Vezot Haberachah

📜 The Story

"Vezot Haberachah" ("And This Is the Blessing") is the very last parsha in the Torah, and it is the only parsha that is never read on a regular Shabbat. It is read only on the holiday of Simchat Torah, right when we finish reading the whole Torah and immediately begin again from the very beginning, from Bereishit.

Before Moshe Rabbeinu passed away, he blessed all twelve tribes of Israel, one by one, with special blessings suited to each tribe. He asked Hashem to give them blessing, strength, and protection, wanting them to know how precious they were to him, just like a loving parent blessing their children before saying goodbye.

After the blessings, Moshe climbed alone up Mount Nevo, and Hashem showed him the entire Promised Land from one end to the other, even though Moshe himself would not get to enter it. There, at the age of one hundred twenty, Moshe passed away by Hashem's word, and the Torah tells us something remarkable about him, that his eyes were not dim and his strength had not left him.

Hashem Himself buried Moshe in a valley in the land of Moav, and to this very day nobody knows exactly where his grave is. The Children of Israel wept and mourned for Moshe for thirty days. Yehoshua bin Nun, upon whom Moshe had already laid his hands, became filled with a spirit of wisdom and rose up as the new leader who would bring the people into the Land.

The parsha, and the entire Torah, ends with moving verses praising Moshe, saying that never again did a prophet arise in Israel like Moshe, who knew Hashem face to face. The parsha also includes the famous verse "Torah tzivah lanu Moshe, morasha kehilat Yaakov" (the Torah that Moshe commanded us is the heritage of the congregation of Yaakov), which is usually the very first verse a Jewish child learns to say by heart.