Comentário sobre Deuteronômio 32:3

כי שם ה' אקרא WHEN I SHALL CALL THE NAME OF THE LORD [ASCRIBE YE GREATNESS UNTO OUR GOD] — You see, כי is here used in the meaning of “when”, similar to (Leviticus 23:10) “When (כי) ye come into the land”. The meaning is: when I proclaim and mention the Name of the Lord, YE ASCRIBE GREATNESS TO OUR GOD and bless His name. From here they (the Rabbis) derived the law that people make the response, “Blessed be the Name of His glorious Kingdom for ever and ever", after the recital of a Benediction in the Temple (Sifrei Devarim 306:37; Berakhot 21a; Taanit 16b).

כי שם ה' אקרא, If this is as I said, then you Israel who have received these words of wisdom, will appreciate that the thrust of my address is a prayer, a prayer that all of us, including myself, will experience the ultimate redemption after the last exile. [Moses includes this in his preamble in order to make sure that his listeners will not fail to see the forest by concentrating too much on the individual trees. Ed.] Our author first proceeds to quote examples of such formulations as Moses uses here meaning prayer. We find in Lamentations 3,55 קראתי שמך ה' מבור תחתיות, ”I have called on Your Name from the depths of the Pit.” Clearly, Jeremiah refers to his prayer. We read in Psalms 99,6 concerning the trio of Moses, Aaron, and Samuel, that they were known as קוראי שמו והוא יענם, “that whenever they prayed to G’d He would respond to them favourably.”
Moses therefore tells the people: “when I pray for the ingathering of the exiles I want G’d to orchestrate this so that it is like the eagle rousing his young and carrying them to a new destination on the back of his wings.” (verse 11) Moses continues, focusing in his prayer on the arrival of the Messiah by saying ה' בדד ינחנו, G’d will do this all on His own, without anyone’s assistance (verse 23). At the very end of his shirah, (verse 43) he exclaims הרנינו גויים עמו, which is equivalent to the instruction in our verse here of הבו גודל לאלוקינו, render glory to our G’d.

כי שם ה׳ אקרא, "For I will proclaim the name of the Lord, etc." Moses explains that the whole objective of his speeches is to exalt the name of G'd, much as we have read in the Zohar volume 3 page 98 that the entire written Torah is an elongated name of the Lord. Concerning this statement Moses says: "and my teaching drop like rain [the teaching being a simile for the name of G'd. Ed.]. The word אקרא may be understood as from the root יקר, precious.

כי שם ה' אקרא, when I will tell you about the great and wonderful things G’d has done for you, as well as that He is righteous in what He will do for you in the future, you too will want to render Him homage, proclaim His greatness, by proclaiming Him as our G’d. This will not be flattery, but recognition of what is a truth.

Now “כי” is used to denote “when”, etc. For it is impossible to explain that [ki here means “because” and that] it is giving a reason for what is written above.

V. 3. כי שם ד׳ וגו׳, denn es ist nicht sein Wort, das er zu sprechen habe, er ist es nicht, in dessen Namen er Himmel und Erde auffordere, es ist Gott, dessen Name, dessen der menschlichen Erkenntnis zugängliche Waltungsweisen (vergl. Schmot 33, 19) er verkündet; Ihm, seinem und ihrem Meister, sollen sie die Größe geben, הבו גדל לאלקינו, in Seinem Namen erwartet er die Mitwirkung zu seinem Werk.

כי שם ה' אקרא, “for I will proclaim the Holy Name of the Lord;” this refers to Moses’ previous reference to heaven and earth; he tells his people that at all times they need to proclaim the greatness of the Lord both in heaven an on earth; this is similar to the psalmist proclaiming in Psalms 69,35: הללוהו שמים וארץ, “praise the heavens and the earth!” The psalmist also phrases this thought when he said (Psalms 19,2) השמים מספרים כבוד אל, “the heavens tell of the glory of G-d.” We do all this whenever we read the Torah in public and a forum of ten male adults is present. The prophet Jeremiah, 33,25, has taught us that G-d is on record as saying that if it were not for His covenant with the Jewish people, He would not consider it worthwhile to have created the universe, i.e. day or night and all of nature that goes with it. The letters in the names of G-d themselves provide a hint, 6 letters which in addition to the four directions of earth point to heaven and earth themselves, i.e. the number 6 reminding us of the number of days G-d took to create our universe.

That one responds “May the Name of His glorious kingdom be blessed, etc.” If you ask that [perhaps it does not mean this formula of “Blessed, etc.” but simply] it means that they answer “Amein” [in the Beis Hamikdosh]. And furthermore from where does he know that it is referring to the Beis Hamikdosh at all, perhaps it refers to outside the Midkosh? One can answer that because it is written “Give greatness,” and “Amein” does not denote greatness, but rather is a statement of belief in the words of the one who recites the blessing. Also, it is written, “When I pronounce Hashem’s Name” which implies the Tetragrammaton [i.e., Four-letter Name of Hashem], and it is forbidden to mention this Name outside the Beis Hamikdosh. For only in the Beis Hamikdosh did they enunciate the Name as it is written.

Another thought Moses may have had in mind here is that although he compared the written and oral Torah respectively to rain and dew, the people should not think of that distinction when studying Torah. All they should concentrate on is to study G'd's Torah. The reason Moses said כי, "for," is to to warn that the reason for Torah study should be to learn the word of G'd in order to better appreciate what His name stands for. Only in this fashion can a man truly ascribe greatness to G'd and His name. In other words, Torah is to be studied לשמה, for its own sake. The reason Moses said אקרא, is that he wants every individual to do precisely this, to proclaim the greatness of G'd. Alternatively, we may understand this in terms of the Zohar volume three page 273 that all the people who are engaged in Torah study are sparks of Moses' soul, and this does not only apply to the generation of the Jews in the desert but all down the long millennia of history until the coming of the Messiah. Anyone who studies Torah is blessed by Moses. This is the reason he could credit Israel's preoccupation with Torah to himself.

Die ersten drei Verse sind Einleitung zum שירה-Wort, das mit dem folgenden Verse beginnt. Berachot 21 a wird an diesem כי שם ד׳ אקרא הבו גדל לאלקינו die Vorschrift der ברכת התורה לפניה, der vor dem Lesen aus der Tora zu sprechenden Beracha gelehrt. Wie Mosche hier, bevor er das Gotteswort der שירה begann, deren Bedeutung als Gotteswort, als Verkündung seines Namens aussprach, und damit die Aufforderung an seine Hörer verband, in diesem Sinne sein Wort anzuhören, und dies durch huldigende Hingebung an Gott zu betätigen, הבו גדל לאלקינו, so ist ja in Wahrheit die ganze תורה eine "Verkündung des Gottesnamens", die Offenbarung Gottes in der Welt, in der Menschheit, in Israel und in dem von Israel zu gestaltenden Leben, und namentlich wer hintritt zum Lesen und Vorlesen der תורה im Kreise seiner Genossen, spricht zuvor es aus, dass es תורתו, dass es die Gotteslehre sei, dass Er sie uns gegeben, und wie er selber in ברוך die Huldigung des Gehorsams an den Geber dieses Gesetzes ausspricht, so fordert er auch die zuhörenden Genossen zu gleicher ברוך-Huldigung auf: ברכו את ד׳ המבורך ganz gleichbedeutend mit dem הבו גדל לאלקינו. Ebenso wird Joma 37 a überhaupt hieran gelehrt, einem den Gottesnamen verkündenden Ausspruch mit dem huldigenden Worte ברוך שם כבוד מלכותו לעולם ועד oder dem zustimmenden sich anschließenden אמן zu begegnen. (Siehe Raschi Berachot daselbst; vergleiche zu Dewarim 8, 10; Bamidbar 6, 27)

כי שם ה' אקרא, these words have been interpreted by the author of the Jerusalem Talmud as meaning that Moses prophesied: “woe to you sinful the gentiles who mention the Holy Name of the Lord;” Even the angels are not able to pronounce that holy name until after the Jewish people here on earth have proclaimed it in the kedushah, by saying: קדוש קדוש קדוש three times. It was Moses who here provided the key to praising G-d in this mode. There are 21 words from the beginning of our portion, containing 85 letters. According to the Sifri, Moses said: “I am satisfied to be immediately behind in rank to seven angels,” i.e. to recite the holy Name of G-d after these twenty one words. This is the reason why the sages arranged for the part of our daily prayers known as “kedushah” to comprise a total of 21 words. [The 21 words are: נקדש את שמך בעולם כשם שמקדישים אותו בשמי מרום, וכן כתוב על יד נביאך וקרא זה אל זה ואמר קדוש הדוש קדוש. In the corresponding morning kedushah prayer on Sabbath mornings, there are 85 words, beginning with: נקדישך ונעריצך כסוד שיח שרפי קודש המקדישים שמד בקודש וגו'. We are not allowed to pronounce the critical words: קדוש קדוש קדוש until after an introduction of 85 words. The same is true of the kedushah prayer in the mussaph service, which commences with words: 'כתר יתנו לך המוני מעלה וגו.]

Another thought Moses may have had in mind when saying כי שם ה׳ אקרא, is that it is the reason for what Moses said later, i.e. הבו גדל לאלוקינו. In order to appreciate this let us look at Yalkut Shimoni Noach item 62 where the author interprets Psalms 22,4 ישב תהלות ישראל, "the enthroned One, the Praise of Israel." According to the Yalkut what this verse means is that G'd did not take His seat on His throne until the angels in heaven had proclaimed: "blessed be the Lord G'd of Israel." He had not been satisfied with being called the "G'd of the heaven and of the earth." This is why Moses here called on the Israelites to praise the Lord. The operative word in what Moses is saying is the word אלוקינו, "our G'd." Only when the Israelites are engaged in studying the Torah do they truly praise the Lord in a manner no one else can. When the angels praise the Lord by reciting the formula: "blessed be the Lord G'd of Israel," this threatens to become a mockery unless the Israelites are engaged in Torah sudy. Should they fail to do so, they make liars out of the angels. Our sages have offered many different interpretations on this verse.

וכן איתא במכלתא פ׳ בא וז׳׳ל: אין לי אלא אכילת מזון שטעון ברכה לפניו ולאחריו תורה מנין וכו׳ רבי חנינא וכו׳ אומר כי שם ד׳ אקרא .זה המברך הבו גדל לאלדינו אלו העונין אחריו ומה הן עונין אחריו ברוך ד׳ המברך לע׳׳ו לללל והנה הרמב׳׳ן בהשנותיו על הרמב׳׳ם בס׳ המצות על מצות עשה לפי דעתו השיג עליו במצוה טו׳ על שלא חשב ברכת התורה לפניה שהיא דאוריתא על פי סוגיא הנ׳׳ל ובעל מגלת אסתר לא מצא להליץ בעד הרמב׳׳ם אם לא שחשב שמדרש הנ׳׳ל בזה הפסוק הוא על דרך אסמכתא בלבד אמנם עליו להביא ראיה עב׳׳ל. ולענ׳׳ד אפשר ראיה גדולה להרמב׳׳ם דהא לכאורה הדבר ברור מתוך המכלתא ומתוך הסוגיא שמדרש הזה לא מיירי כי אם מקריאת התורה בצבור דהא רק בצבור יש עונין אחריו לדרוש בזה הבו גודל לאלדינו ורק בצבור יש ברכה לאחריה שרוצה ללמוד הש׳׳ם מק׳׳ו ע׳׳ש והנה קריאת התורה בצבור גופה אינה אלא דרבנן — אם לא בפ׳ זכור והקהל — אחר זמן מצאתי אשר גם מעדני י׳׳ט פ׳׳ק דברכות סי׳ יג מוכיח דהסוגיא לא מיירי כי אם בצבור ומשום .הכי הדרשא רק אסמכתא ע׳׳ש