5781 – Peninim on the Torah

The later generations will say, your children who will arise after you and the foreigner who will come from a distant land. (29:21)

The Jew and the nachri – foreigner from a distant land – will both be shocked when they see Hashem’s destruction. What seems to be an innocuous verse is tragically a curse that critiques the behavior of Klal Yisrael in the days preceding the advent of Moshiach. Horav Chaim Soloveitchik, zl, bemoans the bitter prophecy, the tragic portent for the “acharis ha’yamim”, the prediction that in the end of the days, the yedias ha’Torah, Torah knowledge, of many Jews will be equivalent to that of a “foreigner from a distant land.” How tragic it is when the non-Jew knows more…

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Rabbi L. Scheinbaum In Nitzavim, 5759

And he will bless himself in his heart saying, “peace will be with me, though I walk as my heart sees fit.” (29:18)

One must be extremely sure of himself, ever smug, to feel that he has no cause to worry. Horav Tzvi Pesach Frank, zl, suggests that this pasuk refers to the individual who asserts that his heart will save him. He does not care about mitzvos. He rejects the Torah, but he has a “good heart,” he is a nice, kind human being. He gives of himself,.opening his heart to those in need. Hashem does not forgive such a person. The heart is but one organ of the body, albeit an important one, that keeps the entire body functioning. One who…

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Rabbi L. Scheinbaum In Nitzavim, 5759

You are standing today, all of you, the heads of your tribes, your elders, your small children, your women. (29:9)

Is there a specific reason that the Torah emphasizes the fact that the heads of the tribes, the Jewish leadership, were also gathered there? Horav Tzvi Hirsch Ferber, zl, explains that ultimately Hashem judges everybody, regardless of the importance of his position, whether he has fulfilled his teudah, mission, in life. He cites Horav Chaim Volozhiner, zl, who explains that the tefillah which we recite in the Mussaf Shemonah Esrei of Rosh Hashanah, “maasei ish u’fekudoso” “everyone’s deed and mission”, delineates the function that each individual must carry out. We all have responsibilities that we are to carry out during…

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The later generations will say, your children who will arise after you and the foreigner who will come from a distant land. (29:21)

And he will bless himself in his heart saying, “peace will be with me, though I walk as my heart sees fit.” (29:18)

You are standing today, all of you, the heads of your tribes, your elders, your small children, your women. (29:9)

YEARS

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