Why a Covenant?
On the final day of Moses’s life, he gathered all the Jewish people together in order for them to pass into a covenant with G-d. As the opening statement of this week’s Torah portion begins:
You are all standing this day before the Lord, your God the leaders of your tribes, your elders and your officers, every man of Israel…
that you may pass into the covenant of the Lord, your God, and His oath, which the Lord, your God, is making with you this day. (Deuteronomy 29:9-11)
What exactly is a covenant? While the conventional understanding is that a covenant is an agreement that each party commits to in exchange for receiving something in return, in the Torah, a covenant is much more than a conditional agreement.
A covenant is not designed for those times when both parties appreciate their relationship and are happy to be there for each other. A covenant is specifically designed for the moments when the parties do not see any reason to remain connected, yet they do so because of the unconditional commitment of the covenant. As the Alter Rebbe, the founder of the Chabad movement, explains:
To explain
through an analogy: Two beloved establish a covenant between themselves so that the love they share should not cease. Now, were the factor that brought about the love to continue forever, there would be no need for a covenant. However, they fear that
will cease and, the love will also cease or that there will be an external factor that will cause .
For these reasons, they establish a covenant that their love will continue forever without faltering; neither an internal nor an external factor will cause any separation they establish a strong and powerful bond that they will remain as one and will bond in love in a wondrous relationship that transcends reason and logic. Even though, according to reason and logic, there that should cause the love to cease or even generate a certain degree of hatred, nevertheless, because of the covenant established, their love persists forever. This love and this strong and powerful bond will “cover all offenses.” (Likutei Torah, Atem Nitzavim)
Rashi addresses why the Torah uses the word “pass into the covenant” and explains that the manner of creating a covenant was to cut something, usually an animal, into two and have both parties pass through between the parts:
“That you may pass through the covenant.”: This was the method of those who made covenants: They would set up a demarcation on one side and a demarcation on the other, and
“passed through” between
, as the verse says, “ they cut the calf in two and passed between its parts”
At first glance, dividing something into two seems to be the antithesis of a covenant, which represents the idea of unity. On deeper reflection, however, the dividing of the parts actually captures the essence of the unconditional bond expressed through the covenant. The purpose of the covenant of marriage, as well as the covenant with G-d, is to express the idea that what seems to be two autonomous, independent parties are, in truth, two halves of one united entity. Husband and wife are one soul, separated in half, and reunited in the covenant of marriage. The essence of the Neshama, the Jewish soul, is a part of G-d. When the Jew enters into a covenant with G-d, he expresses the deeper truth that the bond is unbreakable and unconditional because it is essential. G-d and the Jew are one.