Eikev
Eikev, Ekev, Ekeb, Aikev, or ʿEqeb is the 46th weekly Torah portion in the annual Jewish cycle of Torah reading and the third in the Book of Deuteronomy. It comprises Deuteronomy 7:12–11:25. The parashah tells of the blessings of obedience to God, the dangers of forgetting God, and directions for taking the Land of Israel. Moses recalls the making and re-making of the Tablets of Stone, the incident of the Golden Calf, Aaron's death, the Levites' duties, and exhortations to serve God.
The parashah is made up of 6865 Hebrew letters, 1747 Hebrew words, 111 verses, and 232 lines in a Torah Scroll. Jews generally read it in August or, on rare occasions, late July.
Readings
In traditional Shabbat Torah reading, the parashah is divided into seven readings or, aliyot. In the Hebrew Bible, Parashat Eikev has six "open portion" divisions. Parashat Eikev has several further subdivisions, called "closed portions" within the open portion divisions. The first open portion divides the first reading. The second open portion goes from the middle of the first reading to the middle of the second reading. The short third open portion is contained within the second reading. The fourth open portion starts in the second reading and contains all of the third reading. The fifth open portion corresponds to the fourth reading, and the sixth open portion spans the fifth, sixth, and seventh readings. A closed portion corresponds to the fifth reading. The sixth reading is divided into two closed portion divisions, and the short seventh reading corresponds to a final closed portion.First reading—Deuteronomy 7:12–8:10
In the first reading, Moses told the Israelites that if they obeyed God's rules, God would faithfully maintain the covenant, bless them with fertility and agricultural productivity, and ward off sickness. Moses directed the Israelites to destroy all the peoples whom God delivered to them showing no pity and without worshiping their gods. A closed portion ends here.Moses told the Israelites not to fear these nations because they were numerous, for the Israelites had but to recall what God did to Pharaoh and the Egyptians and the wonders by which God liberated them. God would do the same to the peoples whom they feared, and would send a plague against them, too. God would dislodge those peoples little by little, so that the wild beasts would not take over the land. Moses directed the Israelites to burn the images of their gods, not to covet nor keep the silver and gold on them, nor to bring an abhorrent thing into their houses. The first open portion ends here.
God made the Israelites travel the long way in the wilderness for an additional thirty-eight years because of their sin of unbelief and their rebellion after the twelve spies returned from reconnoitering Canaan, of whom ten gave a negative report about Israel's ability to take the land. God determined that none of that generation would enter the land which He had promised and so they remained in the wilderness until all that generation died. God subjected them to hunger and then gave them manna to teach them that man does not live on bread alone, but on what God decrees. Their clothes did not wear out, nor did their feet swell for 40 years. God disciplined them as a man disciplines his son. Moses told the Israelites that God was bringing them into a good land, where they might eat food without end, and thus when they had eaten their fill, they were to give thanks to God for the good land that God had given them. The first reading ends here.
Second reading—Deuteronomy 8:11–9:3
In the second reading, Moses warned the Israelites not to forget God, not to violate God's commandments, and not to grow haughty and believe that their own power had won their wealth, but to remember that God gave them the power to prosper. The second open portion ends here.Moses warned that if they forgot God and followed other gods, then they would certainly perish like the nations that God was going to displace from the land. The third open portion ends here with the end of chapter 8.
Moses warned the Israelites that they were to dispossess nations greater than they, but God would go before them as a devouring fire to drive out the land's inhabitants. The second reading ends here.
Third reading—Deuteronomy 9:4–29
In the third reading, Moses warned the Israelites not to believe that God had enabled them to possess the land because of their own virtue; God was dispossessing the land's current inhabitants for two reasons: because of those nations' wickedness, and to fulfill the oath that God had made to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. Moses exhorted the Israelites to remember how they had provoked God to anger in the wilderness. At Horeb they so provoked God that God was angry enough to have destroyed them. Moses ascended the mountain, stayed for 40 days and nights, and consumed no bread or water. At the end of the 40 days, God gave Moses two stone tablets that God had inscribed with the covenant that God had addressed to the Israelites. God told Moses to hurry down, for the people whom Moses brought out of Egypt had acted wickedly and had made a molten image. God told Moses that God was inclined to destroy them and make of Moses a nation far more numerous than they. Moses started down the mountain with the two tablets in his hands, when he saw how the Israelites had made themselves a molten calf. Moses smashed the two tablets before their eyes, and threw himself down before God, fasting another 40 days and nights. God gave heed to Moses. God was angry enough with Aaron to have destroyed him, so Moses also interceded for Aaron. Moses burned the calf, ground it into dust, and threw its dust into the brook that came down from the mountain.In the continuation of the reading, Moses reminded the Israelites how they provoked God at Taberah, at Massah, and at Kibroth-hattaavah. And when God sent them from Kadesh-barnea to take possession of the land, they flouted God's command and did not put their trust in God. When Moses lay prostrate before God those 40 days, because God was determined to destroy the Israelites, Moses prayed to God not to annihilate God's own people, whom God freed from Egypt, but to give thought to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob and ignore the Israelites' sinfulness, else the Egyptians would say that God was powerless to bring them into the land that God had promised them. The third reading and the fourth open portion end here with the end of chapter 9.
Fourth reading—Deuteronomy 10:1–11
In the fourth reading, God told Moses to carve out two tablets of stone like the first, come up the mountain, and make an ark of wood. God inscribed on the tablets the Ten Commandments that were on the first tablets that Moses had smashed, and Moses came down from the mountain and deposited the tablets in the Ark.In the continuation of the reading, the Israelites marched to Moserah, where Aaron died and was buried, and his son Eleazar became priest in his stead. From there they marched to Gudgod, and on to Jotbath.
God set apart the Levites to carry the Ark of the Covenant, to stand in attendance upon the Tabernacle, and to bless in God's Name, and that was why the Levites were to receive no portion of the land, as God was their portion. The fourth reading and the fifth open portion end with Deuteronomy 10:11.
Fifth reading—Deuteronomy 10:12–11:9
In the fifth reading, Moses exhorted the Israelites to revere God, to walk only in God's paths, to love God, to serve God with all their heart and soul, and to keep God's commandments. Moses noted that although heaven and earth belong to God, God was drawn to love their fathers, so that God chose the Israelites from among all peoples. Moses described God as supreme, great, mighty, and awesome, showing no favor and taking no bribe, but upholding the cause of the fatherless and the widow, and befriending the stranger. Moses thus instructed the Israelites to befriend the stranger, for they were strangers in Egypt. Moses exhorted the Israelites to revere God, worship only God, and swear only by God's name, for God was their glory, who performed for them marvelous deeds, and made them as numerous as the stars. Moses exhorted the Israelites to love God and always keep God's commandments. Moses asked the Israelites to note that they themselves witnessed the signs that God performed in Egypt against Pharaoh, what God did to Egypt's army, how God rolled upon them the waters of the Sea of Reeds, what God did for them in the wilderness, and what God did to Dathan and Abiram when the earth swallowed them. Moses instructed them therefore to keep all the law so that they might have the strength to enter and possess the land and long endure on that land flowing with milk and honey. The fifth reading and a closed portion end here.Sixth reading—Deuteronomy 11:10–21
In the sixth reading, Moses extolled the promised land as a land of hills and valleys that soaks up its water from the rains, a land that God looks after. He contrasted this with Egypt, which was dependent on irrigation. A closed portion ends here.Then Moses told them words now found in the Shema prayer: If the Israelites obeyed the commandments, loving God and serving God with heart and soul, God would grant the rain in season and they would gather their grain, wine, and oil. God would provide grass for their cattle and the Israelites would eat their fill. Moses warned them not to be lured away to serve other gods, for God's anger would flare up against them, God would suspend the rain, and they would soon perish from the land. Moses urged them to impress God's words upon their heart, bind them as a sign on their hands, let them serve as a symbol on their foreheads, teach them to their children, and recite them when they stayed at home and when they were away, when they lay down and when they got up. Moses instructed them to inscribe God's words on the doorposts of their houses and on their gates, so that they and their children might endure in the land that God swore to their fathers as long as there is a heaven over the earth. The sixth reading and a closed portion end here.