📜 Daily Chumash & Rashi – Parshas Ha’azinu Sheiyni: Hashem’s love for the Jewish people

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Sheiyni

• Remember the days of old and contemplate the past generations. Ask your father and grandfather how Hashem separated the nations according to the people of Israel.
• Hashem’s love for the Jewish people: A portion of Hashem is His people and Yaakov is the rope of His inheritance. He found him in the desert and guarded him like the pupil of His eye. He acted like an eagle protecting his children. Hashem alone did this without any other god.

Parsha Bee – Devarim 32:7–12 (Rashi)

1. What does “Remember the days of old” mean according to Rashi?
   Answer: Remember what Hashem did to earlier generations that angered Him.
2. Which generations does Rashi mention as examples?
   Answer: The generation of Enosh and the generation of the Flood.
3. What happened to the generation of Enosh?
   Answer: They were flooded by the waters of the ocean.
4. What happened to the generation of the Flood?
   Answer: They were destroyed by the Flood.
5. What is Rashi’s second explanation of “reflect upon the years of generations”?
   Answer: Consider the future rewards Hashem can give.
6. What future blessings should one contemplate?
   Answer: The days of Mashiach and the World to Come.
7. Who are called “your father” in this verse?
   Answer: The prophets.
8. Which prophet called his teacher “my father, my father”?
   Answer: Elisha speaking about Eliyahu.
9. Who are “your elders”?
   Answer: The Sages.
10. What will the prophets and sages tell you?
    Answer: The events of earlier generations.
11. What does “When the Most High gave nations their lot” refer to?
    Answer: The punishment and fate of earlier sinful nations.
12. What group is referred to by “the sons of man”?
    Answer: The generation of the Dispersion (Tower of Babel).
13. What could Hashem have done to the generation of the Dispersion?
    Answer: Destroyed them completely.
14. What did Hashem do instead?
    Answer: He scattered them and allowed them to continue existing.
15. Why did Hashem preserve humanity after Babel?
    Answer: For the sake of the future Jewish people.
16. According to Rashi, what number corresponds to the nations of the world?
    Answer: Seventy nations.
17. What number corresponds to the souls who descended to Egypt?
    Answer: Seventy souls.
18. How many languages were established among mankind?
    Answer: Seventy languages.
19. Why did Hashem go to such effort in preserving humanity?
    Answer: Because His portion was hidden within them.
20. Who is Hashem’s portion?
    Answer: The Jewish people.
21. Who specifically is called “the lot of His inheritance”?
    Answer: Yaakov.
22. Why is Yaakov compared to a three-stranded rope?
    Answer: Because he possessed his own merit plus the merits of Avraham and Yitzchak.
23. Which descendants did not become Hashem’s inheritance?
    Answer: Yishmael and Esav.
24. What does “He found him in a desert land” mean?
    Answer: Hashem found Israel faithful in accepting the Torah in the wilderness.
25. Which peoples refused the Torah according to Rashi?
    Answer: The descendants of Esav and Yishmael.
26. What does the “howling wasteland” refer to?
    Answer: A barren desert filled with jackals and ostriches.
27. What merit did Israel display in the wilderness?
    Answer: They willingly followed Hashem into the desert.
28. What does “He encompassed them” mean?
    Answer: Hashem surrounded them with protective clouds.
29. What other protection is included in “He encompassed them”?
    Answer: Hashem held Mount Sinai over them like a canopy.
30. What does “He bestowed understanding upon them” mean?
    Answer: He gave them Torah and wisdom.
31. From what dangers did Hashem protect Israel?
    Answer: Snakes, scorpions, and hostile nations.
32. What is the “pupil of His eye”?
    Answer: The black center of the eye.
33. How does Onkelos explain “He found him”?
    Answer: Hashem provided all of Israel’s needs.
34. According to Onkelos, what does “He encompassed them” mean?
    Answer: He made them camp around His Divine Presence.
35. What was located in the center of the camp?
    Answer: the Ohel Moed (Tent of Meeting).
36. How many tribal divisions surrounded it?
    Answer: Four divisions.
37. To what bird does the Torah compare Hashem?
    Answer: An eagle.
38. How does an eagle awaken its young?
    Answer: Gently, by fluttering above them before landing.
39. Why does the eagle not suddenly enter its nest?
    Answer: So its young will be prepared to receive it.
40. How is Hashem similar to the eagle?
    Answer: He revealed Himself gradually and mercifully.
41. From how many directions did Hashem reveal Himself at Sinai according to Rashi?
    Answer: Four directions.
42. How does an eagle carry its young?
    Answer: On its wings.
43. Why does the eagle carry its young on its wings?
    Answer: It fears arrows more than predators above it.
44. What does the eagle prefer?
    Answer: That an arrow strike it rather than its young.
45. How did Hashem act similarly at the Red Sea?
    Answer: He placed the cloud between Egypt and Israel to absorb danger.
46. What does “Hashem alone guided him” mean?
    Answer: Hashem alone led and protected Israel in the wilderness.
47. What could no foreign god do?
    Answer: Display power or wage war against Israel.
48. How do the Sages interpret verse 12?
    Answer: As referring to the future redemption.
49. How does Rashi himself explain verse 12?
    Answer: As referring to both the past and the future.
50. What is the overall purpose of this whole section?
    Answer: To remind Israel of Hashem’s kindness so they will not betray Him.

Bonus

Why does Rashi compare Yaakov to a three-stranded rope?
Answer: Because Yaakov possessed three layers of merit: his own merit, Yitzchak’s merit, and Avraham’s merit.