This week's Torah
portion includes one of the most enigmatic verses in all of the Five Books of
Moses: " And now, Israel, what does the Lord, your G-D ask of you? Only to
fear (be in awe of) the Lord, your G-d, to go in all His ways, and to love Him,
and to serve the Lord, your G-d with all your heart and with all your soul. To
observe G-D's commandments, and His statutes, which I have commanded you today,
for your benefit" (Deuteronomy 10:12-13).
Gee, is that all?!?! As
I said, enigmatic. It would take a thesis-size paper to include the various and
sundry commentaries on these verses, which on the surface are beyond strange
("What is G-D asking of us, only to achieve perfection). For the moment,
let us focus on but one aspect—the verse presents the two extreme measures by
which one serves G-D: either out of fear/awe ("yir'ah"), or
out of love ("ahavah").
Which approach is "preferable"?
I believe we are
presented with a number of clues. In last week's Parasha, V'etchanan, we read
the first paragraph of the Shema ("Hear, Oh Israel,…") which begins,
"And you shall love the Lord, your G-D with all your heart, with all your
soul, and with all your might/wealth."
This week, we have the second paragraph, which begins, "And it will
be, if you heed My commandments, which I am commanding you today, to love the
Lord, your G-D, and to serve Him with all your heart and with all your
soul…" (11:13).
At this point, the
scoreboard reads: Love-2, Fear/Awe-0. And the Parasha concludes with the
tie-breaker: "For if you will carefully heed this entire commandment which I have commanded to fulfill it; to love
the Lord, your G-D, to walk in all His ways, and to cling to Him" (11:22).
Conclusion: the ultimate way to serve G-D is through love. One stands in
fear/awe of a flesh-and-blood military a/o political leader. Do we love them?
Hardly.
We may carry those
feelings over to the omnipotent, omnipresent, omniscient Almighty. As we are
told in this week's Torah portion, when the nations of the world heard of all
the miracles G-D had performed, all the displays of might, the conquering of
the two mightiest military figures of the day (Sichon and Og) without the loss
of a single combat soldier, they quaked in fear and awe.
It is our
"job" as Jews to rise above that, to serve G-D out of love. Out of an
appreciation for all He has done for us in the past, all He does on a daily
basis, and all He will continue to do in the future. In the inimitable words of
The Beatles: "All You Need Is Love."
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