JTS Torah Commentary: Arnold Eisen on Devarim

...My point is rather the spiritual power stored up in one little word in the first line of this book that has a lot to teach us about the power of words. The book's name after all is Devarim (Words). Moses must use words to unique effect in this address because it is the final speech he will give. Israel must listen to special effect ("shema Yisra'el," he urges more than once; "Hear, Israel!") because Moses cannot accompany them across the river. He cannot refine his words to suit the circumstances they will encounter. He cannot raise his voice or modulate it, speak to the rock or hit it with his staff, summon signs of divine confirmation or offer proof of divine displeasure. All the Israelites can take with them from now on are his words. ...

Never have words mattered more. It cannot be coincidence that the name of the book means not only words, but things: realities, facts on the ground. The words Moses speaks have to be adequate to the realities that Israelites/Jews will face in every generation, beginning with the one he addresses directly. Their actions, the facts they build on the ground, literally and figuratively, in turn have to be worthy of the words that Moses transmitted to them. The davar in each case, on each side of the river, must be true to the davar on the other.

This remains the case in every generation and in every radically new situation; the need to hear well is acute each time that we set out, or send out others, to cross whatever river currently separates us or them from new possibilities. ...

Moses takes pains to fix the current location of the Israelites with precision. It is as if he is saying to them,

Here we are, you and I... After Sinai and the golden calf, devotion and provocation, bickering and nobility of spirit—here is where we are. Now let's get moving. It's time to take God's devarim and make them into yours, to shape realities worthy of the potential stored up in you by God. Hear well for a change, O Israel. Enter the land that is your inheritance. Taste the life of fulfillment that no human being before you has been privileged to know. It starts here, right here, where you are. ...

Now as ever we want our lives aligned to whatever plan God has for us and the world. We hope to use our time well. We want to make God's words real in the world. As Deuteronomy will remind us before Moses concludes his address, these things and words are not beyond reach across the sea or up in heaven, but "Very close to you, in your mouth and in your heart, to do them" (Deuteronomy 30:12). ...