Shabbos Parashas Eikev - 5776

Shabbos Parashas Eikev - 5776

Rabbi Hal Miller

Not by bread alone does man live [Devarim 8:3]

This is one of the most mis-quoted pasukim in all the Torah. Most secular people

take this to mean that we should all spend our time enjoying the physical and material

pleasures of life. But is that what the Torah is telling us? Let us look at the entire pasuk.

He afflicted you and let you hunger, and He fed you the manna that you did not know,

nor did your fathers know, in order to make you know that not by bread alone does man

live, rather by everything that emanates from the mouth of Hashem does man live.

This is the third verse in a new chapter. The first is G-d telling us, through Moshe, to perform

all His commandments in order to come to the land. The second tells us to remember all

that happened in the travels in the desert that tested us. Thus is our context. How does the

snippet of our verse fit in?

Numerous commentators expound on the idea that there are two aspects to bread, the

physical and the spiritual. Rav Moshe Feinstein, for example, says that if the Jews did not

complain about not having food, G-d would have made a miracle that they would not have

needed to eat. Talelei Oros explains our verse that the spiritual force of man does not live

by the physical aspect of food. Rav Chaim Vital writes that when G-d commanded the land

to give forth grasses, He created a life force in the food, a force that nourishes the soul.

All interesting and valuable, but how does our verse fit in?

Rashi and those who follow his view understand this to relate to the test of manna. But was

manna really a test? People went out to gather free food. How is that a test? Nechama

Leibowitz discusses this as a determination whether people who had their needs met would

continue to turn to G-d. Rav Hirsch notes that the manna was outside of nature, thus a

proof that it was G-d who was feeding the people.

The test, then, and the answer to our conundrum, comes in verse 8:10. This is the command

that we know as birchas hamazon, or bentsching. We are to eat and be satisfied, and thank

G-d for the land and the bread.

It isn't hard to accept that we should thank whoever provides for our needs. Here we have

food coming to us, whether fully miraculously as in the manna, or partially miraculously plus

partially from our hishtadlus, the effort we are required to put in for ourselves. We can easily

accept that we need to say thanks.

But how does the land fit in? Why does bentsching include the land? We go back to the

first verse of the chapter: "so that you may live and increase and come and possess the land

that Hashem swore to your forefathers." This is the whole purpose of observing the mitzvos.

It doesn't say, "so that G-d will be happy". It doesn't say, "so that you will be wealthy". It says that

we will live to possess the land.

Not by bread alone do we live, but by living in the land that Hashem promised our ancestors.

The land is so special that it feeds our souls, just as its produce feeds our bodies.