Parshat Ki Tavo
In the portion of Ki Tavo there are a total ninety-eight “curses” which threaten the Jewish People if they turn away from God and the Torah. These “curses” are preceded by a series of blessings that will unfold if the Jewish people cling to God and the Torah. These ninety-eight “curses” are better stated, the natural results and consequences of the Jewish people abandoning their national mission.
In the portion of Bechukotai in the Book of Leviticus there is a similar series of blessings and “curses” but in that portion there are forty-nine “curses,” exactly half of ninety-eight. Many commentators understand the curses of Bechukotai to relate to events leading up to the destruction of the first Temple and the subsequent seventy-year exile to Babylonia, whereas the ninety-eight “curses” of Ki Tavo are seen as relating to the events leading up to the destruction of the Second Temple and the two-thousand-year exile that followed.
In Bechukotai it is repeated many times the idea of Israel being punished seven times for their sins. This relates to the reason expressed in that portion that the underlying reason for the destruction of the Temple and the exile was because they did not observe the Sabbatical year and thus in order for the land to receive its due rest every seven years, the people had to be sent into exile. The seventy-year exile was a measure for measure result of the seventy Sabbatical years Israel as a nation did not observe.
The ninety-eight curses of Ki Tavo relate to the seemingly never-ending exile that followed the destruction of the Second Temple. Although the rebirth of Israel in 1948 is seen by some as the beginning of the end of this exile, that process is certainly not yet complete.
The long exile predicted in Ki Tavo was first shown to Jacob in a prophetic vision when he had a dream of a ladder reaching heaven and angels ascending and descending on it. One Midrash states that Jacob saw the guardian angels of four different nations that would take part in the various exiles in Jewish history. First, he saw the protective angel of Babylonia ascend seventy rungs and then fall, a sign that the Babylonian exile would last seventy years. Next, the angel of Media (Persia) climbed fifty-two rungs, only to fall as well. Jacob again understood this as a sign that the Persian exile would last fifty-two years. The guardian angel of Greece then ascended one hundred and twenty rungs and he too descended. Lastly, he saw the angel of Edom climbing higher and higher with no end in sight. (Edom is the present exile which has lasted nearly two thousand years.) Jacob grew very fearful as he did not see him descend and asked God if the last exile would ever end. God who appeared at the top of the ladder assured him that He would himself bring the angel down in due time. (Vayikra Rabbah 29:2).
There have been many attempts to reinterpret the “curses” of these two portions in a more positive light and even to see hidden blessings. This is in line with Nachum Ish Gam Zo who was known to say about what seemed to be initially negative occurrences: “This too is for the good.” His student Rebbe Akiva along the same lines would say: “All that God does is for the good.” Even as he was being tortured to death he found a way to interpret it as an opportunity to fulfill the mitzvah of loving God with your entire soul.
The Alter Rebbe, Rebbe Shneur Zalman of Liadi, the founder of the Chabad Lubavitch Chassidic movement, was a Ba’al Koreh, one who reads the Torah publicly. He was known to be very exacting with reading the Torah according to the exact musical cantillation. One year, when the ninety-eight “curses” found in the Torah portion of Ki Tavo were read, the Alter Rebbe was away on a trip for communal purposes. While the stand-in person was reading the curses, the son of the Alter Rebbe, Rebbe Dovber, who later led the movement when his father passed away, heard the curses he literally fainted. He was bedridden for a considerable time afterwards. When asked why he reacted so strongly to hearing the curses, when he had heard them many times before, he answered that previously he had only heard them chanted by his father and when his father recited them all he heard were blessings in disguise. This time though, when hearing someone else chant the same words it was as if he was hearing the curses as ‘curses’ for the first time, and they shocked him to the depth of his being.
It should be noted that word “for life” in Hebrew, l’chaim – the spontaneous expression of a Jew’s natural desire for life and goodness – equals 98. Therefore, anytime we say l’chaim, it has the power to counteract the negativity contained in the ninety-eight “curses” and affirms our determination to turn as much as possible in life to the good.
