Teens Question, Va'eschanan 2025

Question

• What words from the parsha do we say in davening every day?
• What's the meaning of those words?
• Why did Chazal fix those specific words into that tefilah? 

Answer

There's actually a lot of possible answers you could pick for this question. A lot of our daily tefillos come from the drashos Moshe Rabeinu said in Sefer Devarim. He gave us a lot of powerful musar and reminders about how to best serve Hashem. Chaza"l drew heavily from Moshe's words as they crafted our tefillos.

You could have chosen shema. You have chosen ואתם הדבקים בד' אלוקיכם חיים כולכם היום. You could have chosen the words of the chacham from the Hagaddah.

But the answer we're looking for is the words we say in עלינו

וידעת היום והשבות אל לבבך כי ד' הוא האלוקים בשמיים ממעל ועל הארץ מתחת אין עוד מלבדו

And you shall know today and you shall place it upon your heart that Hashem is Gd, in the Heavens above and on the Earth below, there is nothing apart from Him 

Devarim 4:39

Moshe tells me I need to "know" Hashem is Gd, and I need to "place it on my heart". What's the difference? Why do I need both of them?

What does it mean? 

First let's discuss "knowing." Knowledge is an intellectual pursuit. You learn. You understand. You come to accept it in your conscious thoughts. Knowing enables you to critically evaluate new information.

But there's another facet to a person's being, a more primal element that we don't have direct control over. I'm referring of course to our feelings and our reactions. These are the "heart" Moshe Rabeinu refers to. Our feelings reveal a deeper part of ourselves that is not governed by our thoughts. We cannot choose to feel or react a certain way.

We can understand this by way of an example. Imagine a Jewish baker who sells only enough bread each day to pay for that day's expenses. When he goes to sleep each night, he considers if he'll have money for the next day. He knows Hashem always provides. He's always provided in the past and he's promised to always provide in the future. So, he goes to sleep assured in his "bitachon" that Hashem is caring for him.

The next morning, he awakes to find a new bakery opening directly across the street from his. The new baker is offering bread at a steep discount to attract customers. The baker is suddenly gripped by fear. "How will I ever pay for today's expenses?" he wonders. "If the price of bread has fallen so low, how will I survive?"

What happened to our baker's assured bitachon from the night before? Was he deluding himself?

By splitting וידעת היום (and you shall know today) from והשבות אל לבבך (and you shall place it on your heart), Moshe Rabeinu teaches us the answer. The baker had met the first ma'aleh of bitachon. He knew that Hashem is Gd and cares for him. At bedtime, he was faced with an intellectual challenge, and he was able to confidently say "Hashem will provide". The next morning, he was faced with an emotional challenge. He saw apparent proof that Hashem would not provide. The baker of our story had not met the second ma'aleh of bitachon. He had not placed it on his heart and so he reacted with fear.

R' Aharon Leib Shteinman z"l teaches this apparent conflict is the only way a person can test himself. We can directly asses the first ma'aleh by considering what we know. But true bitachon requires us to reach the second ma'aleh, to place it on our heart. Rav Shteinman teaches us to evaluate ourselves by checking how we react in a moment of nisayon. If we feel the same calm and certainty in our bitachon as a reaction in our heart as we do when we think of it in our head, we've successfully fulfilled והשבות אל לבבך. If we don't, we're only part way there. 

Why do we repeat it 3 times a day? 

Time to turn the discussion inward. How much hashkafa do you "know"? How much of it have you "placed on your heart"?

Do you "know" Hashem is Gd? Do you know he provides for you? Do you know only he can decide what happens to you, period? Do you worry about your future? Or your present?

Don't just ask yourself these questions as an intellectual exercises. Use R' Shteinman's test. How do you react when your faced with a nisayon in one of these? I mean your initial reaction. What does it feel like when you face external doubt. Does the feeling match the knowledge?

If you're like most of klal yisroel, the answer is no. It doesn't match. B'chasdei Hashem we live in a generation where basically every chareidi Jew has the opportunity to attend a formal education that includes tenants of hashkafa. We all "know" the ways of Hashem. But we don't live them.

Living our hashkafos requires us to do the actual work of והשבות אל לבבך. It requires us to reprogram our subconscious to match what our conscious has already accepted. Chaza"l have given us a great many techniques to accomplish this reprogramming. Learning. Davening. Musar. Repetition. Introspection.

This work is hard and it's constant. The Sefer Hachinuch comments the reason for many mitzvos is "אדם נפעל כפי פעולותיו" - a man is affected by his actions. We repeat the words כי ד' הוא האלוקים וכו' אין עוד מדבדו over and over again. Do we pay attention as we're saying them? If we do, we're actually doing the work of והשבות אל לבבך! We're using our actions to affect our emotions.

Eisav's head

R' Chaim Shmulevitz makes a similar point about Eisav. The midrash recounts that when the shevatim arrived at ma'aras hamachpelah with Yaakov Avinu's body, Eisav stopped them from going in. He claimed that Yitzchok had left 2 graves in ma'aras hamachpelah to his sons. Yaakov had already "used his spot" to bury Leah. According to Eisav, that meant the remaining spot was his.

The shevatim knew Eisav was wrong. He had sold his portion to Yaakov. But they didn't have proof and Eisav woulnd't move. They sent Naftali to run all the way back to Mitzraim to retrieve the sale contract. In the mean time, Yaakov's body sat in disgrace unable to be buried.

One of the men present at the burial was Dan's son Chushim. He was deaf and could not hear the interactions between Eisav and the shevatim. From his perspective, Eisav was just getting in the way! He stood up and smashed Eisav's head off. The midrash recounts that Eisav's body fell outside of machpelah, but his head rolled in to machpelah.

R' Chaim Shmulevitz takes this midrash quite literally and explains the difference between Eisav's head and his body. Eisav was a talmid chacham. He learned Torah from Yitzchok Avinu. He was 100% a וידעת היום. But he never let the Torah change his behavior. His continued to do aveiros with his body. He never made it to והשבות על לבבך. This, says R' Chaim, is the reason only his head made it in to machpelah. Only his head had fulfilled it's duty! 

A serious joke 

I'll leave you with a serious joke*. After the chet ha'egel, Moshe Rabeinu davens that Hashem should forgive us

וסלח נא לעם הזה כי עם קשה עורף הוא

Please forgive this nation, for they are a stiff necked nation

Shemos 34:9

Why does should our "stiff neck" be pretext for Hashem to forgive us? Perhaps you could say because of וידעת היום והשבות על לבבך. We sinned at the egel because even though knew that Hashem was the only Gd, we hadn't placed in our hearts. When we were challenged by the Satan with an image of Moshe Rabeinu's kever, fear entered our hearts and made us forget what we knew.

Why hadn't we placed it on our hearts? Because getting from the head to the heart requires travelling through the neck, and we're a stiff necked nation. It's hard for us to get that musar down! 

 * It's a "serious joke" because the message is 100% true, but it is in no way actually connected to the pasuk.