Summary of the Parasha

“Moses went (Vayeilech) and spoke these words to all Israel: I am a hundred and twenty years old today, I can no longer go out and come in, and Hashem told me: you shall not cross this Jordan.” He reassures the people: God Himself will cross before you, and Joshua. Before all Israel he tells Joshua: “Chazak ve’ematz, be strong and courageous… Hashem will go before you, He will not fail you; do not fear.”

Moses writes this Torah and entrusts it to the Kohanim and the elders. He institutes Hakhel: every seven years, on Sukkot after the Shemitah year, the whole people, “men, women, children and the stranger”, gathers at the Temple to hear the king read the Torah.

God calls Moses and Joshua into the Tent of Meeting, in the pillar of cloud, and announces that the people will stray after Moses’ death. Then “I will surely hide My face” (haster astir). The Talmud (Chullin 139b) sees in these words an allusion to Esther, the story in which God’s name never appears but His hand guides everything. God commands that the Song (Haazinu) be written, so that it will be a witness never forgotten in the mouths of their descendants: the Talmud sees here the last mitzvah of the Torah, writing a Torah scroll. Moses finishes writing the Torah and has it placed beside the Ark of the Covenant, then gathers the elders to speak the song to them.

Summary of the Haftara

“Dirshu Hashem B’Himatz’o” (“Seek Hashem while He may be found”)
Text in Isaiah 55:6–56:8

“Seek Hashem while He may be found, call upon Him while He is near”: according to the Talmud, these are the ten days between Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur. “Let the wicked forsake his way… for He will abundantly pardon.” “My thoughts are not your thoughts.” Like the rain that makes the earth sprout, His word does not return empty. Then the prophet welcomes the stranger who joins Hashem and keeps Shabbat: “I will bring them to My holy mountain, for My house shall be called a house of prayer for all peoples”.

In practice, Vayeilech is almost always read either together with Nitzavim or on Shabbat Shuvah, between Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur, when “Shuvah Yisrael” (Hosea 14) is read: “Return, O Israel, to Hashem your God”.

Parasha-Haftara Connection

In the parasha God announces that He will hide His face; the haftara answers: seek Him while He may be found. Even in the time when God hides, He remains near to whoever calls on Him. And the Hakhel of the parasha, where even the stranger hears the Torah, meets the “house of prayer for all peoples”.