Moses does not speak to the past. He speaks to the future. Here in Deuteronomy, as he nears his death, he projects out what the community will look like when it crosses the Jordan into the Promised Land. At the beginning of this week’s Torah portion, Re’eh, he commands us to follow God’s laws, tearing down sites of idolatry, and committing ourselves to the rituals and observances of our people, even more so than we had done in the wilderness. As he says in Deuteronomy 12:8: “You shall not act at all as we now act here, everyone as they please.” In the future our lives will be better. We will be better.
Next Wednesday, August 12th, we will begin the month of Elul, the month leading up to our High Holy Days. While we cannot see into the future, we hope the year ahead will be a better one for all of us than the year we just had. We hope we will be better people. We hope to stick closer to our ideals and convictions. By being future oriented, we forgive ourselves for the sins of our past and try to learn from our mistakes as we head into a new year. It is easy to get caught in the past; it is far more challenging to move forward collectively into the future. May the words of Moses from thousands of years ago ring true to us today, as we follow his charge to build a better world, a world full of love and life, a world full of the promise of peace and blessing. May it be so! May it be so!
Shabbat Shalom,
Rabbi Alex