“In the sight of all Israel.” I have heard an explanation for why the Torah begins with the letter bet and ends with the letter lamed: because all the letters of the Great Name — yod, vav, and heh — when attached to either bet or lamed, form complete words. These are: bi, bo, bah [בי, בו, בה] and li, lo, lah [לי, לו, לה]. This is not found elsewhere in the alphabet, where attaching these three letters to other letters would form complete words. For example, making from alef, “ei, oh, ah” — since *ah”*is not a word; or making from mem “mi, mo" — since mo is not a word. The explanation for this is that it alludes to the fact that the world and all it contains depends on the Blessed One, and everything belongs to Him. The characteristic of the letter bet represents God speaking for Himself, saying bi [in Me], meaning everything depends on Me. And His creations say bo [in Him], meaning everything depends on Him, blessed be He. The terms bo, bah [in Him, in Her] refer to the masculine and feminine aspects that the sages of the truth, the kabbalists, have mentioned. Similarly, the Holy One, blessed be He, says li [to Me] belongs the world and its fullness, and His creatures say lo [to Him], blessed be He, belongs the world and its fullness, and likewise lah [to Her] in the way explained, and it is all one matter. For since everything depends on Him, blessed be He, therefore everything belongs to Him, blessed be He. This alludes to His oneness, blessed be He, which is the foundation of the Torah. And this matter opens and closes [the Torah], therefore the Torah opens with bet and concludes with lamed, to teach that the Holy One, blessed be He, is the opener and the closer, and everything depends on Him, on His blessed name, as stated. Completed is the book of Deuteronomy, with the help of the Creator of all creatures.