פרשת דברים

Moshe knows that his journey will end soon. He knows that he will not be the one to accompany B’nei Yisrael into the Promised Land, nor will he help them settle and establish their new homes. He worries, wondering if this young, fatherless generation has been sufficiently fortified for the challenges ahead. Is their dedication to Torah up to the task? Is their moral compass unwavering?

Moshe’s concerns come from personal experience. He, too, had been raised without his father, trying to find his own way in a confusing world, trying to understand who he was: an Egyptian? an Israelite?

Dr. Yael Ziegler of Herzog College writes that Moshe’s early identity crisis led him to search for an איש, “a person of moral character with whom Moses can identify, so that he can become an איש.”

Moshe is led through a series of disappointments at first. He witnesses an Egyptian man striking a Hebrew slave, and even before he allows his indignation to take over, Moshe’s thoughts are clear:וַיַּרְא כִּי אֵין אִישׁ.

He finds no mentors the next day either, when he walks among his biological comrades: just two Hebrews wrestling.

Ziegler writes: “Does Moses ever find a person with who he can identify? I believe that he does. Reuel, father, of the girls that Moses saves from the wicked shepherds, is motivated by considerations of justice…. Enthusiasm is mixed with anger as Reuel berates his daughters for failing to properly reward Moses for his deeds.”

Moshe recognizes Reuel’s decency, his eagerness to do the right thing, in a world that seems dominated by bullies, and he opens a monumental chapter in his life:

ויואל משה- Moshe is willing, he is eager, he is ready to take a step. Moshe settles with Reuel/Yitro and his daughter and begins to build a family. When he leads his father-in-law’s sheep into the wilderness one day and approaches Chorev, he receives a vision from God, and is reminded of the people he left behind. His leadership career is launched.

How fitting that now, at the very end of his life, Moshe stands a mere 11-day’s journey from Chorev. And the word marking the close of his journey has the same shoresh as the one at the start:

בְּעֵ֥בֶר הַיַּרְדֵּ֖ן בְּאֶ֣רֶץ מוֹאָ֑ב הוֹאִ֣יל מֹשֶׁ֔ה

The verb וַיוֹאֶל signals the start of Moshe as leader, and הוֹאִיל marks its final days. They are bookends to Moshe’s career; their shoresh, י.א.ל., is absent from every pasuk in between.

י.א.ל. signals an enthusiasm or determination to begin an activity, and it reflects Moshe’s life-long pursuit of righteousness. As a young man, he sought the moral path for himself and was eager to find it. Now he sees his early self in the next generation- they, too, lack a traditional framework; they, too, are being thrust from all that is familiar into a land that is entirely new. This is Moshe’s self-imposed mission in the final moments of his life – perpetuating the tradition that he had recovered as a shepherd, so that his descendants can keep it alive as well.

As teachers, we engage in a similar process. First we seek truth for ourselves, soaking up information from every source we can find. Then we become mediators, filtering our favorite ideas through a student-friendly lens, praying they are considered and ultimately embraced. When a school year or semester draws to a close and we know our time is running out, we rush to make a final impact, to cram it all in so that it sticks permanently. Because like Moshe, we know that harder days lie ahead.

This is when it's helpful to remember's Moshe's encouragement: