Ki Thavo: impact

The Passover Seder ( the most lasting ritual among American Jews) contains  texts from this week’s parsha. 

אֲרַמִּי֙ אֹבֵ֣ד אָבִ֔י וַיֵּ֣רֶד מִצְרַ֔יְמָה וַיָּ֥גׇר שָׁ֖ם בִּמְתֵ֣י מְעָ֑ט וַֽיְהִי־שָׁ֕ם לְג֥וֹי גָּד֖וֹל עָצ֥וּם וָרָֽב׃ 

“My father was a fugitive Aramean. He went down to Egypt with meager numbers and sojourned there; but there he became a great and very populous nation.

In the parsha, these words are recited  when the first fruits are brought to the temple. They are part of the re-assertion that Gd has kept the pledge to deliver the descendents of Abraham to a Promised Land. These words connect the  Israelite to the nation and its history. 

The hagadda gives a Midrashic interpretation: 

[what] Laban the Aramean

sought to do to our father Jacob:

Pharaoh condemned only the boys to death,

but Laban sought to uproot everything,

The Aramean is Jacob. He is cast as an Aramean because  he has fled to his uncle’s land, Aram (Syria?).  Laban is cast as trying to destroy the seed of the nation. Laban’s murderous intent is not clear from the text. His anger and envy are stated. Laban seems to have been ambivalent about Jacob’s family. 

וַיַּ֨עַן לָבָ֜ן וַיֹּ֣אמֶר אֶֽל־יַעֲקֹ֗ב הַבָּנ֨וֹת בְּנֹתַ֜י וְהַבָּנִ֤ים בָּנַי֙ וְהַצֹּ֣אן צֹאנִ֔י וְכֹ֛ל אֲשֶׁר־אַתָּ֥ה רֹאֶ֖ה לִי־ה֑וּא וְלִבְנֹתַ֞י מָֽה־אֶעֱשֶׂ֤ה לָאֵ֙לֶּה֙ הַיּ֔וֹם א֥וֹ לִבְנֵיהֶ֖ן אֲשֶׁ֥ר יָלָֽדוּ׃

Then Laban spoke up and said to Jacob, “The daughters are my daughters, the children are my children, and the flocks are my flocks; all that you see is mine. Yet what can I do now about my daughters or the children they have borne?

Perhaps Laban would have preferred Jacob and family to have stayed in Aram with him. That plot could have led to the destruction of the people not by murder, but by assimilation. The Israelites would be lost אֹבֵ֣ד, among the Arameans and never emerged  as they eventually did from Egypt ( where they were persecuted). 

Onkelos is aligned with the Haggadah. He translates the Torah passage:

לָבָן אֲרַמָּאָה בָּעָא לְאוֹבָדָא יָת אַבָּא

Lavan the Arami wanted to destroy my forefather.

Two things are clear: this is an origin story and the (fore)father is an Arami. He is not a Canaanite. Israel is not the indigenous people returning to the homeland of our origin. The founder, whether he is Abraham ( who was born in Aram) or Jacob ( who returned from Aram, escaping from Lavan) [or some later Hebrew or Jew] is an invader. The promised land has ethical difficulties from day one.

The (fore)father is escaping, a victim of persecution. He was forced to migrate under a threat of death. Does that justify the invasion? It does not guarantee a welcome. The locals shout: "send them back to where they came from." The exiles cannot go back, they have been banished; there is no longer a "place they came from." This is a foundational story of desperation. 

To me, identifying Abraham as the Arami is simpler. When  Abraham was told to leave his father’s home, the family was living in Haran, which seems to have been in Aram. The family that Abraham left spawned Laban ( the Arami). Abraham could certainly be called an Arami. The word Aram is contained in his (birth)name: A(b)ram. Gd had commanded Abram to set off wandering. The original promise of the land was made to Abraham. 

Identifying Abraham as as the wandering Arami of this declaration  is inconvenient because it is not exclusive enough. Abraham’s descendants include the Ishmaeliites, the Edomites and others. Making Jacob the subject excludes those (competing) tribes.  It makes the declaration nationalistic. The recitation, whether in the Temple or at the Passover Seder  asserts loyalty to the nation. 

A  litany of curses that take up most of the parsha. These are characterized as punishments for failure to adhere to the commandments. These curses are  an undoing of the opening. The chapter starts with a celebration of the miracle of the Exodus from Egypt, the liberation from slavery

וַיּוֹצִאֵ֤נוּ יְ

מִמִּצְרַ֔יִם בְּיָ֤ד חֲזָקָה֙ וּבִזְרֹ֣עַ נְטוּיָ֔ה וּבְמֹרָ֖א גָּדֹ֑ל וּבְאֹת֖וֹת וּבְמֹפְתִֽים׃

The LORD freed us from Egypt by a mighty hand, by an outstretched arm and awesome power, and by signs and portents.

It ends with a return to Egypt and status inferior to slavery.

וֶהֱשִֽׁיבְךָ֨ יְ

 מִצְרַ֘יִם֮ בׇּאֳנִיּוֹת֒ בַּדֶּ֙רֶךְ֙ אֲשֶׁ֣ר אָמַ֣רְתִּֽי לְךָ֔ לֹא־תֹסִ֥יף ע֖וֹד לִרְאֹתָ֑הּ וְהִתְמַכַּרְתֶּ֨ם שָׁ֧ם לְאֹיְבֶ֛יךָ לַעֲבָדִ֥ים וְלִשְׁפָח֖וֹת וְאֵ֥ין קֹנֶֽה׃ {ס}

The LORD will send you back to Egypt in galleys, by a route which I told you you should not see again. There you shall offer yourselves for sale to your enemies as male and female slaves, but none will buy.

The curse is presented as a progression. It starts with natural disasters – drought and disease - and progresses to defeat , exile and subjugation. It starts with the national and moves on  to the personal. The atrocities described evoke the holocaust. It is distressing that this ancient text, describing the most repulsive scenes Moshe can imagine, does not quite equal the reality of Poland in 1942.

How did this text prepare the Jews in the Eastern European exile? When the persecution came, did they see it as the expected fulfillment of the prophecy? Did the passage, heard (by many) innumerable times since childhood, add a sense of familiarity to the persecution? Was there some comfort in the prediction? Did it make the nation more cooperative and thus help the evil enemy?

Exile from the promised land is an important element of the chastisement. Foreign status strips the migrant of the protections granted to the citizen. The disenfranchised alien is the easiest victim of abuse. The refugee is willing to endure some additional degradation as part of the price of survival. But even this will be denied.

In the overall arc of the parsha, as applied to more recent history, Zionism emerges as an answer that  conforms to the tradition. The blessings of the promised land include a measure of security that emerges from the reunification of the nation. The wandering Aramean foundation story  questions the validity  of adverse possession.

 Different nations seem to hear Gd’s words differently.

 And then there is propaganda.