SHORT THOUGHTS On Parashat Va’etchanan

Below are four quotes from the parsha with some explorations in relation to our inner work:

1) “Let me, I pray, cross over and see the good land on the other side of the Jordan” (Deuteronomy 3:25).
אעברה נא ואראה את הארץ הטובה אשר בעבר הירדן

I think we are intimately familiar with Moshe’s desperate seeking here, the sense that “on the other side” of the river – on the other side of some experience, some accomplishment, some change in our lives or attitudes – there is the ultimate “good land,” whatever the good land is for us, perhaps a place of enlightenment, of peace, of true freedom, of contentment and equanimity, of understanding and consistent divine connection.   We, like Moshe, are most likely not going to get “there” in our life times – perhaps our children will or perhaps the “good land” is where we go after death – but what we can attain right now, like Moshe from the mountaintop, is an occasional view, a glimpse of this land, a taste of it now and again.   It doesn’t help to argue with the desperate seeking, but maybe we can also allow the occasional glimmer of the “good land” to help us rest in some sense of peace, and to help us know that this life, as it is, with all its seeking and imperfection, is exactly how God wants it to be for us right now.  

2) “From there (misham) you will search for Hashem your God, and you will find Him” (Deuteronomy 4:29).
ובקשתם משם את ה’ אלקיך ומצאת

“From there,” misham, from that very place, from the far-flung place of exile where you have been banished, from the very depths of the emotional suffering, of the sadness, or the fear or the anxiety or the rage or the despair, from that very place itself, from within the darkness, you will find God.  You can start where you are; every place you are is actually an entrypoint to divine connection.  

3) “For the Lord your God is a compassionate God; He will not let go of you” (Deuteronomy 4:31, based on Rashi’s interpretation).
כי אל רחום ה’ אלקיך לא ירפך

God holds on to us with both hands and does not let us go.  We may stray; we may feel distant; we may feel abandoned; but God is always there, steadily holding on, maintaining the connection, sustaining us in life sometimes despite ourselves, like a parent with a wild toddler, just holding on and trusting that sanity will return, never considering rejection or abandonment.   Can we feel into that steadiness, take it inside us and trust it?

4) “With all your muchness”   –  bekhol me’odekha – בכל מאדך (In Shma, Deuteronomy 6:5).

Whatever you have inside you that is me’od, “much,” maybe sometimes even too much, whatever your muchness is, use it to love God.   What is “much,” what is a lot, inside you? Anger, anxiety, pain, sadness, joy, tears, fear, worry, enthusiasm, energy, curiosity, jealousy, yearning?  Whatever that muchness is, it was given to you for worship of God.  It has the intensity, the power, of your soul bound up in it and you can turn it into divine love.  All muchness wants to be returned home to its source.   

Photo by Sandra Seitamaa at Pexels