What is a healthy Torah community?
What is a healthy Torah community?
A group of people who agree on the essentials
Core beliefs (Doctrine) - Authority of Scripture, Yeshua’s work and person.
Core Halachah - Word of God governs all final decisions with oral Torah/traditions as secondary.
A group of people who are willing to disagree and to continue to dialog on issues that are not clear, value dialog realising that dialog is essential for pursuing the truth.
A group of people committed to sharing life with one another.
spending significant time together
helping and loving each other in order to conform to Yeshua together.
A group of people that recognize living the Torah alone is impossible - you can’t love your neighbour if you have no neighbours
What is the primary reason for meeting together?
What is the primary reason for meeting together?
Primary Goal: ‘to create a community in which God’s righteous ways are consistently encouraged so that they may be lived out by the community and passed on to the next generation’.
community meetings are primarily for the building up of each other in the ways of God
the community meetings are not primarily for evangelism.
the community meetings are not primarily to attract visitors.
What are anti community traditions?
What are anti community traditions?
separting women, men
seeker friendly services
quiet reverence and children should be silient and removed
treating gatherings as spectator events
treating growth in numbers and finacnes as most imporant
How should a community be structured?
How should a community be structured?
plurality of leaders - overseers and deacons - not a one man show.
Leaders gain authority from congregation, major decisions are communal.
Indigenous - not a pastor flown in from the outside to fill a job description, it is not to be viewed as an occupation, must know the sheep, will know the price paid to form and maintain
leaders must be qualified in character not credentials.
How do we measure the success of a community?
How do we measure the success of a community?
size of our online ministry? No! Strength of families and growth in children = key
How are we doing with respect to love for each other? Division, backbiting, gossip or patience, kindness, forgiveness, compassion?
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The Bitter Root
The Bitter Root
As we continue to read we get to verse 17 the community is warned when there is an individual or group whose hearts turn away from Adonai to serve other gods that this can produce among the wider community a root producing poinson and bitter fruit as the TLV puts it.
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You saw their detestable things and their idols —wood and stone, silver and gold—that were with them. Beware in case there is among you a man or woman, or family or tribe, whose heart turns away today from Adonai our God to go serve the gods of those nations. Beware in case there is among you a root producing poison and bitter fruit.
What’s interesting here if you note carefully, very similar to what Ben described last week, we see a progression in the text. We see the poinsonous root starting first with the head of the house being the man, then extending to his immediate dependents represented by the woman, then extending to an entire extended family, then extending to an entire tribe. What is the picture we are getting here? We are to see that a bad rosh hashanna apple spoils the whole bunch! There is another point here that I want to highlight. Note that it says root. Have you ever tried to pull up a root? I get these weeds in the backyard that grow these large elephant leaves and I hate them. They have these roots that go way deep so that when you pull off the leaves, even if you pull off att the stem, the root is way deeper and the stems simply break off leaving the root. What do you think happens to that weed in a few weeks? It grows right back and then three more sprout up right next to it! The only way for me to get that root out was to take a drill with a 12 inch long drill bit and bore a hole through and through that root until it was destroyed.
Now, this doesn’t mean that we go around as apple or plant inspectors trying to find somethign to cut out of the community, but it does mean that when a root has taken hold it needs to be dealt with being viewed as a serious matter that threatens the entire community. In fact, it is often the case that you can’t see the root! I find it interesting that the text says ‘whose heart turns away’. Just as others can’t see the root we cannot see the heart. But we can see the fruit - and that is exactly how the TLV renders it - “producing poison and bitter fruit.” The LXX translation refers to it as ‘springing up’.
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The Watered With The Dry
The Watered With The Dry
Verse 19 has been rendered in various ways by the translations, partly because it is a figure of speech. Here are a few exmaples:
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“It shall be when he hears the words of this curse, that he will boast, saying, ‘I have peace though I walk in the stubbornness of my heart in order to destroy the watered land with the dry.’
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When such a person hears the words of this oath he secretly blesses himself and says, “I will have peace though I continue to walk with a stubborn spirit.” This will destroy the watered ground with the parched.
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one who, when he hears the words of this sworn covenant, blesses himself in his heart, saying, ‘I shall be safe, though I walk in the stubbornness of my heart.’ This will lead to the sweeping away of moist and dry alike.
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And it shall be if one shall hear the words of this curse, and shall flatter himself in his heart, saying, Let good happen to me, for I will walk in the error of my heart, lest the sinner destroy the guiltless with him:
How should we understand this verse? In my view this is why context is so important. We have run into an ancient figure of speech and so translators need to make a decision on how to translate this. Do they leave it literal? Do they translate the meaning? What if you are 80% sure of what the figure of speech means, do you then translate the meaning or do you leave it literal just in case to be faithful? Congratulations, you have just engaged with the difficulties of translating Scripture! Let each of us repent from our past pride and have a little more humility when reading our english trnalsations for the work scholars have engaged in. Me personally, I’m not sure what I’d do…I might leave it as the NET has but make a note explaining the likely meaning, just as the NET has!
I personally believe the point of the figure of speech can be ascertained from the context. When such a person rejects the God of the covenant as impotent, turns his back on Adonai to engage with the practices of the nations in serving their gods, and even blesses himself in this regard, the result is that it can lead to the destruction of the righteous with the unrighteous. In other words the entire community can suffer from the root that produces bitterness.
Does this have to be public to happen? As mentioned before, Achan was a personal private sin that had negative consequenses for the entire nation. Granted, that text in Josh 7 dealt with the topic of Herem often translated ‘the ban’ or ‘devoted to destruction’ which is difficult to undertand, nevertheless, the fact remains that a secret or public sin can have an effect on the entire nation. 36 men died in battle because of Achan’s private greed. As well, later in Joshua we see more evidence that the sins of a tribe can affect the entire nation.
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that you would turn away this day from following Adonai? Now you rebel against Adonai today, tomorrow He will be angry with the whole congregation of Israel!
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So Phinehas son of Eleazar the kohen said to the children of Reuben, the children of Gad and the children of Manasseh, “Today we know that Adonai is in the midst of us, because you have not committed this treachery against Adonai. Now you have delivered Bnei-Yisrael from the hand of Adonai.”
The context here is that word had spread that a few of the tribes on the other side of the Jordan had built an altar - and we know there is only one place Israel were permitted to give offerings - and so this lead to serious concern from the other tribes. They went up to investigtae but it turned out that the tribes did indeed build the altar but it was only ceremonial designed to be a witness to future generations that their allegiance was to the one altar for all Israel and that they were brothers with the other tribes. This confirms that Israel had a strong sense of communal consequences for the sins that didn’t necessairly invovle the entire nation. It is also fascinating that Joshua and that generation are the very people receiving the command here in our Torah portion Netzavim - they are the ones standing in Deut and the ones acting in Joshua! Although we won’t spend the time on the Joshua pasage, the speed at which they investigated the matter really jumps out in the story. They were legitimatelly concerned and so acted quickly.
Our text in Deuteronomy says in verse 19 that Adonai will be unwilling to forgive that person and he will be singled out from all the tribes for punishment, yet, in verse 21, seemingly out of left field, the text says that the following generation and foreigners will look upon the entire land that Adonai has destoryed. Why is that? Was it that person’s sin and was he signled out and if so why is the entire land destoryed?
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Deuteronomy 29:23–25 (TLV)
“All the nations will say, ‘Why has Adonai done this to this land? Why this great burning anger?’ “Then they will say, ‘Because they abandoned the covenant of Adonai, the God of their fathers, which He cut with them when He brought them out from the land of Egypt. They went and served other gods and bowed down to them—gods they never knew, that He had not allotted to them.
Wait one second! How did we get from calamity upon that man who was singled out by Adonai, to the entire nation being responsible?
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Adonai has uprooted them from their soil, in anger and wrath and great fury, and hurled them into another land, as is the case this day.’
Because the nation didn’t deal with the bitter root in their midst the Lord uprooted them from their soil! Although this is not the same hebrew word for root and uproot, the context of being removed from the land, or soil as the TLV puts it, is a vivid picture enough. You see, we read the verses about Adonai singling out the individual who sinned and assume that means the community was to sit back and watch God work but the opposite is true. I beleive Adonai singles that person out so that the community itself can administer the judgment God. This is in fact exactly what we saw happen in Joshua 7. Defeat was experienced by the nation, who cried out, and then it was the Lord that singled out Achan as the source of that defeat but it was the responsibility of the community to desire that and to do something about it once they found out.
Does this lesson apply to our apostolic messianic communities today? Obviously we aren’t in a position nor are we entitled to execute civil justice, but that doesn’t mean we can’t apply this principle to our communities. The author of Hebrews references our parasha and says Heb 12.15-16 “See to it that no one comes short of the grace of God; that no root of bitterness springing up causes trouble, and by it many be defiled; that there be no immoral or godless person like Esau, who sold his own birthright for a single meal.”
And of course our Apostle Paul asks in 1 Cor 5 ‘Do you not know that a little leaven leavens the whole lump of dough’. He was referring to the community that had an immoral person committing sexual perversion in their midst. That leadership of that community was at fault for not judging and removing that person from the community.
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The Secret Things
The Secret Things
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“The secret things belong to Adonai our God, but the things revealed belong to us and to our children forever—in order to do all the words of this Torah.
As we come the last verse of chapter 29 what should we make of it? What do you think it refers to?
There have been various interpretations offered, many of the rabbis over the years have understood this to be referring to the context we have read pertaining to hidden sins and revealed sins. In other words, the sins that are in secret will be God’s responsibility but the sins that are revealed will be the community’s responsibility. Other rabbis consider both the hidden and the revealed sins to be the responsibility of the community.
Some Christian commentators suggest this means “the “secret things” to refer to events known only to God, which means God is telling Israel not to concern itself with the future, which they cannot know or control. Instead Israel is to concern itself with the laws God has given. If Israel concentrates on keeping the Law the future will take care of itself!
A decision is not easy, but I think it is a general statement that refers to things unknowable or forbidden to be known by mankind vs the Torah that has been revealed to His people in order to do it.
In other words, God has reserved certain thigns in life that only He understands and knows but in His grace He has revealed things that are good for us, that benefit us, and that prove to be life for us. These are the things He says we are to focus on. Have you ever met someone who is so focussed on the things that we aren’t supposed to know that they spend so little time actually doing the things we are supposed to do? This is not to be the halachah of God’s people.
What tips the scale of this reading for me is found in the verses that follow in Chapter 30. It is a passage I’ve long thought should be translated with a different nuance in virtually all english translations. Most translations translate this verse to suggest that the command is not too difficult to obey. The NASB is typical of that.
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“For this commandment which I command you today is not too difficult for you, nor is it out of reach.
The word translated difficult is ‘Peleh’ in Hebrew. This world is used in popular verses such as Isaiah 9.6 “For a child will be born to us, a son will be given to us; And the government will rest on His shoulders; And His name will be called Wonderful Counselor....” ‘peleh yo’etz’ meaning wonderful counselor, or Ps 118 .23 “This is the Lord’s doing; It is marvelous in our eyes.”
So I would prefer to understand this verse here to mean that the command God is giving them today is not too wonderous, unreachable, unknowable, but is in fact plainly revealed and it is near. The KJV is the only translation I can find that comes closer to this line of thinking:
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For this commandment which I command thee this day, it is not hidden from thee, neither is it far off.
In other words, God keeps the secret things for Himself - we are not to know everything - but the commandment that he has revealed is made plain, it is not far off. It isn’t in the heavens so that some great feat needs to take place in order to know the will of God. He is not unreachable but in fact is very near to us.
When the Israel finds itself dispearsed in the nations and they decide to return to Adonai in repentance, He will have compassion, and all they need to do is take hold of the word that is very near to them - in their mouth and in their heart. Israel can’t point to her achievements of ascedning into heaven to obtain what no one else could, on the contrary, she would have to receive it as a gift on the basis of faith.
This is of course what Paul picks up on in Romans 10 when he quotes the passage. The Messiah, to Whom the Torah points as the goal, is eaxclty the same way. What he offers is not obtained by human effort, the achievement of man to obtain him, but he would come as a gift of God to be near and to be believed in the heart and to be confessed with the mouth. Moses and Paul taught the same thing - that the word of Messiah is near in the present. All it takes is the heart and mouth to receive him.