Do you remember your fifth grade teacher? For good or ill, our teachers leave a lasting imprint on us. Veteran teachers will tell you that years later, they receive letters from students, thanking them for the positive impact they made on their lives. Teachers can lift up students, helping to start them on a path for the rest of their lives. On the other hand, teachers can discourage students, and harsh words from a trusted teacher can affect children for years afterwards. We see both of these qualities—rebuke, and lasting guidance—in the life of Moshe Rabbeinu.
Parshat Va’etchanan opens with one of the most poignant scenes in the Torah. Moshe, after learning that he is to die in the wilderness, begs God yet again to be let into the Land of Israel: “I pleaded (va’etchanan) with the LORD at that time, saying…Let me, I pray, cross over and see the good land on the other side of the Jordan, that good hill country, and the Lebanon” (Devarim 3:24). Why was God so angry with Moshe? What could Moshe have done so wrong, prompting God’s harsh response: “Enough! Never speak to me of this matter again!” (Devarim 3:26).
The Midrash Tanchuma answers this question with a parable about education. According to the Midrash, God is compared to a father who hears his son angrily rebuked by a paidagogos, a teacher entrusted with moral development:
Why was the Holy One angry with Moses? Because he had rebuked Israel. A parable: To what is the matter comparable? To a king who had a son…When the paidagogos became angry with [his son] and reprimanded him, the king heard and said: By the life of my kingdom, you are not entering my palace (Midrash Tanchuma Buber, Appendix to Va’etchanan).
So too, just as Moshe had angrily rebuked the people of Israel at the Waters of Merivah (Bamidbar 20:10-11), God heard and decreed that he would not enter the “palace,” the Land of Israel. This midrash sees Moshe as a humble teacher, wrongly rebuking his student in a moment of anger. In this Midrash, God does not accept angry rebukes from teachers and leaders—whether they are a paidagogos or Moshe Rabbeinu. When we rebuke others, (tochecha) it is only a mitzvah if we do it in such a way that it can be heard (Yevamot 65b).
According to this Midrash, God requires teachers who speak with gentleness, even when the message is a reprimand. Although we could see this as a minor infraction, God the Parent takes it seriously. After all, angry words from a trusted teacher can affect a child for the rest of her life. And in Moshe’s own moments of rage and rebuke, God sees a flaw in his leadership. According to Rambam, Moshe’s sin was that he tended toward anger—and it was not appropriate to be angry as a leader of Israel (Introduction to Rambam’s Commentary on Pirkei Avot). And so, he is forbidden from entering the Land of Israel. Moshe is not the leader that Bnei Israel need as they travel into the next phase of their journey as a people.
The simple understanding of Devarim 3:24 was that God rejected Moshe’s heartfelt prayer and refused to let him into the Land. However, the Ishbitzer rebbe, R. Mordechai Yosef Leiner (1801-1854), has a radically different understanding. He asks why Moshe Rabbeinu chose to include this moment in the Torah (“And Moshe pleaded…”) if Moshe’s own prayer was rejected by God? He writes in the Mei haShiloach:
Even though on the surface it seems as if his prayer had no effect at all, nonetheless, he caused them to understand that his prayer was not in vain. [It is as if he is saying to them] even in the course of actions in the land of Israel I am your teacher and Rabbi, and likewise [Moshe] showed them that his prayer was effective…(Vol. 1, Deuteronomy, Vaetchanan 1).
The Mei haShiloach teaches that in reality, Moshe Rabbeinu’s prayer was answered. Although his mortal life was ending, Moshe did enter the Land of Israel—in the hearts and memories of the Jewish people. “I am your teacher and Rabbi” teaches us that Moshe was still their rabbi, and would be for all future generations. The Mei haShiloach further teaches that Moshe is showing us that we can always pray for God’s mercy, even when the outcome seems inevitable. This teaching is powerful for several reasons. It shows us that even if Moshe was not able to enter the Land physically, his impact was eternal. In this way, Moshe was with the people even in the Land of Israel because he was still their teacher. So too, our important teachers never truly leave us. Even though they cannot walk with us throughout our lives, their wisdom and guidance stays with us.
Bringing these two texts together, perhaps Moshe is both the angry paedagogus and the Rav b’chol hadorot (Rabbi for all generations). Moshe was a complex leader and a complicated personality. Even the greatest teachers have moments of frustration. For Moshe, those moments of harsh rebuke had serious consequences. But he was still the Rav that Bnei Israel brought with them in their hearts, and who was memorialized in the Torah for all time. In a way, the Torah itself (and Deuteronomy in particular) is a record of how future generations bring Moshe’s teachings with them, far beyond the physical Land of Israel. May we learn to distinguish lasting wisdom from harsh moments, and may we merit to carry our greatest teachers with us throughout all of our journeys.
