Komentarz do Powtórzonego Prawa 9:28

BECAUSE THE ETERNAL WAS NOT ABLE TO BRING THEM INTO THE LAND WHICH HE PROMISED THEM. During the affair of the spies, Moses said, [that the nations will say] Because the Eternal was not able to bring this people into the Land which He swore unto them, therefore He hath slain them in the wilderness,¹⁵⁶Numbers 14:16. meaning, they [the nations] will say that as they [the Israelites] approached and were near to the Land, and He saw that He was not able to be victorious over those nations He slew them [the Israelites] in the wilderness. But here [with reference to the calf] he [Moses] said [that the Egyptians would claim], and because He hated them, He hath brought them out to slay them in the wilderness,¹⁵⁷In Verse 28 before us. since this hatred already existed in Egypt before He took them out from there. The purport of this was that, since at the time when the calf was made, they were still close to Egypt and far from the land of Canaan, the Egyptians would claim that even when they were still in Egypt, He realized that He lacked the power to bring them into the Land of which He spoke to them within hearing of the Egyptians. Therefore He hated them that it [His Name] should not be profaned in the sight of the nations¹⁵⁸Ezekiel 20:9. in whose sight He made Himself known to them [the Israelites]. He brought them forth out of the land of Egypt to slay them in the wilderness¹⁵⁷In Verse 28 before us. in a place where their fate would not become known. This is the intent of the verse, [Why should the Egyptians speak, saying:] for evil did He bring them forth, to slay them in the mountains?¹⁵⁹Exodus 32:12. meaning, that He planned this evil design against them before He brought them out from among the people of Egypt to slay them between the mountains, a place that no man passed through, and where no man dwelt.¹⁶⁰Jeremiah 2:6. The point of these arguments was that the nations would speak of the Eternal, the G-d of Israel, [in a manner as they speak of other gods], speaking against Him [saying:] ‘As the gods of the nations of the lands,’¹⁶¹II Chronicles 32:17. similar to what is stated, and now I will return to fight with the prince of Persia.¹⁶²Daniel 10:20. I have already mentioned something of this subject.¹⁶³Leviticus 18:25 (Vol. III, pp. 268-269).

Because of Hashem’s inability. Moshe changed the words here, from what he said at Mount Sinai. There he said, “Why should Egypt be able to say, “He brought them out with evil intent to kill them in the mountains’” (Shemos 32:12). Moshe said that when Hashem was planning on entirely destroying the Jewish people, and the concern was the others would say that Hashem brought them out of Egypt to destroy them, not to make them His people. However, here, once Hashem had reconsidered, and there was no longer concern that He would destroy the entire nation, Moshe said that the nations would think that Hashem was unable to bring them into the land of Israel, and only wanted to bring them to the desert so that their children could dwell there.

מבלי יכולת ה' להביאם אל הארץ, “beyond G’d’s ability to bring them to the land, etc.” Nachmanides points out that in Moses’ prayer to G’d after the debacle with the spies he uses the expression מבלתי יכולת ה' אל הארץ אשר דבר להם ומשנאתו אותם הוציאם להמיתם במדבר, instead of the words used here, i.e מבלתי יכולת ה' להביא את העם הזה אל הארץ אשר נשבע להם וישחטם במדבר.. Why, did Moses mention G’d’s oath to bring the people to the Holy Land in Numbers 14,16, whereas he did not mention a word about G’d having hated this people already in Egypt, and the orchestration of the Exodus only being a preamble to mask G’d’s inability to keep His promise? At the sin of the golden calf he only mentioned that G’d had “said” that He would bring them there? Nachmanides reminds us that the supposed argument by the nations Moses presents to G’d, must be understood in terms of how matters appear to these nations. If G’d had made the people perish after only a few weeks away from Egypt, the surviving Egyptians would have interpreted this as proof that G’d had never intended the people to get to Canaan, but had wanted to kill them where no one would be a witness to His inability, but in fact G’d had already hated the people in Egypt, and that is why He had allowed them to suffer so long. The Canaanites could not have used quite the same argument after the people had survived and prospered in the desert for a year and a half. They, and the surrounding nations, would have concluded that the Jewish G’d, though willing to bring the people to Canaan, had found out that after all this was beyond His power, and rather than have witnesses to His failure, He had killed His own people.

V. 28. ׳פן יאמרו וגו. Und du hast ja nicht nur um ihrer und ihrer Ahnen willen für sie und an ihnen getan, was du getan, Erleuchtung und Belehrung der übrigen Menschheit war ja mindestens in gleichem Maße dein Augenmerk bei all dem Außerordentlichen, was du für dieses Volk getan — und wenn du sie nun nicht zu dem ausgesprochenen Ziele führst, wenn du sie in der Wüste hinsterben lässest, so würde damit ja gerade das Gegenteil von dem bewirkt werden, was erzielt werden sollte; ohnmächtig gegen ein höheres Fatum und menschenfeindselig, wie heidnische Gottheiten in der Vorstellung ihrer Verehrer erschiene auch Gott der eine Einzige in der Auffassung der Völker, denen doch gerade an Israels von Gott geleitetem Geschicke eine Ahnung von der freien Gottesmacht und der liebenden Gottesgröße aufgehen sollte.

ומשנאתו אותם, “and because He hated them;” they reasoned that G–d may never have had the intention of giving them the land of Canaan, but He lured them into the desert out of His hatred for them, in order to let them perish in the desert.” This concept is also found in the Book of Hoseah 2,16, where the prophet speaks of G–d saying that He will punish the idol-worshipping Israelites precisely in such a manner: הנה אנכי מפתיה והולכתי המדבר והמתיה בצמא, “I will speak to her coaxingly and lead her into the wilderness and let her die through thirst. [The author misquoted parts of verses 8 and 16 in that chapter to arrive at this comparison. Ed.

ומשנאתו אותם, “or because of His hatred for them;” the letter ו at the beginning of the word ומשנאתו is to be understood as if the Torah had written: או, “or.” We have numerous occasions where the letter ו means “or,” for instance in Exodus 12,5: מן הכבשים, “or from amongst the sheep;” or in Exodus 21,17: ומכה אביו ואמו, “or if someone strikes his father or his mother,” to mention just a few.