ראה אנכי נותן לפניכם היום ברכה וקללה. ראה כמדבר ליחיד, לפניכם כמדבר לרבים, לפי שאמרו רז"ל (קידושין מ:) לעולם ידמה לאדם כאלו היה כל העולם מחצה על מחצה זכיות ועונות עשה מצוה אחת הכריע את עצמו ואת כל העולם לכף זכות לכך אמר אל כל יחיד ראה שיראה בעין שכלו כי כל מעשיו יחזרו לפניכם, לכולכם.
Look, I place before you today. “See” is singular. “Before you” is plural. This is what our Sages teach us: A person must always view things as if the entire world is half righteous and half wicked. If one performs a single mitzvah they tip themselves and the entire world to the side of merit. Therefore Moshe spoke to every individual, “See” that one should see in their thought that every single action affects all of them.
Deuteronomy 11,26. “See that I place before you this day blessing;” at first glance there seems no need for the word: היום, “this day,” as we know that G’d renews God's blessings every day, just as God renews the act of creation of the universe by providing bright light to God's universe as this is part of God's goodness. People who serve God are aware that they receive new insights daily and learn things they had not known on the previous day. We may therefore understand the word: היום, as “every day,” as our sages said: בכל יום יהיו בעיניך כחדשים, “G’d’s largesse shall be in your eyes as if something brand new each day.”
Alternatively, we should focus on the words: אשר תשמעו in the next verse. This formulation is unusual, as the Torah normally writes: אם תשמעון, “if you will hearken,” and not אשר תשמעו.
Many of you, my readers, are familiar with a statement in the Talmud Kidushin 39 according to which no reward for observing Torah commandments may be expected in this life. There is, however, one kind of “reward” that a person receives already during their life on earth, i.e. שכר מצוה מצוה, “having performed the commandment results in the satisfaction gained from the knowledge that one has been able to perform the commandment in question.” (Avot 4,2). What greater “reward” can there be than the knowledge that one has provided the Creator with pleasure by one’s deed? It is this that Moses tells the people here, “see that I have provided you with a blessing (reward) already this day, i.e. in this life.” All you have to do to qualify for this blessing is to serve God. When becoming more precise about what must be done to qualify for this “reward,” the Torah (Moses speaking) continues with אשר תשמעו, “that you hearken to G’d’s instructions.” In other words, the very act of “hearkening” qualifies you for the blessing that Moses speaks of, a blessing that is available in their daily lives on earth. Comparison with the קללה, curse, of which Moses speaks which will be the people’s fate if they fail to hearken to G’d’s voice by departing from the proper path (verse 28), will show us that the word: היום, “this day,” while alive on earth, is significantly missing. Moreover, the very idea that the people might depart from the proper path is mentioned only as a possibility, i.e. אם לא תשמעו, not as certainty, i.e. אשר.
“Here I have placed before you this day blessing and curse.” It appears somewhat strange that two opposites such as blessing and curse should have been lumped together by Moses in a single verse, instead of being treated in separate paragraphs, as is the case when the Torah, on two separate occasions in Bechukotai and Ki Tavo, lists the results of obeying or disobeying G’d’s commandments.
In order to understand this let us first explain an important rule concerning the works performed by people, something designed to prevent us from becoming overbearing and taking undue credit when we do serve the Creator by performing the various commandments that God has given us for our benefit. If we were to do that, we would be only a few steps away from generating physical desires that may overwhelm us.
Not only must we not compliment ourselves for our service of the Lord as being a major accomplishment on our part, but on the contrary, we must consider such service as being minimal, and as a result of this we must become conscious of the immense spiritual gap between us and the Creator, so that we wind up with a broken heart when we consider our relative impotence when compared to God. The more we serve God, the more will we realize that we are still at the beginning of gaining an understanding of the immensity of a Being that has called into existence the entire universe and keeps in constant touch with all God's creatures, being aware of what they do at any place and at any time. If we merely take time out to contemplate that ours is not the only planet that G’d has created but that are millions like it, how can we not feel our relative insignificance in the scheme of things that G’d has created?
We get a glimpse of the feelings generated by servants of Hashem in the celestial regions when we recite daily in our morning prayers that in spite of their knowing that they are beloved, pure and mighty, i.e. כלם אהובים כלם ברורים, כלם גבורים, nonetheless, in spite of their “standing at the heights of the universe,” ברום עולם, they relate to the Creator in awe and dread, i.e. באימה וביראה. If this applies to the leading angels, how much more does it apply to us mortal human beings. It appears from the version quoted in our prayers that these angels did not experience the feelings of their inadequacy until they were actively involved in performing acts of service for the Creator.
Immediately following these lines in the morning prayers, the highest category of angels, the seraphim, chayot and ofanim, are described as having intensified and reinforced their worship by proclaiming the holiness of G’d three times, i.e. קדושה. When we serve the Lord in the proper manner, our spiritual progress will assume the nature of a “chain reaction,” each act of service resulting in a better understanding of the Creator by God's creature. Our author sees in the command to serve the Lord by blowing shofar on New Year’s day, (Psalms 81,4) an “invitation” to spiritually improve ourselves, the word שופר from the root שפר, personifying the concept of beautifying, i.e. improving oneself. The word תקיעה, based on the root תקע, meaning “firmly pitching (tent),” see Genesis 31,25 when used with the blowing of the ram’s horn, suggests that this service of the Lord be something firmly embedded in our personality, [not an occasional visit to the synagogue. Ed.] The fact that it is performed symbolically on New Year’s especially, points to the effect it has in renewing our commitment to Hashem. The very idea that we need periodically to “renew” this commitment, suggests that we are still at the “beginning” of our spiritual ascent. This is also reflected in the psalmist urging us (psalms 98,1) to “sing a new song for the Lord.” The נפלאות, wonders, which G’d worked that the psalmist describes in psalms 98, are that God deepens the perceptive powers of God's servants, the ones who sing new songs in God's praise.
It is worth recalling an explanation of the Baal Shem Tov on psalms 48,15 where David describes G’d’s leading us forever with the words: הוא ינהגנו על מות, “God will lead us beyond death.” The Baal Shem tov, uses a parable to explain that verse. A parent, when teaching their child to walk, ensures that they do not start by running but by taking slow steps. In order to encourage their child to walk more and more assuredly, they gradually distance themselves from the child, so that the latter needs to cover more distance before arriving in the embrace of their parents. The fact that G’d, i.e. God's essence, appears very distant to us encourages us to make greater efforts to solve this mystery by getting closer to God through serving God better. This in turn, creates the feeling within us that although we have not achieved our objective in unraveling all the mysteries surrounding G’d, we nonetheless no longer consider our efforts as inconsequential. Every day we feel as if we enter a new chapter in our service of the Lord.
Let us now proceed to interpret the line: ראה אנכי נותן לפניכם היום ברכה וקללה, “see! I have placed before you this day blessing and curse.” The word ראה in this context is not a directive to be alert to what follows, rather it refers to the literal meaning of the root ראה, “to see” with one’s eyes, to take advantage of bright light in order to distinguish between different phenomena. (Both abstract ones or physical ones) The Israelite is invited or commanded by Moses to distinguish between phenomena that appear side by side, in order to recognize which of them are beneficial for them and which represent a potential curse for them. Moses implies that the Israelite has the option to accept the “yoke of heaven,” i.e. the commandments of the Torah, something that will prove to be extremely beneficial for them, or to reject that yoke in favour of all kinds of indulgences in our material world, something that in the end will have proven to be a curse for them.
The reason that our sages portray accepting the commandments of the Torah as a “yoke” of heaven, is that the yoke is the instrument by means of which an ox is made to pull the plough, the tool that eventually provides humanity with its wherewithal, i.e. bread.
[The term “yoke of the heavenly kingdom” for the commandments of the Torah, is post-Biblical, and does not appear until Talmudic times.
The simile of a Jew who keeps the commandments as having accepted the “yoke” of heaven, portrays such a Jew as pulling a ploughshare, the reward for doing so is a long way off, until the harvest has been brought in and can be consumed. When we reflect upon this we will find that our sages were very astute in coining this phrase. Ed.]
At this juncture our author draws comparisons between the meaning of the word ברכה “blessing,” and בריכה, “cistern,” from which water is drawn by the bucket. He also compares the word ברכה to המשכה, “continuity,” by means of pulling something. This would be another way of explaining the simile עול מלכות שמים. The proximity of the word וקללה, “or a curse,” is perceived by our author as a warning not to allow the fact that we have accepted the yoke of heaven to go to our heads and give us notions of superiority, seeing that if we were to do this, what was meant to be a blessing could, G’d forbid, turn into a curse due to our arrogance.