Parashas Bechukosai - 5776
Shabbos Parashas Bechukosai - 5776
Rabbi Hal Miller
I will turn My attention to you, I will make you fruitful and increase you, and I will
establish My covenant with you. [Vayikra 26:9]
We often see in the Torah anthropomorphisms, assigning human-like traits to G-d.
Since He does not actually have these traits, there must be some other lesson for us
in each such assignment. In our verse, G-d's turning His attention to us seems to
indicate that His attention had been limited in some way before this, where He was
not paying attention to us. Could that be?
Later, in verse [26:17], we see, "I will turn My attention against you, you will be struck
down before your enemies." This again implies that He is limiting his attention somehow.
Even further on, in [26:42], the Torah says, "I will remember My covenant with Yaakov,
and also My covenant with Yitzchak and also My covenant with Avraham will I remember,
and I will remember the land." Once again, does G-d forget things, that he would need
to remember them later?
Rashi explains our verse as meaning, "I will turn away from all of My concerns to pay
your reward." That may explain what "attention" means, but not why G-d would need to
focus on one thing as opposed to others.
Ramban ties the word attention to the rest of the verse, and says it means that He will
ensure the increase in the Jewish nation. While making sense in a grammatical construct,
this doesn't explain why G-d would be limited in His ability to pay attention to many
things at once.
Sforno looks at the future-tense of these verses, "will turn", and understands these verses
to refer to a time when there remains nothing else for G-d to concentrate upon, thus all His
attention will be upon the Jews. He cites Yirmiyahu [46:28] about the destruction of the
gentile nations, "I will totally wipe out all the nations, ... but I will not wipe you out totally."
Rav Hirsch takes the opposite approach. The verse has nothing to do with the non-Jews.
It refers instead to a time in the future when the entire Jewish people have stopped being
their own dividers, and are no longer their own worst enemies. He reads our verse to mean
that G-d will reward us with all the blessings referred to in our parsha, not at a point when
the rest of the world is peaceful, but when we are at peace among ourselves. He will give
us children, security, etc., when we have shown that we will make proper use of our
resources in advancing the world as a whole. So long as internal strife within the Jewish
people continues, the rest of the world will continue to tear us apart.
Using Rav Hirsch's understanding, we see that G-d is not turning His attention from one
place to another. He is merely changing how He will apply it to us. When we are divided
from each other, not politically, not so much as to how we observe the Torah, but whether to
observe it at all, then His "attention" is the application of the curses mentioned in our parsha.
When we are united in the idea of keeping His commandments, He changes His "attention"
to granting us the blessings. Each mitzvah we do counts triple (at least), once to give
us the credit for doing it, once to give our nation credit in the combined total, and once
as a good example to other Jews who are not yet of a mind to keep the Torah.