Verse Dt30-19 discussing Moses' adjuration to the Jews to observe the convenant states I call heaven and earth to witness against you this day, that I have set before thee life and death, the blessing and the curse; therefore choose life, that thou mayest live, thou and thy seed;

But Heaven and earth are inanimate. They can't be witnesses. Hence Rashi interprets this symbolically. Rashi's suggestion is simple: Heaven and earth follow the inanimate laws that govern them and as a consequence all is well with them. If only we humans could act similarly.

Advanced Rashi: Rashi's first explanation poetically sees the heaven and earth as two witnesses who punish the accused if convicted (The heavens abstain from rain and the earth from produce). However heaven and earth have no cogitive ability or free will and hence cannot really act as witnesses. Rashi's second explanation correctly sees them as symbolic affirmations adjuring humans to follow their inanimate counterparts. We have therefore concentrated on Rashi's 2nd explanation.

We close this year's Weekly Rashi series with a gem of a story from the founder of Chasiduth. The founder of Chasiduth, the Ba'al Shem Tov, that is, the Person with a Good name, as he is affectionately known, was, in his youth, as a sexton, one day, sweeping the synagogue floors. All of a sudden he burst into tears: This lowly broom has fulfilled its maximum potential in existence and has merited to clean synagogue floors, but I, a human created in the image of the Supreme being, have not fulfilled my maximum potential. Of course, the Ba'al Shem Tov was simply echoing the above Rashi that sees Heaven and Earth as inanimate paradigms fulfilling the will of their Creator and contrasting it with human behavior.