Between the Lines—Va-era
Torah from JTS
Weekly Midrash Learning with Rabbi Abigail Treu
‫מדרש תנחומא פרשת וארא סימן יד‬
‫חשך למה? ית' שמו של מלך מלכי המלכים הקב"ה שאין לפניו משוא פנים והוא חוקר‬
‫לב ובוחן כליות לפי שהיו בישראל פושעין שהיה להם פטרונין מן המצרים והיה להם‬
‫ אמר הקב"ה אם אני אביא עליהן מכה‬,‫שם כבוד ועושר ולא היו רוצין לצאת ממצרים‬
‫ ל פ י כ ך ה ב י א ע ל‬. ‫ י א מ ר ו ה מ צ ר י ם כ ש ם ש ע ב ר ע ל י נ ו כ ך ע ב ר ע ל י ה ן‬, ‫ב פ ר ה ס י א ו י מו ת ו‬
‫ ו ל כ ל ב נ י י ש ר א ל ה י ה א ו ר‬, ‫ ו ל א ר או אי ש את א ח י ו‬, ‫ה מ צ ר י ם א ת ה ח ש ך ש ל ש ה י מ י ם‬
.‫במושבותם‬
Parashat Va-era
Exodus 6:2–9:35
January 16, 2010
1 Shevat 5770
Midrash Tanchuma, Parashat Va-era, 14
Why did the King of kings, blessed be His name, the Holy One, Blessed is He,
before Whom there is no favoritism, and Who examines the heart and tests
emotions, bring the plague of darkness upon them? Because among Israel there
were transgressors who had Egyptian patrons and who lived in affluence and
honor, so they did not want to leave Egypt. The Holy One, Blessed is He, said: If
I bring a plague upon them openly from which they will die, the Egyptians will
claim, “Just as we were afflicted, so too were they (Israel) afflicted.” Therefore,
He brought darkness upon the Egyptians for three days; man could not see his
fellow man, but all of the Children of Israel had light in their dwellings.
The Ten Plagues were given “measure for measure” as punishment for specific Egyptian
wrongs, the midrash claims, and then goes through each and every one to explain which of
Pharaoh’s sins merited the particular plague in question. Interestingly enough, the last of the
plagues—the death of the firstborn—is not discussed; presumably, it was the obvious
answer to Pharaoh’s killing of Israelite babies some chapters earlier. Darkness, then, is the
last plague examined in this section and its explication is anything but intuitive.
Rather than identify a clear sin of the Egyptians that would merit the plague of darkness, the
midrash turns the formula on its head. Darkness was given to provide a cover (albeit a
scary, plague-ish one) for the real “measure for measure” taking place: the punishment of
Israelites who, for selfish material reasons, did not want to leave Egypt. The exact nature of
that punishment is not specified, but we infer that it is something terrible enough for God to
want to cover up the act before the Egyptians, lest they come to equate the suffering (or
death?) of the Israelite sinners with their own suffering and the death-to-come of their
firstborn.
And so this midrash would have us believe that the Egyptians were not the only ones to
suffer from the Ten Plagues. Israelite sinners were also punished, a sign (the midrash
suggests) of God’s justice. It would not have been fair for the Israelites who lacked faith to
be redeemed along with their faithful brethren. It also would not have been fair for only the
Egyptians to suffer via the plagues when there were sinful Israelites around, too. In
envisioning darkness not only as a plague of divine retribution for the sins of Pharaoh, but
as a cloak enabling divine retribution for the sins of the Israelites, we are given a hint that
the God of Justice who produces the Exodus is one who found ways of meting out justice to
all of the characters of the story.
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Parashah Commentary
This week’s commentary was written by Rabbi Daniel S. Nevins, Pearl
Resnick Dean of The Rabbinical School, JTS.
There is a lot of action in Parashat Va-era, but not much of it directly involves the
people of Israel. Their role is primarily to witness the increasingly violent confrontation
between Moses and Pharaoh. Given last week’s negative response of the Israelite
elders to Moses and Aaron, this passivity is quite understandable. His early experience
with Israel has demoralized Moses, for he objects to God’s renewed command this
week with bitter words: “In fact, even the Israelites haven’t listened to me, so how will
Pharaoh ever heed me, and I have impeded speech!” (6:12).
Still, it augurs poorly for a people on its way to freedom to be consigned to such a
passive role in their redemption. In the coming weeks Israelites will be given steadily
more challenging opportunities to participate in their own march to freedom. For now,
though, they seem to lack any sense of agency.
Once we are attuned to this dilemma, our eyes can discern a very subtle clause that
opens the door toward Israelite involvement. Just after Moses complains about being
ignored by his own people and is left stammering at their insolence, God tells Moses
and Aaron to command the Israelites and Pharaoh, king of Egypt, to take Israel out of
the land of Egypt (6:13). There is something odd about the first object of this verse—
Moses and Aaron must command the Israelites to take themselves out of Egypt? What
do they have to do with their own enslavement? What power do they have to change
their status? The Torah gives no hint of the content of this message.
Where the Torah is terse the rabbis are often quick to fill in the gaps, and this case is no
exception. Allow me to present three different approaches and invite you to consider
their implications for Israel’s role in the process of emancipation:
1. In the Jerusalem Talmud (Rosh Hashanah 3:5), Rav Shmuel, son of Rav Yizhak,
says that Moses took this delicate moment to teach the Israelites the Torah’s (later)
commandment to emancipate their own slaves after seven years. On its face, this
statement sounds preposterous—slaves are being warned not to hold slaves? Yet this
reading is buttressed by Rabbi Hila, since many centuries later, in the days of the
prophet Jeremiah and King Zidkiyahu, the people of Israel would be punished for
refusing to release Israelite slaves whom they had already held beyond the seven-year
limit (see chapter 34 of Jeremiah). Jeremiah claims that the entire point of the covenant
God made with Israel at the time of the Exodus was to release their slaves.
This first interpretation teaches us that victims often fail to internalize the moral lesson
of their own victimization. They may come to think that the only injustice is that they
have been enslaved, not that slavery itself is inherently wrong. Granted, the rabbis
applied this moral principle only to the holding of Israelite slaves; it would take nearly two
millennia before the practice of enslaving other peoples would be understood to be
morally abhorrent. Still, the horror of slavery is central to the Torah and its rabbinic
interpretation. Moses instructs the Israelites and Pharaoh about the commandment to
free slaves. For Pharaoh the lesson is immediate, but for Israel it is no less essential.
The Exodus narrative is important not only for its original circumstances but also for its
paradigmatic nature—it is the covenant of freedom, and Israel must rehearse the story in
order to remain true to its eternal message—that holding others captive is wrong.
with confidence and dignity, and with respect for even their oppressor?
2. A second explanation of God’s cryptic instruction to command Israel and Pharaoh
about the Exodus is found in the early Midrash to Exodus called the Mekhilta of Rabbi
Ishmael (Pisha, Bo, Vehaya Lakhem). Just before our verse we read that Moses spoke
to the Israelites about their redemption, but they couldn’t hear him because of their
“shortness of breath and the heavy labor.” Rabbi Yehudah ben Bateira finds this apathy
to be alarming. Even the most downtrodden person is pleased to get good news. How
could they have ignored the good tidings of freedom? Rather, he claims that the
Israelites were unwilling to listen to Moses since the price of their freedom was to
abandon their Egyptian idols.
The publication and distribution of the JTS Commentary are made possible by a generous grant
from Rita Dee and Harold (z”l) Hassenfeld.
Perhaps this is the kotzer ruah (constricted spirit) that would not allow them to follow God
to freedom. According to this interpretation, God tells Moses and Aaron to instruct Israel
to separate themselves from idolatry. God can change their external circumstances, but
Israel must make the internal transformation to the monotheistic faith. As Rabbi Haninah
says in the Talmud, “All is in the hands of heaven except for reverence for
heaven!” (Brakhot 33b, Megillah 25a, Niddah 16b). The hardest part of the Exodus is the
internal change required of Israel. Only when Israel will agree to stop worshipping
Egyptian gods (including Pharaoh himself) will they truly be free of Egypt.
3. A third interpretation of our cryptic verse is the one that is most surprising to me. In a
later collection of Midrash called Tanchuma, Rabbi Ishmael reads the verse a bit
differently: “The Lord spoke to Moses and to Aaron and commanded them to teach the
Israelites [about how to behave towards] Pharaoh . . . .” Rabbi Ishmael claims that God
demanded that the Israelites treat Pharaoh with respect, despite all of their legitimate
grievances against him. Likewise the Talmudic Rabbi Judah the Prince referred to
himself in letters to his friend, the Roman ruler Antoninius, as “your servant Judah,” and
so too did Jacob address his brutish brother Esau as “your servant Jacob.”
This interpretation emphasizes the importance of respecting authority even in the heat of
confrontation. Humiliating an opponent reflects poorly on a person; treating even an
oppressor with basic respect demonstrates one’s own dignity and strength. The more I
think about Rabbi Ishmael’s interpretation, the more I appreciate it. The hardest aspect
of emancipation may be the construction of a new social self. How can former slaves
transition from the servile demeanor of an oppressed people into the confident conduct
of the free? Many steps are required, but dignified speech is a fine beginning.
The rabbis have even more interpretations of this verse, but I find these three to be most
compelling. They respond to a perceived deficiency in the narrative, the alarming
passivity of the Israelites as Moses confronts Pharaoh on their behalf. The Torah gives
just a little opening, and the Rabbis push through an entire agenda of auto-emancipation
(to use an anachronistic term from early Zionism). By their readings, the Exodus places
demands on Israel, and not only on Pharaoh.
Which reading do you find most compelling within the Exodus narrative? Is Israel
commanded to accept an Exodus-based covenant founded on the prohibition of slavery
for all? Is their challenge rather to free themselves spiritually by abandoning Egyptian
gods forever? Or is this the moment when they are taught how a free people behaves—
Which of these messages is most resonant today? As we consider the substantial
challenges of our own lives, how can we exercise agency? What internal changes must
we complete before we can be truly free? Considering our opponents, how can we
exhibit true independence and dignity even in the face of provocation? These questions
are part of our spiritual inheritance. Freedom begins with an internal change, and is then
expressed through behaviors of increasing boldness. May we experience this internal
awakening on Shabbat Va-era, and begin to act on behalf of physical, spiritual, and
social freedom for all in the days that follow.
A Taste of Torah
A Commentary on Joseph B’khor Shor by Rabbi Matthew Berkowitz,
director of Israel Programs, JTS
Exodus 6:7–8 And I will take you to be My people, and I will be your God. And you will
know that I, the Lord, am your God who freed you from the labors of the Egyptians. I will
bring you into the land which I swore to give to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob . . .
B’khor Shor, “And I will take you to be My people,” and you will be servants to Me
because it is better for you to be My servants rather than servants to Pharaoh. I will be
your master, and not Pharaoh’s master. “And you will know that I, the Lord . . . freed you
from the labors of the Egyptians,” and you will serve me willingly, for you will say better
to serve the Great King rather than the common and lowly Pharaoh.
The opening of Parashat Va-era showcases God reiterating the ancestral promise of
redemption to a still-reluctant Moses. Aaron will accompany Moses as a spokesperson
and the two will appear before Pharaoh, demanding the freedom of the enslaved
Israelites. God places this drama against the background of prophets and patriarchs
before Moses: God recalls covenantal promises and acknowledges the suffering of the
Israelites. The Israelite God will now enter history through what has become known as
the “four languages of redemption”: “I will free you from slavery,” “I will redeem you with
an outstretched arm,” “I will take you to be My people,” and “I will bring you into the
land.” (Some are quick to identify a fifth expression: “I will give you the land as a
possession.”) How are we to understand the notion of Israelite redemption? Do the
Israelites truly free themselves of servitude?
Joseph B’khor Shor shares an essential interpretation of Israelite redemption. Far from
becoming “free agents,” the Israelites transition from the authority of one master to
another. According to our exegete, when God declares “and I will take you as My
people,” God’s message is to say that God will be a more benevolent master than
Pharaoh. God is on one hand “lowering” the divine Self to become the master of these
former slaves; and on the other hand, the Israelites choose to raise themselves by
serving a higher authority.
On some profound level, B’khor Shor inverts our common understanding of yetziat
Mitzrayim (the exodus from Egypt) and redemption. Though associations with liberation
from bondage conjure images of shackles breaking, the Israelites are far from unfettered.
They now become the servants of God. And it is through the structure of covenant, law,
and relationship that they become free to live meaningful, purposeful, and holy lives.
Eschewing freedom that leads to chaos and idolatry, God and the Israelites choose a
different path—one that will lead to a prophetic and divine vision of a world repaired.
The publication and distribution of A Taste of Torah are made possible by a generous grant from
Sam and Marilee Susi.