The Song of Moses - Poetry at the End

Give ear, O heavens, and I will speak; let the earth hear the words of my mouth. This is the song of Moses, his farewell composition. Not a lecture. A song. Poetry at the end.

I'm struck that Moses doesn't give his final word to the people as prose instruction. He sings it. Makes it memorable, beautiful, rhythmic. He's handing them something that will stick.

I think about the songs I remember from childhood. They stick differently than lectures do. They move through me differently. They touch something that pure information doesn't touch.

Moses is being wise about how we learn and remember. The song of Moses wasn't meant to be a neat summary. It was meant to be experienced, sung, embodied. When the Israelites found themselves in new situations, that song would come back to them. It would reshape how they understood their circumstances.

I'm rethinking how I teach. I've been heavy on information transfer. But maybe the real transmission happens differently - through story, through metaphor, through beauty. Through things that make people want to remember.

There's a song in me somewhere that I'm meant to sing. Not something I've fully composed yet, but the raw materials are there. I don't know what it is yet, but I'm beginning to sense that's the gift I have to give - not more information, but something that touches the deeper parts of how people understand themselves and God.