A Little Justice

Just to pick up on where we left off: The theme of משפט (justice) is found earlier in B'reishit 18. God is about to destroy S'dom and Amora and decides He ought to let Avraham know about his decision. It is interesting how the word משפט is used there and it has implications for understanding back in Exodus.

Consider, though, the question of how would Avraham known about concepts of justice, how did he use those concepts in his argument with God and how did God understand Avraham's relationship to justice (you can address these questions by reading Genesis 18).

Once you have some direction there, consider that Moshe may have already known about the basics or more of a justice system which was passed down to him from many generations prior, even before he would have received the Torah.

Unfortunately, because it is nearly Shabbat, I will have to leave the rest of  my comments until next week. Just recovering from being a bit out of sorts. 

What Did Moshe Know and When Did He Know It?

Thanks for the questions from the last posting. For those who didn't read them, they are important and will help to fit things together as we proceed.

So at the beginning of parshat Yitro, we are faced as readers with a bit of a dilemma simply trying to figure out when the scenario with Yitro visiting Moshe takes place. The chronological issue was provoked by the geographical issue, as we noted last time.

There is at least one more issue to give us pause, as well, and that is Yitro's advice to Moshe. We read in chapter 18 that Moshe gets up every day to act as judge for the people. Yitro suggests how Moshe can implement a judicial system which would be far more effective.

Is Yitro adding on to the Torah which Moshe already received at Sinai? Or is he anticipating something which will yet be given at Sinai?

As for Moshe judging the people: If the Torah has not yet been given, how does Moshe know how to judge the people?  Moshe says to Yitro:

שמות פרק יח (טז) כִּי יִהְיֶה לָהֶם דָּבָר בָּא אֵלַי וְשָׁפַטְתִּי בֵּין אִישׁ וּבֵין רֵעֵהוּ וְהוֹדַעְתִּי אֶת חֻקֵּי הָאֱלֹהִים וְאֶת תּוֹרֹתָיו:

Exodus Chapter 18 (16) When they have a thing (with legal implications), it comes to me and I judge between a man and his neighbor and I let them know the statutes of the Lord and His teachings.

How does Moshe know what the statutes and teachings of the Lord are if the Torah hasn't yet been given? While this question would seem to point to the understanding that this entire chapter must have taken place after the revelation at Sinai, there are other possibilities.

Where else in the Torah prior to this did we learn about justice?

So What Exactly Did Moshe Receive at Sinai and Why Should Anyone Care?

We all know that Moshe received the Torah at Sinai, right?

Um, how does anyone know that?

The Mishnah in Avot teaches us that Moshe received the Torah at Sinai. Why do I refer to the Mishnah and not directly to this week's parsha? Well, this week's parsha doesn't really say that Moshe received the Torah at Sinai. This week's parsha describes the revelation at Sinai and tells us certain things which God said at Sinai. But there isn't a single verse which says Moshe went up to Sinai and received the Torah, period.

As we begin reading this week's parsha, if we keep a close eye, we will discover that this narrative is not a simple one. Moshe does ascend Mt. Sinai (more than once) and he clearly receives commandments from God. But what exactly did he receive? Over what period of time?

Does it matter what exactly Moshe received at Sinai?

I am starting this blog kind of late since Shabbat will begin shortly. However, as the questions posed here can only be answered by a longer view of the text of the Torah itself, we'll start with some points today and come back to this theme many more times over the coming year.

So, to begin this sojourn, let's do some simple readings.

From the time the Children of Israel leave Egypt, they go on a series of trips (מסעים in Hebrew). The route is:

From Raamses to Succot (Exodus 12:37)
From Succot to Eitam (Ex. 13:20)
They return and camp on the edge of the Red Sea (Ex. 14:2)
They go from the Red Sea to the Wilderness of Shur (Ex. 15:22)
They come to Eilim (Ex. 15:27)
They leave Eilim and come to Wilderness of Sin (Ex. 16:1)
The leave the Wilderness of Sin and come to R'fidim (Ex. 17:1)
They leave R'fidim and come to the Wilderness of Sinai (Ex. 19:1,2)

So far so good. Except that I purposely skipped over chapter 18!

If you see all of the references above in their original form and context, you would see that these verses are written stylistically the same, particularly the last five. Basically they say that the Children of Israel left X place and went to Y place.

Now if you look at the first part of this week's parsha you will see another geographic reference:

שמות פרק יח (ה) וַיָּבֹא יִתְרוֹ חֹתֵן מֹשֶׁה וּבָנָיו וְאִשְׁתּוֹ אֶל מֹשֶׁה אֶל הַמִּדְבָּר אֲשֶׁר הוּא חֹנֶה שָׁם הַר הָאֱלֹהִים:


Exodus Chapter 18 (5) And Yitro the father in law of Moshe came and his sons and his wife to Moshe to the wilderness where he was camping there (at) the Mount of the Lord.

Where is this Mount of the Lord? Last time it was mentioned was when Moshe first encounters God (Ex. 3:1) where it is also called Chorev which is yet another name for Mt. Sinai.

So Yitro meets up with Moshe in the wilderness of Sinai. But wait—according to the verses I referenced earlier, Moshe and the C. of Israel don't get to Sinai until the following chapter!

Clearly, someone's got some 'splainin' to  do.

Why this geographic inquiry is necessary for answering our original question about what Moshe received at Sinai is also still not clear.

I'll continue next week if Hashem grants me the well being to do so!

Shabbat Shalom all

You Send Me--Part 2

So why does God want Pharaoh to do the sending?

The simple answer as far as I can tell is because Pharaoh did the enslaving.

If we take the model metaphor of God as parent and humans His children, it would go something like this:

The parent sees his his one kid beat up on and tease his other kid. The parent can pick up the taunted kid and remove him from the torture directly. But if he does that, the bully kid doesn't really learn anything and, not only that, the tortured kid learns that bullies don't necessarily suffer any consequences. So even if the parent thinks the bully kid will not really change his ways if he is punished, he might still punish him in order to teach the other kid that ill behavior does have consequences.

So it is with Pharaoh, the bulliest of bully kids.

Now, though, why should God reward him for sending the Children of Israel out of Egypt?

This is a bit trickier but I will offer at least one suggestion--one for tonight, anyway. Maybe another one for tomorrow night.

Jewish thought includes a notion of reward as well as punishment. One is to be rewarded for fulfilling God's will just as one is to be punished for violating that will.

Pharaoh was commanded, that is, he was given a mitzvah to send the C of I out of Egypt. Ultimately, he fulfills that mitzvah so he should get a reward for it, right?

Maybe you cringe a bit when you read that. After all, Pharaoh really tortured the C of I and, in any event, only released them after his kingdom was a shambles and his own first born died. Nonetheless, I would still say he is deserving of reward of some kind.

Note that the reward doesn't go to Pharaoh directly but rather to the Egyptian people as a whole (see yesterday's posting). This is true for the other examples brought by the M'chilta as well.

But also remember the parent/child metaphor. If the parent forces the bully child to 'make nice' the parent will want to reinforce that behavior by rewarding the child. You might argue that, again, Pharaoh is not really going to change his ways no matter what God does. But I would then add that, again, another reason for the parent to reward the bully when he finally 'does the right thing' is to show the other child that the parent will reward good behavior.

You might ask, though, if Pharaoh really fulfilled the mitzvah at all since, after all, it was done under duress. Well, we'll look at that tomorrow.

You Send Me...

Last week's parsha, which we didn't really get to discuss much, saw the Children of Israel leaving Egypt at Pharaoh's behest. This week's parsha will follow up on the immediate aftermath of that Exodus including the parting of the Red Sea, complaints by the newly freed slaves about food and water, their first encounter with war and more and more.

This week's parsha opens with this verse:

שמות פרק יג

(יז) וַיְהִי בְּשַׁלַּח פַּרְעֹה אֶת הָעָם וְלֹא נָחָם אֱלֹהִים דֶּרֶךְ אֶרֶץ פְּלִשְׁתִּים כִּי קָרוֹב הוּא כִּי אָמַר אֱלֹהִים פֶּן יִנָּחֵם הָעָם בִּרְאֹתָם מִלְחָמָה וְשָׁבוּ מִצְרָיְמָה:

Exodus 13

17) And it was that when Pharaoh sent the nation that the Lord did not conduct them by way of the land of the Philistines, for it was close, for the Lord said, "Lest the nation regret when they see war and they return to Egypt."

For the moment, I want to focus on the word בשלח b'shalach, which is conveniently also the name of our parsha. The root word shalach means 'sent.' This word has played prominently in this story with Moshe and Pharaoh all the way back to when God first appeals to Moshe to lead the Children of Israel out of Egypt. 

Before we go all the way back, though, let's ask a question: Why did God need/want Pharaoh to send the Children of Israel out of Egypt anyway? I think it is safe to say that God could have brought them out Himself in any number of ways. 

Even if we set that question aside, it is still worth noting that the verse frames the exodus from Egypt as being effected if not initiated by Pharaoh. The verse could have said "And came about when Moshe led the Children of Israel out of Egypt" or "When God took the C of I out of Egypt" or any number of other variations. 

Apparently the fact that Pharaoh sent the C of I out of Egypt is particularly significant. 

The Sages, in fact, tell us that because Pharaoh sent the C of I out of Egypt, the Egyptians were rewarded! The M'chilta states:

מכילתא דרבי ישמעאל בשלח - מסכתא דויהי פתיחתא 

הפה שאמר גם את ישראל לא אשלח (שמות ה ב) הוא הפה שאמר אנכי אשלח אתכם (שם /שמות/ ח כד) מה שכר נטלו על כך לא תתעב מצרי (דברים כג ח) 

The mouth which stated "I will also not send out Israel"(Ex. 5:2) is the same mouth which said "I will send you."(Ex. 8:24). What reward did he take for this? "You shall not despise the Egyptian." (Deut. 23:8). 

The M'chilta goes on to bring two more examples of Pharaoh's intransigence, his subsequent bending to God's will and ultimately the reward he earned for the Egyptian people because of his capitulation. 

So not only does God somehow need Pharaoh to send the C of I out of Egypt, but he ultimately rewards him for doing so, even though it is clear that Pharaoh carries out God's wishes only after the most extreme duress. 

Tomorrow we'll look at possible reasons for why God has to have Pharaoh do this sending, why the reward and what 'sending' means anyway.

Moshe vs. Avraham

To pick up from where I left off yesterday and hopefully to address ziggi's comment at the same time:

What distinguishes the Patriarch's from others in their time and in later generations was their ability to communicate with God, to seek out a direct relationship with God and ultimately to secure a covenant with God.

Even though the way we see the story in the Torah, God first seeks out Avraham, the way the sages understand it, Avraham first seeks out God when he realizes that the notion of idol worship doesn't make sense.

Later on, there is an implication, which the sages pick up on and amplify, that Avraham kept all of the Torah including rabbinic enactments, even though he was not commanded to do so.

So Avraham's relationship to the Torah is an organic one; that is, he comes to keep the Torah as he came to worship God, by way of his own initiative and highly perceptive abilities.

 This approach reflects a very high spiritual and intellectual level. While it is incredibly admirable, this is not a model that everyone else can emulate. We are not all blessed with those sorts of abilities and, perhaps more to the point, we are not all imbued with the spirit of seeking that Avraham and the other Patriarchs had.

Moshe, by contrast, is clearly sought out by God, even chased and sort of hounded by God. Moshe displays a different sort of critical mind and way of thinking. When confronted by God, Moshe steps back and says maybe I don't want this relationship. He challenges it on every level.

Moshe represents the person who does not figure out the Torah by himself; in fact, he represents the kind of person who challenges each aspect of the Torah as it is presented to him. Whereas Avraham was in harmony with the Torah and how it works in the world in some kind of intuitive way, Moshe needed to understand each aspect of the Torah as it came to him. Thus, I would argue that Moshe is the more appropriate party to bring the Torah into the world. He leads the way for the rest of us who need to understand the Torah in our own way and may not be up to tuning into the Torah on some kind of higher plane.

Live From Budapest!!

I can't get the whole post in just now. I am at a sort of cafe/food emporium which offers free wi-fi and cheap beer (well, most places here offer the latter, at least) but they are going to close any moment!

Maybe I will just wrap this segment up by pointing out that no matter what particular meanings you assign to these various names of God, you will come away understanding that the Torah looks at each name as being unique and meaningful.

The Ibn Ezra in his commentary here understands the name Shaddai to be derived from the root shoded meaning, in this sense, to control as in The God Who Controls Stuff in the Universe.

Rashi understands the name יקוק to refer to that aspect of God which metes out reward and punishment. This understanding of that name is evident from a number of passages later on in Vayikra, and we'll comment more on them there perhaps (if I remember!).

In our context, then, it means that the Patriarchs didn't personally experience all of the reward that God promised them and yet they didn't kvetch and challenge God as Moshe did.

And here is the contrast, then, between Moshe's argument with God and Avraham's argument with God about the destruction of S'dom and Amora: Avraham's argument was essentially selfless--he had nothing to personally gain by the halting of the destruction nor nothing personally to lose by letting the destruction take place (except maybe losing his nephew Lot, but that gets taken care of anyway).

Moshe, though, when he argues with God here is, of course, concerned primarily with the welfare of his fellows but he is likewise concerned that his own efforts were for naught or worse. That is, he expresses real doubt about God's direction here and feels that in some way God may have slighted him. It is not a bad argument  in some ways and I would argue myself that it may reflect one of the reasons that Moshe was chosen to be the vehicle for receiving the Torah itself whereas the Patriarchs didn't get that particular honor. We'll pick up on this next time.

Night all!!