The meaning of the name of today’s Sidra is “when you come”. Moses continues his final speech by referring to the mitzvah of BIKKURIM, the First Fruit, which the Israelites were commanded to observe as soon as they entered the land. This passage is, therefore, linked to the previous commandment, mentioned in the last paragraph of the previous Sidra, to wipe out the memory of the Amalekite nation. That mitzvah, too, applied only after the settlement in the land. In the previous Sidra, Moses focused on war. In this Sidra, Moses prepares the Israelites for a peaceful and prosperous future in the land.
The basket of the First Fruit consisted of the seven products with which the land of Israel has been particularly blessed. They are: wheat and barley, grapes and figs, pomegranates, olives and dates. In Hebrew they are known as: SHIVA’T HAMINIM. The farmers were commanded to bring the first fruit to Jerusalem and give them to the priest who was in charge at the Temple during that week. The farmer was not allowed to select the priest who lived in his town or one of his friends or acquaintances. The question is: Why did the Torah consider it so important to give the Bikkurim to the priest in the Temple? The answer seems to be because the Canaanites also offered their first fruit to their gods during their summer festivals. They did so in their own localities and the practices which they followed, during those festivals, were considered by the Torah to be an abomination. One of the most famous pagan practices linked to the first fruit was the boiling of a kid in its mother’s milk. For this reason, it was necessary for the Israelites to make a special journey to the Temple, so that no one would be tempted to imitate pagan customs.
The mitzvah of Bikkurim was associated with the Festival of Shavuot, whose biblical name was also YOM HABBIKKURIM. On that day, the first two loaves of bread, from the freshly harvested wheat, were offered to the Almighty. Subsequently, the farmers continued to bring the first fruit from all the other products, so that the mitzvah continued to be observed throughout the summer. The season of the Bikkurim ended at the time of the Festival of Sukkot.
When the farmer arrived at the sanctuary, he had to recite a prayer. This prayer begins at verse 6. It is the first prayer in Judaism, composed by Moses himself. In this prayer, the farmer expressed his joyful gratitude to Hashem for the bountiful harvest which the land yielded. In the name of the ARI, the founder of the mystical school in Zfat, in the 16th century, it is told that this prayer is intended to represent a TIKKUN, a correction, for the sin of the 10 spies. When they returned to the Israelite camp, they brought with them beautiful fruit, which they showed to the people. But, instead of using them to emphasise the goodness of the land, they maligned it. They claimed that just as its fruit were grotesquely large, so were its people, and, therefore, invincible. Their report caused catastrophic panic amongst the Israelites, who refused to continue the journey to the land.
The prayer, which the farmers had to recite, begins with the words ARAMI OVED AVI. This sentence is famous for its ambiguity. There are two difficulties in these three words. One: who is the Aramean? Two: what does the root AVD mean in this context? The root has two distinct meanings; to wonder and to destroy. The P’shat, the more straightforward explanation, is: “My father was a wandering Aramean”. Aram was situated in the territory which we now call Syria, north of Israel. The Aramean is no other than Jacob, our father, who became a wanderer in in the land of ARAM NAHARAYIM, after he was forced to leave his home. He stayed and worked for his uncle Laban in Aram for period of 20 years. The difficulty with this interpretation is that it is not self-evident why Jacob was called an Aramean. Secondly, we do not have any information about him being a wanderer. But he was in exile. Alternatively, we may interpret the sentence as referring to all the three patriarchs who were called ‘my father’ in a collective sense. The patriarchs are called Arameans because Abraham stayed in Aram for a period of time before he moved to the land of Canaan. The patriarchs were OVEDIM, nomads, who wandered in the Negev desert and near Hebron.
Our rabbis interpreted this sentence midrashically. They said that the Aramean is Laban and the sentence means: “Laban, the Aramean, wanted to destroy my father”. At the Seder, in the Hagadah, this interpretation is the basis for an entire paragraph in which our rabbis said that Laban was more brutal towards our people than Pharaoh.
The second portion concludes with a beautiful prayer which is read out louder than usual, in the synagogue: “Look down, mercifully, from heaven, your holy dwelling place, and bless your people Israel and the land you have given us as you promised on oath to our ancestors, a land flowing with milk and honey.”
The last part of the Sidra contains the blessings and the curses, which form the conclusion of the statement of the covenant which the Almighty made with Israel, in the land of Moab, just before they entered the land. The Jewish people are promised that if they abide by the terms of the covenant, they will be most prosperous and successful, but if they break it, they will suffer horrendous consequences. They will suffer many incurable illnesses and afflictions, lose all their possessions, suffer incredible famine to the extent that they will eat their own children’s flesh and they will, finally, be exiled from their land. B very cruel and powerful enemy will drive them out. Even in exile we shall not find peace.
These curses have all happen in the most horrendous manner throughout our exile but, particularly, during the Holocaust, which ended only 67 years ago. Rabbi Adin Steinsalz tells us that he knew a lady, who had been the only survivor from the Vilna Ghetto. Before the war, she and her family were completely assimilated, but after the Holocaust, she returned to Judaism because she herself witnessed how the curses were fulfilled in every single detail. Before the Holocaust, no one could have believed that such terrible events would ever happen. It is a sad reflection. We see that God gave us a Torah of truth.