Sky and Waters Between Us and Hope (Nitzavim)
This Shabbat we read Parashat Nitzavim, where Moses gathers the entire people: “You stand this day all of you”(Deuteronomy 29:9) —from the greatest to the smallest, from the tribal heads to the water-drawers—into one covenant. Rashi notes that this is a profoundly dramatic scene, unfolding on the very day of Moses’ death, carrying the weight of a final testament.It is a short parasha (especially when read apart from Vayelekh), yet it holds some of the Torah’s most stirring expressions. They have long inspired poetic imagination and theological reflection, beyond Deuteronomy’s prevailing rhythm of reward and punishment, covenant and responsibility, practical obligation and faithful response after the long journeys of Israel. These verses breathe a spirit that allows commentators to remain rooted in love of God, attentive to His commandments, and willing to walk forward with Him. Some expressions leave an impression more lasting than the stern warnings of curses and punishments.
At the center of Moses’ words stands one of the most moving declarations in all of Torah:
It is not in heaven… Nor is it beyond the sea… But the word is very near to thee, in thy mouth, and in thy heart, that thou mayst do it (Deuteronomy 30:12–14).
The Sky and the sea embody infinite distance: places unreachable to us. Yet the Torah insists that God’s call—to fidelity and to walking in good paths—is not remote or impossible, but near and attainable. For the rabbis, these words carried a sense of liberation: responsibility rests not with the sky but with those on earth. Yet within the verses themselves we also hear the tensioned thread stretched between heaven and earth, between ideal and reality. In this nearness lies encouragement—no transcendent power is required for us to live out God’s word.
But the mention of heavens and sea as measures of distance can also evoke our smallness before nature: the endless sky above, the oceans spanning continents. At the same time, precisely because we humans have learned to cross such distances through our ingenuity, we know that expanses once thought infinite can indeed be traversed. This earthly knowledge encourages us: what seems far may in truth be close. And yet it can frustrate us as well—if something is near and attainable, why do we fail to bring it into being?
This freedom—spiritual and earthly—can also wound. If everything is so near, why can we not realize all our aspirations for good? Perhaps this was Moses’ own experience on Mount Nebo, as described later in the book: the land before him, close and visible, yet forbidden to enter. It is a mirror of inspiration and barrier together. Nearness and distance, woven in reciprocity. The asymptote becomes a central metaphor for life.
From Consolation to Creation
The haftarah this week concludes the seven weeks of consolation (shiva d’nechemta) between Tisha b’Av and the end of Elul. On this Shabbat we stand with the awareness that it seals the current year; next Shabbat we will already be within the Ten Days of Repentance, between Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur.
The call of return and repentance permeates both the parasha and the haftarah and will accompany us in the coming days. Sometimes these words open our hearts, renewing our trust in ourselves and in the lives we shape. Sometimes they strengthen our longing to plead for help so that our efforts—in spirit and in substance—may succeed. And sometimes, for some of us, these terms feel worn, and it is instead the liturgical poems of the High Holiday machzor—prayers recited in crowded sanctuaries, in the consciousness of both individual and community—that awaken us.
This week also marked the 25th of Elul, which according to one Jewish tradition is the day of creation. Rabbi Eliezer teaches (Pesikta de-Rav Kahana 23a; Vayikra Rabbah 29a) that the world itself was created on this date, while humankind was created on Rosh Hashanah. Holding fast to this tradition means that a few days before the new year the world was created, and only then humanity joined it. By this account, Rosh Hashanah is the birthday of humankind, and it carries both the crown of creation and the weight of responsibility for what unfolds in our world.
Counting the days between the 25th of Elul and the beginning of the year reminds us of the primordial separations: between light and darkness, the waters above and below, sea and dry land, the diverse forms of life in every sphere.
As the Mishnah teaches (Rosh Hashanah 1:2):
On Rosh HaShana, all creatures pass before Him like sheep [benei maron], as it is stated: “He Who fashions their hearts alike, Who considers all their deeds” (Psalms 33:15).
Thus creation and accountability converge: the beauty of the world alongside the burden of judgment, the freshness of beginnings alongside the duty of repair. This dialectic—of a world preceding humankind and of humankind charged with sustaining the world—remains with us. We are not the origin of existence, but we bear the charge “to till it and to keep it.” (Genesis 2:15): to do good within it, to increase its blessing.
On this eve of Shabbat, with Parashat Nitzavim, it becomes clear that in our present as well, we are standing before uncertainty—facing endless-feeling wanderings in wildernesses and questions without clear answers. In ordinary times, such moments can kindle faith, growing from the anticipation of what is yet to come. But the truth of this year is harsher: we have lived through another painful week, with devastating news in Israel, with mounting anxiety for the hostages, and with existential questions—personal and collective—about the future of Jewish safety and human morality.
Poetry at the Edge of Horizon
Shortly after October 7th, poet Gali Ravitz wrote “Horizon.” It resonated immediately with many readers, and it remains piercingly relevant. The horizon remains asymptotic, never reached—offering not only escape but also the capacity to hold on to a broader picture than the despair of the present moment. Suddenly, the heavens do not represent frustrating distance, but expansiveness: the ability to sketch life’s events as part of a larger tapestry, personal and communal alike. This is no evasion of responsibility. The present remains urgent and demanding. But within it, clinging to enduring or newly discovered faith allows us to stand differently in the midst of upheaval.
It is a season
when it is hard to speak
of a horizon,
as if none waits on the horizon.
And yet,
when I close my eyes
at night,
before sleep,
I recall my dreams,
the places I longed
to be—
with my children, my loves.
And I grow light,
like a gull
soaring higher, ever higher,
drawing a line for myself,
and flying
toward it.
Poet Yael Blankind Eran, too, wrote soon after October 7th, wrestling with the presence or absence of hope. Her poem spoke at the time in direct codes about the plight of the hostages, and it remains painfully relevant. The “bottle of milk” suggests home, but it also evoked the infants of the Bibas family, for whom so many prayed to remain alive.
The poem includes a seemingly casual question, placed in parentheses, yet the very brackets underscore its urgency: “Do you know the sun has risen?”
Now, in light of testimony from those who have returned, we cannot help but hear it differently: were they hidden in darkness and massacre, or did they glimpse a sliver of light, perhaps even the consolation of nature within the nightmare?
Wherever You May Be, Please | Yael Blankind Eran
Hold fast to something:
a crack in the wall,
a drop of water,
a voice you know.
Cling to a shaft of light,
to lucidity,
to the sun that has risen.
(Have you noticed it has risen?)
We are not far—
we are not far.
Hold on tight:
a hand,
a bottle of milk,
the memory of home,
hope.
The poetry joins the Torah’s call: “It is not in the heavens, nor beyond the sea.” Hope can indeed be planted within us.
My colleague Rabbi Raaya Ofner, who lost her son – Avi – in the 1997 helicopter disaster, once offered a powerful rereading of the well-known song ‘A Window to the Mediterranean’ (Chalon LaYam HaTichon), written by Yaakov Gilad and performed by Yehuda Poliker, with its famous line: ‘How will we know if there is hope?’. The song became an anthem for families displaced after October 7th, sung in gatherings of learning, prayer, and solidarity not bound to any single movement, thanks to the Beit Midrash for Israeli Rabbis. Rabbi Ofner suggested punctuating the refrain differently—“How will we know if there is hope? When we arrive.” She teaches that when we ourselves come—bearing spirit, values, and new deeds—we ourselves sow hope.
The fact of the ongoing war is not contested. Opinions differ—within Israel and across humanity—about its necessity, about whether what once seemed right still holds, or whether it no longer does. But on the hardship itself, there is no disagreement. The toll is clear: in lives lost, in wounded souls, in consequences that will unfold for generations. The arguments lie in past, present, and future, while the pain is shared by all.
The two poems—by Ravitz and Blankind Eran—speak of a condition like wandering in the wilderness, not knowing how long the journey will last. They do not address leadership or sweeping promises, but the stance of standing itself—“from the hewer of thy wood to the drawer of thy water” (Deut. 29:10)—and the covenants we forge, even within hardship.
As noted, the haftarah of this Shabbat concludes the seven weeks of consolation, with these words:
In his love and in his pity he redeemed them; and he bore them, and carried them all the days of old (Isaiah 63:9).
May it be that we, too, learn to attend not only to the heavens but to what is upon the earth; that we may act in love and in compassion, and thereby bring redemption. And within it, may we merit—individually and collectively—the compassion of Heaven.
