Shabbat Parashat Ki Tavo - 5786

Shabbat Parashat Ki Tavo - 5786

Rabbi Hal Miller

  These shall stand to bless the people on Mount Gerizim, when you have crossed the

  Jordan: Shimon and Levi and Yehudah and Yissachar and Yosef and Binyamin. [Devarim 27:12]

  And these shall stand for the curse on Mount Eival: Reuven, Gad and Asher and Zevulun,

  Dan and Naphtali. [Devarim 27:13]

It might seem that tribes would prefer to be assigned to Mount Gerizim, location of blessings, rather than Mount Eival, location of curses, but some were assigned to each mountain. Why does the Torah command this specific breakdown of who stands where? Most commentators do not even address this, but a few do.

At the beginning of the book of Shemot, Rav Hirsch notes that the names of the tribes are listed in groups, two verses for the sons of Leah and Rachel (other than Yosef who was then already in Egypt), followed by two verses for the sons of the maidservants. He notes that here our verses assign tribes in the same way, with a couple exceptions. First, Yosef is now included since his tribe was present this time. Second, given the eight-to-four split, two tribes (Leah's eldest and youngest) were moved from the Leah-Rachel group to the Bilhah-Zilpah group in order to place an equal number of tribes on each mountain. Thus there is no claim of demeaning the tribes of the maidservants as they are combined with some of Leah's. Further Rav Hirsch explains that the curses and the blessings were not directed 'to' the tribes on those mountains, rather were spoken out 'from' those tribes, and that all members of all twelve tribes said amen to each. Reinforcing the idea that the members of the tribes were not being cursed, Saadiah Gaon points out that our verses list the progenitors of the tribes and do not say "tribe of" for any of them.

In verses 27:2-5 the Torah commands that stones and altars be set up as a monument on Mount Eival and that sacrifices and blessings take place on them. Rav Moshe Feinstein explains that these were set up on Mount Eival as a connection to the curses that will be said there since this was the establishment of a covenant, and a covenant is based on punishment for failure to fulfill it. Thus we should not look at Mount Eival as some type of bad place, but a place of covenant with God and the tribes there are sealing that covenant for all Israel.

Ramban sees the entire episode as God giving Israel a way to bless and a way to curse, depending on their fulfilling the covenant. Rav Soloveitchik understands it as a reference to what Yirmiyahu will say [1:4] that "from the north the misfortune will break forth", noting that Mount Eival is to the north of Mount Gerizim, thus the curses are a reference to the nations that will in the future attack from the north, so the stones and altars would act as a guardian against such attack. Malbim mentions that this was the practice in those days, to set up monuments to show the conquering of a land and thus the strength of those who occupy it now in order that other attackers might pause to reflect.

Perhaps the reason most commentators do not address this issue is that it is not really an issue at all. Since the tribes on Gerizim are not being blessed and the tribes on Eival are not being cursed as one might have thought, rather the entire nation is being instructed on what will happen depending on their behavior, and since the Torah has issued this positive command about climbing the mountains and participating in this process for which there is no potential punishment, there is no reason for any individual or tribe to be concerned over which mountain they stand upon. Instead, Moshe announces that "today you have become a people", that all of Israel is involved equally in every portion of this episode. The choice of combination of the tribes could have been just to make the numbers of people on the two hills roughly equal.