After learning this, we can now begin to explain our Parsha. In truth, if we had the time, we would need to take Parshat Ha’azinu and study it for three full months without pause. Why? Because the Ramban, along with the Tzror Hamor, write that all the secrets of the six thousand years of history, from the day of Creation until the very end of time, are contained within Parshat Ha’azinu. And if you want even more, the holy sefarim write – though we do not have the time to delve into it now – that all the names of every person who will ever live, from the beginning of Creation until its end, are hidden within Parshat Ha’azinu. Everything is contained here. This Parsha carries more secrets than any other words of Rabboteinu. If you wish, open the Tzror Hamor, and see where he speaks at length about the wondrous secrets found within this Parsha. He writes that Ha’azinu, from the beginning of the song until its end, is one continuous unit of profound mystery.
Parshat Ha’azinu always falls either just before Yom Kippur or just after. When there is no Shabbat between Yom Kippur and Sukkot, then Nitzavim and Vayelech are combined and read before Rosh Hashanah. But in a year like ours, when there is a Shabbat between Yom Kippur and Sukkot, Ha’azinu is read after Yom Kippur. And then the focus naturally shifts to the themes of Sukkot.
Indeed, this Parsha carries a clear connection to Sukkot. Where is that connection? In the Pasuk that says that Hakadosh Baruch Hu guarded us like the apple of His eye. As it is written: יִמְצָאֵהוּ בְּאֶרֶץ מִדְבָּר – He found him in a desert land. Whom did He find? Hakadosh Baruch Hu found Am Yisrael in the wilderness:
יִמְצָאֵהוּ בְּאֶרֶץ מִדְבָּר וּבְתֹהוּ יְלֵל יְשִׁמוֹן יְסֹבְבֶנְהוּ יְבוֹנְנֵהוּ יִצְּרֶנְהוּ כְּאִישׁוֹן עֵינוֹ
He found them in a wilderness country, in arid, shrieking desolation. He encircled them around, He granted them understanding, He sheltered them like the pupil of His eye.
Rashi explains the phrase יְסֹבְבֶנְהוּ: He surrounded them and encompassed them with clouds; He encircled them with banners on all four sides; and He surrounded them at the foot of the mountain when He overturned it upon them like a barrel. In other words, יְסֹבְבֶנְהוּ means He surrounded them with the Ananei Hakavod – the Clouds of Glory.
And what do we sit in the Sukkah for? In memory of what? In memory of those very Clouds of Glory. Here in our Parsha we have the allusion to Sukkot itself – that Hakadosh Baruch Hu encircled us with His clouds, and it is these Ananei Hakavod that we will soon recall, B’ezrat Hashem, when we sit in the Sukkah in just a few days.
