A Song of the Land

With love, You led the people You redeemed; With might, You led (them) to Your holy shrine.                                              Exodus 15:13

The land of Canaan is “Your holy shrine.” Rashbam (12^th century)

The entire Land of Israel is called “Your holy shrine.” Hizkuni (13^th        century)

This verse, the thirteenth of the Song of the Sea, signals a shift in the song’s content. The content of the first twelve verses of Israel’s song is praise of God for His battle against His and His nation’s enemies, including details of the wonders of splitting the Red Sea. Our verse interjects praise of the Creator, for leading Israel to the Promised Land. The verse does not interrupt the flow of the song, rather stresses that the purpose of the miracles at the Red Sea was to bring Israel to its Land. (As Amos Ḥacham commented [Da’at Mikra], our verse can also be understood as Israel’s prayer that the Holy One blessed be He indeed lead them into the Land.)

            While there are commentaries which understand “Your holy shrine” to refer to Mount Sinai, according to Rashbam and Hizkuni, after Israel successfully crossed the Red Sea, they thanked God (or prayed to Him) for fact that He will lead them into their Land, not for bringing them to Mount Sinai.

            Perhaps the intention is to hint that, despite the supreme importance of the revelation at Mount Sinai, giving the Torah is not an end in itself, rather a means. At the foot of Mount Sinai, Israel received its national constitution so that it may enter its Land – God’s Land [Hosea 9:3] and within the Land fulfill the mitzvot given at Sinai.

            My father wrote that at the Red Sea Israel sang a song of thanks to the Lord for His deliverance from Egyptian slavery while looking forward to entering the Land of their fathers, to establish their own free state based upon sanctity. In so doing, the Israelites expressed their understanding that bringing Israel into its Land was indeed the purpose of the exodus, as the verse [Deuteronomy 6:23] states:

And He brought us out from there, to bring us to the Land He promised our fathers, and give it to us.

            Without denigrating the importance of the Land of Israel, it in itself is not the final goal, but necessarily the Land is connected to Sinai, for if the Children of Israel do not fulfill mitzvot within her, the Land will spit them out [Leviticus 18:28]. Perhaps this point is implied in the continuation of the song [verse 17]:

O bring them and plant them on the mount You possess. The place You dwell in is Your accomplishment, God. The shrine of God Your Hands have founded.”

Based upon Midrash Mechilta, this verse expresses Israel’s request that they be “planted in the Land, never to be uprooted,” that is, to remain eternally within the Holy Land, something which can be realized only when the People of Israel dwell within the Land of Israel in accordance with the Torah of Israel.

At the Red Sea Israel sang a song of thanks to the Lord for His deliverance from Egyptian slavery. Israel looked forward to entering the Land of their fathers, to establish their own free state based upon sanctity.