Parshat Ki Teitzei: See No Evil?
Parshat Ki Teitzei continues the speech that Moshe gave to the Jewish nation before his passing. 74 mitzvot are mentioned in this week’s parsha. There are mitzvot of all types and stripes: Behavior during war, rebellious kids, taking care of another’s lost property, cross-dressing, tzitzit, workers rights, divorce, sensitivity to a debtor and honesty in business practices, to name a few.
At the very end of this string of mitzvot is the exhortation regarding Amalek – the enemy nation of the Israelites who attacked them when they left Egypt at a time when everybody else was cowering with fear and respect for the Jewish nation.
Remember what Amalek did to you on your way out of Egypt: How he happened upon you on the way and cut off all the stragglers at your rear when you were faint and weary. They had no fear of God. So it will be that when the Lord your God grants you rest from all of your enemies around you in the land which the Lord your God gives to you as an inheritance to possess – that you shall wipe out the memory of Amalek from beneath the heavens. You shall not forget!
This was the first Never Again, Never Forget that was uttered thousands of years before it would become the rallying cry after the Holocaust. And in it, Moshe goes out of his way to point out that the Jewish people must never forget Amalek and his ilk, even when things seem to be going well and they are in a state of peace and rest from their enemies.
So it will be that when the Lord your God grants you rest from all of your enemies around you… that you shall wipe out the memory of Amalek from beneath the heavens. You shall not forget!
When the economy is humming, when life is good, when the people feel strong, powerful and successful, Amalek still has to remain in the back of our minds. Moshe warns that we cannot drop our guard … ever. That we can’t lose sight of the fact that there always lurks an enemy that is willing to pounce on any weakness the way Amalek did against the weakest part of the Jewish people when they exited Egypt.
It is a crucial lesson that Moshe is imparting and one that we have unfortunately witnessed in recent years. Just like Amalek preyed upon the
weakest and fragile at the edges of the camp, so too Hamas attacked the most trusting and kind-hearted Israeli souls who sought to live in peace with their Gazan neighbors. Alas, the words of the Pesach Haggada, “In each and every generation there are those who try to rise up and destroy us” once again became all too true.
We have recently had to re-learn this bitter lesson of never letting our guard down no matter how soothing the reassurances of our so-called friends who tell us not to worry and that they got our back. We cannot ever be lulled into believing that evil people and evil nations no longer exist. When they say they want to destroy us – we have to take them at their word and believe them. It isn’t just sloganeering when they utter, “Death to Israel.”
This is the very thing that Moshe is warning us. Other nations might have the luxury of forgetting what evil people would like to so. Every other nation can close their eyes to the realities of Amalek and of its present day incarnation, Iran. But not us, not the Jewish people. Not now, not ever. They can fall asleep at the wheel, close their eyes and pretend it’s all ok, but we can’t. We know better. We have to know better.
We can’t forget Moshe’s words. One day Amalek and all those who follow them will be destroyed and we will be able to finally let our guard down and live at peace with all the nations of the world. We look forward to that day. But it’s a bit naïve to think that that day is today.
I wanted everybody else in the world to know it
That I ain’t ever gonna let ’em take the life from me I’ve no regrets,
I will not ask for your forgiveness
-Lord Huron
