January 24th: Va’ayra
THIS WEEK IN THE TORAH
Rabbi David E. Ostrich
To quote myself, “The thing about cliffhangers is that they inspire a kind of creative anxiety.” The creativity part can be entertaining. The anxiety part can be plaguing, but it can also help us to bridge the gap between literary voyeurism and deeper empathy. Just as we do not know what will happen, so do the people involved in the story not know the ending.
While we know—even at the beginning of Exodus—that the terrible enslavement of the Israelites in Egypt will end, the actual Israelites do not know. For some four hundred years, they suffer and do not know what will happen next.
If we were Israelites lucky enough to live during Joseph’s days or in their immediate aftermath, things would be rosy. The Egyptians are happy to have us, and we have a refuge from the famine and other difficulties of our homeland in Canaan. This happiness, however, is only as long as the first paragraph of Exodus.
In the second paragraph, a “new king” arises over Egypt, one “who did not know Joseph…” Everything changes—and for the worse. “He said to his people, ‘Look, the Israelite people are much too numerous for us. Let us deal shrewdly with them…so they set taskmasters over them to oppress them with forced labor…” (Exodus 1.8-11)
If our ancestors were scholars of Torah, they might consider a relevant prophecy. In Genesis 15, in a dream, God tells Abram his people’s future: “Know well that your offspring shall be strangers in a land not theirs, and they shall be enslaved and oppressed four hundred years; but I will execute judgments on the nation they shall serve, and in the end they shall go free with great wealth.” (Genesis 15.13-14) This is sort of good news—except for that four-hundred-year part.
And there is a problem with the number. Though God seems to say that the four hundred years will begin when the Israelites are enslaved, the usual Biblical chronology puts the Exodus as four hundred years after Abram’s dream. (This is one of many problems with the Biblical chronology—a problem exacerbated by the absence of any outside/non-Biblical corroborating references). In any event, the Israelites themselves have no idea what will happen to them and for how long this oppression will last. While we can look with joy at the eventual Exodus and redemption, our ancestors for most of those four hundred years face terrible conditions. “The Egyptians dealt harshly with us and oppressed us; they imposed heavy labor upon us. We cried to the Lord, the God of our ancestors, and the Lord heard our plea and saw our plight, our misery, and our oppression.” (Deuteronomy 26.6-7)
I have entitled this series of essays Patience, but I hesitate to be too sanguine about what our ancestors endured. Theirs was a difficult and tragic life, and, though we all experience difficulties and tragedies, I do not know how they could hold up and maintain any sense of hope—any sense of humanity.
The Midrash offers us three possible ameliorative insights. The first comes from Leviticus Rabba and speculates that the Israelites’ survival as Israelites was dependent on four practices. First, they kept their Jewish names. Second, they kept speaking the Hebrew language. Third, they did not gossip (participating in lashon hara / the “evil tongue).” And fourth, they were not sexually promiscuous (like the Egyptians). While one wonders how the Rabbis of the 5th-7th Centuries CE (some 1700 years after the Exodus) could know such things, their point makes sense. In order for Jews to survive persecution and a world that is not particularly friendly, we need to maintain our both our Jewish faith and our Jewish moral values. Though the Midrash speaks about the time as slaves in Egypt, the Rabbis’ advice is something every generation of Jews should consider as we face our own share of challenges.
The second insight comes in a discussion of theodicy—how God could let the Israelites suffer for so long. The Torah says in numerous places that God was aware of our suffering—hearing “our plea” and seeing “our plight, our misery, and our oppression.” Why did the redemption have to wait? One answer parallels questions about our long wait for the Messiah. If God is aware and good and powerful, what is the delay? The answer? God waits for the Israelites to redeem themselves—to break free of the Egyptians. As long as there is a chance, God holds back. However, when the Israelites’ spirit is finally broken—when “they would not listen to Moses, their spirits crushed by cruel bondage” (Exodus 6.9), then God decides that only a miraculous rescue will work. As we learn in the Midrash about Nachshon “jump-starting” the splitting of the Red Sea, God empowers us and wants us to pursue our own redemption.
A third insight speaks more about God’s comforting Presence. In the aftermath of the Revelation at Mount Sinai, Exodus 24 offers a curious passage about Moses and the elders “seeing God.” “They saw the God of Israel, standing on what looked like a pavement of sapphire, pure and clear like the very sky.” (Exodus 24.10) Other than the obvious question of such anthropomorphism, the Midrash focuses on the pavement and teaches that the sapphire pavement is what God builds while in slavery to the Egyptians. When the Israelites are suffering, God is right there with them, sharing their burdens, accompanying them, feeling their pain because it is God’s pain, too.
We all experience suffering in our own ways. Some is clearly less severe than others, and some is less visible/knowable than others. However, we are bidden to remember that God is with us. In whatever befalls our people, our families, ourselves, God is with us—and God is continually reminding us of our holy potential. Even in the midst of difficulty, we can maintain our Judaism and our morality, we can work for our own liberation and redemption, and we can feel the supportive and loving Presence of our God.
Baruch Atah Adonai, Shom’renu, Go’alenu, v’Tzur Yish’enu.
Blessed is the Lord, Who protects us, Who helps us when we are in difficulty,
and Who is our eternal and everlasting hope.