An attentive reading shows that this passage, which expresses the idea of free will for choosing or not to observe the covenant and the consequences of such choice, (blessing and curse), starts with a change in person in its original language, going from the singular re’eh, “behold”, to the plural “you”. What does this mean? If Torat Adonay Temimah, if “the Torah is ‘perfect’”, how can we explain this “confusion”? Furthermore, what can we learn from this modification?

In his commentary, Abraham Ibn Ezra (born in Spain in 1092 and died in Narbona, Southern France, in 1167) poses a first response: “Behold: I will speak to each individual”. With these words, Ibn Ezra seems to suggest that, even though the message is directed to all, God makes a personal call; He summons each one of the members of the people.

The Alshich (Rabbi Moshe bar Chaim Alshich, 1508-1593, Safed), goes a little bit farther. On discussing this verse, he declares: “… the mitzvot observed by the majority are not the same as the ones observed by the individuals”. That is to say, just as he implies further on, do not think that having given them to the collective, each one of us is exempt from observing the precepts.

While Ibn Ezra raised the summons to each individual within a collective, Alshich adds that the change in person serves to reassert the responsibility of each person in their fulfillment of mitzvot. The mitzvot were given to the entire nation, but their observance is a question of personal choice.

Some centuries later, the Hida (Haim Yossef David Azoulay, Jerusalem 1724, Livorno, Italy 1806) moves one step further in the understanding of this verse. In his opinion, the juxtaposition of the singular and plural means that “each person must improve and serve as a vehicle to influence the collective”. In other words, the Torah enhances the potential of each person to impact the reality of the whole.

The Hida’s position confers a new dimension to our passage. Not just the summons to each one, not just the assumption of the individual commitment to observe, but rather the ability of each human being to make the difference, to modify the collective, to transform the world.

The Talmud reflects the same spirit (Kidushin 40b): Man must always see himself as if the world was half guilty and half worthy. The observance of a Mitzvah can tilt the scale of the entire world towards the worthy side; one transgression tilts the scale of the entire world towards the guilty side.

According to this passage, any action, no matter how small it seems, can influence the fate of humanity. And that is also the message that appears at the beginning of our Parashah. The singular and the plural emphasize the summons’ intensity: blessing and curse are in front of you, but it is you (and only you) who decides.

Torat Adonai Temimah, Meshivat Nafesh, “The law of the Lord is perfect, restoring the soul”, or as the outstanding English rabbi Louis Jacobs (1920-2006) once said, it is precisely because it restores the soul, that the Torah of the Lord is perfect.