Flashy achievements make the news. Great triumphs, awesome deeds, transcendent moments grab our attention and seize our imagination. Humdrum acts fail to stir excitement. But when we are devising a strategy for how to prepare our ladder of ascension, it may be ill-advised to pursue quantum leaps of greatness. In fact the most effective process to transformative greatness is slow and gradual and dotted with seeming unremarkable, bite-sized micro movements up a very tall ladder. This idea is hinted to in Rashi’s first comment to our Parsha. When we analyze other parts of the Parsha, we see a variety of angles as to why the slow and unremarkable path is optimal. In this wonderful Parsha podcast, we also take deep and penetrating dive into the mysterious and esoteric world of the nature first set of tablets that Moshe and brought down from heaven, their shattering, and their pending reclamation.

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We pick up where we left off last week amid Moshe’s speech to the nation before his passing, and as in the previous few weeks, Parshas Eikev is jam packed with insights and timeless lessons. Moshe pivots between looking back on the conduct of the nation in the preceding 40 years and admonishing them for their misdeeds, and gazing forward to the conquest of Canaan and the secrets to making their settlement peaceful, prosperous, and secure.

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Prayer always makes an impact. Moshe’s prayer was exceedingly powerful and made a supercharged impact. But all of Moshe’s prayer, and all of his pleading, and all of his incessant Divine entreatment did not succeed in getting God to change his decree barring Moshe from entering the Land. Moshe’s 515 prayers was unable to reverse the decree. In this very interesting Parsha podcast, we go behind the scenes and explore some fascinating angles and reasons why Moshe was denied entrance to the Holy Land.

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Moshe was Joshua’s teacher. By any measure, Moshe was a greater leader of the nation than Joshua was. Moshe was the sun to Joshua’s moon. But Moshe was unable to lead the nation across the Jordan; a feat that Joshua pulled off. How did Joshua the acolyte manage to outshine and upstage the master? That question is the first of two subjects addressed in this week’s Parsha podcast. To find out the other one you will have to listen for yourself.

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This week’s parsha continues Moshe’s monologue to the nation in the weeks preceding his passing. He begins by recounting his repeated efforts in trying to convince God to rescind His decree that Moshe not enter the Land; Moshe then begins the retelling of the Torah; and we read many warnings and predictions about proper behavior and the consequences of abandoning Torah and mitzvos. This is a parsha replete with iconic verses and big themes!

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A month before his passing, Moshe gathers the nation for a final message. He begins with a two-verse critique of the nation, not excoriating them for their sins, but gently reprimanding them in a veiled and subtle manner. Moshe then pledges to begin to explain the Torah with scintillating clarity. Before he does so though, he offers a broad retrospective of some of the events of the preceding 40 years. He talks about the nation seeking alternative judges, retells the episode of the spies and its aftereffects, and recounts the nation’s encounters with five foreign kingdoms on the east bank of the Jordan: Edom, Moab, Ammon, and the twin nations of Sichon and Og. In this somewhat technical edition of the Parsha podcast, we offer an understanding of Moshe’s larger message. It explains the precise events that Moshe chose to tell in great detail and what he chose to omit.

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A year after the Exodus Moshe dispatched a contingency of dignified men to scout the land of Canaan prior to the Nation’s invasion. It was a catastrophic debacle. The scouts returned with a devastating, slanderous report about the Land, prompting the nation to bewail needlessly all night, and condemning the nation to 40 years of wondering in the Wilderness. The day of the return of the scouts was designated for misfortune. On this day, the ninth day of the month of Av, both temples were destroyed. The Midrash tells us that there is a causal link: because the nation cried needlessly on this night, they were condemned to cry for a very good reason on this night. What is the connection between the sin of the spies and the destruction of Jerusalem and the Temple? In this this Parsha podcast., we explore the verses in our Parsha that hearken back to that calamitous, catastrophic reconnoitering of the land.

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5 weeks before his passing, Moses gives a three-parsha-long speech to the nation, which constitutes his last will and testament. He begins with a retrospective of the history of the nation over the past 40 years since the Exodus – subtly rebuking the nation, guiding them, admonishing them, ensuring that they don’t repeat their mistakes of yore.

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Freedom of speech is enshrined in the First Amendment. Our society allows people to say whatever they want so long as they’re not perjuring themselves or making explicit calls to violence. In our society, words don’t carry weight. A verbal agreement without a signed contract carried no legal muster. The Torah has a very different perspective: your power to communicate verbally is your most essential human characteristic and corrupting your speech is corrupting your essence. Moreover, your speech creates realities of enormous gravity. This is not the only departure from common perception found in our double Parsha. How do we view eating, how do we view a default person, how do we view the spiritual versus the physical realities… Torah is designed to upgrade us to a higher level of living to a higher level of existence. In this Parsha podcast, we learn how that works.

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The Book of Bamidbar ends on a bit of a surprising note. The final chapter of our book revisits the somewhat technical narrative relating to the inheritance of the ancestral lands of a man named Tzelafchad. This man from the tribe of Menashe died without sons, and in chapter 27 of the book of numbers we learned that his lands will be apportioned to his daughters in lieu of male heirs. One may have thought that the saga of Tzelafchad was all settled. But no. The final chapter of the book revisits this story and offers an epilogue to it. Why is this the most fitting culmination of the book? In this very special Parsha podcast, we offer a novel solution. We learn how these five sisters were each remarkable in her own way, a lesson that serves as a fitting and powerful crescendo to the Book of Bamidbar.

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