Parashat Ha'azinu

(1) Give ear, O heavens, let me speak; Let the earth hear the words I utter! (2) May my discourse come down as the rain, My speech distill as the dew, Like showers on young growth, Like droplets on the grass. (3) For the name of יהוה I proclaim; Give glory to our God! (4) The Rock!—whose deeds are perfect, Yea, all God’s ways are just; A faithful God, never false, True and upright indeed. (5) Unworthy children— That crooked, perverse generation— Their baseness has played God false. (6) Do you thus requite יהוה, O dull and witless people? Is not this the Father who created you— Fashioned you and made you endure! (7) Remember the days of old, Consider the years of ages past; Ask your parent, who will inform you, Your elders, who will tell you: (8) When the Most High gave nations their homes And set the divisions of humanity, [God] fixed the boundaries of peoples In relation to Israel’s numbers. (9) For יהוה’s portion is this people; Jacob, God’s own allotment. (10) [God] found them in a desert region, In an empty howling waste. [God] engirded them, watched over them, Guarded them as the pupil of God’s eye. (11) Like an eagle who rouses its nestlings, Gliding down to its young, So did [God] spread wings and take them, Bear them along on pinions; (12)יהוה alone did guide them, No alien god alongside. (13) [God] set them atop the highlands, To feast on the yield of the earth; Nursing them with honey from the crag, And oil from the flinty rock, (14) Curd of kine and milk of flocks; With the best of lambs, And rams of Bashan, and he-goats; With the very finest wheat— And foaming grape-blood was your drink. (15) So Jeshurun grew fat and kicked— You grew fat and gross and coarse — They forsook the God who made them And spurned the Rock of their support. (16) They incensed [God] with alien things, Vexed [God] with abominations. (17) They sacrificed to demons, no-gods, Gods they had never known, New ones, who came but lately, Who stirred not your forebears’ fears. (18) You neglected the Rock who begot you, Forgot the God who labored to bring you forth. (19) יהוה saw and was vexed And spurned these sons and daughters. (20) [God] said: I will hide My countenance from them, And see how they fare in the end. For they are a treacherous breed, Children with no loyalty in them. (21) They incensed Me with no-gods, Vexed Me with their futilities; I’ll incense them with a no-folk, Vex them with a nation of fools. (22) For a fire has flared in My wrath And burned to the bottom of Sheol, Has consumed the earth and its increase, Eaten down to the base of the hills. (23) I will sweep misfortunes on them, Use up My arrows on them: (24) Wasting famine, ravaging plague, Deadly pestilence, and fanged beasts Will I let loose against them, With venomous creepers in dust. (25) The sword shall deal death without, As shall the terror within, To youth and maiden alike, The suckling as well as the aged. (26) I might have reduced them to naught, Made their memory cease among humankind, (27) But for fear of the taunts of the foe, Their enemies who might misjudge And say, “Our own hand has prevailed; None of this was wrought by יהוה !” (28) For they are a folk void of sense, Lacking in all discernment. (29) Were they wise, they would think upon this, Gain insight into their future: (30) “How could one have routed a thousand, Or two put ten thousand to flight, Unless their Rock had sold them, יהוה had given them up?” (31) For their rock is not like our Rock, In our enemies’ own estimation. (32) Ah! The vine for them is from Sodom, From the vineyards of Gomorrah; The grapes for them are poison, A bitter growth their clusters. (33) Their wine is the venom of asps, The pitiless poison of vipers. (34) Lo, I have it all put away, Sealed up in My storehouses, (35) To be My vengeance and recompense, At the time that their foot falters. Yea, their day of disaster is near, And destiny rushes upon them. (36) For יהוה will vindicate God’s people And take revenge for God’s servants, Upon seeing that their might is gone, And neither bond nor free is left. (37) [God] will say: Where are their gods, The rock in whom they sought refuge, (38) Who ate the fat of their offerings And drank their libation wine? Let them rise up to your help, And let them be a shield unto you! (39) See, then, that I, I am the One; There is no god beside Me. I deal death and give life; I wounded and I will heal: None can deliver from My hand. (40) Lo, I raise My hand to heaven And say: As I live forever, (41) When I whet My flashing blade And My hand lays hold on judgment, Vengeance will I wreak on My foes, Will I deal to those who reject Me. (42) I will make My arrows drunk with blood— As My sword devours flesh— Blood of the slain and the captive From the long-haired enemy chiefs. (43) O nations, acclaim God’s people! For He’ll avenge the blood of His servants, Wreak vengeance on His foes, And cleanse His people’s land. (44) Moses came, together with Hosea son of Nun, and recited all the words of this poem in the hearing of the people. (45) And when Moses finished reciting all these words to all Israel, (46) he said to them: Take to heart all the words with which I have warned you this day. Enjoin them upon your children, that they may observe faithfully all the terms of this Teaching. (47) For this is not a trifling thing for you: it is your very life; through it you shall long endure on the land that you are to possess upon crossing the Jordan. (48) That very day יהוה spoke to Moses: (49) Ascend these heights of Abarim to Mount Nebo, which is in the land of Moab facing Jericho, and view the land of Canaan, which I am giving the Israelites as their holding. (50) You shall die on the mountain that you are about to ascend, and shall be gathered to your kin, as your brother Aaron died on Mount Hor and was gathered to his kin; (51) for you both broke faith with Me among the Israelite people, at the waters of Meribath-kadesh in the wilderness of Zin, by failing to uphold My sanctity among the Israelite people. (52) You may view the land from a distance, but you shall not enter it—the land that I am giving to the Israelite people.

(1) This is the blessing with which Moses, God’s agent, bade the Israelites farewell before he died. (2) He said: יהוה came from Sinai, And shone upon them from Seir; [God] appeared from Mount Paran, And approached from Ribeboth-kodesh, Lightning flashing at them from [God’s] right. (3) Lover, indeed, of the people, Their hallowed are all in Your hand. They followed in Your steps, Accepting Your pronouncements, (4) When Moses charged us with the Teaching As the heritage of the congregation of Jacob. (5) Then [God] became King in Jeshurun, When the heads of the people assembled, The tribes of Israel together. (6) May Reuben live and not die, Though few be his numbers. (7) And this he said of Judah: Hear, יהוה, the voice of Judah And restore him to his people. Though his own hands strive for him, Help him against his foes. (8) And of Levi he said: Let Your Thummim and Urim Be with Your faithful one, Whom You tested at Massah, Challenged at the waters of Meribah; (9) Who said of his father and mother, “I consider them not.” His brothers he disregarded, Ignored his own children. Your precepts alone they observed, And kept Your covenant. (10) They shall teach Your laws to Jacob And Your instructions to Israel. They shall offer You incense to savor And whole-offerings on Your altar. (11) Bless, יהוה, his substance, And favor his undertakings. Smite the loins of his foes; Let his enemies rise no more. (12) Of Benjamin he said: Beloved of יהוה, He rests securely beside [God], Who protects him always, As he rests between God’s shoulders. (13) And of Joseph he said: Blessed of יהוה be his land With the bounty of dew from heaven, And of the deep that couches below; (14) With the bounteous yield of the sun, And the bounteous crop of the moons; (15) With the best from the ancient mountains, And the bounty of hills immemorial; (16) With the bounty of earth and its fullness, And the favor of the Presence in the Bush. May these rest on the head of Joseph, On the crown of the elect of his brothers. (17) Like a firstling bull in his majesty, He has horns like the horns of the wild-ox; With them he gores the peoples, The ends of the earth one and all. These are the myriads of Ephraim, Those are the thousands of Manasseh.