Vayelech, Vayeilech, VaYelech, Va-yelech, Vayelekh, Wayyelekh, Wayyelakh, or Va-yelekh (—Hebrew for "then he went out", the first word in the parashah), is the 52nd weekly Torah portion (, parashah) in the annual Jewish cycle of Torah reading and the ninth in the Book of Deuteronomy. It constitutes Deuteronomy 31:1–30. In the parashah, Moses told the Israelites to be strong and courageous, as God and Joshua would soon lead them into the Promised Land. Moses commanded the Israelites to read the law to all the people every seven years. God told Moses that his death was approaching, that the people would break the covenant, and that God would thus hide God's face from them, so Moses should therefore write a song to serve as a witness for God against them.
With just 30 verses, it has the fewest verses of any parashah, although not the fewest words or letters. (Parashat V'Zot HaBerachah has fewer letters and words.) The parashah is made up of 5,652 Hebrew letters, 1,484 Hebrew words, 30 verses, and 112 lines in a Torah Scroll. Jews generally read it in September or early October (or rarely, in late August). The lunisolar Hebrew calendar contains between 50 weeks in common years, and 54 or 55 weeks in leap years. Parashat Vayelech is read separately in some years, when two Sabbaths fall between Rosh Hashanah and Sukkot and neither of them coincides with a holy dayW. Gunther Plaut, The Torah: A Modern Commentary: Revised Edition, revised edition edited by David E.S. Stern (New York: Union for Reform Judaism, 2006), page 1393. (for example, 2025). In other years (for example, 2024, 2026, and 2027), Parashat Vayelech is combined with the previous parashah, Nitzavim, to help achieve the number of weekly readings needed, and the combined portion is then read on the Sabbath immediately before Rosh Hashanah.
Readings In traditional Sabbath Torah reading, the parashah is divided into seven readings, or , aliyot. In the Masoretic Text of the Tanakh (Hebrew Bible), Parashat Vayelech has two "open portion" (, petuchah) divisions (roughly equivalent to paragraphs, often abbreviated with the Hebrew letter (peh)). The first open portion spans the first four readings. The second open portion spans the remaining three readings (, aliyot). Within the first open portion, a further subdivision, called a "closed portion" (, setumah) (abbreviated with the Hebrew letter (samekh)), spans the first two readings.See, e.g., Menachem Davis, editor, The Schottenstein Edition Interlinear Chumash: Devarim / Deuteronomy (Brooklyn: Mesorah Publications, 2009), pages 196–203.
First reading—Deuteronomy 31:1–3 In the first reading, Moses told the Israelites that he was 120 years old that day, could no longer go out and come in, and God had told him that he was not to go over the Jordan River.. God would go over before them and destroy the nations ahead of them, and Joshua would go over before them, as well.. The first reading ends here.See, e.g., Menachem Davis, editor, Schottenstein Edition Interlinear Chumash: Devarim / Deuteronomy, page 196.
Second reading—Deuteronomy 31:4–6 In the second reading, Moses promised that God would destroy those nations as God had destroyed Sihon and Og, the kings of the Amorites, and the Israelites would dispossess those nations according to the commandments that Moses had commanded them.. Moses exhorted the Israelites to be strong and courageous, for God would go with them and would not forsake them.. The second reading and a closed portion end here.See, e.g., Menachem Davis, editor, Schottenstein Edition Interlinear Chumash: Devarim / Deuteronomy, page 197.
Third reading—Deuteronomy 31:7–9 In the third reading, in the sight of the people, Moses told Joshua to be strong and courageous, for he would go with the people into the land that God had sworn to their fathers and cause them to inherit it, and God would go before him, be with him, and not forsake him.. Moses wrote this law and delivered it to the priests, the sons of Levi, who bore the Ark of the Covenant and to all the elders of Israel.. The third reading ends here.See, e.g., Menachem Davis, editor, Schottenstein Edition Interlinear Chumash: Devarim / Deuteronomy, page 198.
Fourth reading—Deuteronomy 31:10–13 In the fourth reading, Moses commanded them to read the law before all Israel at the end of every seven years during Sukkot, when all Israel was to appear in the place that God would choose.. Moses told them to assemble all the people—men, women, children, and strangers—that they might hear, learn, fear God, and observe the law as long as the Israelites lived in the land that they were going over the Jordan to possess.. The fourth reading and the first open portion end here.See, e.g., Menachem Davis, editor, Schottenstein Edition Interlinear Chumash: Devarim / Deuteronomy, page 199.
Fifth reading—Deuteronomy 31:14–19 In the fifth reading, God told Moses that as the day of his death was approaching, he should call Joshua, and they should present themselves in the tent of meeting so that God might bless Joshua.. God appeared in a pillar of cloud over the door of the Tent and told Moses that he was about to die, the people would rise up and break the covenant, God's anger would be kindled against them, God would forsake them and hide God's face from them, and many evils would come upon them.. God directed Moses therefore to write a song and teach it to the Israelites so that the song might serve as a witness for God against the Israelites.. The fifth reading ends here.See, e.g., Menachem Davis, editor, Schottenstein Edition Interlinear Chumash: Devarim / Deuteronomy, pages 200–01.
Sixth reading—Deuteronomy 31:20–24 In the sixth reading, God continued that when God will have brought the Israelites into the land flowing with milk and honey (, chalav udevash), they will have eaten their fill, grown fat, turned to other gods, and broken the covenant, then when many evils will have come upon them, this song would testify before them as a witness.. So Moses wrote the song that day and taught it to the Israelites.. And God charged Joshua to be strong and courageous, for he would bring the Israelites into the land that God had sworn to them, and God would be with him.. And Moses finished writing the law in a book.. The sixth reading ends here.See, e.g., Menachem Davis, editor, Schottenstein Edition Interlinear Chumash: Devarim / Deuteronomy, page 202.
Seventh reading—Deuteronomy 31:25–30 In the seventh reading, Moses commanded the Levites who bore the Ark of the Covenant to take the book and put it by the side of the Ark so that it might serves as a witness against the people.. For Moses said that he knew that even that day, the people had been rebelling against God, so how much more would they after his death?.
In the maftir () reading of Deuteronomy 31:28–30 that concludes the parashah,See, e.g., Menachem Davis, editor, Schottenstein Edition Interlinear Chumash: Devarim / Deuteronomy, pages 202–03. Moses called the elders and officers to assemble, so that he might call heaven and earth to witness against them.. For Moses said that he knew that after his death, the Israelites would deal corruptly and turn away from the commandments, and evil would befall them because they would do that which was evil in the sight of God.. And Moses spoke to all the assembly of Israel the words of the song.. The seventh reading, the second open portion, and the parashah end here.See, e.g., Menachem Davis, editor, Schottenstein Edition Interlinear Chumash: Devarim / Deuteronomy, page 203.
Readings for Parashiot Nitzavim-Vayelech When Jews read Parashat Nitzavim together with Parashat Vayelech, they divide readings according to the following schedule:
ReadingVerses129:9–28230:1–6330:7–14430:15–31:6531:7–13631:14–19731:20–30Maftir31:28–30
Readings according to the triennial cycle In years when Jews read the parashah separately, Jews who read the Torah according to the triennial cycle of Torah reading read the entire parashah according to the schedule of first through seventh readings in the text above. When Jews read Parashat Nitzavim together with Parashat Vayelech, Jews who read the Torah according to the triennial cycle can read the parashah according to the following schedule.See, e.g., Richard Eisenberg, "A Complete Triennial Cycle for Reading the Torah," in Proceedings of the Committee on Jewish Law and Standards of the Conservative Movement: 1986–1990 (New York: The Rabbinical Assembly, 2001), pages 383–418. Year 1Year 2Year 3Reading29:9–30:1430:1–31:631:7–30129:9–1130:1–331:7–9229:12–1430:4–631:10–13329:15–2830:7–1031:14–19430:1–330:11–1431:20–22530:4–630:15–2031:22–24630:7–1031:1–331:25–27730:11–1431:4–631:28–30Maftir30:11–1431:4–631:28–30
In ancient parallels The parashah has parallels in these ancient sources:
Exodus 3:8 and 17, 13:5, and 33:3; Leviticus 20:24, Numbers 13:27 and 14:8; and Deuteronomy 6:3, 11:9, 26:9 and 15, 27:3, and 31:20 describe the Land of Israel as a land flowing "with milk and honey." Similarly, the Middle Egyptian (early second millennium BCE) tale of Sinuhe Palestine described the Land of Israel or, as the Egyptian tale called it, the land of Yaa: "It was a good land called Yaa. Figs were in it and grapes. It had more wine than water. Abundant was its honey, plentiful its oil. All kind of fruit were on its trees. Barley was there and emmer, and no end of cattle of all kinds."Nathan MacDonald, What Did the Ancient Israelites Eat? Diet in Biblical Times (Grand Rapids, Michigan: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, 2008), page 6.
In inner-Biblical interpretation The parashah has parallels or is discussed in these Biblical sources:For more on inner-Biblical interpretation, see, e.g., Benjamin D. Sommer, "Inner-biblical Interpretation," in Adele Berlin and Marc Zvi Brettler, editors, The Jewish Study Bible, 2nd edition (New York: Oxford University Press, 2014), pages 1835–41.
As Moses reported that he was 120 years old when he began his speech in Deuteronomy 31:2, 40 years had passed since he spoke to Pharaoh, which Exodus 7:7 notes he did when he was 80. Deuteronomy 34:7 reports that Moses was still 120 years old when he died.
While Moses complained in Deuteronomy 31:2 that he could "no more go out and come in," Deuteronomy 34:7 insists that at his death, his eye was not dim, nor his natural force abated. In 1 Kings 3:7, Solomon would similarly protest to God that Solomon was like a child who did not "know . . . how to go out or come in." Moses recalled in Deuteronomy 31:2 that God had told him that he would "not go over this Jordan," perhaps remembering how in Numbers 27:12–13, God had told Moses that upon ascending the mountain of Abarim and seeing the land that God had given to the Israelites, Moses would die. For soon thereafter, in Numbers 27:17, Moses had used language like that in Deuteronomy 31:2 to ask God that God might set someone over the congregation "who may go out before them, and who may come in before them, and who may lead them out, and who may bring them in." Previously, in Numbers 20:12, at Meribah, God had told Moses that because Moses had not believed in God, to sanctify God in the eyes of the Israelites, Moses would not bring the Israelites into the land that God had given them. And in Deuteronomy 3:27, Moses recalled that God had told him to ascend to the top of Pisgah and look in every direction, for, God told Moses, "You shall not go over this Jordan."
Moses calls heaven and earth to serve as witnesses against Israel in Deuteronomy 4:26, 30:19, 31:28, and 32:1. Similarly, Psalm 50:4–5 reports that God "summoned the heavens above, and the earth, for the trial of His people," saying "Bring in My devotees, who made a covenant with Me over sacrifice!" Psalm 50:6 continues: "Then the heavens proclaimed His righteousness, for He is a God who judges."