By Ariel Ben Avraham In previous commentaries we have insisted that there is not such a thing as the apparent conditionality of God’s Love, because all conditions exist on our behalf. We also have repeated that Love is its cause and effect, its instant reward, and in this sense we understand the first verse of this portion: “(…) because (eikev) you will heed these ordinances and keep them and perform, that the Lord, your God, will keep for you the Covenant and the loving kindness that He swore to your forefathers.

” (Deuteronomy 7:12) and also the meaning of His Covenant and His loving kindness, with which “(…) He will love you, and bless you, and multiply you (…)” (7:13) Thus, as long as we walk in His ways and attributes, Love is also with us. The Covenant is always present, as God’s Love is omnipresent and omniscient, and it’s up to us to be aware of this Truth. That’s our choice.

We are Israel and such as we are bound to fulfill our part of the Covenant, because it is our alliance with Him that gives our identity as Jews, and this is our greatest blessing: “You shall be blessed above all peoples” (7:14) because as we live with, in and for Love: “There will be no sterile male or barren female among you or among your livestock.” (7:14) meaning no lack, no inadequacies: “And the Lord will remove from you all illness, and all of the evil diseases of Egypt which you know, He will not set upon you, but He will lay them upon all your enemies.” (7:15) because the lack and emptiness of ego’s materialistic desires and illusions (Egypt) are the diseases that we live in, and Love makes us aware that those illusions live from their own lack.

For most of us, living in ego’s illusions is easier than accepting the truthfulness of Love. Thousands of years conditioning our intellect, mind, emotions, feelings, passions and instincts under the mirages of an egotistic approach to life can’t be overcome overnight. It may take also many centuries to overturn the negative patterns (“the nations”) imprinted in humankind’s genetic memory. The good news is that Love is the cure for all kinds of our illnesses: “And the Lord, your God, will drive out those nations from before you, little by little. You will not be able to destroy them quickly, lest the beasts of the field outnumber you.” (7:22) and it is the fire of Divine Love in us that can transform darkness and negativity into Light and Love in all levels and dimensions of our consciousness, hence in our surroundings: “The graven images of their gods you will burn in fire (…)” (7:25)

This is the way to return again to the kind of life that God’s Love wants for us, a life that affirms that we are Love in His image and likeness: “a Land in which you will eat bread without scarcity, you will lack nothing in it (…) And you will eat and be sated, and you shall bless the Lord, your God, for the good Land He has given you.” (8:9-10) Time and again we are warned in the entire Torah about the consequences of separating our consciousness from Love’s ways and attributes. This separation only happens when we let ego’s materialistic agenda to rule our lives: “and you will say to yourself, ‘My strength and the might of my hand that has accumulated this wealth for me.'” (8:17) Also, time and again the way to return to Love is always paved and cleared for us: “But you must remember the Lord your God, for it is He that gives you strength to make wealth, in order to establish His Covenant which He swore to your forefathers, as it is this day.” (8:18) Such a simple and plain Truth overshadowed by our false sense of self-sufficiency.

We have to be aware that, while ego quenches its thirst with the waters of materialistic illusions, Love sustains us directly from our Creator. As our true Essence and identity, Love settles us in the delights of His ways and attributes: “For the Land into which you go (…) drinks water of the rain of Heaven” (11:10-11) and once we enthrone Love in all levels of consciousness, we are fully satiated with prosperity, joy, happiness, and abundance: “I will give grass in your fields for your livestock, so that you may eat and be full (11:15), and let’s never forget that loving our Creator and our attachment to Him are two of His Commandments for us to keep His Covenant: “(..) to love the Lord your God, (…) to cleave to Him.” (11:22, 10:20)

The Prophet also reminds us that God’s Love, also in our own Love, is our sole Redeemer in all times: “For the Lord shall console Zion [our awareness of Divine Love], He shall console all its ruins, and He shall make its desert like a Paradise and its wasteland like the Garden of the Lord; joy and happiness shall be found therein, thanksgiving and a voice of song.” (Isaiah 51:3) Amen.