“David Harbater is a master teacher and an inspired reader with a thousand theological insights”

Helen Keller famously said, “Alone we can do so little, together we can do so much”. The biblical term for coming together as a community or nation derives from the root k-h-l (קהל), which is the root of the name of this week’s parashah—Parashat Vayakhel (פרשת ויקהל). The truth of Keller’s observation about the power of community can be clearly demonstrated by Megillat Esther that we read on Purim, by Parashat Ki Tisa that we read last week, and by Parashat Vayakhel that we read this week. 

This coming Shabbat is known as Shabbat Zachor, the Shabbat of Remembrance, because we read the portion in the Torah that commands us to remember the attack of the Amalekites soon after we left Egypt and to eradicate the Amalekite nation from the face of the earth (see Deuteronomy 25:17-19). Since Haman was a descendant of Amalek (see I Samuel 15:8 and Esther 3:1) we read this portion on the Shabbat before Purim. The question is, why did the Amalekites attack us and why does the Torah command us to remember their attack and not that of other nations, such as that of the Amorites (Numbers 21:23) or the Midianites (Numbers 25:17-18)?