Ki Tavo – and Bible Criticism (of the Rabbis)

Deuteronomy Chapter 27 דְּבָרִים

The title contains “Bible Criticism” which I am attributing to the Rabbis, of all people. Isn’t that rather harsh, considering  Orthodox /Phariseeic Judaism  has given us the famous 13 principles of Maimonides, and strictly holds the Torah to be divine?

Well, we need to look at the evidence to answer these questions.

The above Parsha discusses the writing down of the entire Torah.

1 And Moses and the elders of Israel commanded the people, saying: 'Keep all the commandment which I command you this day.

2 And it shall be on the day when ye shall pass over the Jordan unto the land which the LORD thy God giveth thee, that thou shalt set thee up great stones, and plaster them with plaster.

3 And thou shalt write upon them all the words of this law, when thou art passed over; that thou mayest go in unto the land which the LORD thy God giveth thee, a land flowing with milk and honey, as the LORD, the God of thy fathers, hath promised thee.

And again:

ח  וְכָתַבְתָּ עַל-הָאֲבָנִים, אֶת-כָּל-דִּבְרֵי הַתּוֹרָה הַזֹּאת--בַּאֵר הֵיטֵב.  {ס}

8 And thou shalt write upon the stones all the words of this law very plainly.'

10 Thou shalt therefore hearken to the voice of the LORD thy God, and do His commandments and His statutes, which I command thee this day.'

The above verses clearly refer to the Torah, thus all the law was commanded to be written down.  If there was an non-written Law, i.e. orally transmitted, the verses above would be wrong, and redundant. The verses are talking about the entire body of Law commanded – to be re-written on the great stones. Thus there is nothing that has been commanded to Moses, that remains unwritten.   This is the thesis of this chapter.  The claim of the Pharisees, is the anti-thesis of this chapter, and hence denial of the Torah itself.

Some rabbinic commentators have claimed that the verses refer only to the blessing and curse that follow in the next chapters.  However, this is definitively disproven by the opening verse of  Ch.28

1 And it shall come to pass, if thou shalt hearken diligently unto the voice of the LORD thy God, to observe to do all His commandments which I command thee this day, that the LORD thy God will set thee on high above all the nations of the earth.

2 And all these blessings shall come upon thee, and overtake thee, if thou shalt hearken unto the voice of the LORD thy God.

If we compare V.1 of Ch.28  to v1, and v10. of Ch.27 – they are almost identical.

The blessing and curse of Ch. 28 is not conditional upon keeping only the commandment of writing  on the stones – that would make things quite absurd. That single law was fulfilled, and if that were the case,  there would not be any room for a curse or exile, ever again.  The entire Torah is being referred to – the contract is encasing the entire Torah, which was written down. Therefore we see further in this chapter:

נח  אִם-לֹא תִשְׁמֹר לַעֲשׂוֹת, אֶת-כָּל-דִּבְרֵי הַתּוֹרָה הַזֹּאת, הַכְּתֻבִים, בַּסֵּפֶר הַזֶּה

58 If thou wilt not observe to do all the words of this law that are written in this book, that thou mayest fear this glorious and awful Name, the LORD thy God;

And

69 These are the words of the covenant which the LORD commanded Moses to make with the children of Israel in the land of Moab, beside the covenant which He made with them in Horeb.

The Covenant /Brit is new, but Laws are the same Laws of the Torah.  Moreover, verse 58 specifies the words of the Torah which are written in the Book. 

These words and commands are the same as those in 27;3, all to be written on the stones on Mount Ebal.  There is no mention of any supposed “oral law”. In fact, any now written law is excluded by these verses.  Observance of the Written Law without observance of a single rabbinical or oral law  is sufficient, and necessary to enjoy the blessings.  Violation of the entire rabbinic law , whilst performing the entire Written law has no consequence as far as the Torah is concerned. It simply did not exist at the time of the giving of the Torah. To insist that the Torah missed something out, which is what the rabbis do, is denial and criticism of the Torah.

Lubavitcher Rebbe - Messiah or Anti-Messiah?

The late Rabbi Menachem Mendel Schneerson was widely praised as being a Tzaddik (righteous man), a mystic and miracle maker by his followers, and friends. Many people from all over the world sought advice from him, including Israeli Prime Ministers and military leaders.

At some point in his career, his followoers openly starting claiming he was the Messiah of the TeNaKh, the King who will redeem Israel.  Even non-Lubavitch rabbis were making such implications, saying he was the best qualified to be Messiah. I even heard from one of my favourite  rabbis that he was the reincarnation of Moses!   By the late 1980s,  there was a split in Orthodox Rabbinic Judaism, between his supporters and his opponents. Of course, after his death, in Brooklyn, having never even visited Israel,  it was clear to all that this was a false Messianism, based on lies and distortions.

Even within the rabbinic halakhah, the famous codifier Maimonides writes a number of qualifications and conditions that need to be fulfilled by someone claiming to be Messiah.  Below are some excerpts from Ch. 1 and 12 of  the Laws of Kings and Wars:



"In the future, the Messianic king will arise and renew the Davidic dynasty, restoring it to its initial sovereignty. He will build the Temple and gather the dispersed of Israel...

The main thrust of the matter is: This Torah, its statutes and its laws, are everlasting. We may not add to them or detract from them....

If a king will arise from the House of David who diligently contemplates the Torah and observes its mitzvot as prescribed by the Written Law and the Oral Law as David, his ancestor, will compel all of Israel to walk in (the way of the Torah) and rectify the breaches in its observance, and fight the wars of God, we may, with assurance, consider him Mashiach.
If he succeeds in the above, builds the Temple in its place, and gathers the dispersed of Israel, he is definitely the Mashiach....
When the true Messianic king will arise and prove successful, his position becoming exalted and uplifted, they will all return and realize that their ancestors endowed them with a false heritage and their prophets and ancestors caused them to err...

In that era, there will be neither famine or war, envy or competition for good will flow in abundance and all the delights will be freely available as dust. The occupation of the entire world will be solely to know God...."


There is very little difference, I would argue , between the Tenakh version and the Maimonidean version - the main point of contention is obviously the "oral law" he mentions. Nevertheless, it is important to note that the Lubavitcher rebbe opposed Zionism, and the  establishment of the State of Israel. He opposed migration to Israel.  He told his followers to stay put in exile, until the Moshaich arrives!   Thus the key events that did occur in the Zionist era - return to the Land of Israel, winning wars and Israeli territory, liberation of Jerusalem and Temple Mount - were all achieved outside of the Lubavitch framework.   In fact, the very man who did fight to liberate jerusalem, Rabbi Shlomo Goren, was told by the Rebbe of Lubavitch to resign from the post of Chief rabbi (althouogh it wa said more respectfully than by other hareidi leaders). 

The "believers" claimed that the Rebbe had single handedly brought back millions of Jews to Orthodox observance - even though in his own time there were only approximately 1 million Ultra-Orthodox Jews who were that way from birth.  He never fired a single shot in any war, and did not enlist himself or his followers into the Israeli army.  They claimed that the "wars" were spiritual wars, such as convincing people to wear tefillin (even though the Book of Wars by Maimonides focuses on military warfare).

IN sum, it is clear that Rabbi Schneerson was not the Messiah of the TeNakh, or of Maimonides. 
The victories in Israel's wars were won by largely secular soldiers and generals, whose State and Army were opposoed by Lubavitch Hassidim in previous generations, and also by Schneerson himself.   His instructions were the opposite of the requirements of messiah - i.e. to gather the exiles into Israel. he wanted to keep them in exile. This not only makes him a false messiah, but also an Anti-Messiah!