Shabbat Parashat Ha'azinu - 5783

Shabbat Parashat Ha'azinu - 5783

Rabbi Hal Miller

He found him in a desert land, and in the wastes of a howling wilderness, He

encircled him, He made him comprehending, He guarded him like the pupil of

his eye. [Devarim 32:10]

The beginning of this verse is troubling. Was God somehow stumbling around,

looking for Israel somewhere in a wasteland, not sure where the nation went?

What does it mean that He found Israel in the desert?

Rashi tells us that God found Israel to be faithful to Him while they were in the

desert coming out of Egypt, "for they accepted upon themselves His Torah and

His kingship and His yoke", in other words Israel proved themselves faithful.

Sforno is close to this, that the heart of this nation was "pure and loyal".

Rav Hirsch translates it, "He sought him out in a desert land," meaning that God

was testing Israel, sort of a precursor to what Rashi thought.

Rashbam differs with his grandfather Rashi, and follows instead Onkelos. He cites

numerous places in the Torah where the word yimitza'eihu, which we translated

above as "He found him", means to 'find', supply or provide for someone's needs.

Ramban explains the beginning of our verse in context of the end, that God

'discovered' Israel meaning to care for as would someone guard their own eyes.

Rav Soloveitchik comes at it from a completely different angle. He writes, "When

man searches for God, as he approaches the boundaries of his reality, he retreats.

Here, God reveals Himself from above nature. Thus God causes man to find Him."

This is saying that Israel wanted to find God but was unable to do so, thus God

gave Israel the ability and caused them to succeed at Sinai.

Nechama Leibowitz notes that in our portion Ha'azinu, Moshe traces the

history of the people. Abarbanel asks why, if so, did Moshe not begin with the

exodus from Egypt before the desert? Nechama cites numerous commentators

who address this, where they say that the entire song of Ha'azinu is about the

kindnesses that God showed the people. But she asks Abarbanel's question,

saying that it would seem like the removal from Egypt was the greatest of all

kindnesses. She answers that in fact the bringing Israel out of Egypt was not,

itself, a kindness, rather it was a means to achieve the giving of the Torah,

which was.

God was not stumbling around looking for us, rather was helping us find Him as a

culmination of His kindnesses.