Deut. 3:23 - 7:11
Précis: Moses continues the recapitulation of travels, and urges the People to follow the laws and commandments of Adonai. Moses pleads with God that he be allowed to enter the Promised Land, and is refused. Moses reminds the people that God was angry with him on account of their sinful ways, and therefore was refused permission to enter the Land. Moses continues with a restatement of the Ten Commandments, and follows with an articulation of the basic element of Jewish theology: the Sh’ma. Moses then warns the people against the perils of forgetfulness, particularly of the Exodus, and cautions against idol worship of gods of the nations they will conquer.
Deut. 6:5 “Love God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your might.”
This week’s reading includes the Sh’ma, as well as the commandment cited above. Rabbi Sari Laufer has written about “love” in Judaism (10 Minutes of Torah, 8/12/24). She notes that the Torah commands love in three different ways: (1) to love God, as cited here; (2) to love the stranger (a command that is repeated more than any other in the Torah); and (3) to love our neighbors as ourselves.
We note that this command comes at an unexpected moment: it is after the Israelites have spent 40 years in the desert. We might have expected the Torah to say “fear” or “be in awe” of God, but instead, we see for the first time, the command to “love God.” In the desert, the focus was on survival. The Torah command to love is not a desert priority; it is not the focus of a survival mentality. As Laufer says, “The fact that Torah commands love right at this moment teaches us that love is elemental, foundational, and will move us from survival to security, from tenuousness to thriving.”
For Jews, whether in the Biblical desert, in Israel or in the United States in 2025, love is what we do--not just how we feel. How are we to show our love of God? By acting in ways we believe God acts: showing care and compassion for others, seeking the well-being of the least among us, and above all, seeking peace between people, communities, and the world.
