DEUTERONOMY XXI:1-30

PUBLIC READING OF THE TORAH

After encouraging Yehoshua (Joshua) with the expression of ChazakVeemats, the desire for his leadership over the people to be strong and persistent, Moshe (Moses) instructs that at the conclusion of the Shemitahperiod, the annual rest of the land after 7 years, the people should be gathered for the public reading of the Torah. The timing will be propitious to emphasize that the Shemitah sabbatical year  is not only for the purpose of “rest of the lands.” It must be a period of reflection and study, of spiritual growth that will be crowned with public reading, which in turn can be considered as a renewed commitment to the Torah. Listening to its content, there must be a mobilization and renewal of the Brit assumed in Har Sinai: God undertakes to watch over the well-being of the people and the people commit themselves to fulfill the Mitsvot, to obey the Divine Will. 

The one who had to perform the public reading was the king, the administrative ruler of the people, as a sign that the Torah had a public message; its rules were to govern the behavior of society in all its manifestations. Adults and children, the elderly and young alike had to listen to this reading. This gathering was called Hakhel, whose root is Kahal, the collective, the totality of the Hebrew people.

With the establishment of the State of Israel, attempts were made to renew this activity. In this regard, Chief Rabbi Yitzchak Herzog wrote a teshuvahin his book Heichal Yitzchak, where he suggests that even in the absence of the Beis HaMikdash, one  can celebrate Zecher leHakhel, a remembrance of this activity, and that the head of state could lead the public reading of the Torah.

As a historical note, it is worth mentioning that it was a son of this great rabbi, General Yaacov Herzog, Israel’s ambassador to the United Nations, who in a famous speech reacted in November 1975 to the adoption of the infamous General Assembly document that made an equivalence between Zionism and racism. While the Torah is a document of coexistence with great ethical content, the UN document had the function of promoting hatred, an expression of the immorality of its content that constituted a historical distortion of the Zionist movement. Yaakov Herzog ended his brilliant speech by publicly tearing up the paper on which this resolution was written.

Days ago, at a public press conference, another Israeli general, son of Yaacov Herzog, in a commemoration of the 30th anniversary of that infamous resolution, spoke about its historical injustice and, again, in front of the television cameras, tore up the document. It should be noted that the UN General Assembly subsequently resolved to overturn the original decision, in a fair amendment to an earlier regrettable decision. 

Chief Rabbi Yitzchak Herzog had suggested a mass gathering before the Kotel to do the Torah reading, which was to be preceded by the blowing of the Shofar. According to many exegetes, one should read the Sefer Devarim, the last Book of the Torah. It can also be mentioned as an interesting fact that, years ago, a synagogue in New York scheduled the public reading of the Tanakh and invited different public personalities to participate in this event. The audience received copies of the Tanach while the reading was done on the podium, chapter by chapter. 

Hakhel is a further demonstration of the centrality of Torah study for all sectors of society. The presence of the children highlights that from childhood a love for Torah and study must be instilled  , the decisive factor for the survival of the Jewish people.

MITZVAH: ORDINANCE OF THE TORAH IN THIS PARSHA

CONTAINS 2 POSITIVE MITSVOT

612. Deuteronomy 31:12 Gather all the people to hear the Torah reading  after the sabbatical year

613. Deuteronomy 31:12 Every Jew must write a Torah for himself