The Words That Roared

“You have affirmed on this day that Hashem is your God, to walk in His ways, to observe His laws… And Hashem has affirmed on this day that you are, as He promised you, His treasured people who shall observe all His commandments.” (Devarim 26:17-18)

“The key verb in both these pesukim is l’haamir. The English translation used above is “to affirm,” based on the Jewish Publication Society Tanakh. Any translation, however, works at a deficit to capture the authenticity of the actual Hebrew word. This word l’haamir shares the root of one the most common of all biblical verbs, lomar — “to say.” Yet the specific form used here — hiphil, the causative form — is unique and doesn’t appear anywhere else in the Bible. Why here? (Rabbi Lord Jonathan Sacks, Covenant & Conversation)

It should have been a summer like any other. Our bein hazmanim plans lent no premonitions or warning that my life was about to be altered, the timeless patter of all my years about to be disrupted.

It was a 2 a.m. call that set it in motion. And less than 24 hours later, after jumping on a late-night plane and driving four hours from JFK, I stood outside the ICU of Sinai Hospital in Baltimore, my brain not fully registering the events that led me here.

Part of my senses were so heightened. I registered the hushed crepe-soled footsteps of the nurses, the whoosh of automatic doors. Yet part of my senses had shut down, mercifully, so I couldn’t comprehend why I was standing outside the room that was hosting my father’s last moments.

The use of language in the Torah isn’t vague or accidental. The way something is said is connected to what is being said. Here, we have before us not simply a phrase, a link of words, but a creation of a new concept — the creation of a covenant between G-d and His nation, through this word le-ha’amir — to affirm.

I was so grateful that I had made it in time. But the enormity of the minutes ticking by set up a clamber in my head, a pounding that deafened any further emotion.