Who spoke Greek in the plains of Moav?

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Why would Moshe repeat the Torah in 70 languages? Rashi tells us that before Moshe passed away, he repeated the Torah to the Jewish nation in 70 languages!  (Rashi Devarim 1:5.)  He was speaking to the Jews at the end of his life, preparing them for life without his leadership.  They were about to enter the Land of Israel under the leadership of Yehoshua.  

After 40 years of Torah study in the cocoon of the desert, surrounded by miraculous clouds, eating miraculous bread and drinking miraculous water, the people were about to live a life of Torah practice in the real world.  So Moshe repeated the Torah in a way that was clear and relevant to them.  But why in 70 languages?  The Jews in the desert all spoke Hebrew and probably very few spoke any other languages.

The Torah is much more than a history book or a book of laws.  In addition to being the world’s user guide, if you will, the Torah is the will and the wisdom of Hashem.  Meaning, as Rambam says, that the spiritual source of Torah is unified with Hashem.  

Hashem gave us the Torah in order for us to bring it into the world.  By studying Torah and living by the Torah’s laws, we are infusing the world with Divine energy and making it “a home for Hashem.”

How is it possible to fuse the physical world, not exactly a place of Divine revelation, with the pure Divine energy that is one with Hashem?  The answer is through Torah. Though rooted so spiritually high, the Torah teaches us to do practical, physical Mitzvot, which bridges the gap between the physical and the spiritual.

But this is no small feat.  The light of Torah has to “break through” the darkness of this world.  This is why the giving of the Torah was such a cataclysmic event with many miracles, like the Sinai mountain burning, a shofar blowing non-stop, lightning that was heard and thunder that was seen, and much more. 

It was Moshe who bridged this gap.  He was the greatest leader the Jewish people ever had, while also the humblest, and he had a special relationship with Hashem.  Moshe was able to live in heaven for 40 days without food or water, and to speak to Hashem “as a person speaks to his friend.”  Only Moshe was able to bring us the Torah and begin the process of transforming the physical world.

Every aspect of the world requires transformation, and therefore there is nothing that the Torah does not address.  People ask me all the time why there is so much “minutia” and regulation in the Torah?  The answer is that this is the whole point of Creation, to bring the unity of Hashem into every little detail of the physical world.

Hebrew is called “Lashon Hakodesh,” the holy tongue.  The world was created in Hebrew and the Torah was given in Hebrew.  Every Hebrew letter represents a different form of Divine energy, as explained at length in Kabbalah and Chassidus.  Hebrew, therefore, is the perfect language for Torah.  But Moshe wanted to bring the Torah into the secular languages.  

Moshe understood that languages other than Hebrew would not have been able to carry the great Divine light of Torah unless he himself made that happen.  So Moshe spoke the Torah in every existing language.  Now, when we study Torah in English, it is a worthy receptacle for the holiness of Torah, since Moshe made it so.

So while it is best to read the Torah in the original, if you don’t understand it, you can still connect to the holiness of Torah in whatever language you do understand.  And while it is best to observe Torah in the Holy land, as I wrote last week we can still connect to Torah wherever we are.  

The Temple has been destroyed and many of us are not in Israel.   By bringing Torah to every corner of the world, in every language, we are continuously refining every aspect of the world, and we will be rewarded with the rebuilding of the third Holy Temple by Moshaich.


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