Parashas Tzav starts with a new word. I don’t mean a new word in that we haven’t seen this word before. I mean new in a narrative sense. The word is צַו (tzav): command.

HaKadosh Baruch Hu speaks to Moshe and says to him, “Command Aharon and his sons.” That is interesting. Last week, Hashem said to Moshe, “Have a conversation with the Jewish people about these korbanos.” This week, He’s telling Moshe to command Aharon about these same korbanos.

What’s the difference?

Rashi:

צו — אין צו אלא לשון זירוז מיד ולדורות

Tzav — tzav is nothing other than the language of urging, immediately and for all generations. (Rashi on Vayikra 6:2)

A conversation, evidently, does not have the same sense of urgency as a command. It’s information, preparation for the moment when you will need to act.

A command, on the other hand, means get going right now.

And what is it that Aharon and his sons need to do right away? It has to do with fire.

צַו אֶת אַהֲרֹן וְאֶת בָּנָיו לֵאמֹר זֹאת תּוֹרַת הָעֹלָה הִוא הָעֹלָה עַל מוֹקְדָהּ עַל הַמִּזְבֵּחַ כׇּל הַלַּיְלָה עַד הַבֹּקֶר וְאֵשׁ הַמִּזְבֵּחַ תּוּקַד בּוֹ

Command Aharon and his sons, saying: This is the teaching of the olah — it is the olah, upon its burning place, upon the mizbeach, all the night until the morning, and the fire of the mizbeach shall be kindled on it. (Vayikra 6:2)

The korban olah has to be put on something called a מוֹקְדָה (mokdah). Now I don’t 100% know what the word mokdah means, but my (not yet) working hypothesis is that it has to do with kindling. Perhaps it’s the place where the fire is kindling. Or the state of being kindled.

Not sure. The key point for us, though, is that it relates to fire.

The olah is going to be on the mokdah — on the place that’s lit with fire — all night long until the morning.

Now, this is not the only reference to fire in this short little section. We are also told that אֵשׁ הַמִּזְבֵּחַ תּוּקַד בּוֹ (eish hamizbeach tukad bo) — the fire of the mizbeach will be kindled on it.

So we are connecting the fire to the mizbeach. The fire is kindled on the mizbeach, and the olah goes on that fire. It doesn’t just go on the mizbeach — it specifically goes on the fire of the mizbeach.

And it’s this fire — and the olah that goes on it — that Aharon (and his sons) are commanded to tend to immediately.

Fire has (once again) come to the fore.

We saw fire play a prominent role at the sneh. We saw fire play a prominent role at Har Sinai.
And now we are seeing fire play a prominent role in the Mishkan.

But it’s not just the fire that gets prime play in our parsha. It’s also the ash which the fire creates:

וְלָבַשׁ הַכֹּהֵן מִדּוֹ בַד וּמִכְנְסֵי בַד יִלְבַּשׁ עַל בְּשָׂרוֹ וְהֵרִים אֶת הַדֶּשֶׁן אֲשֶׁר תֹּאכַל הָאֵשׁ אֶת הָעֹלָה עַל הַמִּזְבֵּחַ וְשָׂמוֹ אֵצֶל הַמִּזְבֵּחַ

The kohen shall put on his linen garment, and his linen breeches he shall put upon his flesh, and he shall lift up the deshen that the fire has consumed of the olah upon the mizbeach, and place it beside the mizbeach. (Vayikra 6:3)

That דֶּשֶׁן (deshen), the mefarshim say, is a fatty type of ash.

Ash. That is familiar.

Remember the chet ha’eigel — Moshe ground it down until it was very fine, dust-like.

And the parah adumah was burned until it became אֵפֶר (efer) — ash (Bamidbar 19:9).

And just like the ash (אֵפֶר — efer) of the parah is taken to a מָקוֹם טָהוֹר (makom tahor — a “pure” place), so too the ash (הַדֶּשֶׁן — deshen) is taken to a pure place.

Once again, we see a connected theme. And we note that connection.

And once again, we note a variation off of that theme — efer vs deshen.

Why the difference? As always, we start with not knowing — and (bezras Hashem) work our way from there to some levels of understanding.

Today we will merely mention the deshen, without trying to figure it out. But we will leave some mental notes.

Note #1: Pay attention if (in our journey through the yam shel Torah) any clues come that indicate what this may mean.

Note #2: Try and circle back to this quesiton some day.

With that said, let’s return to the fire.

We have been waiting to find the fire. We have already noted the call and the cloud — הקרִיאָה and הענן. We saw how the cloud covered both Har Sinai and the Mishkan. And we noted that there was a call both at Har Sinai and the Mishkan (not to mention the Sneh — and elsewhere).

And so we figured that it was only a matter of time until we found the fire. And now we have. Yes, it was also mentioned last week — but now it is taking center stage.

And as we look further at this command to Aharon, we notice how much focus is placed on this fire.

Aharon is told that the fire of the mizbeach will be kindled on it (i.e., on the mizbeach):

וְאֵ֥שׁ הַמִּזְבֵּ֖חַ תּ֥וּקַד בּֽוֹ

And the fire of the mizbeach shall be kindled on it. (Vayikra 6:2)

And then he is told that again.

וְהָאֵ֨שׁ עַל־הַמִּזְבֵּ֤חַ תּֽוּקַד־בּוֹ֙

And the fire on the mizbeach shall be kindled on it. (Vayikra 6:5)

And then again.

אֵ֗שׁ תָּמִ֛יד תּוּקַ֥ד עַל־הַמִּזְבֵּ֖חַ

A perpetual fire shall be kindled on the mizbeach. (Vayikra 6:6)

Furthermore, he is told not to extinguish that fire:

וְהָאֵ֨שׁ עַל־הַמִּזְבֵּ֤חַ תּֽוּקַד־בּוֹ֙ לֹ֣א תִכְבֶּ֔ה

And the fire on the mizbeach shall be kindled on it, you shall not extinguish it. (Vayikra 6:5)

And then he is told that again:

אֵ֗שׁ תָּמִ֛יד תּוּקַ֥ד עַל־הַמִּזְבֵּ֖חַ לֹ֣א תִכְבֶּ֔ה

A perpetual fire shall be kindled on the mizbeach, you shall not extinguish it. (Vayikra 6:6)

Why the repetition? We don’t know. And we won’t focus on it today. But we will create some mental notes.

The point is, this fire is important. Or, put otherwise, there is something about the mizbeach and fire that is of central importance.

And that is something that we will focus on today.

But first, we have to take a closer look at fire itself.

Seeing Fire Everywhere

There is an interesting “side-effect” of this Dvar Torah. Now that I’m looking for fire, I’m seeing it everywhere. Well, in a lot of places.

For example, the Bris Bein HaBesari — aka the covenant between the pieces. G-d is “represented” by fire. Or, more accurately, a flame of fire:

וַיְהִ֤י הַשֶּׁ֙מֶשׁ֙ בָּ֔אָה וַעֲלָטָ֖ה הָיָ֑ה וְהִנֵּ֨ה תַנּ֤וּר עָשָׁן֙ וְלַפִּ֣יד אֵ֔שׁ אֲשֶׁ֣ר עָבַ֔ר בֵּ֖ין הַגְּזָרִ֥ים הָאֵֽלֶּה׃

And the sun came down, and there was a deep darkness, and behold — a smoking furnace and a flame of fire that passed between these pieces. (Bereishis 15:17)

Let me explain what I mean by “represented”. G-d is make a covenant with Avraham. Essentially, he is “signing” a contract. So, how does the Creator indicate that He is “signing”, by having a flame of fire pass between the parts.

Now, this becomes even more interesting when we note the Hebrew word which I translated as “flame”. it’s אֵ֔שׁ (lapid).

That same word is used at Har Sinai, in the context of the Ten Statements (aka Ten Commandments):

וְכׇל־הָעָם֩ רֹאִ֨ים אֶת־הַקּוֹלֹ֜ת וְאֶת־הַלַּפִּידִ֗ם וכו׳

And all the people saw the voices and the flames (הַלַּפִּידִ֗ם — halapidim)...

And it becomes even more interesting when we remember that G-d descended upon Har Sinai in fire:

וְהַ֤ר סִינַי֙ עָשַׁ֣ן כֻּלּ֔וֹ מִ֠פְּנֵ֠י אֲשֶׁ֨ר יָרַ֥ד עָלָ֛יו יְהֹוָ֖ה בָּאֵ֑שׁ וַיַּ֤עַל עֲשָׁנוֹ֙ כְּעֶ֣שֶׁן הַכִּבְשָׁ֔ן

And Mount Sinai was all in smoke because Hashem descended upon it in fire, and the smoke ascended like the smoke of a kiln...

And honestly, that reference to a kiln at Har Sinai reminds me of the smoking oven at the Bris Bein HaBesarim. In essence, a kiln and an oven are the same thing, the only difference is what is inserted — food or clay.

The key takeaway — G-d can (and is) represented by fire. Which is interesting. And which leads us to wonder — why?

Let’s keep looking.

G-d smote Sedom and Amora with fire and brimstone:

וַֽיהֹוָ֗ה הִמְטִ֧יר עַל־סְדֹ֛ם וְעַל־עֲמֹרָ֖ה גׇּפְרִ֣ית וָאֵ֑שׁ וכו׳

And Hashem rained upon Sedom and Amora brimstone and fire...

And as it was with Sedom and Amora, so it was with the Egyptians:

וַיֵּ֨ט מֹשֶׁ֣ה אֶת־מַטֵּ֘הוּ֮ עַל־הַשָּׁמַ֒יִם֒ וַֽיהֹוָ֗ה נָתַ֤ן קֹלֹת֙ וּבָרָ֔ד וַתִּ֥הֲלַךְ אֵ֖שׁ אָ֑רְצָה וַיַּמְטֵ֧ר יְהֹוָ֛ה בָּרָ֖ד עַל־אֶ֥רֶץ מִצְרָֽיִם׃ וַיְהִ֣י בָרָ֔ד וְאֵ֕שׁ מִתְלַקַּ֖חַת בְּת֣וֹךְ הַבָּרָ֑ד וכו׳

And Moshe stretched out his staff toward the heavens, and Hashem sent thunder and hail, and fire went down to the earth, and Hashem rained hail upon the land of Mitzrayim. And there was hail, and fire flashing within the hail...

This is a hard verse to translate. But what’s not difficult is that once again G-d rained fire upon those that He punished.

So, G-d is represented by fire. And G-d uses fire to punish.

And there is more.

We were commanded in Egypt to eat the Korban Pesach צְלִי־אֵ֣שׁ (tzeili esh — roasted by fire).

The Torah is called an אֵשׁ דָּת (eish dat) — a fiery law.

Yirmiyahu HaNavi talks about the word of G-d burning like a fire inside him (וְהָיָ֤ה בְלִבִּי֙ כְּאֵ֣שׁ בֹּעֶ֔רֶת).

And I’m sure we can find other examples.

But for now, I want to focus our attention on one specific example.

Where There’s Wood There’s Fire

Let’s go back to the Akeida. Note the command and how Avraham responds.

For starters, what exactly is Avraham supposed to do? He is to offer Yitzchak as an olah:

וְהַעֲלֵ֤הוּ שָׁם֙ לְעֹלָ֔ה

And offer him there as an olah. (Bereishis 22:2)

Like the olah of our parsha — the one that goes on the mokda (מוקדה). In other words, where there is an olah, there’s fire.

And sure enough, Avraham gets up in the morning, saddles his donkey and starts chopping wood:

וַיַּשְׁכֵּ֨ם אַבְרָהָ֜ם בַּבֹּ֗קֶר וַֽיַּחֲבֹשׁ֙ אֶת־חֲמֹר֔וֹ וַיִּקַּ֞ח אֶת־שְׁנֵ֤י נְעָרָיו֙ אִתּ֔וֹ וְאֵ֖ת יִצְחָ֣ק בְּנ֑וֹ וַיְבַקַּע֙ עֲצֵ֣י עֹלָ֔ה

And Avraham got up in the morning, saddled his donkey, and took with him two of his servants and Yitzchak his son, and he chopped wood for the olah. (Bereishis 22:3)

Wood. For the olah. Because an olah gets placed on the wood which is on the fire:

וְ֠נָתְנ֠וּ בְּנֵ֨י אַהֲרֹ֧ן הַכֹּהֵ֛ן אֵ֖שׁ עַל־הַמִּזְבֵּ֑חַ וְעָרְכ֥וּ עֵצִ֖ים עַל־הָאֵֽשׁ׃ וְעָרְכ֗וּ בְּנֵ֤י אַהֲרֹן֙ הַכֹּ֣הֲנִ֔ים אֵ֚ת הַנְּתָחִ֔ים אֶת־הָרֹ֖אשׁ וְאֶת־הַפָּ֑דֶר עַל־הָעֵצִים֙ אֲשֶׁ֣ר עַל־הָאֵ֔שׁ אֲשֶׁ֖ר עַל־הַמִּזְבֵּֽחַ׃

And the sons of Aharon the kohen shall put fire on the mizbeach and arrange wood on the fire, and the sons of Aharon the kohanim shall arrange the pieces, the head and the fat, on the wood that is on the fire that is on the mizbeach. (Vayikra 1:7)

Indeed, this is what the Kohanim do each and every morning:

וּבִעֵ֨ר עָלֶ֧יהָ הַכֹּהֵ֛ן עֵצִ֖ים בַּבֹּ֣קֶר בַּבֹּ֑קֶר וְעָרַ֤ךְ עָלֶ֙יהָ֙ הָֽעֹלָ֔ה

And the kohen shall burn wood on it in the morning, and arrange the olah on it. (Vayikra 6:9)

So here is Avraham Avinue, in the morning, chopping wood which he plans to place on the Mizbeach and kindle so that he can place the olah on top of it.

Three days later, and they see “the place” from a distance. Avraham takes the wood and gives it to Yitzchak to carry. Avraham has something else that he needs to bring — the fire (and something else):

וַיִּקַּ֨ח אַבְרָהָ֜ם אֶת־עֲצֵ֣י הָעֹלָ֗ה וַיָּ֙שֶׂם֙ עַל־יִצְחָ֣ק בְּנ֔וֹ וַיִּקַּ֣ח בְּיָד֔וֹ אֶת־הָאֵ֖שׁ וְאֶת־הַֽמַּאֲכֶ֑לֶת וַיֵּלְכ֥וּ שְׁנֵיהֶ֖ם יַחְדָּֽו

And Avraham took the wood of the olah and placed it upon Yitzchak his son, and he took in his hand the fire and the ma’acheles, and they both went together. (Bereishis 22:6)

Now, I haven’t translated that word הַֽמַּאֲכֶ֑לֶת (ma’acheles). Rashi (and the Rashbam), will soon enoug tell us that it’s a knife.

But I want to focus on something besides its meaning. I want to focus on its root: א-כ-ל (alef-kaf-lamed) — because we find that word associated with fire over and over again.

At Har Sinai, G-d’s honor (כבוד) is described as being like a consuming fire (אֵשׁ אֹכְלָה):

וּמַרְאֵה֙ כְּב֣וֹד יְהֹוָ֔ה כְּאֵ֥שׁ אֹכֶ֖לֶת בְּרֹ֣אשׁ הָהָ֑ר

And the appearance of the kavod of Hashem was like a consuming fire on the mountaintop. (Shemos 24:17)

Indeed, Moshe Rabbeinu himself describes G-d Himself as being an אֵשׁ אֹכְלָה (eish ochla) — a consuming fire:

כִּי יְהֹוָ֤ה אֱלֹהֶ֨יךָ֙ אֵ֣שׁ אֹכְלָ֔ה הוּא אֵ֖ל קַנָּֽא

For Hashem your G-d is a consuming fire, a jealous G-d. (Devarim 4:24)

At the Sneh, what is remarkable is the fact that the Sneh is not consumed (אֵינֶנּוּ אֻכָּל — einenu uchal) by the fire.

And remember that deshen (דֶּשֶׁן) that we discussed above? That deshen was created by the fire consuminig (אכל — achal) the olah on the mizbeach:

וְהֵרִים אֶת הַדֶּשֶׁן אֲשֶׁר תֹּאכַל הָאֵשׁ אֶת הָעֹלָה עַל הַמִּזְבֵּחַ וְשָׂמוֹ אֵצֶל הַמִּזְבֵּחַ

And he shall lift up the deshen that the fire has consumed of the olah upon the mizbeach, and place it beside the mizbeach. (Vayikra 6:3)

And so, here we are, on a mountain. Indeed, a mountain (Har Moriah) which is very much like Har Sinai. A mountain which will eventually become known as Har HaBayis.

And we have a mizbeach — like the mizbeach in the Mishkan and (eventually) in the Beis HaMikdash. And we are being told that Avraham took both the fire and that consuming item.

I get that it means a knife. Rashi gives two explanations for why it means a knife. But all these other associations tell me that it’s not for naught that the Torah uses this word in particular to refernce the knife.

And when we take a deeper look at the grammar of the word itself, we see something quite interesting. The root of the word is a three letter root: א-כ-ל (alef-kaf-lamed).

This seems common enough.

But look deeper, there seems to be a two letter root “hidden” within that three letter root: כ-ל (kaf-lamed).

A root which means completion, as in And G-d completed (וַיְכַ֤ל — vayechal) on the seventh the work he had done.

But a root that also means destruction, as in:

יַדְבֵּ֧ק יְהֹוָ֛ה בְּךָ֖ אֶת־הַדָּ֑בֶר עַ֚ד כַּלֹּת֣וֹ אֹֽתְךָ֔ מֵעַל֙ הָאֲדָמָ֔ה אֲשֶׁר־אַתָּ֥ה בָא־שָׁ֖מָּה לְרִשְׁתָּֽהּ׃

Hashem will cause the pestilence to cling to you, until it has completely finished you off from upon the land that you are coming there to inherit. (Devarim 28:21)

Indeed, the Malbim in his work Ayelet HaShachar directly relates the two words:

שפעל ‘אכל’ מציין פעולת האש עצמו שאוכל ומכלה את הגשם

The verb “achal” (אכל) indicates the action of the fire itself that eats and completley finishes a physical substance.

It’s as if the root itself is combined of a more fundamental (כל) with an alef as a prefix. Which seems to be one of the ways that Hebrew roots are formed (Rav Hirsch, I believe, has a theory about this).

Fire has the ability to totally and completely destroy something — so much so that at the end there basically nothing left. Indeed, whatever ash (deshen or efer) is left is utterly and totally devoid of any of the substance and essence that was previously there.

That makes sense by fire. But by a knife? Not as much so. True, we find the same root (א-כ-ל) used in reference to a sword (as Rashi and the Rashbam note):

וְחַרְבִּי תֹּאכַל בָּשָׂר

And my sword will eat flesh. (Yeshayahu 31:8)

But this usage is difficult — which may be why Rashi explains why a knife is called a ma’acheles:

וְשֶׁמַּכְשֶׁרֶת בָּשָׂר לַאֲכִילָה

Because it prepares the flesh for eating.

In other words, in its essence, a knife is not a ma’acheles. It does not consume. Rather, it enables consumption.

And who (or what) is the consumer? In our case here it is the fire on the mizbeach. Yet another time where in fire is “representing” G-d.

Put otherwise, the knife “prepares” the flesh to be totally and utterly destroyed on the mizbeach.

It will be consumed by fire, because that is what fire does. And that is what an olah is about — total and physical destruction of the physical substance of a given entity.

At the Akeida it was Yitzchak’s physical body that G-d had asked Avraham to destroy.

In the Mishkan, it is the physical body of the korban that is being totally and utterly consumed on the mizbeach.

And this is a quality that G-d Himself has. G-d is called an Eish Ochla (אֵשׁ אֹכְלָה) — a consuming fire.

Why? Well, perhaps this verse can give us a sense as to why:

וְעַתָּה֙ הַנִּ֣יחָה לִּ֔י וְיִֽחַר־אַפִּ֥י בָהֶ֖ם וַאֲכַלֵּ֑ם וְאֶֽעֱשֶׂ֥ה אוֹתְךָ֖ לְג֥וֹי גָּדֽוֹל

And now, leave me alone, and let my anger burn against them and I will consume them, and I will make you into a great nation. (Shemos 32:10)

At the Chet HaEgel, G-d was essentially asking Moshe to “allow” Him to totally and utterly destroy the Jewish people. We wouldn’t even be a footnote in a history book.

Totally and utterly gone. Essentially erased from existence. If anything remained, it would just be the ash of our previous existence. Nothing more.

Thus Moshe’s warning to the Jewish people:

הִשָּׁמְר֣וּ לָכֶ֗ם פֶּֽן־תִּשְׁכְּחוּ֙ אֶת־בְּרִ֤ית יְהֹוָה֙ אֱלֹ֣הֵיכֶ֔ם אֲשֶׁ֥ר כָּרַ֖ת עִמָּכֶ֑ם וַעֲשִׂיתֶ֨ם לָכֶ֥ם פֶּ֙סֶל֙ תְּמ֣וּנַת כֹּ֔ל אֲשֶׁ֥ר צִוְּךָ֖ יְהֹוָ֥ה אֱלֹהֶֽיךָ׃ כִּ֚י יְהֹוָ֣ה אֱלֹהֶ֔יךָ אֵ֥שׁ אֹכְלָ֖ה ה֑וּא אֵ֖ל קַנָּֽא

Guard yourselves, lest you forget the covenant of Hashem your G-d that He made with you, and you make for yourselves a carved image, a form of anything that Hashem your G-d commanded you not to. For Hashem your G-d is a consuming fire, a jealous G-d. (Devarim 4:23-24)

Be careful, says Moshe. G-d, in all His glory, has a certain destructive capacity to Him. Not a vindicative quality. Not a vengeful one. When fire destroys, it doesn’t do so out of mallace or spite. It does so because this is its nature if not handled properly.

Of course, fire can be of great benefit. And how much more so can a deep and meaningful relationship with the Creator of all that is.

But be careful. With that benefit comes a risk — the risk of total and utter destruction.

And so, we see here, this quality of fire. It’s destructive quality. And we see that it is that quality that we want on the Mizbeach.

And all we can wonder is, why?

Why would the Creator of all that is want us to use the ultimate destructive force when serving Him?

Why would that same G-d who planted a garden and place man there to work it and guard it, want us to use fire?

And why, on the place that would eventually become the replacement for that garden — the Beis HaMikdash — would He want us to use fire?

Why destruction in the heart of construction?

Construction or Destruction

All of the above is true — fire has the ability to destroy. But that is not all that fire can do.

Fire can cook. It can transform our food from something that we cannot eat, to something that can nourish and sustain us.

It can refine. It can take something that is impure and separate out the impurities, leaving behind something that is pure.

It can provide warmth when it is cold and light when it is dark.

In short, fire is a force. A powerful force that can be constructive or destructive — depending upon how we use it.

This is why it is such a good “representative” for G-d. It’s its combination of creative flexibility and destructive potential that makes it a fitting symbol for the Creator.

And the place where that is most clearly visible is on the mizbeach itself.

The mizbeach is not simply the place where we bring korbanos. It is also a source of other fires in their various forms.

The light of the Menorah is (one way or the other) sourced from the fire of the mizbeach.

The incense burns from coals taken from the fire of the mizbeach.

And the Kohen Gadol enters the Kadosh HaKadoshim with a fire pan (a מַחְתָּה) filled with coals taken from the fire of the mizbeach.

Put otherwise, you want to shine the light of Torah out to the world (the Menorah)? Then you need the fire of the mizbeach.

You want the unity and inner richness of the Torah (the incense)? Then you need the fire of the mizbeach.

You want the transformative power of teshuva on Yom Kippur (the machta)? Then you need the fire of the mizbeach.

In short, the destructive heart of the mizbeach is also the constructive source for much of the avoda of the Beis HaMikdash.

In short. If we really want to understand fire and its importance in the Torah — it seems like the mizbeach is the place to look.

Two Fires, One Altar

Up until this time, we have been talking about the fire on the mizbeach — as if there is one.

But, according to Rashi (based on Chazal) there were two fires on the mizbeach. The one that came down from heaven and the one that we (man) raise up to the altar:

אַעַ”פִּי שֶׁהָאֵשׁ יוֹרֶדֶת מִן הַשָּׁמַיִם מִצְוָה לְהָבִיא מִן הַהֶדְיוֹט

Even though fire descends from heaven, it is a mitzvah to bring from the ordinary — from human hands.

Two fires. One altar.

Interesting. And confusing.

Does anyone out there have any idea what a heavenly fire look like? Does it function any different?

In short, what is the difference between a heavenly fire and the earthly one that we bring?

Physically speaking, I don’t know. But there is another type of fire — the one that Yirmiyahu HaNavi mentioned — the fire of passion.

He talked about G-d’s word burning inside him like a fire.

That is an example of a heavenly fire.

And there are more like it.

The Meeting Point

G-d’s fire came down to Yirmiyahu and burned inside him.

This is the fire of truth and values.
Of meaning and purpose. Of principles and ideals.

These fires come down from heaven and inspire and move us. Both as individuals and as communities.

They are the fires of movements and ideologies.
Of schools of thoughts and worldviews.

They are lofty.
On high.
Intellectual.
Spiritual.

They are heavenly fires

The earthly fires are of a different nature.

There are our drives and desires. Our emotions and wants.

They are lowly. Animalistic. Base.

They are the earthly fires.

And we are commanded to lift these up onto the mizbeach where they can meet up with and connect to the heavenly fires.

In other words, both fires need to be on G-d’s altar. The fire of values and the fires of drives. That is the consuming fire we want — when are base, animalistic self is in sync with our higher, spiritual self.

Both alive. Both passionate. And both in sync with G-d’s will.

That is the fire that Aharon and his sons were commanded to place on the mizbeach. That is the fire that has to burn all night long — even in the most difficult times.

And that is the fire that we can never extinguish.

And if we learn to kindle that fire — then (and only then) can we kindle the other fires.

The flame of the menorah. The coals of the ketores. The fire pan of Yom Kippur.

It’s all there, sourced in the union of the earthly and heavenly fires.

Share masmid

We ended last time learning how much weight the word וַיִּקְרָא carries at the opening of the sefer. Not just that G-d called to Moshe — the word arrives loaded with context.

The immediate context is Sefer Shemos. The Sneh. The first time G-d calls directly to a human being — מִתּוֹךְ הַסְּנֶה. That is where the kriya begins for Moshe.

But the full context starts earlier. And what is striking is not how the word is used — but how it is not used.

G-d spoke to Avraham. He commanded Avraham. He appeared to Avraham.

As it was with Avraham, so it was with Yitzchak and Yaakov.

What we do not find is G-d calling to the Avos.

Or do we?

There is one time that it may be that G-d Himself calls to Avraham. It is toward the end of the Akeida — the moment when Avraham is about to sacrifice Yitzchak:

וַיִּקְרָא אֵלָיו מַלְאַךְ יְהוָה מִן־הַשָּׁמַיִם וַיֹּאמֶר אַבְרָהָם אַבְרָהָם וַיֹּאמֶר הִנֵּנִי׃

“And the angel of Hashem called to him from the heavens, and said: ‘Avraham, Avraham!’ And he said: ‘Here I am.’”

Was that HaKadosh Baruch Hu Himself? The mefarshim disagree. The Ramban reads it as an angel relaying G-d’s word. Rashi seems to treat the speaker as Hashem Himself. What it may represent is one unique moment — perhaps the only moment — when HaKadosh Baruch Hu called out to Avraham. Beyond that, He never called, never summoned, never invited any of the Avos.

Then there is Moshe. Hiding away in Midian. Shepherding the flocks. There, he sees a vision. And from within that vision, Elokim Himself (not a malach) calls out to him:

וַיִּקְרָא אֵלָיו אֱלֹהִים מִתּוֹךְ הַסְּנֶה וַיֹּאמֶר מֹשֶׁה מֹשֶׁה וַיֹּאמֶר הִנֵּנִי׃

“And G-d called to him from within the bush and said: ‘Moshe, Moshe!’ And he said: ‘Here I am.’”

And as it was at the Sneh, so it was at Har Sinai — except that at Sinai, it is Shem Havayah (יקוק) who calls to him:

וַיִּשְׁכֹּן כְּבוֹד־יְהוָה עַל־הַר סִינַי וַיְכַסֵּהוּ הֶעָנָן שֵׁשֶׁת יָמִים וַיִּקְרָא אֶל־מֹשֶׁה בַּיּוֹם הַשְּׁבִיעִי מִתּוֹךְ הֶעָנָן׃

“And the honor of Hashem rested upon Har Sinai, and the cloud covered it for six days, and He called to Moshe on the seventh day from within the cloud.”

And as we noted, that same cloud now covers the Mishkan. And Moshe is unable to enter on account of it.

‎And as it was at the Sneh and Har Sinai, so too it was at the Mishkan:

וַיִּקְרָא אֶל־מֹשֶׁה וַיְדַבֵּר יְהוָה אֵלָיו מֵאֹהֶל מוֹעֵד לֵאמֹר׃

“And He called to Moshe, and Hashem spoke to him from the Ohel Moed, saying.”

There is something about Moshe and being called.

Of course, as we noted, it may not only be Moshe. Avraham was also called. But it was only one time. And it’s not clear if it was Hashem who called him or a malach.

And if we look a little deeper, there is another prophet who was called: Shmuel HaNavi. And like Moshe, he was called in the Mishkan.

But that too was a one time event. One night. While asleep.

Avraham.
Moshe.
Shmuel.

What is the connection?

I have a guess.
The Mishkan/Beis HaMikdash.

After all, Avraham was on Har HaMoriah when Hashem (or the malach) called out to him.

And even those other two times that Hashem called to Moshe — at the sneh and Har Sinai. They too seem to share the same properties of the Mishkan, even if they aren’t physically the same place.

After all, as the Ramban notes, the Mishkan seems to be the continuation of Har Sinai. And as the pasuk tells us — Moshe was on Har Sinai when he saw the vision of the sneh.

So clearly, there is a Mishkan, calling connection. It’s not about the Mishkan per se — but about some property that the Mishkan has that it shares with the Beis HaMikdash and Har Sinai.

But what is that connection? And what are those properties?

A Puzzling Beginning

And so, we move on. But no further do we textually travel that we hit upon another puzzling fact.

Chazal often refer to Sefer VaYikra as Toras Kohanim — the laws of the Kohanim. And there is a simple reason for that — because much of Sefer VaYikra relates to laws that are relevant specifically to the Kohanim.

And that is particularly true with regards to the Mishkan. As we find out in Parshas Tzav:

וַיְדַבֵּ֥ר יְהֹוָ֖ה אֶל־מֹשֶׁ֥ה לֵּאמֹֽר׃ צַ֤ו אֶֽת־אַהֲרֹן֙ וְאֶת־בָּנָ֣יו לֵאמֹ֔ר זֹ֥את תּוֹרַ֖ת הָעֹלָ֑ה

And Hashem spoke to Moshe, saying: “command Aharon and his sons, saying: ‘this is the Torah of the Olah...”

It doesn’t get much clearer than this. Command Aharon and his sons — i.e., the Kohanim. Tell them that this is the Torah of the Olah. Put it all together — Toras Kohanim.

And it’s not just the Olah.

It’s also the Torah of the Mincha.
And the Torah of the Chatas.\ And of the Asham.\
And the Shlomim.

So far, so good.

But as I noted, all this is in Parashat Tzav. We are in Parshas Vayikra and in the very beginning of the Sefer that is known as Toras Kohanim, where we finally have the first Kriya to Moshe from within the Ohel Moed. Who does Hashem want to speak to?

Not the Kohanim.
Not Aharon and his sons.

No. He wants to speak to the entire nation.

דַּבֵּר אֶל בְּנֵי יִשְׂרָאֵל

Speak to B’nei Yisrael...

And what does he want to talk to them about?

About the Korban Olah.
And the Mincha.
And the Shelamim.
And the Chatas.
And the Asham.

The order is (slightly) different. But the subject matter is exactly the same.

Now this does not seem to make sense.

Why start with the Jewish people?
Indeed, why is he talking to them at all. After all, it is the Kohanim that do the essential avoda with the Korbanot.

They throw the blood on the Mizbeach. They put the Korban on the Mizbeach. They arrange the fire on the Mizbeach. And much, much more.

So why is he addressing the Jewish people about this at all? And why does he start with them?

Evidently, there is something about the korbanot that HaKadosh Baruch Hu wants the nation as a whole to know. Something that does not relate to the Torah of these korbanot.

What is that something?

A Different Word

But with just a little effort, we can see one clear distinction between what HaKodesh Baruch Hu has to tell the Kohanim and what he has to tell the Jewish people.

With regards to the Kohanim, it’s all about the Torah, as we mentioned above. It’s the Torah of the Olah. The Torah of the Minchah. And so on.

But with regards to the Jewish people — that word does not appear. Another word, takes its place.

אָדָ֗ם כִּֽי־יַקְרִ֥יב מִכֶּ֛ם קׇרְבָּ֖ן לַֽיהֹוָ֑ה

A man who will cause to come close a korban to Y-K-V-K...

Korban (קרבן)

A word which will remain untranslated for the time being.

Each and every time. By the Olah (as I just mentioned).

By the Minchah:

וְנֶ֗פֶשׁ כִּֽי־תַקְרִ֞יב קׇרְבַּ֤ן מִנְחָה֙ לַֽיהֹוָ֔ה

A soul who will cause to come close a korban Minchah to Y-K-V-K...

By the Shelamim:

וְאִם־זֶ֥בַח שְׁלָמִ֖ים קׇרְבָּנ֑וֹ אִ֤ם מִן־הַבָּקָר֙ ה֣וּא מַקְרִ֔יב אִם־זָכָר֙ אִם־נְקֵבָ֔ה תָּמִ֥ים יַקְרִיבֶ֖נּוּ לִפְנֵ֥י יְהֹוָֽה׃

And if a slaughtering of shelamim is his korban, if from the cattle he causes it to come close before Y-K-V-K...

And it’s even by the Chatas (and asham) — but we have to search a bit to find it:

אִ֣ם הַכֹּהֵ֧ן הַמָּשִׁ֛יחַ יֶחֱטָ֖א לְאַשְׁמַ֣ת הָעָ֑ם וְהִקְרִ֡יב עַ֣ל חַטָּאתוֹ֩ אֲשֶׁ֨ר חָטָ֜א פַּ֣ר בֶּן־בָּקָ֥ר תָּמִ֛ים לַיהֹוָ֖ה לְחַטָּֽאת

If the anointed Kohen will sin to the detriment of the people — he will cause to come close with regards to the sin that he committed, a bull from the cattle, unblemished, to Y-K-V-K for a sin offering...

So far we have two out of three:

1. coming close - וְהִקְרִ֡יב

2. Y-K-V-K (יקוק) — did you notice that Shem Havaya shows up each and every time.

But we don’t yet have the word Korban (קרבן). But it will show up. We just have to move past the Kohein HaMashiach and his Chatas — and move on to the Nasi and his chatas:

אֲשֶׁ֥ר נָשִׂ֖יא יֶֽחֱטָ֑א וְעָשָׂ֡ה אַחַ֣ת מִכׇּל־מִצְוֺת֩ יְהֹוָ֨ה אֱלֹהָ֜יו אֲשֶׁ֧ר לֹא־תֵעָשֶׂ֛ינָה בִּשְׁגָגָ֖ה וְאָשֵֽׁם׃ אֽוֹ־הוֹדַ֤ע אֵלָיו֙ חַטָּאת֔וֹ אֲשֶׁ֥ר חָטָ֖א בָּ֑הּ וְהֵבִ֧יא אֶת־קׇרְבָּנ֛וֹ שְׂעִ֥יר עִזִּ֖ים זָכָ֥ר תָּמִֽים׃

If a Nasi will sin and do one of all the mitzvos of Hashem his G-d that should not be done in error, and he is guilty — or if he is informed about his sin that he committed in it, and he will bring his korban, a male goat, unblemished...

But here, it basically ends. When it comes to the Korban Meilah, Korban Talui and (perhaps) the Korban Asham we lose our structure. No use of the word Korban. No statement that one is bringing the Korban close. Although Hashem (as always) is still there.

Why the difference? I don’t know — and we’ll have to leave that question for another time.

But all in all, the pattern is clear. For all the other korbanos there is a clear theme of coming close. Indeed, the idea of closeness is in the very root of the word that we all too often translate as “sacrifice” or “offering”.

קָרְבָּן (korban) comes from the root קרב (ק-ר-ב).

As Rav Hirsch points out, a korban is not something you give up. It is something that helps you draw close to HaKadosh Baruch Hu.

And it’s this facet of a korban that our parsha is emphasizing.

This is utterly different than next week’s parsha. There the focus is on the Torah of these korbanos. It is on the Kohanim’s responsibility.

But here, in our parsha, the focus is on coming close. Evidently, there is something about this moment which requires that we hold off on talking to the Kohanim and the laws that they need to know.

Closeness takes precedence.

Or, more accurately, closeness of the entire nation takes precedence.

And that closeness happens here, in the Mishkan. The Mishkan that has the cloud hovering over it. And into which Moshe is invited — via a kriah.

And in case you are wondering — yes, I do think that there is a connection between the kriah and the closeness.

Not Just Now

Moshe was invited into the cloud on Har Sinai via a Kriah. And if we think about it — there is something interesting about that kriah.

That kriah (the kriah to enter a cloud) was after the Aseres HaDibros and after the giving of the Mishpatim.

But it was before the laws about building the Mishkan.

Now that is interesting.

You want to learn about how to build a Mishkan? You need to be invited into a cloud to do so.

You want to learn about how to do the avodah in the Mishkan.
You need to be invited to do so.

Now that is fascinating. And I have absolutely no idea what it means. But I do have a hunch.

Let’s take a closer look at the first verse of our parshas — the verse that gives our sefer its name: Sefer VaYikra:

וַיִּקְרָ֖א אֶל־מֹשֶׁ֑ה וַיְדַבֵּ֤ר יְהֹוָה֙ אֵלָ֔יו מֵאֹ֥הֶל מוֹעֵ֖ד לֵאמֹֽר׃

“And He called to Moshe, and Hashem spoke to him from the Ohel Moed, saying.”

This verse seems simple enough — similar in nature and form to a thousand other verses like it.

But look again.

We’ll start with the first three words:

וַיִּקְרָ֖א אֶל־מֹשֶׁ֑ה

“And He called to Moshe...”

Still seems pretty simple, right? But one question — Who is speaking with Moshe?

We all know. It is Hashem, Y-K-V-K. But He is not mentioned yet.
No, that happens in the next clause:

וַיְדַבֵּ֤ר יְהֹוָ֙ה֙ אֵלָ֔יו

“And Y-K-V-K spoke to him...”

Now this is a bit strange. Why not combine it together. Something like this:

וַיִּקְרָ֖א י-ק-ו-ק אֶל־מֹשֶׁ֑ה מֵאֹ֥הֶל מוֹעֵ֖ד לֵאמֹֽר

“And Y-K-V-K called to Moshe from the Ohel Moed, saying...”

Now that would actually be simple. Straight and to the point. No extra pronouns, no unnecessary repetition.

But that’s not what happens. We break it up.

And He called to Moshe and Y-K-V-K spoke with him...

Why?

Another question. Take a look at this Rashi:

לְכָל דִּבְּרוֹת וּלְכָל אֲמִירוֹת וּלְכָל צִוּוּיִים קָדְמָה קְרִיאָה

Every dibbur, every amirah, every tzivuy was preceded by a kriya, a calling.

According to Rashi (based on Chazal), this kriah was not a one time event. Now, that is a beautiful idea — where did this idea come from? What proof is there for it.

There is nothing in the words that indicate it.

Or perhaps there is something we are missing.
Something hidden in the very structure of the verse itself.

It’s in the Words

Take a look at the following verse:

וַיֵּרָ֤א יְהֹוָה֙ אֶל־אַבְרָ֔ם וַיֹּ֕אמֶר

“And Y-K-V-K appeared to Avraham and said...”

Do you see anything noteworthy? No.

Okay, then let’s try this one:

וַיִּגַּ֥שׁ אַבְרָהָ֖ם וַיֹּאמַ֑ר

“And Avraham approached and said...”

Is that better?
Still no.

Okay, let’s try again.

וַתַּ֤הַר לֵאָה֙ וַתֵּ֣לֶד

“And Leah conceived and bore a son...”

I know, I don’t need to ask — it’s still not clear.

So let me try to present it a different way:

[action] [subject] [second action]

Or

[verb] [noun] [verb]

This is what I will call a linguistic template (if it has a technical name, I don’t know it). One that we can use for various different sentences of certain types.

Let me illustrate with an example.
We have a young baby (a yeled — יֶלֶד) named Yitzchak. And this yeled ends up doing two actions.

Action #1: He grows older Action #2: He is weaned from nursing

Same subject, two separate actions.
In that case, this is how Biblical Hebrew works.

First you mention the first action (the verb). Then you mention the subject (the noun). Then you mention the second action (the second verb).

And thus we have:

וַיִּגְדַּ֥ל הַיֶּ֖לֶד וַיִּגָּמַ֑ל

“And the child grew and was weaned...”

In other words, in this linguistic situation, use this grammatical form.

Linguistic situation: two actions done by one subject. Grammatical form: verb, noun, verb.

How do we know that it’s a rule. Because we see it time and time again. Look up above at the other three examples I gave above. They all follow this pattern. And, according to the Malbim (who is the source of this rule and these examples) this is the pattern we see time and again.

So, we have a rule.

And that means that we have a problem. Because take a look at our verse — not the words, but the structure.

One subject: Y-K-V-K.

I have to pause here and note that Moshe is not the subject of this verse. Rather, he is the object. The subject is the one doing the action. In this case, Hashem is the One who is calling and speaking.

Moshe is not doing either of those actions. Rather, he is the “recipient” of those actions. He is the one being called and the one being spoken to. That is what we mean (in grammatical terms) by the object.

So, let us return to our problem.

One subject: Y-K-V-K. Two actions: calling and speaking.

And we have one rule: [verb] [noun] [verb].

So we can easily plug this in:

וַיִּקְרָ֖א י-ק-ו-ק אֶל־מֹשֶׁ֑ה וַיְדַבֵּ֤ר אֵלָ֔יו

“And Y-K-V-K called to Moshe and spoke to him...”

If we follow our rule, then this is how the verse should be written.

And yet, that is not the structure of our verse. Our verse follows a rather different (and convoluted) structure:

[verb] [object] [verb] [noun] [object]

The structure is off. The object is needlessly repeated.

More importantly, the verse places the subject after the second verb as follows:

[verb] [verb] [noun]

And that breaks our rule of [verb] [noun] [verb].

So, the question is — what are we supposed to do with this?
We have two options.

Option #1: Shrug our shoulders and move on. Option #2: Look for an answer.

Option #1 is easier. But it keeps us locked in our ignorance.

So, we’ll go with option #2

Even if it takes time.
Even if it is hard.
Even if we have no idea where to start.

Rules and Variations

Above we noted a rule. And rules are set in stone.

But stones don’t have to have just one rule.

That was our initial problem. Yes, we have one subject. And yes, we have two actions. But that’s not always the whole story.

Yitzchak grew up. Very nice. He stopped nursing. Great.

How many times do you think that Yitzchak did this? My guess — once.
The same is true with Leah becoming pregnant and giving birth (as noted above). For this child, she became pregnant once and gave birth to him once.

Nothing out of the ordinary here.

But what if it’s a bit different. What if it’s not a one-off event. What if it’s something that recurs again and again. How does the language (read grammar) handle that?

One option, by switching up the order. And so, we have a variation to our rule.

Rule #1: all things equal, [verb] [noun] [verb] Rule #1b: if the actions are recurring, then [verb] [verb] [noun]

And this is what Chazal (and Rashi in their wake) is telling us. Let us retranslate our verse and see how it makes sense:

וַיִּקְרָ֖א אֶל־מֹשֶׁ֑ה וַיְדַבֵּ֤ר יְהֹוָ֙ה֙ אֵלָ֔יו

And Y-K-V-K would call to Moshe and say to him...

See that subtle switch I made in the translation? There is no Hebrew equivalent of the word “would”, so the language needs to find other methods of conveying the same idea.

I believe that one such method (there may be more than one) is this very switch in the order of the verbs and the noun. And I believe that this is why Rashi (following Chazal) is telling us that this was not a one time event. This was something that happened again and again.

I should note that the Malbim understands it slightly differently (see the appendix at the end of this article).

Of course, this verse is still part of a narrative flow. The anan (ענן) did cover the Mishkan. Moshe was (later on) invited in.

All of that is true.

But the way the narrative is being framed tells us something beyond that narrative flow. In our case, it is telling us that when Hashem spoke with Moshe, He always called him first.

And He did so because of His love and affection for us.

And that love — and that affection — they are crucial for understanding our parsha. Indeed, perhaps one can even say that this kriah here was a paradigmatic kriah — one that clearly shows just how much Hashem really loves us.

About that Narrative Flow

There is something that is bothering me.

I see how the Mishkan is parallel to Har Sinai. I see the connection. It is so clear — and so beautiful.

But (and I don’t mean to be blunt), what is the point? Why are we recreating Har Sinai?
I’m not against it. Love the idea.

But I want to understand it.
What is HaKadosh Baruch Hu trying to accomplish?

Remember, He told us that we should make a Mishkan so that He can dwell among us:

וְעָ֥שׂוּ לִ֖י מִקְדָּ֑שׁ וְשָׁכַנְתִּ֖י בְּתוֹכָֽם

“And they shall make for Me an inherently holy place, and I will dwell among them.”

As such, I assume that this facet of being a mini-Har Sinai relates somehow or other to that goal. I just want to know how.

And I already have in mind two ideas.

**Idea #1: ** Rabbi Yishmael. **Idea #2: ** Rabbi Akiva.

Idea number one is, in some ways, easy. It’s the notion that there are more mitzvahs to receive. HaKadosh Baruch Hu has more Torah to reveal to us. Not every one of the 613 mitzvahs was given to Moshe on Har Sinai.

Yes, we got the 10 Statements (aka the Ten Commandments). And yes, we got Parshas Mishpatim. And yes, we got the laws about building the Mishkan.

But there is so much more that we did not get:

We didn’t get the laws of the korbanos. We didn’t get the laws of arayos. We didn’t get the laws of the legal and judicial system.

So, for example, during the Ten Statements (aka the Ten Commandments) we got the commandment to not commit adultery. We usually see this as a specific prohibition to do a specific action.

But it may be what I call a paradigmatic example.

A paradigmatic example is when the Torah uses a particular example of a particular Mitzva as a means of representing an entire class of Mitzvos. In that case, adultery would be representative of illicit marital relations. And it would be singled out because it is the most common method by which people violate this class of prohibitions.

The same would be true of not murdering. Not murdering would not be mentioned in the Ten Commandments as an isolated prohibition, but as an example of a class of prohibitions against causing physical harm to another human being.

It would be singled out because it is the most extreme form of causing physical harm to someone else.

And this would fit in quite nicely with the chazal that teaches us that not stealing is about kidnapping, which is the most extreme form of stealing we can imagine.

As such, these mitzvahs and others given at Har Sinai would be considered general principles rather than specific details. And, says Rabbi Yishmael, it was only in the Ohel Moed that the details of these prohibitions got specified.

So, for example, it’s only in the Ohel Moed that we get the full list of prohibited marital relations. Only there do we learn about incest, homosexuality, and bestiality.

And therefore we need the mishkan.

Because without the Mishkan we cannot get the full Torah. And without the full Torah, HaKadosh Baruch Hu cannot fully dwell among us.

And so we have the cloud and we have the calling. And as I still hope to show, we have the fire — although I don’t know if I’ll show it this week. Hopefully, at the very latest, next week.

This seems to me, in some ways, the easiest and most straightforward reading of the narrative that we’ve been following. It would map perfectly to what we have read so far. The mitzvahs are revealed in the Torah in the order and at the time that they were given.

For example, in Egypt we already got the laws about the sanctification of the month (aka Kiddush HaChodesh).

Later on at Marah, we got various parshas of the Torah to study and learn. And those particular parshas were fleshed out during the Ten Commandments in Parshas Mishpatim.

Then, after that, Moshe goes up to Har Sinai for forty days and forty nights — not to get the full Torah. Rather, to get the laws of building the Mishkan, which is the next step in our redemptive process.

And now that the Mishkan is built, we now need to get the rest of the Torah.

Which is why the luchos are in the Aron HaKodesh. And why the keruvim are on top of the luchos.

So that between those keruvim on that Aron with those luchos, HaKadosh Baruch Hu can reveal to us the rest of the Torah.

And thus, ויקרא.

But what about Rabbi Akiva?

According to Rabbi Akiva, it was not just the general legal principles that were given on Har Sinai. No, the Torah in its entirety was given at Har Sinai. Details and all.

True, it is not presented that way, but that’s an issue of narrative presentation, not about what historically happened.

Okay, fine.

I hear the idea, but why? Why present it this way? What are we being told?

What is the point of this particular narrative presentation as understood by Rabbi Akiva?

The answer to that question is hidden within the Mishkan itself.

A House and a Home

The Mishkan, as we know, is the desert version of what is eventually going to be known as the base of the Beis Hamikdash (בית המקדש) -- the Inherently Holy House.

It’s the word Beis (בית, house) that I want to focus on.

A house, in my definition, is just a structure — a structure with potential. A house can become a home if one takes advantage of it. If there is love in the home, caring, connection, growth.

Or, put otherwise, if the people who are living in a house are close to one another; then you have a home.

But more often than not, people do not begin close to one another. They may desire to have that closeness. They may want to build a home. But they are who they are at that moment when they begin.

They’re different. They lack understanding. They have emotions and desires and drives which aren’t in sync with the other members of the home.

And so if one wants to build a home, there’s a certain type of work that one has to do. It’s the work of coming close.

Of learning to understand the other. Of modifying oneself so that one can connect to and live with the other.

With that said, let’s take a look at our home away from home. Our true home, in the Jewish sense of the word, is the Beis Mikdash on Har HaBayis in Yerushalayim in Eretz Yisrael.

But we aren’t yet in Eretz Yisrael. We can’t build up Yerushalayim, let alone build a Beis Hamikdash. But that doesn’t mean we can’t build a home.

A home needs a structure.
And if that means that we have to build the equivalent of a rental unit or a vacation home, so be it.

It still can be a place where we can all live and grow together. And by “all”, I mean G-d and the Jewish people.

And so we build the Mishkan. And the holiness of the Mishkan is in its name itself.

The name מִשְׁכָּן (Mishkan) comes from the root שׁ-כ-נ — meaning to dwell. The Mishkan is the dwelling place of the Shechinah — aka the Divine Presence. It is the place where G-d meets the Jewish people.

But how does that work? What makes the Mishkan such a place. We have already partially touched upon that — the luchos.

The luchos I’ve been calling the ten statements, because that’s the most accurate English translation. They are commonly known in English as the Ten Commandments, which is also defensible.

For our purposes here, though, I would like to introduce a new, more literary translation — the Ten Principles. We noted above the idea of a paradigmatic example. Built within these ten statements or these ten commandments are ten categories of laws which encompass the Torah as a whole. Rashi already notes this in the name of Rav Saadia Gaon.

How that works fully is beyond the scope of this article, but it’s there. We’ve already seen a few examples. Here’s a few more:

• Shabbos as the paradigmatic example of all the Moadim (holidays).

• Not having other gods as the paradigmatic example of all the prohibitions against idolatry.

• Not bearing false witness as the paradigmatic example of having an honest court system.

Of course, this is only a partial list and I have not fully made my case yet. But for now, I think this suffices. The point right now is not so much how the Ten Principles encompass the entire Torah, but that they do. The how will have to be fleshed out another time.

So, principles in hand (and heart and mind), we build an Aron to house these ten Torah-encompassing principles.

We place it in the holy of the holies — the place that is the most sanctified. Because it’s the place where you can most clearly see G-d. And, by extension, where G-d can most clearly see us.

We put that into a mishkan. In short, it is, for lack of a better word, a shrine to the principles and values and ideals of the Torah.

But just like a home, all we have right now is potential. We have the values. We have the ideals. We have even the details, but there’s something that’s still lacking: the ability to live it, to put into practice those ideals and those details that we so deeply cherish.

It is like a man and a woman getting married and wanting to start a home. Do they yet know how to actually and truly love and care for each other? Are they ready at that moment to actually love and parent their children?

The desire is there, but is the ability there? Often times yes and often times no. I think most often yes and no. We begin with certain capabilities but also with certain limitations. If we want to build a home, we have to sharpen our capabilities and develop them while dealing with and working on our limitations. As it is in our everyday homes, so too it is in our home away from home.

It’s not enough to build the shrine. It’s not enough to say we will do and we will hear. We need to work on the transformation. We need to become the people who can actually live what we desire and profess to be.

And that is where our Parsha comes in. Our Parsha is the next stage in the journey.

The journey begins with the initial desire to be committed. With the naaseh (נעשה) without the v’nishmah (ונשמע).

It then moves on to the initial listening — the hearing of the Ten Principles (or, at the very least, the first two).

It then continues with an actual commitment. We hear more fully what is involved and then we add the v’nishmah — naaseh v’nishmah (נעשה ונשמע).

And then we build our home — the Mishkan.
And like a couple who hangs their kesubah on the wall of their home, we place the Aron with the luchos at the heart of the Mishkan.

And if we look, we see this is the narrative flow of Sefer Shemos leading up to Sefer Vayikra. The Torah isn’t giving us a chronology of what happened and when. It’s laying out the process — the transformation — that had to take place. For Rabbi Yishmael, sequence means chronology. For Rabbi Akiva, sequence means process. That (may be) how he reads the narrative of the Torah.

And with this said, we’re now ready to go back and re-read the opening of Sefer Vayikra.

Ready to Begin

So the Mishkan is built, and the cloud is hovering above it. We’ll take a second to talk about that cloud, not in any sort of depth and not fully. Rather, we’ll just touch upon one aspect of the cloud andleave a fuller explanation for another time.

It’s a hot day. You’re traveling — outside.
For hours at a time. Day after day.

It’s difficult. It’s tiring. Even dangerous.

And then a cloud appears. There’s still light. But a much more pleasant light.

This type of cloud is an act of caring. As such, the cloud can also be a sign of love. And that sign is what hovered over the Mikdash.

And then comes the loving call: “Moshe, Moshe”. And Moshe enters. This is the context. It’s the love. It’s the desire to have not just a house, but a home.

As such, we begin Sefer Vayikra not with the Kohanim, but with Am Yisrael. At the end of the day, the Mishkan is not about the Kohanim. The Kohanim work there, but they are not the focus or the purpose.

The focus and purpose of the Mishkan is so that Hashem will dwell among us — the Jewish people. The Kohanim are the facilitators. But they can only facilitate if we — the Jewish people — are ready, willing, and able.

And therefore, with that first call, HaKadosh Baruch Hu lays out the essence of what we are supposed to do with the Mishkan — transform. Or, in the language of the Torah, to becoming close to HaKadosh Baruch Hu.

So what does it mean to come close?

The answer laws within the very structure of the Mishkan itself.

The heart and soul of the Mishkan are the luchos. Which is to say that the values and principles of the Torah are the heart and soul of the Mishkan.

And that is the key. Let’s see how.

Did we follow Hashem into the desert? Check. Did we pldge our allegiance to Him and His Torah? Check. Did we make the covenant? Check.

How about the Mishkan?

Did we donate our time? Check. Did we donate our efforts? Check. Did we donate our skills? Check.

In short, we are inspired, dedicated and committed.

All of that is necessary. But it is not sufficient.

Let’s take a trip into the future (not our future, our ancestors future).

We are past the Makos. Past Yam Suf. Past Har Sinai. Past building the Mishkan. Past entering the land.

And it is Tuesday.
What, you might ask, is so special about Tuesday?

Absolutley nothing! And that is the point.

Tuesday is Moshe speak for a regular day. And the question we need to ask is what then. How are we on a regular day?

When things are going well — or not.
When we are in a good mood — or not.
When we are inspired — or not.

What happens when those thoughts enter our mind. You know, the thoughts that we don’t tell anyone about. The thoughts that we wish we didn’t have?

And what about those desires?
What happens when those inner drives hit and urge us to do that what we should not do — or not do that which we should?

And ditto goes for our emotions or habits (good and bad) and everything else that keeps us from actually living the principles of the Torah — in all their details.

If you are a human being reading this, then you know what I’m talking about. You know that it’s easy to talk the talk, but not always easy to walk the walk.

But that’s not the end of the story. Rather, it is the beginning.

Relationships have to be built. Because each of us start as we are — not as who we need to be. In the context of marriage, it means that we don’t always speak as we want. We aren’t always there for each other. We don’t always do what we need to do and often times we do what we should not do.

But if we are dedicated to the relationship, then we work on it. We learn how to become the person we need to be in order to develop the relationships that we want to have.

And that is how it is with HaKadosh Baruch Hu.

Entering a relationship with G-d, means that Tuesdays will not be easy. We will find that we aren’t always as in sync with G-d and His will as we originally thought. That we have drives that we don’t know how to deal with and thoughts that we don’t know what to do with.

Or, put otherwise, there are G-d’s principles and values — and there are our thoughts, desires and emotions. And they need not be in sync. Often times they are not.

And, as such, we are distant from G-d and need to find a way to come close. As it says in Pirkei Avos — make G-d’s will your will.

How? By doing the work to align yourself with G-d’s principles and values. Because that is what G-d wants — for us to live these values (not merely preach them).

As such, we have the karbonot.

We have the Korban Olah, which is about dealing with our inappropriate thoughts and those positive commandments (our responsibilities) that we failed to fulfill.

We have the Korban Mincha — which I have to admit may be connected to the manna and the shulchan (an idea I hope to develop further some time in the future). But it may (also?) be a poor man’s version of an ola.

We have the Shelamim. Not 100% sure about this one. What I would like to say is that the Shelamim is about learning how to live with each other (aka peace). And it is about being complete and whole — to further devloping those Torah and Mitzvos that I most readily resonate with while dealing with and shoring up those areas where I struggle.

We have the Korban Chatat, which relates to what we did wrong. Not to the things that we purposely did wrong, but rather to those commandments that we didn’t want to violate, but inadvertantly did so.

In short, when we want to work on the relationship. We take something of value and bring it to the opening of the Mishkan (אֶל־פֶּ֜תַח אֹ֤הֶל מוֹעֵד֙) — the shrine of G-d’s values — and work on transforming us into the people that G-d (and we) want to be.

The Music of Closeness

One last example.

Imagine someone who doesn’t know how to play piano. Indeed, he has never once set a single finger on a single key.

You hand them a book on how to play piano. It is a gem of a book. It doesn’t just teach how to play the piano, but everything that could possibly be related.

The history of pianos. How to make pianos. How to fix them. Music theory. How to write songs. The various different styles of music. And — of course — how to actually play the piano.

And this man, genius that he is, reads and masters the entire book. He knows it backwards and forwards.

But he still has never set a single finger on a single key.

All knowledge, no training.

Now, let’s introduce him to an actual piano. We’ll seat him at the best there is — in carnegie hall. In front of a crowd of thousands.

How do you think he would do? How long until you — and everyone else — walk out?

Perhaps you’ll stay out of kindess. Perhaps you’ll leave out of kindness.

I don’t know.
But what I am sure about is that he won’t be playing the piano. He can’t.

He never trained himself.

True, all his knowledge helps. It can aid him tremendously in his development. But only if he at some point actually plays.

Which means hitting the wrong note. Playing the wrong chord. Losing rhytm.

And all the other mistakes that naturally come with getting better.

The analogy is clear. The Torah is the book.
The Mishkan is the piano.
The Korbanot are the training sessions. Our life is the concert. And Hashem is the One who keeps inviting us to play.

וַיִּקְרָא

Appendix: The Malbim’s Reading of Vayikra 1:1

In the article above, we noticed that the structure of our verse is unusual. The subject (Hashem) appears after the second verb, not between the two verbs where we would expect it. We suggested that this change in word order signals a recurring action — that Hashem would call to Moshe every time He spoke with him, not just this once.

The Malbim, in his commentary on Vayikra 1:1, notices the same problem — but reads it differently. Here is his approach, step by step.

The Rule

The Malbim establishes a rule of Biblical Hebrew grammar. When one subject performs two actions, the standard word order is:

[verb] [subject] [verb]

He brings several examples:

וַיֵּרָא יְהוָה אֶל־אַבְרָם וַיֹּאמֶר

“And Hashem appeared to Avram and said...” (Bereishis 12:7)

וַיִּגַּשׁ אַבְרָהָם וַיֹּאמַר

“And Avraham approached and said...” (Bereishis 18:23)

וַיִּגְדַּל הַיֶּלֶד וַיִּגָּמַל

“And the child grew and was weaned...” (Bereishis 21:8)

In each case: first verb, then the subject (the person doing the actions), then the second verb. That is the normal pattern.

The Problem

Now look at our verse:

וַיִּקְרָא אֶל־מֹשֶׁה וַיְדַבֵּר יְהוָה אֵלָיו

If we follow the rule, it should read:

וַיִּקְרָא יְהוָה אֶל־מֹשֶׁה וַיְדַבֵּר אֵלָיו

“And Hashem called to Moshe and spoke to him...”

But instead, the subject (יְהוָה) is pushed past both verbs to the end. The Malbim calls this a סֵרוּס — a displacement, an inversion. And he says: the Torah does not invert its language without reason.

What the Displacement Means

The Malbim explains that Chazal have a consistent principle for reading such displacements. When the subject is pushed past both verbs, it fuses the two actions together. It teaches that the two actions were alike in some way — and therefore the Torah presses them close together, with no space between them.

He brings a proof from Bereishis Rabbah on the verse about Sarah:

וַתַּהַר וַתֵּלֶד שָׂרָה לְאַבְרָהָם

“And she conceived and bore — Sarah — to Avraham” (Bereishis 21:2)

The subject (שָׂרָה) is pushed to the end. Chazal derive: just as the birth was certainly from Avraham, so too the conception was from Avraham and from no one else. The displacement equates the two actions.

Another example, about Lavan:

וַיֵּלֶךְ וַיָּשָׁב לָבָן לִמְקוֹמוֹ

“And he went and returned — Lavan — to his place” (Bereishis 32:1)

The subject (לָבָן) is pushed past both verbs. Chazal derive: the going and the returning were immediate and inseparable. The moment Lavan turned away from Yaakov, he returned to his old ways.

Applied to Our Verse

The Malbim applies the same principle here. The kriya (calling) and the dibbur (speaking) are pressed together — inseparable. The calling is not an introduction or a preliminary. It is part of the speaking itself. Every dibbur had a kriya bound to it.

As the Malbim puts it: the Torah placed the subject after both verbs to teach that the kriya was תְּכוּפָה — pressed close — to the dibbur, and was a part of it. There cannot be a dibbur without a kriya.

This is slightly different from the reading we offered in the article. We suggested the word order signals that the action was recurring — that it happened again and again. The Malbim’s reading is that the word order signals fusion — that the two actions are inseparable. In both readings, the result is the same: every time Hashem spoke to Moshe, He first called to him. But the mechanism is different. We read recurrence into the grammar. The Malbim reads inseparability.

Share masmid

We are at the end of Sefer Shemos, and I want to take a step back and look at the sefer as a whole. Not to construct a single grand theory — that’s a bit ambitious — but to trace several themes that run through it, connecting the beginning to the center to the end, and into the opening of Sefer Vayikra. The goal is to see whether the sefer has an architecture, and whether that architecture reveals something we might otherwise miss.

To do that, I want to start in the center.

There are forty chapters in Sefer Shemos. Chapters 19, 20, 21 — the giving of the Torah at Har Sinai, the Aseres HaDibros, the beginning of Parshas Mishpatim — sit at the physical center of the sefer. I believe they also sit at the conceptual center. So we will begin there and radiate outward — backwards into the story of the Exodus, forward into the Mishkan — until the structure of the whole sefer begins to emerge.

The Destination

Let’s begin with a simple observation.

When Bnei Yisrael arrive at Midbar Sinai, something happens that has not happened at any other stop on their journey: וּמֹשֶׁה עָלָה אֶל הָאֱלֹהִים — Moshe went up to the Divinity (19:3).

Two things are remarkable about this.

First, note what it says and what it doesn’t say. It doesn’t say Moshe went up to the mountain. It says he went up to Elokim — to the Divinity. This sounds like a spiritual ascent. Perhaps he physically went up the mountain to aid him in his spiritual elevation, but the ascent itself seems spiritual in nature.

Second — and this is crucial — no one told him to do it. There was nothing he was reacting to. No crisis, no complaint, no instruction from Hashem. Moshe, on his own volition, decided to have a spiritual ascent. And then, from the mountain, Hashem calls out to him: וַיִּקְרָא אֵלָיו ה׳ מִן הָהָר.

This is unlike any of the other stops made until now.

Trace the journey that brought them here. From Ramses to Sukkos, from Sukkos to Eisam, through the Yam Suf to Midbar Shur, Marah, Eilim, Midbar Sin, Refidim — at every stop along the way, there are crises: no water, no food, quarreling. And at every stop, Moshe responds. He cries out to Hashem, he is given solutions, he deals with whatever arises. But he never initiates. There is no stop at which Moshe, on his own, unprompted, goes up to the Divinity.

Until Sinai.

At Sinai, unprompted, uninstructed, Moshe goes up. Why?

Because this was always the destination.

Go back to the very beginning. At the sneh, on this very mountain, Hashem told Moshe: בְּהוֹצִיאֲךָ אֶת הָעָם מִמִּצְרַיִם תַּעַבְדוּן אֶת הָאֱלֹהִים עַל הָהָר הַזֶּה — When you take this nation out of Mitzrayim, you will serve the Divinity on this mountain (3:12).

Isn’t that interesting? The verse says they will serve Ha’Elokim (האלהים) — the Divinity. And what did Moshe just do? He went up el Ha’Elokim (אל האלהים) — to the Divinity. The same word. Moshe knew exactly where they needed to go, and when he returns here, he knows exactly what he needs to do. The other places were just stops on the way. This is the destination.

The Proposal

It’s not just Moshe who knows what to do. HaKadosh Baruch Hu also knows exactly what He needs to do. He needs to talk to the Jewish people. He needs to get a message to them, and Moshe is the one to deliver it. So after Moshe rises up towards God, God calls to Moshe. We need to take note of that word kriyah (קריאה) — what it means for God to call Moshe — but He does so. And when He does, He tells Moshe there is a message he has to give to the Jewish people.

That message begins with two words: ko somar (כה תאמר). We need to remember those two words. They are going to come back.

כֹּה תֹאמַר לְבֵית יַעֲקֹב וְתַגֵּיד לִבְנֵי יִשְׂרָאֵל

Thus shall you say to Beis Yaakov, and tell to Bnei Yisrael.

Two different verbs — tomar (תאמר) and tageid (תגיד). Ko somar suggests a precise formulation, almost a direct quote. Tageid, from the root of Haggadah (הגדה), suggests something more expansive: relate, discuss, tell the story. There is both a message and a conversation about that message.

So what is it that God wants to tell the Jewish people? It starts with another two words: atem re’isem (אתם ראיתם). We have to remember those two words also. They too are going to come up again — and in fact, they are going to come up in conjunction with ko somar. “Thus you shall say” and “all of you have seen” are going to appear together a second time. For now, we’ll see what HaKadosh Baruch Hu wants them to see right now.

אַתֶּם רְאִיתֶם אֲשֶׁר עָשִׂיתִי לְמִצְרָיִם — You have seen what I did to Mitzrayim.

וָאֶשָּׂא אֶתְכֶם עַל כַּנְפֵי נְשָׁרִים וָאָבִא אֶתְכֶם אֵלָי — And I bore you on eagles’ wings and brought you to Me.

God says to the Jewish people: you’ve seen what I did to Mitzrayim. You’ve seen the ten makos (מכות). You’ve seen Yam Suf (ים סוף). But it’s not just what I did to Mitzrayim. You’ve also seen how quickly I brought you here — to Me. I bore you on eagles’ wings. And you’ve seen and noted that.

And then the crucial word: וְעַתָּה — And now. Now that you’ve seen what I did in Egypt, and now that you’ve seen that I brought you to Me — you have an opportunity.

אִם שָׁמוֹעַ תִּשְׁמְעוּ בְּקֹלִי וּשְׁמַרְתֶּם אֶת בְּרִיתִי — If you listen to My voice and guard My covenant...

וִהְיִיתֶם לִי סְגֻלָּה מִכָּל הָעַמִּים — You will be a treasure to Me from among all the nations.

וְאַתֶּם תִּהְיוּ לִי מַמְלֶכֶת כֹּהֲנִים וְגוֹי קָדוֹשׁ — And you will be for Me a kingdom of priests and a holy nation.

If you listen to My voice and you guard My covenant, you will end up being more precious to Me than any other nation in the world. That’s what segulah (סגולה) means — essentially a type of treasure that one holds dear and stores away. You will also be a mamleches kohanim (ממלכת כהנים) — a kingdom of priests, we’ll translate it as priests for now — and a goy kadosh (גוי קדוש), a holy nation, a holy unit.

Obviously, listening to God’s voice and keeping His covenant are quite important. It would be nice, therefore, if we knew what He meant. Which voice are we listening to? Which covenant are we keeping? Is it the voice that God is about to speak to us, or a different voice that we’ve already heard? Is it a covenant that He’s going to make with us, or a covenant that He’s already made with our forefathers?

We don’t know yet. But as we’ll see, it seems that the Jewish people do have an idea.

Now, we are not yet sure what mamleches kohanim means. But goy kadosh — we have an idea. We have our working hypothesis of the word kadosh (קדוש). Something kadosh is something that, when you see or interact with it, helps you to think of and be aware of God — or helps God to be aware of and think of you. Says HaKadosh Baruch Hu: if you will listen to My voice and you guard My bris, you, as a nation, as a unit, will be holy. People will see you, and by seeing you they’ll see Me.

How? How is that going to happen?

I would like to suggest that it has to do with mamleches kohanim. You’ll be a kingdom of priests. Now, usually priests are a subclass within a kingdom. A whole nation of priests — that is what people are going to see, and by seeing that, they’re going to see God. But what does it mean to be a kingdom of priests?

“Priest” is probably the wrong word. A kohen (כהן) does a type of service, a job — perhaps a holy job — for God. Within the Jewish people, the kohanim are the assistants who work in the Beis HaMikdash (בית המקדש). They help bring the korbanos (קרבנות), they help people bring their bikurim (ביכורים), and the like. They do a particular service for God. So too, says HaKadosh Baruch Hu, the entire nation can do a particular job that God needs done — if we will listen to His voice and guard His covenant.

Putting it all together: the Jewish people are given the opportunity to become segulah mikol ha’amim — precious, more desired than every other nation — and a kingdom of priests who do some service or job for God. And by becoming these priests, they become a holy unit. Even if there are individuals within the nation who are not so holy, as a unit they will be holy. And this will help other people to see God Himself.

Moshe comes and he thoroughly explains this concept, this proposal from God, to the elders of the Jewish people. How do we know he did it thoroughly? Because it says: וַיָּשֶׂם לִפְנֵיהֶם אֵת כָּל הַדְּבָרִים הָאֵלֶּה — he placed before them all of these words. We’ve seen that phrase — tasim lifneihem (תשים לפניהם) — before. It appears at the beginning of Parshas Mishpatim: וְאֵלֶּה הַמִּשְׁפָּטִים אֲשֶׁר תָּשִׂים לִפְנֵיהֶם. Without going into all the details here — we’ll get to that shortly — it means that Moshe made sure they thoroughly understood what they were getting themselves into.

And the response? As a whole, as a unified whole, the nation said: כֹּל אֲשֶׁר דִּבֶּר ה׳ נַעֲשֶׂה — Everything that Hashem speaks, we will do.

Moshe returned these words of the nation to Hashem. He told Him what they said.

Preparation and Revelation

Moshe has gone up to the Divinity. Hashem has made His offer. The Jewish people have accepted it. What more do we need?

We need to make sure that commitment sticks.

God says to Moshe:

הִנֵּה אָנֹכִי בָּא אֵלֶיךָ בְּעַב הֶעָנָן — Behold, I am coming to you in the thickness of a cloud.

The anan (ענן) — the cloud — is another word we are going to pay careful attention to. It’s going to come up again and again.

We may not understand why specifically a cloud, and why specifically a thick cloud. But however that works, whatever that means, HaKadosh Baruch Hu explains why it’s going to be this way: it’s so that the nation can hear Hashem having a conversation with Moshe.

I want to introduce here a close cousin to the working hypothesis, which I’ll call the working understanding. I believe the difference between the word amirah (אמירה) and devarim (דברים) is that amirah is something like a statement and devarim is something like a conversation. This is not a hypothesis; it’s what I remember from what the Radak says, I believe cited by the Malbim. I don’t have time to check and verify it right now, so I’ll work with it because I think it works well in many, many verses.

That would be what Hashem is saying to Moshe right now. I’m going to have a conversation with you — b’dabri imach (בדברי עמך). I want the Jewish people to overhear that conversation. I want them to hear Me speak with you. In order to do that, though, that conversation has to be within the thickness of a cloud. Why? We don’t know. We’ll just accept that for now.

וְגַם בְּךָ יַאֲמִינוּ לְעוֹלָם — And they will also be loyal to you forever.

So we understand why Hashem needs to speak to Moshe in a thick cloud — because that will enable the Jewish people to hear Hashem have a conversation with him. But why is it important for the nation to hear that?

I think that’s what the continuation of the verse means: so that they will believe in you forever. That word gam (גם) — “also” — makes me think there’s some value in just the hearing and the conversation itself. But beyond any value that exists there, there is this very real need for the Jewish people to trust and believe in Moshe forever.

Why? Why is that so important?

Because God’s word is going to travel through Moshe Rabbeinu. If we don’t trust that Moshe Rabbeinu is delivering God’s word, then that word will never reach us. It doesn’t matter how faithful a servant he is. It doesn’t matter how accurately he transmits what God says, or how deeply he understands God’s word. If we don’t trust him, we won’t pay attention to it. God needs us to trust Moshe, and therefore God needs us to hear Him have a conversation with Moshe.

Or, to put it into the context of what we’re talking about in this chapter: if the Jewish people are committed to hearing what God’s voice is, they have to know that they’re hearing God’s voice. And so they have to hear the conversation.

That is Hashem’s plan: they will hear. Note the verb. The nation will hear Hashem speaking with Moshe, and that hearing will produce emunah (אמונה).

At this point, we would think we go to the next stage of the back-and-forth between God and Moshe, Moshe and the Jewish people. But instead, Moshe has a strange response. The verse tells us:

וַיַּגֵּד מֹשֶׁה אֶת דִּבְרֵי הָעָם אֶל ה׳ — and Moshe told over the words of the nation to Hashem.

He just did that one second earlier. Before God told him about having this conversation that the people could overhear, Moshe had returned the words of the nation: וַיָּשֶׁב מֹשֶׁה אֶת דִּבְרֵי הָעָם אֶל ה׳. Now it’s the exact same sentence, except that instead of the word vayashev (וישב) we have vayageid (ויגד).

Without even knowing the precise difference between the two words, there must be some noticeable distinction — either a significantly different way of presenting it, a stronger way of presenting it, or some other distinction we don’t yet understand. Moshe evidently does something different this time, and Hashem takes it rather seriously.

He says: go to the nation. Sanctify them today and tomorrow. Launder their clothes. Let them be ready for the third day, כִּי בַּיּוֹם הַשְּׁלִישִׁי יֵרֵד ה׳ לְעֵינֵי כָל הָעָם עַל הַר סִינָי — because on the third day, Hashem will descend in front of the eyes of the entire nation on Har Sinai.

This is quite a shift. In the first response, the nation didn’t have to do anything except overhear a conversation. Now they have to prepare themselves. In the first response, they heard; they were listening to what was going on. Now they are going to see. We have gone from passive to active, and from listening to seeing.

But this is not a replacement for the first plan. It’s an addition. We have two parallel tracks, two complementary plans: one which is passive and auditory, and the other which is active and visual.

And there are new elements introduced in this second track. There need to be some sort of borders and boundaries — gevulot (גבולות) — for the nation. They cannot go up the mountain or even touch it; that is dangerously deadly. I assume that having moved to the visual is an indication of a heightened spiritual experience, which means also a more dangerous spiritual experience, and thus the need for boundaries. There is also the idea of the shofar (שופר): בִּמְשֹׁךְ הַיֹּבֵל הֵמָּה יַעֲלוּ בָהָר — when the yovel (יובל), which is a type of shofar, has a long continuous sound, that would be the indication that the Shechinah (שכינה) has gone away and they can now go up on the mountain.

So the second track adds new elements related to this heightened spiritual experience: the idea of Hashem descending on the mountain, the nation seeing that, the need for gevulot, and the shofar. In response, Moshe goes down and gets the nation ready.

The Third Day

And then the third day arrives.

קֹלֹת וּבְרָקִים וְעָנָן כָּבֵד עַל הָהָר וְקֹל שֹׁפָר חָזָק מְאֹד

Kolot (קולות) are sounds. Berakim (ברקים) are, I assume, something like flashes — that’ll be my initial guess. There’s also an anan kaved (ענן כבד) — a weighty cloud — on the mountain. That sounds a lot like that thick cloud that Hashem was talking about. I can’t be sure, but it sounds like a reasonable guess.

And there’s the kol shofar chazak me’od (קול שופר חזק מאד).

So we have an element that relates to the first track — to the conversation we’re going to overhear. And we have an element that relates to the second track — to the Divine descent we’re going to see.

The nation is in the camp and they’re trembling. Moshe brings them out — וַיּוֹצֵא מֹשֶׁה אֶת הָעָם לִקְרַאת הָאֱלֹהִים — to meet, to greet the Divinity. They present themselves, standing, waiting, at the bottom of the mountain — וַיִּתְיַצְּבוּ בְּתַחְתִּית הָהָר. That mountain is filled with smoke because Hashem has descended upon it in fire. The mountain itself is trembling.

Now I want us to understand the focus of these verses. It is primarily on the state of the mountain itself, although there is this element of Moshe bringing the people out to the bottom of that mountain, and of the fear and trembling of that very same people. There is a mention of Hashem descending in fire, but that’s only mentioned so as to explain why the mountain is all covered with smoke.

We should note on the side that smoke and clouds are somewhat similar. They can both be white, ephemeral-type substances, and the words — ashan (עשן) and anan (ענן) — are almost the same. Just the middle letter changes.

The verse tells us that the kol hashofar is getting stronger, exceedingly strong. That’s one of the elements of the visual track. And then it says: מֹשֶׁה יְדַבֵּר וְהָאֱלֹהִים יַעֲנֶנּוּ בְקוֹל — Moshe would speak, and the Divinity would answer him with a voice (19:19). That seems to relate to the auditory track. And note who is leading this conversation — Moshe. Not our topic for now, but worth noting nonetheless.

And now the verse switches focus. No longer is the main subject the state of the mountain, but rather it’s the interaction between Hashem and Moshe. We are told once again that Hashem descended upon Har Sinai — albeit without any mention of the fire. Rather, we are told where on the mountain He descends to: to the top of the mountain. And that Hashem calls Moshe to the top of that mountain. Again, there’s a kriyah (קריאה) from Hashem to Moshe, and Moshe ascends.

Hashem says to Moshe: go down and warn the nation, lest they break through to Hashem to see, and many of them will fall. This is part of the visual track — this need for gevulot. They might want to see more than they should see. Also, the kohanim (כהנים) who are nigashim el Hashem (נגשים אל ה׳), who are accustomed to approaching Hashem — they should sanctify themselves. Sanctifying themselves is part of the visual track. They might think that they can go up; they too have to stay back.

Moshe responds and says: the nation can’t go up. You already warned us to make gevulot. What I understand Moshe to be saying is: I’ve already set up the barriers, I’ve already set up the officers. They can’t go up.

Now, I’m not sure that we see a direct response to this point of Moshe in the Chumash. The next line you might read as one, but I have my reasons to think that the next line relates to a different conversation and a different point, as we will see as we make our way through this narrative.

Hashem says to Moshe: לֶךְ רֵד וְעָלִיתָ אַתָּה וְאַהֲרֹן עִמָּךְ — go down, and come back up, you and Aharon with you. But the kohanim and the nation should not break through to Hashem, lest Hashem break out against them.

This is not, I think, a response to what Moshe said about the borders and the policemen. This is something else. At some point, Hashem said to him: you’ve got to go down and come back up with Aharon. Whether He means to go down this second or at some set time, I think it’s a different point entirely. It’s brought here because in this section of the narrative, these two relevant and important conversations between Hashem and Moshe are brought together.

We are told that Moshe did go down to the nation and said it to them. That sounds like a reference going back to the issue of the gevulot. It’s confusing, and I understand that the way I’m reading it sounds like we’re ping-ponging back and forth between conversations. Yet I think that’s actually what’s going on. It’s not that it’s a difficult reading; it’s that the Chumash is, for some reason, purposely presenting the story this way.

And then the next transition: וַיְדַבֵּר אֱלֹהִים אֵת כָּל הַדְּבָרִים הָאֵלֶּה לֵאמֹר — And God spoke all these words, saying.

Who did He speak them to? Did He say them to Moshe? Did He say them to the entire nation? Where is Moshe when He says this? Is Moshe down at the camp because Hashem told him to go down, or is Moshe back up? Is Moshe up with Aharon? We don’t know. It doesn’t say וַיְדַבֵּר אֱלֹהִים אֶל מֹשֶׁה or וַיְדַבֵּר אֱלֹהִים אֶל הָעָם. It leaves out that bit of information, which is interesting. How many times do we see וַיְדַבֵּר ה׳ אֶל מֹשֶׁה לֵאמֹר? Constantly. But not here.

And what follows needs no introduction: the ten statements, the ten devarim (דברים). Note that we are no longer in the mode of a conversation. It’s not that Hashem is speaking to Moshe and everyone’s overhearing Him — or is it? We are not focused on the mountain, and we are not focused on the conversation between Moshe and God going back and forth. This is, you might say, a monologue. We know it as revelation, but it’s a one-way communication.

In other words, to recap: the narrative started with a description of the state of the mountain, with a little insertion about how the nation related to that. It then added in the notion of a conversation between Moshe and God: Moshe would speak, and the Divinity would answer him. Then there’s a conversation between Yud-Kei-Vav-Kei and Moshe — which doesn’t sound like it’s the same thing as Moshe speaking and the Divinity answering him. It’s a different name of Hashem, and in one case Moshe sounds like he’s the one speaking with Hashem responding, while in the other Hashem is the one speaking and Moshe is the one responding. And then we have revelation.

We would think that once the revelation is over, the narrative would continue with what happened next. But it doesn’t seem to do that. It seems to circle back to that narrative describing the state of the mountain when Hashem descended on the third day — this time with the focus on the nation’s experience of it.

What the Nation Sees

It’s as if we are zooming in on the line that says the nation was trembling in the machaneh. That might be our initial thought based on what we’re about to read. But I think we’re actually zeroing in on the next verse — where it says that Moshe brought the nation out from the machaneh to greet the Divinity, and that they are standing, prepared, waiting at the bottom of the mountain. It’s at that moment that I think this narrative picks back up. We left that moment behind! They are there waiting, and then we panned away from the nation and went to the mountain, seeing it all covered in smoke. Now the narrative continues from their vantage point.

The entire nation sees the kolot (קולות) and the lapidim (לפידים) — those kolot and lapidim that were mentioned in the narrative about the state of the mountain. But there it was kolot and berakim (ברקים). My working assumption — it’s not yet at the level of a hypothesis — is that berakim are flashes of light and lapidim are something like bolts of light, like lightning bolts. The nation sees this, and they see the kol shofar (קול שופר), and the mountain awash in smoke.

What’s being left out here, rather conspicuously, is the heavy cloud. It doesn’t say that the people see that. We skip over that part in the list. Before the Dibros, the list was: kolot, berakim, anan kaved al hahar, kol shofar. Now: they see the kolot, they see the lapidim, they see the kol shofar, and then we go to the next one on the list and they see Har Sinai ashan kulo — the mountain all in smoke. That cloud is hidden so far. It’s not there. We’ll have to see where it is.

What happens? They see all this, and — וַיָּנֻעוּ וַיַּעַמְדוּ מֵרָחֹק — they move back and stand at a distance. This is why I think we’re talking about the point when they were at the tachtis hahar (תחתית ההר), at the bottom of the mountain. If they’re in the machaneh, they’re not going to move back — they’re already at a distance. But if they’re at the bottom of the mountain, they’re afraid. On the other hand, if they’re moving back in fear, why, in that earlier conversation between Hashem and Moshe, is Hashem saying “go down and warn them”? They don’t need warning. They don’t want to get any closer. They didn’t even want to go in the first place — Moshe had to take them out. They’re trembling in fear. All this needs explanation another time.

But for us it’s the next line that we need to pay attention to. They say to Moshe:

דַּבֵּר אַתָּה עִמָּנוּ וְנִשְׁמָעָה — You speak with us and we will listen.

וְאַל יְדַבֵּר עִמָּנוּ אֱלֹהִים פֶּן נָמוּת — And let not Elokim speak with us, lest we die.

As opposed to what? As opposed to Hashem speaking with them directly. Now we have to wonder: have they heard Hashem yet? It doesn’t say so — it just says that they’ve seen the state of the mountain. Did they ever get to hear when Moshe is speaking and Hashem is answering b’kol (בקול)? Perhaps, but it doesn’t mention it. Indeed, they say: don’t let Hashem speak with us lest we die. We can wonder: did they ever hear Hashem speak directly to them, or not?

Moshe says to them: אַל תִּירָאוּ — don’t be afraid:

כִּי לְבַעֲבוּר נַסּוֹת אֶתְכֶם בָּא הָאֱלֹהִים — The Divinity has come in order to test you.

That word nasot (נסות) — we have to put that aside. We’re going to see a variation of it soon enough.

וּבַעֲבוּר תִּהְיֶה יִרְאָתוֹ עַל פְּנֵיכֶם לְבִלְתִּי תֶחֱטָאוּ — And so that His fear will be upon your faces, that you not sin.

And that word ba’avur (בעבור) is also interesting. Hashem had said to Moshe: I’m going to come to you in the thickness of a cloud ba’avur — so that the nation can hear Me when I speak with you, and also so that they will believe in you forever. We see that already they seem to be believing in Moshe — “you speak with us and we will listen” — but we don’t seem to have the cloud yet! The cloud hasn’t been mentioned here in these verses.

Could it be that there is more to that ba’avur than is written there? We’re back to this narrative style of the Chumash, where when it references a previous narrative it seems to add in relevant details that weren’t mentioned the first time. We see this pattern again and again.

Either way, here are two reasons why the Divinity has come: l’nasot etchem — to test you — and so that the fear of Hashem will be on your faces, that you not sin. What sin is He worried about? What sin does He want to make sure won’t happen?

Either way, the nation stays distant: וַיַּעֲמֹד הָעָם מֵרָחוֹק. It seems that they do not return to their previous closeness. And listen to this:

וּמֹשֶׁה נִגַּשׁ אֶל הָעֲרָפֶל אֲשֶׁר שָׁם הָאֱלֹהִים — And Moshe approached the arafel (ערפל), the deepest, thickest cloud that there is, because there is the Divinity.

We found our cloud.

I’m assuming that this moment here — of Moshe approaching the arafel — is right before what we saw earlier: that Moshe would speak, and the Divinity would answer him with a voice.

And now we can maybe understand why the cloud wasn’t mentioned earlier. The people aren’t afraid of the cloud. The cloud is comforting. Even if there is a certain fear of entering into it, or perhaps a certain respect for it, a certain awe that holds one back, they didn’t go backwards in fear because of the cloud. They went backwards because of all the other elements. But the cloud was what enabled the nation to hear Hashem have a conversation with Moshe.

And I am wondering: even though they are now distant, perhaps they can still hear that conversation. We would like to know what the content of that conversation was. As important as that question might seem, I’m not going to get into it here. I’ll just note the following from the Ramban. It says in the Mechilta (מכילתא) that this conversation — where Moshe would speak and the Divinity would answer him — was during the time of Matan Torah (מתן תורה), and that Moshe would make the Dibros (דברות) heard to Yisrael. According to the Ramban, in the method of pshat (פשט), we aren’t yet speaking about the Aseres HaDibros. According to him, it relates to the conversation that Hashem had with Moshe — go down and warn the nation — and they heard the conversation but they didn’t understand it. We’ll have to leave this question for another time.

The Second Revelation

We are now post-Aseres HaDibros. That seems to me clear from the pesukim. And we have Hashem speaking to Moshe again. Listen to what He says:

וַיֹּאמֶר ה׳ אֶל מֹשֶׁה כֹּה תֹאמַר אֶל בְּנֵי יִשְׂרָאֵל — And Hashem said to Moshe: Thus shall you say to Bnei Yisrael.

Ko somar (כה תאמר). Remember that phrase? Remember I told you to take note of it? When Moshe went up for the first time to the Divinity, Hashem had a message for Bnei Yisrael: כֹּה תֹאמַר לְבֵית יַעֲקֹב וְתַגֵּיד לִבְנֵי יִשְׂרָאֵל. Well, once again Hashem has a message for Bnei Yisrael.

And how does that message start?

אַתֶּם רְאִיתֶם — You have seen.

Atem re’isem (אתם ראיתם). Just like before, when Moshe first went up. Atem re’isem.

The same two words. Both times, ko somar. Both times, Bnei Yisrael. Both times, atem re’isem.

And what did they see? The first time: אַתֶּם רְאִיתֶם אֲשֶׁר עָשִׂיתִי לְמִצְרָיִם — you have seen what I did to Mitzrayim. The second time: אַתֶּם רְאִיתֶם כִּי מִן הַשָּׁמַיִם דִּבַּרְתִּי עִמָּכֶם — you have seen that from the heavens I have spoken with you.

The first one said: you saw what I did to Egypt. You saw how I brought you here. And now I want to know — are you in or out? Do you want to be an am segulah (עם סגולה)? Do you want to be a mamleches kohanim (ממלכת כהנים)?

And this second time, it is also related to this question. But it will be harder to see. Indeed, initially, it seems disconnected — more like a random set of halachos. But it’s there. We’ll just have to take the time to actually see it.

And to do that, we’ll have to take a closer look at these halachos.

What are these halachos?

לֹא תַעֲשׂוּן אִתִּי — Do not make with Me.

What does that mean — “with Me”? Iti (אתי), aleph-tav-yud. It doesn’t quite sound the same as lo yihyeh lecha elohim acheirim al panai — don’t have other gods before Me — or lo ta’aseh lecha pesel — don’t make yourself an idol. Those were in the Aseres HaDibros. This seems like something related but different. Don’t make with Me — don’t make something alongside Me? To accompany Me? I’m not sure yet.

אֱלֹהֵי כֶסֶף וֵאלֹהֵי זָהָב לֹא תַעֲשׂוּ לָכֶם — Gods of silver and gods of gold, do not make for yourselves.

That’s clearer — don’t make gods of silver and gold. But why is He saying this now? He just told them in the Aseres HaDibros not to make idols. Why say it again?

And then something unexpected. After telling them what not to make, He tells them what to make:

מִזְבַּח אֲדָמָה תַּעֲשֶׂה לִּי — Make Me an earthen altar.

וְזָבַחְתָּ עָלָיו אֶת עֹלֹתֶיךָ וְאֶת שְׁלָמֶיךָ — And slaughter upon it your olos (עולות) and your shelamim (שלמים).

Why is Hashem giving halachos about a mizbeach (מזבח) right here, right now? Three halachos which seem to randomly appear and just as quickly randomly disappear. We don’t know what lo ta’asun iti means. We don’t know why He’s repeating the prohibition against gods of silver and gold. And we don’t yet know what a mizbeach is doing in the middle of all this. We’ll come back to these.

Because finally, we get the parashah (פרשה) that we have been waiting for:

וְאֵלֶּה הַמִּשְׁפָּטִים אֲשֶׁר תָּשִׂים לִפְנֵיהֶם — And these are the mishpatim which you shall place before them.

As much as I want to delve into this parashah right now, as much as I want to talk about what’s in it, I have to skip over it for a moment and read the passage that comes right after the revelation of these halachos. But before we skip over them, we will make two observations.

The first is that letter vav (ו) at the beginning: v’eileh (ואלה) — and these are the mishpatim. This is a continuation of what Hashem just said, starting with ko somar. You’re going to tell all this to Bnei Yisrael. You’re not just going to tell them that you heard Me speak from the shamayim (שמים). You’re going to tell them lo ta’asun iti, and about the gods of silver and gold, and about the mizbeach — and then you’re going to do more than tell them these mishpatim. You’re going to place them in front of them.

What does it mean to place the mishpatim in front of them? Says Rashi: don’t just teach it to them so they can recite it ba’al peh (בעל פה), by memory. No, you need to do more than that. They have to understand these halachos — the ta’am hadavar u’feirusho (טעם הדבר ופירושו), the reason for them and their explanation.

What we have here seems to be a second revelation. And just like Moshe let Bnei Yisrael know the content of the Aseres HaDibros, soon enough he is going to let them know the content of these halachos, these mishpatim. That’s what we are going to read about right now.

The Covenant

I have to admit: there seems to be something about revelation which leads to — maybe even requires — interesting narrative techniques. We have already seen that in the narratives that come right before and right after the Aseres HaDibros, and we’re going to see it again right now, in the parashah that begins right after the second revelation of Parshas Mishpatim.

And it starts with an interesting grammatical point.

It says: וְאֶל מֹשֶׁה אָמַר — and to Moshe He said. Now, in biblical Hebrew, the normal way to tell a story is to put the verb first: וַיֹּאמֶר — and He said. When you do that, the narrative moves forward. First this happened, then that happened, then that happened. Each vayomer or vaya’as is the next step in the story. It’s what we call the continuous past.

But here, the Torah doesn’t do that. It doesn’t write וַיֹּאמֶר אֶל מֹשֶׁה — and He said to Moshe. Instead, it puts the noun first: וְאֶל מֹשֶׁה אָמַר — and to Moshe He said. When the noun comes before the verb, it breaks the sequence. It’s no longer telling you what happened next. It’s telling you what had already happened — what had been said at some earlier point. In English, we’d use the word “had”: “And to Moshe He had said.”

Think of it this way. If I say, “I walked to the store and I saw my friend,” that’s a sequence — first I walked, then I saw. But if I say, “I walked to the store, and I had seen my friend across town earlier that day” — now the seeing didn’t happen at the store. It happened before. The word “had” takes you back in time.

That’s what the Torah is doing here. By putting Moshe before the verb, it’s saying: this wasn’t said now, after Parshas Mishpatim. This was said earlier. It’s being brought here now because it becomes relevant now.

What happened earlier, before Parshas Mishpatim, that we need to know about right now? It’s that Hashem told Moshe:

עֲלֵה אֶל ה׳ אַתָּה וְאַהֲרֹן נָדָב וַאֲבִיהוּא וְשִׁבְעִים מִזִּקְנֵי יִשְׂרָאֵל

Come up to Hashem, you and Aharon, Nadav and Avihu — Aharon’s two oldest sons — and seventy of the elders of Yisrael.

Now this sounds semi-familiar.

Remember those conversations right before the Aseres HaDibros, between Moshe and Hashem? Hashem said to Moshe, “Go down and warn the nation not to come up.” Moshe said, “I don’t need to. We’ve already set up the gevulot and the boundaries.” And Hashem responded with a line that didn’t seem like a response: לֶךְ רֵד וְעָלִיתָ אַתָּה וְאַהֲרֹן עִמָּךְ — go down, and come back up, you and Aharon with you. I noted at the time that I felt like that was a separate conversation — a different instruction about a different aliyah (עליה).

I think this is that conversation. Hashem is telling Moshe: there will be a time that I need you and Aharon and his sons and the seventy elders to come up. And we once again encounter this narrative style of the Chumash — when it references back to an earlier narrative, it adds in relevant details. In chapter 19 it was just Aharon. Now it’s Aharon, Nadav, Avihu, and seventy elders.

So when the Chumash is about to tell us a story that takes place after Parshas Mishpatim, before it tells that story, it references that earlier conversation to remind us: previously — seemingly before the Aseres HaDibros — Hashem had already said to Moshe that you and Aharon and his sons and the elders need to come up to Me. Why it’s related this way, I’m still trying to figure out. But it seems to me that this is what’s going on.

We’re going to enter this new narrative not on the mountain. Moshe hasn’t gone up yet with Aharon and his sons and the elders — that’ll happen soon enough. Moshe is in the camp with the people, after the Aseres HaDibros, after Parshas Mishpatim. And let’s see what happens next.

Moshe, we are told, relates to the nation all the words of Hashem and all the mishpatim:

וַיְסַפֵּ֤ר לָעָם֙ אֵ֚ת כׇּל־דִּבְרֵ֣י יְהֹוָ֔ה וְאֵ֖ת כׇּל־הַמִּשְׁפָּטִ֑ים

And the nation, when they hear this, they respond in one voice:

כָּל הַדְּבָרִים אֲשֶׁר דִּבֶּר ה׳ נַעֲשֶׂה — Everything that Hashem has spoken, we will do.

Now that phrase should be familiar to us. We have heard it before, back in chapter 19, when Hashem first proposed the covenant. The same words, the same phrase. Could it be that they’re relating to the same issue, the same idea?

Could it be that before the revelation, they had the sense and understanding of what the revelation would be about — if not the details, at least the general direction? At that point, Hashem said: are you in? Will you listen to this, will you observe it, will you be dedicated to it? And they said yes: we will do all that Hashem has spoken. Now, after the details have been revealed — the full list of laws — they’re asked again: are you still in? And they say yes: we will do all that Hashem has spoken.

Let us continue.

Moshe writes down kol divrei Hashem (כל דברי ה׳). And he builds a mizbeach (מזבח) at the foot of the mountain.

And once again, this should sound familiar. A mizbeach. We just had a revelation about a mizbeach right before Parshas Mishpatim. Remember, we wondered: why is Hashem telling us this law now? It seems so out of place. No — it is so in place. Now is when you need to know this halachah, because now you are going to be building a mizbeach, and it is crucial that this mizbeach is of earth, or, if it is of stone, that no sword touches it.

Indeed, let’s take a closer look at that halachah right now. Hashem said you have to make an earthen mizbeach, and you slaughter upon it your olos (עולות) and your shelamim (שלמים). And what happens in our story? Moshe builds his mizbeach, and he sends the na’arei Bnei Yisrael (נערי בני ישראל), and they offer olos and shelamim. It certainly seems connected.

But why are they doing all this now? What is so special, so unique about Parshas Mishpatim that they are making a sacrifice and offering olos and shelamim?

Because they are going to make a covenant — a bris (ברית).

Remember? Hashem said to us: if you will listen to My voice — seemingly the voice of the Aseres HaDibros and Parshas Mishpatim — and guard My bris — the bris that we are making right now — then you will be segulah mikol ha’amim (סגולה מכל העמים). Then you will be mamleches kohanim (ממלכת כהנים) and goy kadosh (גוי קדוש). This is the bris He was talking about.

And at the moment that they actually make this covenant on these words — when Moshe takes the Sefer HaBris (ספר הברית) and reads it in the ears of the nation — then they say:

כֹּל אֲשֶׁר דִּבֶּר ה׳ נַעֲשֶׂה וְנִשְׁמָע — Everything that Hashem has spoken, we will do and we will listen.

Na’aseh v’nishma (נעשה ונשמע). At that moment, Moshe takes the dam habris (דם הברית) and throws the remaining half on the nation.

The bris is sealed.

And with that, Moshe and Aharon, Nadav, Avihu, and the seventy elders of Israel all ascend the mountain. They have visions of the God of Israel. They gaze upon the Divinity — וַיֶּחֱזוּ אֶת הָאֱלֹהִים. And they eat and they drink.

And yet we still need to wonder: what is so special about Parshas Mishpatim? Why is it specifically this parashah that Hashem says — if we listen to it, if we guard it, if we do and understand it — that we will be segulah mikol ha’amim and mamleches kohanim and goy kadosh?

The answer is where the story began.

Back to the Beginning

Let us return to the third chapter of Sefer Shemos.

Moshe is shepherding the flock of his father-in-law. He leads them achar hamidbar (אחר המדבר) — after the desert, or perhaps to the desert, the one he knows. And he comes to Har HaElokim (הר האלהים), Chorev (חורב).

A malach Hashem (מלאך ה׳) appears to him בְּלַבַּת אֵשׁ מִתּוֹךְ הַסְּנֶה — in a flame of fire, from within the sneh (סנה).

Fire. At the mountain of the Divinity. This is where the story of redemption begins — and it begins with fire. And as we know, when Hashem descends upon the mountain, He descends in fire. There seems to be some interesting connection between revelation and fire. We’ll have to park that on the side for now.

As we were saying, there is a fire. A bush — a sneh — is burning. And yet it is not being consumed. And Moshe, upon noticing this, has a question:

מַדּוּעַ לֹא יִבְעַר הַסְּנֶה — Why doesn’t the sneh burn?

This is not idle curiosity. This is, for Moshe, a deep question. Perhaps the question. He has been asking this type of question for a while — just not in this particular form.

To see what I mean, we need to go back to what the Chumash tells us about Moshe before this moment.

Moshe has grown up. And for the first time, he goes out to see his brothers. He sees their burdens — the torturous labor, the beatings, the attempt by Egypt to break the Jewish people’s will and spirit. He sees an Egyptian striking a Jew, and he intervenes. The next day, he sees two Jews fighting, and he intervenes again. Then he flees to Midyan, where he sees the daughters of Yisro being driven away from the well by bullying shepherds — and he intervenes yet again.

Moshe sees the same pattern wherever he goes: the powerful oppressing the weak — the fires of the world consuming the snehs of the world.

And yet, through it all, Moshe notices another constant. If there is another interceding power that is willing and able — then there is a means by which one can protect those who are weaker from those who are stronger.

If there is a Moshe around, then there is hope. But he has to be around. If not, then what? No hope.

And so Moshe wonders. Why is the sneh not being consumed? What power or force is protecting it? This is what I am looking for. This is what I want to understand.

And so Moshe turns to gaze — intellectually — at this wondrous vision. And once Hashem sees that this is the question Moshe wants an answer to, He calls to him:

וַיִּקְרָא אֵלָיו אֱלֹהִים מִתּוֹךְ הַסְּנֶה — And Elokim called to him from within the sneh.

Hashem calling to Moshe. Sounds familiar.

And He doesn’t just call to him, but from within the sneh.

The answer you are looking for is right here. I am in the sneh — and that is why it is not being consumed.

You want to fundamentally change reality? You want to find a way to stop the oppression? Then help bring Me down to earth.

And to that, Moshe said: הִנֵּנִי — Hineni (הנני).

What Egypt Was

So Moshe is in. But let us understand the task ahead of him. Let us get a full sense of the fires of the world and how they like to consume the snehs of the world.

It starts with Pharaoh and an irrational fear. The Jewish people were no threat, but they were growing — growing faster than the Egyptians were growing. They were still smaller than them. But who knows? Perhaps someday they could catch up, maybe even surpass us:

פֶּן יִרְבֶּה

And who knows? There could be a war. And who knows? They may join our enemies. And if that happens, they may leave Egypt.

A long list of maybes. And the great evil that could happen if this long list of maybes all comes true is that the Jewish people will go back to where they came from.

That’s it. No real evil done, and no real reason to believe that it will happen.

And yet, on the basis of this fear, Pharaoh lashes out.

He sets taskmasters upon them. He afflicts them with the burdens of the Egyptians. He gives them backbreaking labor. He makes their lives bitter.

And when none of that works, he sets to killing every single Jewish baby boy.

Murder, theft, enslavement — all in the pursuit of an irrational, unreasonable, immoral fear.

This is what Moshe Rabbeinu signed up for. This is what HaKadosh Baruch Hu went to war against.

You have seen, says Hashem, what I did to Egypt. All the plagues. The plagues weren’t there just to bring the Jewish people out of Egypt — at least not the first nine. They were there to show the world that HaKadosh Baruch Hu and His moral law will not be trifled with.

I am Hashem, your God, who took you out of Egypt. I want you to know that I saw your affliction. I heard your cries. I felt your pain.

And I proclaim, as clearly as can be, right now:

Lo tirtzach (לא תרצח) — you cannot murder. Lo tignov (לא תגנוב) — you cannot steal. Lo tachmod (לא תחמוד) — you cannot covet that which belongs to your neighbor.

These laws are the antithesis of Mitzrayim. And they are the essence of how God wants us to treat — or not treat — each other.

But they are general principles. They require specifics if we are truly going to transform mankind and this world.

And that is the place of Parshas Mishpatim.

Parshas Mishpatim

The starting point. Look at the very first halachah. It’s about buying a Jewish slave — an eved Ivri (עבד עברי). We just had chapter after chapter about Jewish slavery. The Egyptians used slavery to crush people, to embitter their lives, to break them. And now Hashem says: when there is slavery among you, there will be rules.

The slave serves for six years. Then he goes free. He has rights. If he comes in with his possessions, he leaves with them — you can’t steal them from him. Even if a man sells his daughter into servitude — the most vulnerable person in the most vulnerable position — she too has rights and protections.

Why does the Torah start here? Because this is the weakest member of society. And if you want to build the opposite of Egypt, you start by protecting the people Egypt would have crushed.

Lo tirtzach in practice. Pharaoh said to kill every newborn Jewish boy. HaKadosh Baruch Hu said lo tirtzach (לא תרצח) — don’t murder. Parshas Mishpatim tells us how to implement this principle in practice. Intentional murder is a capital offense. And nothing — not even the mizbeach (מזבח) — can protect you from that punishment. Unintentional murder is not a capital offense. But it still has consequences.

Lo tignov in practice. The Egyptians stole everything from the Jewish people — their time, their labor, their freedom, their children. HaKadosh Baruch Hu said lo tignov (לא תגנוב) — don’t steal. But what counts as stealing? What if you were watching someone’s possessions and they got stolen — are you responsible? Parshas Mishpatim works through the cases.

Don’t afflict the stranger — כִּי גֵרִים הֱיִיתֶם בְּאֶרֶץ מִצְרָיִם — because you were strangers in the land of Mitzrayim.

If you see the donkey of your enemy collapsing under its burden — help him. Even your enemy.

And Shabbos appears here too — not as testimony to creation, but so that your animals, your servants, and the stranger may rest. The exact opposite of how Egypt treated its slaves.

The heart of the sefer. This is what Parshas Mishpatim is. It takes the broad principles of the Aseres HaDibros and turns them into the detailed blueprint of the kind of society God wants — a society built on tzedek u’mishpat (צדק ומשפט), the exact opposite of Egypt.

The First Taste

Let’s go back — before the mountain, before the cloud, before all of it. There is one more piece of this architecture, and it is hidden in a stop along the way we may have passed over too quickly.

We are at Marah (מרה). The bitter waters have just been sweetened. And there, the Torah tells us:

שָׁם שָׂם לוֹ חֹק וּמִשְׁפָּט וְשָׁם נִסָּהוּ

There He placed for them chok and mishpat, and there He tested them.

And at this point, we should already start to see some connections. Soon enough — at Har Sinai — we will get the Mishpatim (משפטים). And here, at Marah, we received mishpat (משפט).

And when we do get the Mishpatim, G-d will instruct Moshe to set (שם) these mishpatim before them (לפניהם). And here, we are told that G-d set (שם) this mishpat to him (לו) — him being a reference to the nation.

Not exactly the same thing.
But not so different either.
שָׂם לוֹ versus תָּשִׂ֖ים לִפְנֵיהֶֽם.

And that is not the only similarity. There is more. For example:

אִם שָׁמוֹעַ תִּשְׁמַע לְקוֹל ה׳ אֱלֹהֶיךָ וְהַיָּשָׁר בְּעֵינָיו תַּעֲשֶׂה וְהַאֲזַנְתָּ לְמִצְוֹתָיו וְשָׁמַרְתָּ כָּל חֻקָּיו

If you listen to the voice of Hashem your G-d, and you do what is straight in His eyes, and you pay attention to His mitzvos, and you guard all His chukim...

That structure should sound familiar. At Sinai, in the proposal, Hashem will say: אִם שָׁמוֹעַ תִּשְׁמְעוּ בְּקֹלִי — if you listen to My voice. Nearly the same words. The voice at Marah and the voice at Sinai are the same voice.

My guess — at Marah we got the principles. At Har Sinai we got the details. The Malbim in Parshas Mishpatim says something similar (although he offers a different proof for this idea).

Either way, in both cases, there is a positive benefit to listening.

At Sinai, we know what it is — segulah mikol ha’amim, mamleches kohanim, goy kadosh. That is Sinai’s gift: who you will become.

At Marah it was not who we would become, but rather what would not happen to us:

כָּל הַמַּחֲלָה אֲשֶׁר שַׂמְתִּי בְמִצְרַיִם לֹא אָשִׂים עָלֶיךָ כִּי אֲנִי ה׳ רֹפְאֶךָ

All the machalah that I placed upon Mitzrayim, I will not place upon you — for I am Hashem, your healer.

Machalah (מחלה). We could attempt a translation — sickness, ailment. But we don’t need to translate it. We can figure it out by asking: what did the Jewish people just witness?

They had seen the Nile turn to blood. Frogs. Lice. Boils. Darkness. The death of every firstborn. Then they walked through the sea, and they watched the entire Egyptian army swallowed by the waters. That happened days ago. It is not yet a memory — it is still present, still raw.

That is the machalah. Not a clinical illness. But the war that G-d had just waged against Egypt. And now Hashem is saying: if you will listen to these mishpatim, I will not place these ailments upon you — i.e., I will not go to war against you.

In other words, want to know why I visited these makos on Mitzrayim? Because they violated these principles. They took Jewish babies and threw them into the Nile. They enslaved an entire nation. Backbreaking labor. Torture. Murder. They violated every principle that Mishpatim was about to enshrine.

So don’t take these mitzvos lightly. Because if you do, those makos can be visited upon you too — as we saw to our horror at the destruction of the Beis HaMikdash and the exile.

But there is more to keeping the mishpatim than simply not getting destroyed. There is the opportunity to become an am segulah, a mamleches kohanim, and a goy kadosh.

We will be segulah mikol ha’amim (סגולה מכל העמים) — more precious than all the other nations.

No matter what generation, no matter what place, no matter what the circumstances — the remnant of this people will remain dedicated to these Mishpatim.

Not every Jew in every era. But a certain core will remain true no matter what. This is what makes you precious.

We will be a mamleches kohanim (ממלכת כהנים) — a kingdom of priests.

What does a kohen (כהן) do? He serves HaKadosh Baruch Hu. In the Mishkan, that involves one set of tasks — korbonot, bikurim, and the like. In the world as a whole, it involves another set of tasks — namely, mishpatim. By being dedicated to and implementing these mishpatim, we become G-d’s kohanim vis-à-vis the rest of the world.

And we will be a goy kadosh (גוי קדוש) — a holy nation. Kedushah (קדושה), as we have discussed, is what causes people to think of G-d.

When the nations of the world see the Jewish people living by these principles — no matter the time, place or circumstances — they will see G-d.

Segulah, mamleches kohanim, goy kadosh. All three flow from the same source: listening to G-d’s voice, guarding His bris, and dedicating ourselves — in principle and in detail — to the laws of tzedek u’mishpat.

That is what begins at Marah. And that is what reaches its fullness at Sinai.

What About the Chok?

Everything so far has been about mishpat. The laws. The moral framework. The antithesis of Egypt. But the Torah says Marah gave us chok and mishpat. We haven’t touched the chok yet. Does it also fit?

Here we need the help of Rashi based on Chazal. Chok, we are told, relates to the parashah which is, in essence, the paradigmatic example of a Chok. Indeed, when the Torah itself introduces the laws of the Parah Adumah by labeling it a chok: זֹאת חֻקַּת הַתּוֹרָה (Zos chukas HaTorah).

So if our Parsha here in Mara is going to tell us that we were given a Chok without any further information, it makes sense to connect it to the Parah Adumah, which is labeled a Chok, just as we connected Mishpat to Parsha Mishpatim.

And yeah, once again, we don’t just have a linguistic connection. It’s not just that the words are the same or very similar.

Let us remember from last week’s parashah. What happened when Moshe Rabbeinu saw the egel? As we have already noted, he essentially destroyed it just like one destroys the Parah Adumah.

He burns it in fire (like we burn the Parah Adumah). He grinds it into dust (just like we burn the Parah Adumah into ash). He scatters on water (just like we sprinkle the dust on water). And then has the nation drink the water (this is probably more similar to Sotah, but perhaps we can compare it to sprinkling the water on one who needs to become tahor).

And we also noted the famous Rashi that directly connects the Parah Adumah to the chet ha’egel: let the mother come and clean up the mess of her child.

Not to mention the fact that a molten calf may very well look like a red heifer.

As such, I wonder — did HaKadosh Baruch Hu know that the risk of a chet ha’egel already existed at this point in the journey? And was He preparing them to either withstand the temptation or deal with it if they succumbed?

That’s my guess. And I think there may be another bit of evidence backing it up.

Remember those three laws that seemed out of place — the ones given right after the Aseres HaDibros and before the Mishpatim? One we made sense of — the mizbeach. Soon they were going to need to make a mizbeach, so they now need the laws relating to the mizbeach.

Could those other two halachos also be needed soon. Let’s consider the first one:

לֹא תַעֲשׂוּן אִתִּי — Don’t make with Me.

It still is an awkward phrase — hard to make sense of it. But we have two (and only) two clues. “Making” and “with me”.

Could this be a reference to the golden calf? Could the golden calf have functioned as some sort of intermediary — as a physical means of connecting to the Divine that Hashem had not sanctioned?

It certainly seems likely. The Ibn Ezra thought so (although Rashi sees this as a reference to the Kruvim). And it would partly fit with the next verse — about not making idols of silver or gold.

The golden calf was, well, golden. So that rules out silver. But the gold part still works.

So maybe.

I need to do more research into this to be fully confident. But the pieces (somewhat) seem to fit: the parah adumah and the chet ha’egel are deeply connected. Chazal clearly saw the connection. The procedure Moshe uses to destroy the egel mirrors the parah adumah. And these halachos after the Aseres HaDibros — which we noted seemed puzzling and out of place — may in fact be part of the same thread, warning about a danger that was already present and would soon manifest.

If all of this is correct, then the parah adumah at Marah is not random at all. It is Hashem seeding the antidote before the sin — the same pattern we see with mishpatim, where He gives them the principles before the full details.

And Then There’s Shabbos

Theoretically speaking, we should be done. But that Rashi I mentioned above (based on Chazal) mentioned three halachas that were given at Marah. We’ve mentioned two already: Parah Adumah and Mishpatim, but Rashi also mentions Shabbos. We will wonder once again: How does Shabbos fit into our story? Not the story of the Man, where it clearly fits in and which we need to further delve into when the time comes, but the story of Mishpatim and perhaps, and obviously, the story of the Mishkan. How does Shabbos fit into that? What preparation or awareness did we need that was given to us at Mara?

Before we directly address that question, let’s ask a second one. Is Shabbos a chok or a mishpat? We were given two categories of halachas at Marah: chok and mishpat, and three halachas. We have to map these three halachas onto these two categories. The first two are easy: mishpatim relates to mishpat and Parah Adumah relates to chok, but what about Shabbos?

Our first instinct may be to call Shabbos a chok. After all, Shabbos is not a law which relates to monetary or physical damages. It’s about creation and providence.

G-d made the world in six days and rested on the seventh — so rest on the seventh day. G-d took us out of Egypt — so rest on the seventh day.

True, there is a clear logic to it, which means it doesn’t fit neatly into the classic definition of a chok (something that seems to defy human logic). But if you have to choose between chok and mishpat, it seems more chok-like than mishpat-like.

And yet, I think (not so) hidden within Shabbos is a mishpat element to Shabbos. And the best place to see it is in Parshas Mishpatim itself.

שֵׁשֶׁת יָמִים תַּעֲשֶׂה מַעֲשֶׂיךָ וּבַיּוֹם הַשְּׁבִיעִי תִּשְׁבֹּת לְמַעַן יָנוּחַ שׁוֹרְךָ וַחֲמֹרֶךָ וְיִנָּפֵשׁ בֶּן אֲמָתְךָ וְהַגֵּר

Six days you shall do your work, and on the seventh day you shall rest — so that your ox and your donkey may rest, and the son of your maidservant and the stranger may be refreshed.

Look at the reason the Torah gives here for Shabbos. It’s not creation. It’s not the Exodus. It’s social. Your animals need rest. The people working for you — the son of your amah (אמה), the ger (גר) who is in a harder financial position — they need to rejuvenate. You need to take their welfare into account. You cannot just work them endlessly.

This is a mishpat. This is about how you treat other people. And it fits perfectly within Parshas Mishpatim, right alongside the laws about not oppressing the stranger and not afflicting the widow.

But it goes further than Shabbos itself.

Right before Shabbos in Parshas Mishpatim, we find Shemitah (שמיטה):

שֵׁשׁ שָׁנִים תִּזְרַע אֶת אַרְצֶךָ וְאָסַפְתָּ אֶת תְּבוּאָתָהּ וְהַשְּׁבִיעִת תִּשְׁמְטֶנָּה וּנְטַשְׁתָּהּ וְאָכְלוּ אֶבְיֹנֵי עַמֶּךָ וְיִתְרָם תֹּאכַל חַיַּת הַשָּׂדֶה

Six years you shall seed your land and gather its produce. And the seventh year, you shall relinquish it and let it lie fallow — and the destitute of your nation shall eat from it, and what remains, the wild animals of the field shall eat.

Shemitah is also about the social good. The destitute get to eat. The wildlife gets to partake. And Shemitah is essentially Shabbos for the land — שַׁבַּת הָאָרֶץ. The same six-plus-one framework, just on a different scale.

And the framework keeps scaling. Six days, then Shabbos. Six years, then Shemitah.

And then we have Parshas Behar (פרשת בהר). Yes, it is in Sefer VaYikra — but the Torah goes out of its way to tell us that these halachas were also part of the Mishpatim. And there, we count cycles of Shemitah years and arrive at Yovel (יובל) — the Jubilee. The time when slaves go free and land reverts to its original owners.

And finally, in Devarim (דברים), we learn that debts are released at the end of the Shemitah year.

This is Shabbos in its fullest form — in terms of days, years and years of years. And they all relate to social needs, not “religious” ones.

To not overworking ones workers (or animals).
To granting debt release. To freeing slaves. To preventing monopoly power and granting renewed economic opportunity.

This is Shabbos as much as a recognition of creation and providence is Shabbos.

And it was given at Marah — alongside the general principles of the mishpatim. But not only alongside.

As we have noted, Shabbos also relates to the Man. And it also relates to building the Mishkan.

Soon enough, we will build a home to house the luchos. The luchos which contain the Ten Statements (aka Ten Commandments) which G-d gave us on Har Sinai. The Ten Statements which form (among other things) the general foundation upon which the Mishpatim are built.

And we are told — when building that house, do not violate Shabbos. Do not violate this institution which is foundational to all that the luchos themselves represent.

Do not violate the day that tells you to give rest to people who are working too hard — in order to build a place that enshrines the principle that you should not work people too hard?

Do not violate the seventh day in order to build a place which enshrines the memory that G-d rested on the seventh day.

In short, do not violate a principle in order to establish that principle.

And so, before the Man and Parshas Mishpatim and building the Mishkan, we needed to know about Shabbos. And so Hashem informed us about it at Marah.

The Architecture Complete

The laws of Parshas Mishpatim have been given. The bris has been sealed. Moshe and Aharon, Nadav, Avihu, and the seventy elders have gone up, gazed upon the Divinity, and eaten and drunk.

But there is something more.

Once again, Hashem says to Moshe: עֲלֵה אֵלַי הָהָרָה וֶהְיֵה שָׁם — come up to Me to the mountain and be there. Stay there. וֶהְיֵה שָׁם. This time, Moshe is not coming back quickly. Aharon stays with the machaneh (מחנה) — “whoever has issues, come to him.” That’s an interesting instruction, because there are going to be issues very soon. Yehoshua accompanies Moshe partway.

And what is Moshe going up to receive?

וְאֶתְּנָה לְךָ אֶת לֻחֹת הָאֶבֶן וְהַתּוֹרָה וְהַמִּצְוָה אֲשֶׁר כָּתַבְתִּי לְהוֹרֹתָם

The luchos ha’even (לוחות האבן) — the stone tablets — and the Torah and the mitzvah which I have written, to instruct them.

Hashem has already written these. Asher kasavti (אשר כתבתי) — past tense. But Moshe doesn’t have them yet. He needs to go up for forty days and forty nights to receive them.

But why forty days? Not just for the luchos. For the Mishkan (משכן). The whole structure. The house that will hold the luchos, the Torah, these values. There’s going to be an aron (ארון) with the luchos inside, and a kaporet (כפורת) on top of it, and kruvim (כרובים) on top of that. And from between those kruvim, Hashem’s word will come forth. That’s the conversation that is going to continue — HaKadosh Baruch Hu speaking to Moshe from between the kruvim, on top of the aron, inside the Mishkan.

Moshe goes up. The anan (ענן) covers the mountain. The kevod Hashem (כבוד ה׳) rests upon Har Sinai. For six days the anan covers it.

And on the seventh day:

וַיִּקְרָא אֶל מֹשֶׁה בַּיּוֹם הַשְּׁבִיעִי מִתּוֹךְ הֶעָנָן

Hashem calls to Moshe on the seventh day from the midst of the cloud.

That word — מִתּוֹךְ (mitoch) — from within. We have seen that word before. At the sneh, Elokim called to Moshe מִתּוֹךְ הַסְּנֶה — from within the sneh. Now He calls to him מִתּוֹךְ הֶעָנָן — from within the cloud. At the sneh, Hashem was inside the thornbush, and the fire could not consume it. Now Hashem is inside the cloud, and from within it He is going to give Moshe the instructions for building the house where these values will live.

And the appearance of the kevod Hashem (כבוד ה׳) is like an eish ocheles (אש אוכלת) — a consuming fire — on the top of the mountain...

Fire. Clouds. Revelation.

Over and over again, these come together.

There was fire at the sneh. There was a pillar of cloud and a pillar of fire that led the Jews in the desert. There were clouds and fire at Har Sinai. And now, once again, clouds and fire.

And so Moshe enters the cloud and goes up to the mountain. He is there for forty days and forty nights — to receive the laws of the Mishkan.

And now we transition to our parashah (פרשה) and the end of Sefer Shemos. Here we will see the entire nation willingly donate to this project. They are implementing, with their hearts, their souls, and their pocketbooks, na’aseh v’nishma (נעשה ונשמע). Every person whose heart inspires him — כָּל אִישׁ אֲשֶׁר נְשָׂאוֹ לִבּוֹ — and everyone whose spirit moves them to generosity, brought the terumas Hashem (תרומת ה׳) for the meleches Ohel Moed (מלאכת אוהל מועד). And they brought so much that eventually they had to make a proclamation: no more!

The day to erect the Mishkan comes. It’s the first of Nissan (ניסן) — exactly one year after Hashem told Moshe הַחֹדֶשׁ הַזֶּה לָכֶם רֹאשׁ חֳדָשִׁים, the day that freedom began. One year later, Hashem says: you’re going to set up this Mishkan.

And Moshe does. He takes the luchos — the second luchos that he received — and places them in the aron. He takes the aron, with the kaporet on top, and brings it into the Mishkan. He sets up the paroches (פרוכת) and covers the entranceway to the Aron HaEidus (ארון העדות). He sets up the rest of the keilim (כלים) of the Mikdash. All just as Hashem commanded him.

And then Moshe finishes the work. And what happens?

וַיְכַס הֶעָנָן אֶת אֹהֶל מוֹעֵד וּכְבוֹד ה׳ מָלֵא אֶת הַמִּשְׁכָּן

The anan (ענן) — a cloud!

And because of that cloud, Moshe cannot enter the Mishkan.

And that is where Sefer Shemos ends — at least in terms of the chronological narrative.

And then, Sefer Vayikra begins:

וַיִּקְרָא אֶל מֹשֶׁה וַיְדַבֵּר ה׳ אֵלָיו מֵאֹהֶל מוֹעֵד לֵאמֹר — And He called to Moshe, and Hashem spoke to him from the Ohel Moed, saying.

It begins with a calling — from Hashem to Moshe.

And there will also be a fire. But that will have to wait for when we actually enter Sefer Vayikra.

Share masmid

As most of us know, Rashi wrote a running commentary on the Chumash. Line by line, he works through the text. He addresses difficulties, clarifies meaning and thereby helps us flow through the Torah with a deeper sense of what it is teaching us.

But the very first Rashi doesn’t quite fit that pattern.

The first Rashi on the first pasuk of the Torah doesn’t function like a typical running commentary on a particular difficulty in a particular pasuk. It reads more like a quasi-introduction — a window into the nature of the Chumash as a whole, rather than a comment on a single textual issue.

We’re going to treat it that way. But we’re also going to treat it as something else: an introduction to Rashi’s own method. Rashi never explains his method outright. We have to figure it out as we go along, and certain Rashis along the way will give us hints. This first Rashi is one of them.

And the hint is hiding in the first three words.

אמר רבי יצחק

Rabbi Yitzchak said.

Everything that follows those words — the entire substance of this Rashi — is a quote from Rabbi Yitzchak. But before we get to what Rabbi Yitzchak said, we need to stop and ask: who is Rabbi Yitzchak? And why is Rashi quoting him?

These may seem like small questions. They are not.

If I were giving a lecture and opened with “As Oliver Wendell Holmes once said...” or “In the words of Einstein...” — those names carry weight. They signal to you that what follows comes from someone whose insight you should take seriously, someone whose authority in a particular domain is well established. Rashi is doing the same thing here. Rabbi Yitzchak is a name that means something. And if we take some time to understand who he is and why Rashi considers him worth quoting, we will begin to understand one crucial aspect of what Rashi is doing in his commentary on the entire Chumash.

To get there, though, we need some background. More than just a bit.

We need to understand something fundamental about the Torah — something that some people readily grasp, and others find quite difficult. The Torah has two pillars. There is the תורה שבכתב, the Written Torah — that part which is actually written down. And there is the תורה שבעל פה, the Oral Torah — that part which was transmitted orally through the generations.

The goal of what follows is not to prove this claim or to argue theology. The goal is much simpler: to show that the idea of an oral tradition accompanying a written text should not surprise us at all.

In fact, what should surprise us is if there weren’t one.

The World the Torah Was Given Into

From the time of Avraham Avinu onward — and probably earlier — oral traditions existed throughout the ancient world. The Egyptians had them. The Hittites, the Canaanites, the Amorites, the Phoenicians — all of them passed down knowledge orally. Some of these traditions were stories, like the Epic of Gilgamesh, which scholars believe began as an oral tradition long before it was written down. Some were laws and customs. The Phoenicians passed on trade routes and navigational knowledge through oral teaching. Various forms of wisdom literature circulated by word of mouth across the ancient Near East.

This makes sense for two reasons.

The first is technical. We are talking about a world before electricity, before the printing press, before mass literacy. Writing was the province of specialized scribes, often cloistered in temples or royal courts. Reading and writing were simply not the most practical means of disseminating information to large numbers of people. In this context, the Torah’s insistence that everyone in the nation should be able to engage with the written text is itself quite remarkable — a striking departure from the norms of the ancient world.

But there is a second, deeper reason why oral traditions flourished: they have qualities that writing does not. Oral transmission involves engagement. It involves dialogue — the ability to question, to discuss, to push back. A written text sits on a page. It cannot defend itself. It does not respond to your confusion. But a teacher, a conversation partner, a court of law — these can.

And it is here that we should look at two striking examples, both from the world outside the Torah, that illuminate this idea in different ways.

Homer and the Power of Memory

In the eighth century BCE — roughly the time of Yeshayahu HaNavi, Chizkiyahu HaMelech, and the exile of the ten tribes — a poet (or perhaps a tradition of poets) known as Homer composed two monumental works: the Iliad and the Odyssey.

These are massive texts. Hundreds of pages of material. And they were not written down — not for centuries. They were composed in a form designed for memorization and oral performance, using rhythmic structures and formulaic phrases that made them easier to remember, to recite, and to transmit. Generation after generation of performers memorized and passed on these epics, perhaps improvising in places, but preserving the core narrative with remarkable fidelity.

Hundreds of pages. Transmitted orally. For centuries.

That is remarkable. And it tells us something important: oral transmission, when done with care and structure, is capable of preserving vast quantities of information across long stretches of time.

Socrates and the Value of Not Writing Things Down

A few centuries later — in the period when the Jewish people were returning to Eretz Yisrael after the destruction of the First Beis HaMikdash, the time of Koresh (Cyrus) of Persia and the early prophets of Shivas Tzion like Chaggai and Zechariah — a man named Socrates was walking the streets of Athens.

Socrates did not write anything down. Not because he couldn’t, but because he believed he shouldn’t.

In one of the dialogues recorded by his student Plato — the Phaedrus — Socrates articulates a position that may sound surprising. He argues that writing things down is actually bad for learning. Writing weakens memory. It weakens understanding. When you commit something to writing, the words become fixed. They can’t defend themselves. They can’t respond to questions. They don’t invite the kind of thinking that emerges from genuine dialogue.

In a conversation, ideas are alive. Each side can challenge and refine the other’s thinking. That, for Socrates, was where real understanding happened.

Now, we might disagree with Socrates — and I think he takes his point too far. But there is truth in what he says. There is something irreplaceable about dialogue, about the back-and-forth of thinking together with another person, that a written text alone cannot fully replicate.

Greek society as a whole did not go as far as Socrates. The Greeks wrote prolifically. But they also built an extraordinary culture of oral education — the academy, the lyceum, public debates, rhetorical training. There was a dual track: a recognition that writing things down has value, and that discussing things orally has a different and complementary value.

This dual-track idea — writing and oral discussion working together — should sound familiar.

A Living Tradition Within the Torah Itself

So we’ve established that oral traditions were common throughout the ancient world, and that there are real reasons — both practical and philosophical — for why information might be transmitted orally rather than in writing.

Now let’s look at the Torah itself. Because within the written text of the Chumash, there are clear indications that something very much like an oral tradition must have existed alongside it.

Yisro and the Court System. Consider the story in Sefer Shemos where Yisro observes Moshe sitting from morning to night, fielding questions from the entire nation. People are coming to him with legal questions, questions about how to conduct themselves, disputes that need resolving. They come all day long. Yisro tells him this is unsustainable — he needs to set up a system of judges and courts at multiple levels.

Think about what this means. There are questions being asked. There are answers being given. There is, implicitly, a growing body of legal reasoning. Do we really think that once a question was answered, it was never discussed again? That no one remembered the ruling, passed it on, or referred to it when a similar case arose?

The Chumash describes a sophisticated court system — local judges in every city, higher courts for difficult cases, a supreme court in Yerushalayim. Any serious legal system generates precedent. New cases raise new questions about how to apply the law. That accumulated reasoning has to go somewhere.

The Shema. Then there is the Shema. In Devarim, we are explicitly told:

וְדִבַּרְתָּ בָּם בְּשִׁבְתְּךָ בְּבֵיתֶךָ וּבְלֶכְתְּךָ בַדֶּרֶךְ

And you shall speak of them when you sit in your home and when you walk on the road.

The Torah itself commands us to talk about these things — at home and away, day and night. And to teach them to our children. When people discuss ideas, when they teach their children, when they engage with a text over the course of generations — new understandings develop. That is how intellectual societies work. That is how education works.

And the evidence does not stop with the Chumash.

Yehoshua. In the very first chapter of Sefer Yehoshua, HaKadosh Baruch Hu tells Yehoshua:

וְהָגִיתָ בּוֹ יוֹמָם וָלָיְלָה

You shall meditate upon it day and night.

If the leader of the nation is instructed to contemplate the Torah constantly, do we imagine he kept every insight to himself? In a society whose foundational text demands that the Torah be taught, discussed, and lived?

Tehillim. The same idea appears in the very first chapter of Tehillim — the righteous person is described as one who meditates on the Torah day and night. So this is not only for leaders. It is a quality of anyone who takes the Torah seriously.

Shmuel, Devorah, and Shlomo. In Sefer Shmuel, we see Shmuel himself traveling throughout the land, judging the nation — which means adjudicating cases, which means applying the law, which means generating the kind of legal reasoning that accumulates over time. Devorah sat under a tree and took questions. Shlomo HaMelech was famous for his wisdom and his judgments, and the text references teachings of his that do not appear in any of the books we have.

Bnei Neviim. In Sefer Melachim, we encounter the בני נביאים — schools of prophets. Whatever they were studying in those schools, they were learning something, discussing something, and passing it on to their students.

Iyov. And then there is Sefer Iyov — a book-length dialogue in which a man and his companions sit together for days and engage in a passionate, searching debate about the deepest questions of suffering and justice. This is the portrait of a culture that valued sustained, serious oral discourse.

Ezra. Finally, when the Jews returned from Bavel in the time of Ezra, the text tells us they gathered the people together, read the Torah aloud, and explained it — making sure everyone understood. There was teaching. There was explanation. There was a living engagement with the text.

All of this points in one direction: from the time of Moshe through the end of Tanach and beyond, there was a rich, active, ongoing conversation about the Torah — its meaning, its application, its implications. The Chumash itself tells us to have these conversations. And human societies that value education do not simply ask questions and forget the answers.

Where Did It All Go?

So we have centuries — more than a millennium — of discussion, debate, teaching, and legal reasoning about the Torah. All of it happening orally, alongside the written text.

What happened to all of that?

The tradition tells us that this information was passed down through the generations. I assume this means that the deepest insights, most meaningful interpretations, and most authoritative legal reasoning were preserved and transmitted — while the less significant material was naturally filtered out over time.

And at a certain point in history, this vast oral inheritance began to be gathered together and organized into written collections. The Mishnah compiled legal traditions. The Gemara recorded the discussions and debates surrounding the Mishnah.

And then there were the Midrashim — some focused on halacha, legal matters, and others on aggadah, the philosophical, narrative, and homiletical dimensions of the Torah. Much of this material relates directly to understanding what the Chumash says and means.

Can Information Really Survive That Long?

At this point, a reasonable person might object. Can information really be preserved faithfully over a thousand years of oral transmission?

It can — if the system is designed for it. And to see why, consider a game most of us have played: Telephone.

In the classic version, someone whispers a word to the person next to them, who whispers it to the next, and so on down the line. By the end, “elephant” has become “pajamas,” and everyone laughs. This is a terrible system for transmitting information — and it is designed to be terrible. You whisper, which makes it hard to hear. You pass the message to only one person. There is no verification, no redundancy, no way to check whether the message arrived intact.

Now redesign the game.

This time, you don’t whisper. You write the word down clearly on a piece of paper and hand it to Reuven. Then you speak the word aloud and have Reuven repeat it back to you. He writes it down and shows it to you. You verify — written and oral, in both directions. Then you do exactly the same thing with Shimon.

Before either of them passes it on, Reuven and Shimon verify with each other — writing and speaking, checking and confirming. Only then do they move to the next row, where each of them repeats the entire process with Levi and Yehudah.

What you have now is a system built on two principles: redundancy and verification. Multiple people hold the same information. Multiple modes of transmission — written and oral — reinforce each other. And at every stage, the information is checked before it moves forward.

With a system like this, it does not matter whether there are ten rows or ten million. So long as the system is maintained, the information arrives intact.

Now, there can be disruptions. An earthquake. An exile. A period of upheaval where the lines of transmission thin out. But notice — the system does not require that every single link remain intact. If a hundred people in one generation hold the information and a disruption reduces that to five, those five can faithfully transmit to the next generation, and from there the chain can expand again. What matters is that a critical mass of carriers is maintained.

And when we look at the Torah’s own system, we see redundancy and verification everywhere. The Torah is written on scrolls. It is also written on stones. It is read publicly. There is a national gathering every seven years — הקהל — where the entire people hear the Torah read aloud. Every person is supposed to study it, teach it to their children, discuss it day and night. There are schools, courts, teachers, judges. Even in periods of decline, there were always core groups who preserved the tradition.

This is not wishful thinking. This is how information systems work. It is why DNA can replicate faithfully across billions of generations. It is why you can send an email that gets forwarded a million times and arrives with every word intact. The principle is the same: redundancy, verification, and a system designed to catch and correct errors.

What Rashi Is Doing

Now we can finally understand what Rashi is up to — and who Rabbi Yitzchak is.

An analogy might help. Most of us are familiar with the United States Constitution. Imagine you wanted to write a book explaining, line by line, what the Constitution means at its most fundamental level — its peshat, so to speak.

You wouldn’t just read the text and offer your own thoughts. You would go to the source material.

The debates that took place during ratification. The landmark court cases that interpreted and applied the text. The academic scholarship that has accumulated over two hundred and fifty years. And more.

You would sift through this enormous body of material and select the most authoritative, most insightful voices — the ones that best illuminate what the Constitution is actually saying.

That is something like what Rashi is doing with the Chumash.

The Chumash was written over three thousand years ago. Between then and Rashi’s time in eleventh-century France, more than two millennia of discussion, study, debate, and interpretation had taken place. Much of this was captured in the Mishnah, the Gemara, and the various Midrashim.

But it doesn’t stop there. Even within Tanach itself, the books of Nevi’im and Kesuvim contain passages that elucidate and develop ideas found in the Chumash. A line in Tehillim, a story in Melachim, a passage in Yeshayahu — these can shed light on what a verse in the Chumash means, even if the connection is not immediately obvious to us.

One aspect of Rashi’s genius is as a curator. He goes through this vast body of literature — the Midrashim, the Gemara, the rest of Tanach — and he selects. Not everything in that literature relates to peshat. Not every insight is about the straightforward, first-level reading of the text. Some material relates to remez, or drush, or sod — deeper layers of meaning. Rashi’s task is to find those statements, from among the thousands available to him, that best help us read the Chumash at the level of peshat.

And peshat, let me be clear, does not mean superficial. It means the first level of deep understanding. Think of it like meeting a person. You might interact with someone at length — observe their body language, listen to how they speak, watch how they conduct themselves — and come away with a genuinely good understanding of who they are. But there may still be deeper layers, things you would only discover through years of close relationship or in moments of crisis. Peshat is that first good understanding. It may be very deep. But there is deeper still.

Rashi wants to give us peshat. And one of his primary methods is drawing on the accumulated wisdom of the oral tradition — the insights of the sages whose words were preserved in the Midrashim and the Gemara — and selecting those that illuminate the straightforward reading of the text.

Meeting Rabbi Yitzchak

And so we arrive at Rabbi Yitzchak.

Rabbi Yitzchak was one of the Tanna’im — the sages of the Mishnaic period — whose teachings are found in the Midrash Tanchuma, among other sources. He is one of those great minds whose insights, transmitted and preserved across the generations, help us understand what the Chumash is saying at its most fundamental level. Rashi quotes him here, at the very opening of the Torah, because what Rabbi Yitzchak has to say speaks directly to the peshat of why the Torah begins where it begins.

It is like opening a book on constitutional law by quoting one of the great justices. The name signals authority. It signals that what follows is not casual opinion but the fruit of serious, sustained engagement with the text — the kind of engagement that has been happening, as we have seen, since the Torah was first given.

Now, Rashi does not continue this pattern of attribution throughout his commentary. He does not say אמר רבי פלוני before every comment. Most of the time, he simply presents the insight without naming the source. But here, at the very beginning, he lets us see behind the curtain. He is telling us: this is how I work. I am drawing on a tradition. I am drawing on the accumulated insight of the greatest minds who have engaged with this text over the centuries. And I am selecting from among them the ones that I believe best help us understand what the Torah is saying on the level of peshat.

That is what the first three words tell us.

אמר רבי יצחק

Three words — and in them, an entire methodology. A tradition of learning stretching back over a thousand years. A vast body of literature, carefully preserved, from which Rashi draws with extraordinary discernment. And an invitation to us: when you learn Rashi, you are not only reading the thoughts of one of the greatest Rishonim to ever live. You are also accessing a chain of insight that reaches back to the earliest conversations about the Torah itself.

Share masmid

It is forty days later.

Forty days (and forty nights) after HaKadosh Baruch Hu told Moshe to go up the mountain to get the Luchos, the Torah, and the Mitzvah. And during this entire time, we have joined Moshe as he received the directive to build the Mishkan (while still keeping Shabbos).

And yet, we almost forgot something; namely, the Jewish people.

They’re not on the mountain with HaKadosh Baruch Hu. Nope. They are down below, in the camp, waiting.

And evidently, this is a problem. If not for all of them, then for at least some of them:

וַיַּרְא הָעָם כִּי בֹשֵׁשׁ מֹשֶׁה לָרֶדֶת מִן הָהָר…

And the people saw that Moshe was boshesh to come down from the mountain

But here’s my problem. What does this word mean — בֹשֵׁשׁ (boshesh)?

I have no idea.

And if I don’t know what the word means, I can’t know what the problem is. And if I don’t know what the problem is, how can I understand why the Jewish people responded the way they did?

But let’s read the rest of the verse:

וַיַּרְא הָעָם כִּי בֹשֵׁשׁ מֹשֶׁה לָרֶדֶת מִן הָהָר, וַיִּקָּהֵל הָעָם עַל אַהֲרֹן, וַיֹּאמְרוּ אֵלָיו: קוּם עֲשֵׂה לָנוּ אֱלֹהִים אֲשֶׁר יֵלְכוּ לְפָנֵינוּ, כִּי זֶה מֹשֶׁה הָאִישׁ אֲשֶׁר הֶעֱלָנוּ מֵאֶרֶץ מִצְרָיִם, לֹא יָדַענוּ מֶה הָיָה לוֹ.

The people saw that Moshe was boshesh to come down from the mountain, and the people gathered on Aharon and said to him: Get up, make us gods that will go before us — because this man Moshe who brought us up from the land of Egypt, we don’t know what happened to him.

They gather עַל (al) Aharon — the man Moshe left in charge — and tell him:

כִּי זֶה מֹשֶׁה הָאִישׁ אֲשֶׁר הֶעֱלָנוּ מֵאֶרֶץ מִצְרָיִם, לֹא יָדַעְנוּ מֶה הָיָה לוֹ

Ki zeh Moshe ha’ish asher he’elanu me’eretz Mitzrayim, lo yadanu meh hayah lo — this man Moshe who brought us up from the land of Egypt, we don’t know what happened to him.

They don’t think Moshe is coming back. He’s בֹשֵׁשׁ (boshesh) — whatever that word means.

Maybe he fled.
Maybe he died.
Maybe he wants to stay with G-d on the mountain.

However they understand it, the bottom line is the same: he’s not here, and they don’t think he’s coming back.

So they need a new Moshe.

Therefore, they command Aharon:

קוּם עֲשֵׂה לָנוּ אֱלֹהִים אֲשֶׁר יֵלְכוּ לְפָנֵינוּ

Get up and make for us an Elohim that will go before us.

Now honestly, I have no idea what they have in mind here. Moshe is gone, so therefore Aharon should make them a god or some sort of divine power which will go before them?

How exactly does that work? I don’t know, but that’s what they asked for.

And how exactly will this god or whatever it is replace Moshe? I also don’t know, but they think it will work.

And why don’t they just ask Aharon to take Moshe’s place? After all, if he is capable of making a replacement for Moshe, then why not just ask him to be the replacement?

None of it makes any sense.

Aharon’s Response: The Gold

Now, as strange as this request is, it’s even stranger that Aharon takes it seriously:

פָּרְקוּ נִזְמֵי הַזָּהָב

Take off the gold earrings.

And not just any gold earrings, but the gold earrings of your wife and kids:

פָּרְקוּ נִזְמֵי הַזָּהָב אֲשֶׁר בְּאָזְנֵי נָשֵׁיכֶם וּבְאָזְנֵי בָנֵיכֶם וּבְאָזְנֵי בְּנוֹתֵיכֶם, וּבִיאוּ אֹתָם אֵלַי.

Take off the gold earrings that are in the ears of your wives and your sons and your daughters, and bring them to me.

We’ll leave aside the question of how Aharon could make such a suggestion. Instead, we’ll just notice a seeming similarity.

We just had Parshas Terumah. And at the beginning of that parsha, HaKadosh Baruch Hu requests donations from the entire Jewish people to build the Mishkan.

And here is Aharon requesting donations from (most of) the Jewish people to build the golden calf.

But, as I note, it’s only most of the Jewish people.

The wives. And the sons. And the daughters.

One’s closest family members.

Why them specifically? Why only them?

And why their jewelry in general and their earrings in particular?

The Calf Emerges

Somehow or other, it actually worked. Either their wives and kids voluntarily gave up their golden jewelry — or they took it from them (my guess is the latter).

Either way, they bring the golden jewels to Aharon. And, surprise (again), he takes it from them.

וַיִּקַּח מִיָּדָם

And he took it from their hands.

And he shapes it.

וַיָּצַר אֹתוֹ בַּחֶרֶט

And he gave it shape with a cheret.

And he makes it into a molten calf.

וַיַּעֲשֵׂהוּ עֵגֶל מַסֵּכָה

And he made it into a molten calf.

This isn’t a golden calf.
This is a molten golden calf.

Fresh out of the oven. Burning hot. Glowing bright orange (or red).

Red. What an interesting color for a bovine (aka cattle aka baby cow).

So we have our golden (molten) calf. Singular. As in one.

And yet, note the next of the “people”:

אֵלֶּה אֱלֹהֶיךָ יִשְׂרָאֵל אֲשֶׁר הֶעֱלוּךָ מֵאֶרֶץ מִצְרָיִם.

“These are your gods, Israel, who took you up from the land of Egypt.”

These? Plural?

A moment ago everything was singular.

“Aharon formed it.” Aharon made a calf.”

So where did the plural suddenly come from?

I don’t know.

The Claim That Doesn’t Make Sense

But even before that, we have a much larger problem. What they say doesn’t make any sense.

Just a moment ago they themselves said that Moshe was the one who took them out of Egypt — and that they now needed someone or something to go before them because Moshe was gone.

But now things have changed. Now, it is no longer Moshe who took them out of Egypt.

Nope.

Instead, it is the calves. The singular turned plural, molten golden calves took the Jewish people out of Egypt.

This is their message. To the people who just came out of Egypt. Who saw all the plagues.
And the splitting of the sea. And manna. And who stood at Har Sinai some forty days earlier where G-d Himself told them that He took them out of Egypt.

You expect these people to believe that it was a calf that they just made that took them out of Egypt?

Evidently they do.

Why Rewrite History?

And there’s another question. Why is this even necessary? Why do these gods have to be the ones who took them out of Egypt?

If they need someone to lead them now — fine. That at least would make some sense.

But why rewrite the past? Why redefine history?

I still don’t know. But at least this time I have an idea.

Moshe hasn’t come down and now they “need” to replace him.

To do that, they are constructing a narrative. And for that to work, the people need to believe that these golden molten calves are responsible for their salvation.

Why? Still don’t know.
But if I had to guess...

If these are the ones who took you out of Egypt, then you owe them your allegiance. And if you give them your allegiance, then they can lead you.

Aharon’s Next Move

Aharon builds a mizbeach before it — before the calf — and proclaims:

חַג לַה׳ מָחָר.

“Tomorrow will be a festival for Hashem.”

And, indeed, the next morning comes and the people are up bright and early.

וַיַּשְׁכִּימוּ מִמָּחֳרָת.

And they offer sacrifices.

Olot (עלות) — burnt offerings. Shlamim (שלמים) — peace offerings.

And then they eat and drink. And then they “play”:

וַיָּקֻמוּ לְצַחֵק.

And all of this (except for the “playing” part) feels familiar

Let’s go back again to the end of Parshas Mishpatim. But this time to the story just before Moshe goes up the mountain. The covenant ceremony. When the Jewish people accept the covenant with Hashem.

Moshe writes the words of Hashem. He builds a mizbeach at the foot of the mountain. The young men of Israel bring olot and shlamim. Moshe takes the blood — half he places in bowls, half he throws on the mizbeach. He reads the Sefer HaBrit to the people. And they say:

נַעֲשֶׂה וְנִשְׁמָע.

We will do, and we will understand.

Then Moshe throws the blood on the people and declares:

הִנֵּה דַם הַבְּרִית אֲשֶׁר כָּרַת ה׳ עִמָּכֶם.

“This is the blood of the covenant.”

Then Moshe, Aharon, Nadav, Avihu, and the seventy elders ascend the mountain. They see the God of Israel. And what do they do? They eat and drink.

Now look again at what is happening with the calf.

Aharon builds a מִזְבֵּחַ (mizbeach). They rise early the next morning. They bring עֹלֹת (olot) and שְׁלָמִים (shlamim). They eat and drink.

The structure is almost identical.

Except for one detail. One extra phrase.

וַיָּקֻמוּ לְצַחֵק.

They rise to revel.

So what is going on here? Are they trying to recreate the covenant ceremony? Are they trying to reproduce what Moshe did — but now with a new covenant? If so, where is the covenant?

And here, I have another guess.

The most effective way to lead people astray is not to create something entirely new. It is to imitate what is real. To keep the same forms. The same rituals. The same language.

But give it an entirely different meaning.

You will act unjustly in the name of justice. You will oppress in the name of freedom. You will torture in the name of love.

Give it the same appearance. But direct it toward a completely different reality.

Is that what is happening here? All the trappings of the covenantal ceremony — but without the covenant?

Moshe on the Mountain

Moshe is still on the mountain when all of this is happening.

But not for long.

HaKadosh Baruch Hu sends him down — and soon enough he (and Yehoshua) approach the camp. And something is not right.

There is noise.

What kind. I do not know (but you knew that, right). But it is noteworthy:

וַיִּשְׁמַע יְהוֹשֻׁעַ אֶת קוֹל הָעָם בְּרֵעֹה.

I don’t know what that word means. בְּרֵעֹה (bere’o). I don’t know what they are doing.

But Yehoshua has an idea:

קוֹל מִלְחָמָה בַּמַּחֲנֶה.

It sounds like war in the camp.

Moshe responds:

אֵין קוֹל עֲנוֹת גְּבוּרָה.

It’s not the sound of victory.

וְאֵין קוֹל עֲנוֹת חֲלוּשָׁה.

It’s not the sound of defeat.

Instead:

קוֹל עֲנוֹת אָנֹכִי שֹׁמֵעַ.

I hear קוֹל עֲנוֹת (kol anot). What is kol anot? I have no idea.

So I have בֹשֵׁשׁ (boshesh) — I don’t know what that means.\ I have רֵעֹה (re’o) — I don’t know what that means.
And I have עֲנוֹת (anot) — I don’t know what that means either.

Starting to see a pattern?

Then They See

Moshe and Yehoshua continue on. And then, Moshe sees what is happening.

וַיַּרְא אֶת הָעֵגֶל וּמְחֹלֹת.

And he saw the calf and dancing

He sees the calf. And he sees dancing.

Dancing.

Before they were “playing”. Now they are dancing.

Are they worshipping the calf? Or is this just some sort of celebration?

Not clear.

But whatever it is, Moshe does not like it. Indeed, it angers him (as it had angered Hashem before):

וַיִּחַר אַף מֹשֶׁה וַיַּשְׁלֵךְ מִיָּדָיו אֶת הַלֻּחֹת וַיְשַׁבֵּר אֹתָם תַּחַת הָהָר.

And Moshe’s anger flared, and he cast the tablets from his hands, and he shattered them at the foot of the mountain.

Sounds like it is more than just a celebration.

The Destruction of the Calf

There is more breaking to be done.

Moshe takes the calf.

וַיִּקַּח אֶת הָעֵגֶל אֲשֶׁר עָשׂוּ.

He burns it in fire:

וַיִּשְׂרֹף בָּאֵשׁ.

Then he grinds it into golden dust:

וַיִּטְחַן עַד אֲשֶׁר דַּק.

Then Moshe scatters it over water:

וַיִּזֶר עַל פְּנֵי הַמָּיִם.

And then he makes the Israelites drink it:

וַיַּשְׁקְ אֶת בְּנֵי יִשְׂרָאֵל.

In short, their wives and kids are not getting their gold back. And the people are not getting their calf back.

Nope. It is gone. Totally and utterly destroyed.

I get all of that. It’s the last part I don’t quite get. Why make the nation drink it? Why not just scatter the dust to the wind or throw it into the sea?

Why must they drink it? Why must they consume it?

And yet, I once again hear an echo.
Again, to the covenantal ceremony. The one with the olot and shlamim and the eating and drinking which we mentioned above.

There was something else there. Not water, but blood. The blood of the sacrifices. And it was that blood which was used to formalize the covenant.

Half of it was thrown on the mizbeach. And the other half was thrown on the nation.

Blood. Water. And the nation.

Is it a stretch?
I don’t think so. But I also don’t know what it means.

The Levites

I have more questions — many more questions. But I’m going to skip them for now. Instead, I’ll focus on one last part of the story which I just don’t understand.

Moshe stands at the gate of the camp. And he calls out:

מִי לַה׳ אֵלָי.

Whoever is for Hashem — come to me.

The tribe of Levi gathers to him. And Moshe commands them:

שִׂימוּ אִישׁ חַרְבּוֹ עַל יְרֵכוֹ, עִבְרוּ וָשׁוּבוּ מִשַּׁעַר לָשַׁעַר בַּמַּחֲנֶה, וְהִרְגוּ אִישׁ אֶת אָחִיו וְאִישׁ אֶת רֵעֵהוּ וְאִישׁ אֶת קְרֹבוֹ.

Put every man his sword on his thigh, go back and forth from gate to gate throughout the camp, and strike down every man his brother, every man his fellow, and every man his relative.

Three thousand people die that day.

Why is this necessary? Moshe has already destroyed the calf. He already burned it, crushed it, made everybody drink it. No one seems to have stood up to him.

Was there still some sort of threat? If so, what was it? If not, then what is Moshe (and the Leviim) doing?

The Questions Remain

We’ve gone through the story.

It almost led to the destruction of the people as a whole.

It did lead to the destruction of the first tablets.

And it also led to the killing of some three thousand people.

And yet, despite its severity. I still have no idea what exactly the issue is. I understand it was bad. But I don’t understand the nature of the problem.

And in some ways I’m more confused about the story now that I read it closely, than I was before I delved into it.

So, how are we going to make sense of this?

By going back. By looking at the story again.
By trying to find answers and connections. And by looking at what Chazal and the mefarshim have to say.

What Did the Nation See?

So let us remind ourselves. Where did this all start:

וַיַּרְא הָעָם כִּי בֹּשֵׁשׁ מֹשֶׁה לָרֶדֶת מִן הָהָר.

The people saw that Moshe was boshesh to come down from the mountain.

What does this word mean? As you know, I don’t know.
But Rashi might.

Let’s see what he has to say:

כְּתַרְגּוּמוֹ — לְשׁוֹן אִחוּר

According to its translation — it means “delay.”

But Rashi does not stop there. He brings another place in Tanakh where the same word appears — in Sefer Shoftim.

Which means, we are going to take a little detour to Sefer Shoftim.

We are after the war with Sisera and Devorah and Barak sing their famous victory song. Towards the end of this song, we are presented with a vivid image:

בְּעַד הַחַלּוֹן נִשְׁקְפָה וַתְּיַבֵּב אֵם סִיסְרָא.

Through the window she looks out, and Sisera’s mother laments.

Why is Sisera’s mother looking out the window? Because she is waiting for her son to come home. We know that he is dead, but she does not yet know that.

And so, she sits, waits, worries and wonders:

מַדּוּעַ בֹּשֵׁשׁ רִכְבּוֹ לָבוֹא?

מַדּוּעַ אֶחֱרוּ פַּעֲמֵי מַרְכְּבוֹתָיו?

Why is his chariot delayed in coming? Why is the sound of his chariots late to arrive?

So here we have two words that seem to mean something similar: בֹּשֵׁשׁ and אֶחֱרוּ. Both seem to refer to delay.

But if we follow the approach of the Malbim, synonyms in Tanakh are rarely identical. There is usually some nuance separating them.

In other words, conceptually speaking, they are the same. But they each have a unique take (so to speak) on that concept.

That’s a bit abstract. So let’s see a concrete example from the Malbim himself as relates to these two words:

כִּי יֵשׁ הֶבְדֵּל בֵּין אִחֵר וּבֵין בּוֹשֵׁשׁ. בּוֹשֵׁשׁ הוּא הַמִּתְמַהְמֵהַּ יוֹתֵר מִן הָרָגִיל, וְהַמְאַחֵר מְאַחֵר זְמַן קָבוּעַ שֶׁהָיָה מְעוּתָּד לַחֲזוֹר

There is a difference between achar and boshesh. Boshesh is one who tarries more than is customary. Me’acher means being late past a fixed time when one was expected to return.

In other words, אִיחוּר (ichur) means simply being late. There was a time you were supposed to arrive, and you came later than that.

But בֹּשֵׁשׁ (boshesh) is something stronger. It is a delay that is far beyond what is normal or expected. Not just a little late. But significantly so.

It’s the difference between being 5 minutes late for an appointment and 5 hours.

In one case, they fit you in. In the other, you still pay for the appointment. And you still have to reschedule.

Another Example in Shoftim

Rashi brings another example from Sefer Shoftim. This time from the story of Ehud.

Ehud assassinates Eglon, the king of Moav, who had been oppressing Israel. After killing him, Ehud escapes. He locks the doors of the upper chamber behind him. Eglon’s servants arrive and see the locked doors. They assume the king is relieving himself. So they wait.

And they wait. And wait.

Eventually, they can’t wait any more:

וַיָּחִילוּ עַד בּוֹשׁ.

And they waited until bosh.

Bosh, very similar word. Essentially, our word but with just one shin instead of two. And according to Rashi, it also means waiting a long time:

עַד בּוֹשׁ. עַד עִכּוּב, כְּלוֹמַר זְמַן אָרוֹךְ:

Until bosh. Until a delay, meaning a long time.

So What Does “בֹּשֵׁשׁ” Mean?

So according to Rashi — and supported by these other examples — the word boshesh does not simply mean “late.” It means late beyond reason.

A delay so long that it begins to raise alarm.

Something is wrong. Something has happened. This is not normal.

So when the Torah says:

וַיַּרְא הָעָם כִּי בֹּשֵׁשׁ מֹשֶׁה.

It means the people believed Moshe had delayed far beyond what was reasonable. Not simply that he was late. But that he had been gone too long. Long enough to make them think something must have gone wrong.

The Satan and the Cognitive Yetzer Hara

So what went wrong?

According to Rashi, it was a miscalculation. I’ll spare us the math for now (but I’ll encourage you to look up and see Rashi’s calculation).

For now, we’ll note that Moshe was supposed to come down on the morning of the 17th of Tammuz and they thought he was supposed to come down on the 16th.

But that’s not the interesting part. Rather, what I want to focus on is the Satan (הַשָּׂטָן).

But be careful. We are not talking about a devil like creature. No, we are talking about something far more interesting.

Rashi writes:

בְּי”ו בָּא שָׂטָן וְעִרְבֵּב אֶת הָעוֹלָם, וְהֶרְאָה דְּמוּת חֹשֶׁךְ וַאֲפֵלָה וְעִרְבּוּבְיָה, לוֹמַר וַדַּאי מֵת מֹשֶׁה לְכָךְ בָּא עִרְבּוּבְיָא לָעוֹלָם,

On the 16th, the Satan came and mixed up the world, and showed a semblance of darkness and confusion, to say: Moshe must have died.

To understand this Rashi, let me use one of my favorite learning tools: the working hypothesis.

I have a working hypothesis about the Satan. I believe he is the intellectual yetzer hara (see, no devil in disguise).

Sometimes we have desires which when left unchecked lead us astray.

Sometimes we have emotions which do the same.

And sometimes we have cognitive distortions which are the culprit.

All of them are “inclinations”. We are not forced to go after them, but our default state is to follow them.

And all of them are destructive if we don’t properly channel or relate to them.

Thus the term, yetzer hara — a destructive inclination (I prefer destructive over evil).

And, as I mentioned above, not all inclinations are drives, desires or emotions. We may have certain inclinations on how to interpret or understand events.

Interpretations which are off one way or the other.

And that is where the Satan comes in.

HaKadosh Baruch Hu tells Avraham that through Yitzchak he will build up the Jewish people. And then He tells him to sacrifice Yitzchak.

And for three days the Satan tells him that it makes no sense.

And then there is Kashrus and Parah Adumah. The Satan and Umas Haoloam tell us that it makes no sense.

Or how about Sefer Iyov. Where the Satan sets Iyov up and orchestrates events that directly test Iyov’s intellectual understanding of G-d and how He operates in the world.

That is the Satan.

And, according to Rashi, he was at work here as well. He mixed things up. Led people to believe that Moshe was dead.

After all, he went up To the mountain without any food or water, and now the day that we expected him (erroneously) to arrive has come, but he has not.

He must be dead.

That was their unchecked interpretation. That was the darkness.
The fear.

We are now alone in the desert. We don’t know how to navigate the desert. We can’t split the sea. We can’t make bitter waters sweet. We can’t bring manna from the heavens.

We need someone. And we have no one. And we know of no one.

So we need something else.
Something divine.
Not G-d, but G-d like.
Like Moshe was G-d like.

Now things are starting to make sense. But honestly, I think there is another piece of the puzzle we should check out before we move on.

A Familiar Word

That word בֹשֵׁשׁ (boshesh) is interesting. It is so familiar. We have seen it before.
And not just in Sefer Shoftim.

No, here, in the Chumash. We have seen it. But we just didn’t see the connection.

But, I think it is there.

So, once again, we are going to go back to the garden. Because so much of the Chumash flows out from the garden.

Man has been created. As has woman. And they are in their natural state, as the Chumash notes:

וַיִּהְיוּ שְׁנֵיהֶם עֲרוּמִּים הָאָדָם וְאִשְׁתּוֹ וְלֹא יִתְבֹּשָֽׁשׁוּ.

And the two of them were naked, the man and his wife, and they were not yitboshashu.

Note that beautifully untranslated word — יִתְבֹּשָֽׁשׁוּ (yitboshashu).

Look at the root: ב-ש-ש.

It is the same root.
Moshe was בֹשֵׁשׁ (boshesh) from going down the mountain. The man and the women were not יִתְבֹּשָֽׁשׁוּ (yitboshashu) — even though they were naked.

Could it be that Moshe was embarrassed to come down the mountain? Because clearly, the word yitboshashu (יִתְבֹּשָֽׁשׁוּ) means embarrassed — as the targum and numerous mefarshim point out and as is clear from the context itself.

So, could Moshe have been embarrassed to come down the mountain? Or, more accurately, could it be that the people (through the influence of the Satan) thought that Moshe was embarrassed to come down the mountain?

Indeed, before I make this case, can I note the following midrash:

שְׁלוֹשָׁה הֵן שֶׁלֹּא הִמְתִּינוּ בִּשְׁלוֹתָן שֵׁשׁ שָׁעוֹת, וְאֵלּוּ הֵן: אָדָם וְיִשְׂרָאֵל וְסִיסְרָא.

Three are those who did not endure six hours in their tranquility: Adam, Israel, and Sisera.

Adam, as it is stated: “and they were not ashamed [velo yitboshashu]” — not even six hours passed with him being in peace.

Israel, as it is stated: “The people saw that Moses tarried [boshesh]” (Shemos 32:1) — six hours had passed, and Moses had not come.

Sisera, as it is stated: “Why does his chariot tarry [boshesh] to arrive” (Shoftim 5:28) — every day he was accustomed to come home during the third or fourth hour, but now the sixth hour had passed and he had not come. That is the meaning of “velo yitboshashu.”

Did you catch that?

The Midrash explicitly links all three verses — Bereishis 2:25, Shemos 32:1, and Shoftim 5:28 — through the same word. The doubled shin contains שֵׁשׁ (shesh) — six. Three cases of people who could not endure past the sixth hour. Adam in the garden. Israel at the mountain. Sisera’s mother at the window.

Now, the Midrash is giving a classic midrashic reading of the word — a sort of play on words.

But what is meaningful for us is the connection. That the Midrash connects these three verses and these three words.

Back to Shoftim with New Eyes

Now let us take a detour back to Shoftim before we return to our verse with Moshe and the mountain.

Do we remember what it said? Sisera’s mother is looking through the window.

מדוע בשש רכבו לבוא?

We translated it, we understood it as Rashi said: why does his chariot tarry to come?

Let’s look at it again with our new understanding of the word בֹּשֵׁשׁ (boshesh).

Could she be asking a (slightly) different question — why is he embarrassed to come home?

Did he perhaps lose the war and is ashamed to come home?

Or maybe we can combine the two words — בֹּשֵׁשׁ (boshesh) and אֶחֱרוּ (acheru). Maybe it is the type of delay that happens because of embarrassment.

He is late — purposely late because he is embarrassed. Perhaps hesitate is a better word than delay.

She asks — why does he hesitate to come home? Why is he reluctant?

Indeed, now the story with Eglon makes more sense as well. They waited עד בּוֹשׁ (ad bosh).

They waited until it became embarrassing to wait any longer.

Moshe’s (Assumed) Hesitation

Now let’s go back to our story.

Let me try and get into the people’s mind. Into that confusion caused by their miscalculation.

Moshe has gone up to the heavens to get the Torah.

Who says that he is going to succeed. Perhaps he failed. Perhaps he has nothing to give us and is בֹּשֵׁשׁ (boshesh) — embarrassed. He promised so much and in the end will deliver so little.

True, when it came to taking us out of Egypt and guiding us in the desert, he succeeded. But this was the whole point. All of that was about all of this.

And now he has failed.

Maybe that is why he is not coming down the mountain. Indeed, perhaps he will never come down, unable or unwilling to face the certain shame he would feel when facing the nation.

And so, we are alone. And in the desert. And the Torah — it will eternally remain in heaven.

Only Moshe can bring it down, and he is not coming back. So we need a substitute. Not one that can bring us the Torah, but one that can just keep us alive.

The problem is, no man can take Moshe’s place.
And they don’t believe that they can connect to G-d without Moshe.

And so, they need something that is neither G-d nor man.

And perhaps also, that is not an idol either (albeit a close cousin).

The Gold

Let’s take a closer look at that gold.

Aharon tells the people to bring gold:

פָּרְקוּ נִזְמֵי הַזָּהָב אֲשֶׁר בְּאָזְנֵי נְשֵׁיכֶם בְּנֵיכֶם וּבְנֹתֵיכֶם וְהָבִיאוּ אֵלָי.

Remove the golden rings that are in the ears of your wives, your sons, and your daughters, and bring them to me.

Not just any gold, but נִזְמֵי הַזָּהָב (nizmei hazahav) — golden rings. And not just any earrings, but from their wives and children.

And note the word: בְּאָזְנֵי (b’oznei) — in the ears of.

Why?

One common explanation (one that I like) is that this was a delay tactic. Aharon expects resistance. He expects the wives and kids to hold the men at bay — long enough for Moshe to return.

That, indeed, is why he said that there would be a chag for Hashem tomorrow.

Tomorrow. The day Moshe is actually supposed to (and going to) return.

But still. The people aren’t foolish. They aren’t going to fall for just any old delay tactic. It seems to me that there must be something substantial about Aharon’s suggestion. Something that has appeal for those who want his assistance.

This is the brilliance (and problem) of his response. He relates to their request in a way that speaks to them, but also buys him (and them) time.

So what is that something substantial?

I have a thought. But, I have to admit, it is only a thought. Meaning, I don’t have any sources to back it up.

So I offer as an initial attempt to come up with a substantive answer. But not a final one. It is, I hope, at the very least a decent start.

So, let’s think about wives and earrings and gold (not in that order). This isn’t just any old gold. It has value beyond its financial worth.

It is a symbol of family. Of love. Of connection. It means something to the wives and the kids.

And it means something to the husbands and fathers as well.

And it is that extra something that Aharon is suggesting they give. Of course, he is not suggesting that they give only that extra something.

It does need to be gold. Something of financial value and aesthetic beauty and appeal.

But that is not enough.

Rather, it is all of them (and more) combined. Financial value. Aesthetic beauty. Emotional connection. And hard work (as represented by the calf). And untapped potential (as represented by the fact that it is a calf and not a full grown ox).

That is what is going to lead them through the desert. These values, the possessions, these capabilities. If they can tap into and develop them, then they can make it through.

That is the substitute for Moshe Rabbeinu.

And that was the appeal of Aharon’s idea.

It wasn’t an idol, but a symbol.

They were not worshipping the calf or using it to channel some sort of divine power. Rather, they were using it as a means of concentrating all of the above values in one unifying symbol.

What About the Ear

And so, they run with Aharon’s idea. And to Aharon’s dismay, they succeed.

But there was something else in Aharon’s suggestion. Something subtle which they did not pick up on.

And that is the ear.

Aharon didn’t suggest that they take gold necklaces or bracelets or even nose rings. No, specifically earrings.

Perhaps as a (not so) subtle reference. Those ears that heard HaKadosh Baruch Hu say:

אָנֹכִי ה׳ אֱלֹקֶיךָ אֲשֶׁר הוֹצֵאתִיךָ מֵאֶרֶץ מִצְרַיִם.

I am Hashem your G-d who took you out of the land of Egypt.

Those ears should wait. They should have faith and believe that the same G-d who took them out of Egypt will give them the full Torah.

Similar to the symbolism of that very first Mitzvah given in Parshas Mishpatim — that a slave who wants to remain a slave should have his ear pierced at the doorpost:

וְרָצַע אֲדֹנָיו אֶת אָזְנוֹ בַּמַּרְצֵעַ

And his master shall pierce his ear with an awl.

And Rashi asks: why the ear? Why not any other part of the body?

אֹזֶן שֶׁשָּׁמְעָה עַל הַר סִינַי “לֹא תִגְנֹב” — וְהָלַךְ וְגָנַב, תֵּרָצַע.

The ear that heard at Mount Sinai “You shall not steal” — and went and stole — shall be pierced.

The ear that heard at Sinai. That is the ear Aharon is pointing to.

But, as we know, they didn’t get the hint.

The Reinterpretation of History

So far, so good (at least I think so).

But what happened next?
Why the switch once the calf came out of the fire?

Why did they turn to the rest of the nation and say:

אֵלֶּה אֱלֹהֶיךָ יִשְׂרָאֵל אֲשֶׁר הֶעֱלוּךָ מֵאֶרֶץ מִצְרָיִם.

These are your gods, Israel, who brought you up from the land of Egypt.

Remember what they originally asked for:

קוּם עֲשֵׂה לָנוּ אֱלֹהִים אֲשֶׁר יֵלְכוּ לְפָנֵינוּ

Get up and make for us gods that will go before us.

The first was forward-looking — יֵלְכוּ לְפָנֵינוּ (yelchu lefaneinu), “will go before us.” The second is retroactive — הֶעֱלוּךָ (he’elucha), “brought you up.” That is a significant shift.

I have a guess. That there was a switch once they actually saw the calf. Originally, it was about making it through the desert.

But once they actually beheld it — and all that it represented — they reinterpreted their history. They started to wonder, perhaps it really was these values that brought us out of Egypt.

At the very least, it was these values that helped us to survive Egypt. Long before Moshe came on the scene we already blossomed in Egypt. And no matter how much they tried to keep us down, we kept rising up.

Maybe it wasn’t really Moshe Rabbeinu (or even HaKadosh Baruch Hu) after all. Perhaps this is all we really need.

Is that what it means? I don’t know. It’s just a suggestion. But it’s something to work with and/or think about.

The Mother and the Son

Now we arrive at the destruction of the egel.

We already listed the five steps in the first pass. Moshe takes the calf. Burns it in fire. Grinds it to powder. Scatters it on water. Makes the people drink.

But there is another process in the Torah that follows an eerily similar sequence. The parah adumah — the red cow, described in Bamidbar 19.

And the parah adumah is not a latecomer to the story. Rashi on Shemos 15:25 tells us:

בְּמָרָה נָתַן לָהֶם מִקְצָת פָּרָשִׁיּוֹת שֶׁל תּוֹרָה שֶׁיִּתְעַסְּקוּ בָהֶם, שַׁבָּת וּפָרָה אֲדֻמָּה וְדִינִין

At Mara, He gave them some sections of the Torah to engage in: Shabbat, the red cow, and civil law.

The parah adumah was already part of the Torah given before Sinai. It was already in their hands.

The process: Take a red cow. Burn it entirely outside the camp. Reduce it to ash. Mix the ash with water. Apply to the person who needs purification.

Take. Burn. Reduce to ash. Mix with water. Apply to the people.

Now go back to what Moshe did with the egel.

He took the calf. He burned it in fire. He ground it to powder. He scattered it on water. He made the people drink.

Take. Burn. Grind to powder. Mix with water. Apply to the people.

The structure is the same (see Rashi to Bamidbar 19:22).

And then there is the mashal. The Midrash Tanchuma (Chukat 8) and Bamidbar Rabbah (19:8) both bring it:

תָּבוֹא אִמּוֹ וּתְקַנֵּחַ אֶת הַצּוֹאָה... תָּבֹא פָּרָה וּתְכַפֵּר עַל מַעֲשֵׂה הָעֵגֶל

Let the mother come and clean up the excrement of the son. Let the cow come and atone for the deed of the calf.

The parah — the cow — is the mother. The egel — the calf — is the son. The mother comes to clean up the mess the son made.

And remember what I noted earlier about molten gold? If you’ve ever seen gold at high temperatures, it glows with a deep red-orange color. Striking. Beautiful.

The same color as a parah adumah — a red cow. There is more to say here. But (once again), I’m out of time.

What Remains

Why were the Levites needed?

The egel was already destroyed. Everyone had already drunk the water. No one seems to have stood up to Moshe. So what was still going on? What was Moshe seeing when he saw that the nation was פָרֻעַ (parua) — out of control, exposed?

I don’t know.

These are open questions. And I’m comfortable with that. But as I learned many years ago in Yeshiva — no one’s ever died of a kasha.

Share masmid

Before I even open the parsha, I already know what I want to explore.

It’s the stones. The precious jewels — or more accurately, the precious rocks.

And it’s their connection to the names of the Shevatim (the twelve tribes). What do the Shevatim have to do with rocks — even precious ones?

And what does any of this have to do with Aharon HaKohein and the Mishkan?

Why stones? Why these stones? Why Aharon HaKohein? Why the Mishkan?

Those are my questions. And I come in without any answers. Not even a clue where to start.

So, I’ll start where I always start — with the verses themselves.

The Clothes and the Kehuna

The section we want begins three pesukim into the parsha — with Aharon and his clothes. The stones aren’t just stones in isolation. They’re part of the clothing. So if we want to understand the stones, we first have to understand the clothing. And if we want to understand the clothing, we have to understand Aharon and the kehuna.

Hakadosh Baruch Hu tells Moshe to bring Aharon close:

וְאַתָּ֡ה הַקְרֵ֣ב אֵלֶ֩יךָ֩ אֶת־אַהֲרֹ֨ן אָחִ֜יךָ וְאֶת־בָּנָ֣יו אִתּ֗וֹ מִתּ֛וֹךְ בְּנֵ֥י יִשְׂרָאֵ֖ל לְכַהֲנוֹ־לִ֑י אַהֲרֹ֕ן נָדָ֧ב וַאֲבִיה֛וּא אֶלְעָזָ֥ר וְאִיתָמָ֖ר בְּנֵ֥י אַהֲרֹֽן׃

“You shall bring forward your brother Aharon, with his sons, from among the children of Yisrael, to serve Me as priests: Aharon, Nadav and Avihu, Elazar and Isamar, the sons of Aharon.” (Shemos 28:1)

הַקְרֵב אֵלֶיךָ (hakrev eilecha). Bring him close. There’s distance here — Aharon and his sons are no different from anybody else in Klal Yisrael right now. But they’re about to be. לְכַהֲנוֹ לִי (l’chahano li) — not to be a Kohen in the abstract, but to do the active work of kehuna.

Aharon has to be transformed into something he isn’t yet. He has to become someone who can bring people closer to Hakadosh Baruch Hu, and Hakadosh Baruch Hu closer to people. That’s the job. And Moshe has to bring him into it.

But how? How do you transform someone into a Kohen?

With clothes.

וְעָשִׂ֥יתָ בִגְדֵי־קֹ֖דֶשׁ לְאַהֲרֹ֣ן אָחִ֑יךָ לְכָב֖וֹד וּלְתִפְאָֽרֶת׃

“Make holy garments for Aharon your brother, for kavod and for tiferes.” (Shemos 28:2)

Clothes! בִּגְדֵי קֹדֶשׁ (bigdei kodesh) — holy garments. Remember our working definition of kedusha: something is קָדוֹשׁ (kadosh) when it leads you to think about and connect to Hakadosh Baruch Hu. A mezuzah, tefillin, Shabbos — these things cry out God. These clothes are going to do that too.

And they’re לְכָבוֹד וּלְתִפְאָרֶת (l’kavod ul’tifares). כָּבוֹד (kavod) comes from כָּבֵד (kaved) — heavy, weighty, a certain gravitas. תִּפְאֶרֶת (tiferes) comes from פְּאֵר (pe’er) — not beauty exactly (we have יֹפִי / yofi for that), but something more like radiance. I don’t have a full handle on kavod and tiferes yet, and I think they’re going to matter more as we go deeper. For now: the clothes carry weight and they carry light.

Now, who makes them?

וְאַתָּ֗ה תְּדַבֵּר֙ אֶל־כׇּל־חַכְמֵי־לֵ֔ב אֲשֶׁ֥ר מִלֵּאתִ֖יו ר֣וּחַ חׇכְמָ֑ה וְעָשׂ֞וּ אֶת־בִּגְדֵ֧י אַהֲרֹ֛ן לְקַדְּשׁ֖וֹ לְכַהֲנוֹ־לִֽי׃

“Speak to all the wise of heart, whom I have filled with a spirit of wisdom, and they shall make the garments of Aharon, to make him holy, to serve Me as a Kohen.” (Shemos 28:3)

חַכְמֵי לֵב (chachmei lev) — wise of heart — filled with רוּחַ חׇכְמָה (ruach chochma). Not just technically skilled — wise in the heart. And God Himself fills them with that wisdom. You can’t make garments that carry kedusha through craftsmanship alone.

And look at what these clothes are for: לְקַדְּשׁוֹ לְכַהֲנוֹ לִי (l’kadsho l’chahano li) — to make him holy, so he can serve as a Kohen.

The clothes are going to make Aharon kadosh. Not just be kadosh themselves — make him kadosh. Make him someone who just by being there puts you in mind of God. That’s what the transformation looks like.

But notice something. The clothes are no longer called בִּגְדֵי קֹדֶשׁ (bigdei kodesh). They’re called בִּגְדֵי אַהֲרֹן (bigdei Aharon) — the garments of Aharon.

Why? I’m not sure. But perhaps the Torah is telling us that the chachmei lev need to understand they’re making Aharon’s clothes. They have to have him in mind.

Now the Torah lists what’s to be made:

וְאֵ֨לֶּה הַבְּגָדִ֜ים אֲשֶׁ֣ר יַעֲשׂ֗וּ חֹ֤שֶׁן וְאֵפוֹד֙ וּמְעִ֔יל וּכְתֹ֥נֶת תַּשְׁבֵּ֖ץ מִצְנֶ֣פֶת וְאַבְנֵ֑ט וְעָשׂ֨וּ בִגְדֵי־קֹ֜דֶשׁ לְאַהֲרֹ֥ן אָחִ֛יךָ וּלְבָנָ֖יו לְכַהֲנוֹ־לִֽי׃

“These are the garments they are to make: a choshen, an eifod, a me’il, a kesones tashbetz, a mitznefes, and an avneit. They shall make these bigdei kodesh for Aharon your brother and for his sons, to serve Me as priests.” (Shemos 28:4)

The first two garments on this list — the choshen and the eifod — carry stones. Stones with names on them. That’s where we’re headed.

The Eifod’s Shoulders

The eifod seems to be some sort of apron-like garment. I want to skip its details and get to what matters for us — its shoulders:

וְלָ֣קַחְתָּ֔ אֶת־שְׁתֵּ֖י אַבְנֵי־שֹׁ֑הַם וּפִתַּחְתָּ֣ עֲלֵיהֶ֔ם שְׁמ֖וֹת בְּנֵ֥י יִשְׂרָאֵֽל׃

“Then take two stones of shoham, and engrave upon them the names of the children of Yisrael.” (Shemos 28:9)

Two stones of shoham. We’ll come back to what shoham is — but mark that word. You’re taking two particular stones. And then: וּפִתַּחְתָּ עֲלֵיהֶם שְׁמוֹת בְּנֵי יִשְׂרָאֵל (u’fitachta aleihem shemos Bnei Yisrael) — you’re going to open up on them the names of Bnei Yisrael. That word — פִּתַּח (pitach). Not “write.” Not “carve.” Open. As if the names are somehow already inside the stone, waiting to be revealed.

שִׁשָּׁה֙ מִשְּׁמֹתָ֔ם עַ֖ל הָאֶ֣בֶן הָאֶחָ֑ת וְאֶת־שְׁמ֞וֹת הַשִּׁשָּׁ֧ה הַנּוֹתָרִ֛ים עַל־הָאֶ֥בֶן הַשֵּׁנִ֖ית כְּתוֹלְדֹתָֽם׃

“Six of their names on the one stone, and the names of the remaining six on the second stone, in the order of their birth.” (Shemos 28:10)

Six names on one stone, six on the other — כְּתוֹלְדֹתָם (k’soledosam), according to their birth order.

And how are we going to open them? The Torah tells us:

מַעֲשֵׂ֣ה חָרַשׁ֮ אֶ֒בֶן֒ פִּתּוּחֵ֣י חֹתָ֗ם תְּפַתַּח֙ אֶת־שְׁתֵּ֣י הָאֲבָנִ֔ים עַל־שְׁמֹ֖ת בְּנֵ֣י יִשְׂרָאֵ֑ל

“The work of a stone engraver, seal engravings — you shall open the two stones with the names of the children of Yisrael.” (Shemos 28:11)

מַעֲשֵׂה חָרַשׁ אֶבֶן (ma’asei charesh even) — the work of a stone engraver. פִּתּוּחֵי חֹתָם (pituchei chosam) — engravings like a seal, like a king’s signet ring. That’s how you open the names onto the stones. And they’re set in מִשְׁבְּצוֹת זָהָב (mishbetzos zahav) — settings of gold.

Now, where do they go?

וְשַׂמְתָּ֞ אֶת־שְׁתֵּ֣י הָאֲבָנִ֗ים עַ֚ל כִּתְפֹ֣ת הָֽאֵפֹ֔ד אַבְנֵ֥י זִכָּרֹ֖ן לִבְנֵ֣י יִשְׂרָאֵ֑ל וְנָשָׂ֨א אַהֲרֹ֧ן אֶת־שְׁמוֹתָ֛ם לִפְנֵ֥י יְהֹוָ֖ה עַל־שְׁתֵּ֥י כְתֵפָ֖יו לְזִכָּרֹֽן׃

“Attach the two stones to the shoulder-pieces of the eifod, as stones of remembrance for the children of Yisrael. And Aharon shall bear their names before Hashem on his two shoulders, for remembrance.” (Shemos 28:12)

On the shoulders. That’s where you carry weight.

אַבְנֵי זִכָּרֹן לִבְנֵי יִשְׂרָאֵל (avnei zikaron l’Vnei Yisrael). Stones of remembrance for Bnei Yisrael — not the shevatim themselves, but their children. All of us. And we need to be remembered.

But who is doing the remembering? Let’s listen to the pasuk carefully.

וְנָשָׂא אַהֲרֹן אֶת שְׁמוֹתָם (v’nasa Aharon es shemosam) — Aharon will bear up their names. לִפְנֵי ה׳ (lifnei Hashem) — before Hashem. עַל שְׁתֵּי כְתֵפָיו (al shtei ketefav) — on his two shoulders. לְזִכָּרֹן (l’zikaron) — for remembrance.

Hashem needs to remember these names — as in וְאֵלֶּה שְׁמוֹת בְּנֵי יִשְׂרָאֵל הַבָּאִים מִצְרָיְמָה (v’eileh shemos Bnei Yisrael haba’im Mitzrayma). Those names which went down to Egypt are now going up to and before Hashem — so that Hashem can remember us.

This is quite an idea. One that needs to be explored from numerous perspectives.

For now, though, I’d like to explore it from the perspective of our working definition of kedusha. Until now, our working definition has been that something is holy when it helps man to remember and be mindful of Hakadosh Baruch Hu.

But I think it’s time for an expansion of our working definition.

It seems to me that something can also be holy if it helps Hakadosh Baruch Hu to remember and be mindful of us. After all, we have just learned that this is one of the central — if not the central — jobs of the eifod.

And we know that the eifod is one of the bigdei kodesh.

So it follows that an item can be holy if it has the quality of helping Hakadosh Baruch Hu to remember us, His people.

What’s in a Name?

But what exactly is Hashem being reminded of? What’s in these names?

I had said in my first article on Sefer Shemos — which is called Shemos, “Names” — that the names themselves carry content, meaning, perspectives. The mothers gave them particular meanings, and we carried those meanings with us into Egypt. But there’s something else in the names too: the people who first bore them. Their stories.

Take Yehuda. On the one hand, you hear the meaning of the name — recognition and thanks to Hashem. But we also remember the man who said מַה בֶּצַע (mah betza) — “What profit do we get if we kill Yosef?” Not Yehuda’s finest moment.

And we remember the same Yehuda who said צָדְקָה מִמֶּנִּי (tzadka mimeni) — who, when he could have protected his reputation at the cost of Tamar’s life, chose instead to protect her life at the cost of his reputation. We remember the man who told Yaakov אָנֹכִי אֶעֶרְבֶנּוּ (anochi e’ervenu) — “I will be the collateral for Binyamin” — and when the moment came, offered himself as a slave in Egypt so that Binyamin could go free.

All of that is in the name. The good and the bad. The growth.

So Aharon is bearing up all of this — all the weight of these names, their meanings and their histories — on his shoulders, before Hakadosh Baruch Hu. That’s not a light load.

And he does so on אַבְנֵי שֹׁהַם (avnei shoham) — stones of shoham.

Back to Gan Eden

We almost forgot about the shoham. We’ve been thinking about the names, the shoulders, the remembrance. But Aharon carries all of that on a particular type of stone. And that name — שֹׁהַם (shoham) — we’ve seen it before.

Which means, once again, we need to go back to Gan Eden. Because that’s where we first encountered it:

וּֽזְהַ֛ב הָאָ֥רֶץ הַהִ֖וא ט֑וֹב שָׁ֥ם הַבְּדֹ֖לַח וְאֶ֥בֶן הַשֹּֽׁהַם׃

“The gold of that land is good; bdellium is there, and the even hashoham — the shoham stone.” (Bereishis 2:12)

But we need to see this verse in context. And that context is the river.

Let me go back to the moment when God plants the garden:

וַיִּטַּ֞ע יְהֹוָ֧ה אֱלֹהִ֛ים גַּן־בְּעֵ֖דֶן מִקֶּ֑דֶם וַיָּ֣שֶׂם שָׁ֔ם אֶת־הָֽאָדָ֖ם אֲשֶׁ֥ר יָצָֽר׃

“Hashem Elokim planted a garden in Eden, in the east, and placed there the man whom He had formed.” (Bereishis 2:8)

God plants a garden in Eden, מִקֶּדֶם (mikedem) — from the east — which seems to imply that the garden is in the eastern part of Eden.

He also places man inside the garden and grows all the trees of the Garden:

וַיַּצְמַ֞ח יְהֹוָ֤ה אֱלֹהִים֙ מִן־הָ֣אֲדָמָ֔ה כׇּל־עֵ֛ץ נֶחְמָ֥ד לְמַרְאֶ֖ה וְט֣וֹב לְמַאֲכָ֑ל וְעֵ֤ץ הַֽחַיִּים֙ בְּת֣וֹךְ הַגָּ֔ן וְעֵ֕ץ הַדַּ֖עַת ט֥וֹב וָרָֽע׃

“From the ground Hashem Elokim caused to grow every tree that is pleasant to look at and good to eat, and the Eitz HaChaim in the midst of the garden, and the Eitz HaDaas Tov v’Ra.” (Bereishis 2:9)

At this point, we would expect the story to continue to tell us about man and his time in the garden. But instead, it goes on a seemingly irrelevant tangent and starts talking about rivers:

וְנָהָר֙ יֹצֵ֣א מֵעֵ֔דֶן לְהַשְׁק֖וֹת אֶת־הַגָּ֑ן וּמִשָּׁם֙ יִפָּרֵ֔ד וְהָיָ֖ה לְאַרְבָּעָ֥ה רָאשִֽׁים׃

“A river goes out from Eden to water the garden, and from there it divides and becomes four heads.” (Bereishis 2:10)

Let’s break this verse down.

There is a river that starts somewhere in Eden. Where, we don’t know. But not inside the garden.

No, it starts outside of the garden.

And this river passes by (or is it through) the garden. Indeed, this is the purpose of this river — to water the garden.

But it doesn’t just water the garden. When it reaches the garden it divides. It splits into four heads — וְהָיָה לְאַרְבָּעָה רָאשִֽׁים (v’hayah l’arba’ah rashim).

And each of those “heads” becomes a separate river in and of itself.

Why do we need to know this? I have no idea. But I’ll venture a less than satisfactory guess.

We have just been told that G-d planted a garden and grew in that garden all varieties of trees.

And we know that trees in particular need a good deal of water to grow — particularly fruit trees.

And so, we are told that G-d provided that water. That would “explain” at least half of this verse — and also “explain” why this verse appears specifically here, right after the verse about all the trees of the garden.

But honestly, this answer is so mundane that it seems impossible to believe. This simply is not the type of information that the Torah is interested in.

There has to be something more. But for now, that’s all we have.

Let’s continue.

One of these four rivers is called Pishon, and we’re told it encircles a land called Chavilah:

שֵׁ֥ם הָֽאֶחָ֖ד פִּישׁ֑וֹן ה֣וּא הַסֹּבֵ֗ב אֵ֚ת כׇּל־אֶ֣רֶץ הַֽחֲוִילָ֔ה אֲשֶׁר־שָׁ֖ם הַזָּהָֽב׃

“The name of the first is Pishon — it is the one that encircles the entire land of Chavilah, where the gold is.” (Bereishis 2:11)

And we are also told that the gold of this land is good.

וּֽזְהַ֛ב הָאָ֥רֶץ הַהִ֖וא ט֑וֹב שָׁ֥ם הַבְּדֹ֖לַח וְאֶ֥בֶן הַשֹּֽׁהַם׃

“The gold of that land is good; bdellium is there, and the shoham stone.” (Bereishis 2:12)

Here we have yet another seemingly mundane and irrelevant piece of information. Honestly, I have never been that interested in the goings on of the land of Chavilah.

And it’s great that they have good gold, but honestly — what does this have to do with Gan Eden and Adam and Chava or anything else that the Torah (and we) are interested in?

Seemingly nothing.

And yet, we pause and think for just one second. Why is it that we are reading this verse again?

Oh yeah, because of the shoham stone. The same shoham stone that Aharon carries on his shoulders into the Kodesh Kedoshim.

Well, it’s in this verse — the one that talks about the land of Chavilah and its high quality gold — that we first encounter the shoham stone.

And it is at this point that we remember that those shoham stones with the names of the Jewish people were set in מִשְׁבְּצוֹת זָהָב (mishbetzos zahav) — settings of gold.

All of a sudden this gold seems a bit more interesting. Here is a land with gold and stones of shoham.

And here is a priestly garment with stones of shoham set in gold.

And these stones, in this gold, are supposed to be carried into the Kodesh Kedoshim — where the Eitz HaChaim (aka the Torah) is housed within the Aron HaKadosh which has on top of it the Keruvim — the guardians of the path to the Eitz HaChaim.

And all of this we are being told right after we are told that G-d caused all the various trees of the Garden to grow — including the Eitz HaChaim.

Now that’s interesting.

What’s more — there are four rivers mentioned. But none of these other rivers get nearly the amount of attention and detail that Pishon does.

Only Pishon gets a description of its land — the gold, the bedolach, the shoham. Gichon encircles Cush — similar language, but no details about what’s there. Chidekel goes east of Ashur, but again no details.

And Pras? Just its name. Nothing else.

The Torah is pointing us somewhere — at that first river and its land, where our shoham (and gold) comes from.

And no sooner is our interest finally piqued that the Torah drops the entire subject of these rivers and returns to the story of the garden:

וַיִּקַּ֛ח יְהֹוָ֥ה אֱלֹהִ֖ים אֶת־הָֽאָדָ֑ם וַיַּנִּחֵ֣הוּ בְגַן־עֵ֔דֶן לְעׇבְדָ֖הּ וּלְשׇׁמְרָֽהּ׃

“Hashem Elokim took the man and placed him in Gan Eden, to work it and to guard it.” (Bereishis 2:15)

When all is said and done, all I have left from these stories is some curiosity and some questions.

Why is the Torah telling us about the rivers at all? This is a story about God placing man in Gan Eden, about man’s relationship with God and God’s relationship with man.

Why do I need to know about any of these rivers — even the river that watered the garden, let alone the rivers that didn’t?

Why do I need to know about the gold and jewels found in the land of Chavilah?

What do they have to do with the story of Gan Eden?

Once again, I have no idea.
And we won’t have any idea, until we get a bit more wisdom.

Nothing Like Wisdom

Chapter 28 in Sefer Iyov is an interesting chapter (although, truth be told, every chapter in Sefer Iyov is an interesting one).

The chapter begins discussing silver and gold.

Gold — sounds familiar.

Later on, though, it turns to the subject of חׇכְמָה (chochma) — wisdom.

And then, just a little bit further, it starts to compare chochma to gold.

But not just any gold, fine gold. The best gold. The type of gold you would find in the land of Chavilah.

But not just to fine gold. Also to the shoham stone:

לֹא־יִתֵּ֣ן סְג֣וֹר תַּחְתֶּ֑יהָ וְלֹ֥א יִ֝שָּׁקֵ֗ל כֶּ֣סֶף מְחִירָֽהּ׃ לֹֽא־תְ֭סֻלֶּה בְּכֶ֣תֶם אוֹפִ֑יר בְּשֹׁ֖הַם יָקָ֣ר וְסַפִּֽיר׃

“It [chochma] cannot be bought with fine gold, and silver cannot be weighed as its price. It cannot be praised against the gold of Ophir, or against precious shoham and sapphire.” (Iyov 28:15–16)

What an interesting combination. High quality gold and the shoham stone.

Haven’t we seen that duo before?

Now, for those of you who read Hebrew, you may be wondering — where did I get this translation of “fine gold”. The original Hebrew is סגור.

Well, let’s take a look at Rashi:

״זָהָב סָגוּר״ (מלכים א ו:כ) זֶהוּ זָהָב טוֹב, שֶׁבְּשָׁעָה שֶׁנִּפְתָּח, כָּל חֲנֻיּוֹת שֶׁל זָהָב נִסְגָּרוֹת:

“Gold of Segor (I Melachim 1:20) — this is good gold (זהב טוב), that when it is opened, all the shops of gold are closed.” (Rashi on Iyov 28:15)

Now, in case you are still not convinced, let us look just two verses later:

לֹא־יַעַרְכֶ֣נָּה זָ֭הָב וּזְכוֹכִ֑ית וּתְמ֖וּרָתָ֣הּ כְּלִי־פָֽז

“It cannot be valued with gold and glass, and its exchange is not vessels of fine gold.”

Either way, wisdom is being compared to gold and to precious shoham stones.

And we are being told that when you do compare them, there really is no comparison.

To compare gold to wisdom is like comparing a hot dog to a filet mignon or a can of coke to a glass of fine wine. They’re not even in the same category. They’re not even close.

Wisdom is simply in a category all of its own.

That, for any and all who think about it, is obviously true. But that is the point — you have to think about it.

What happens, though, if you do not think about it? What do you spend more time chasing — wisdom or gold?

Given a choice, most people would choose the gold. Gold and precious jewels have an immediate appeal that wisdom does not.

And so we need to be reminded. If we have to choose, what we really want is wisdom, not gold.

But we need to be reminded. And we need to choose.

Upstream and Downstream

Let us go back to those rivers.

The river goes out from Eden to water the garden. That’s its purpose — לְהַשְׁקוֹת אֶת הַגָּן (l’hashkos es hagan).

And then, when it reaches the garden, it splits — and it continues.

And when it splits, and when it continues — it reaches a land and produces gold.

Well, “produces” is not quite the right word. The river doesn’t create the gold. But it contains it — gathers it together, concentrates it, makes it accessible to man. The same may be true of the shoham stone.

Think about that.

The same water. Upstream, it nourishes the garden. Downstream, after it leaves the garden, it deposits material wealth.

So up above, life. Indeed, the עֵץ הַחַיִּים (Eitz HaChaim) — the Tree of Life. Which is the Torah. Which is wisdom (see last week’s dvar Torah).

And down below.
Gold. And precious stones — including the Shoham stone.

That is not to say that there was no gold or precious stones in the Garden of Eden. But they weren’t the essence or the focus.

But in Chavilah. That was the essence. That is what that land was known for.

And they are all connected by the same river. That one, singular river which starts not in the garden, but in Eden.

Eden.

We haven’t paid enough attention to Eden. We’ve been focused on gardens and rivers and gold and jewels.

But honestly, Eden deserves some attention now.

Note the name. Eden (עֵדֶן). What does it mean?

Pleasure. Delight.

This river flows not just from a place, but from a state of being. Pleasure itself is flowing. And that pleasure, that joy — first and foremost it is there to nurture the garden.

It wants to nurture life and growth and wisdom. There is a joy in wisdom — if only you take the time to notice it and choose it.

It is a taste that perhaps needs to be developed (like fine wine). But once you taste it, nothing compares.

But there are other pleasures in life. They are, of course, downstream from wisdom. But they are there.

One such pleasure is found in gold and precious jewels. Don’t believe me.

Let’s try a little experiment. Buy your wife a diamond necklace and tell me whether or not a smile comes across her face.

Tell a man that he won the lottery and see whether or not he jumps up and down with joy.

Walk into Fort Knox and tell me whether or not you are in awe of all that gold.

So there is a river which flows out of pleasure itself. And once it nourishes life and wisdom, it splits and nourishes all sorts of other types of joys.

You see, it’s not a tangent at all. The Torah tells us that G-d planted various trees in the garden. Some were pleasant to behold. Some were beneficial to consume. And, of course, there was the Eitz HaChaim and the Eitz HaDaas of good and evil.

But these trees are more than trees. They are the good things of life — pleasant to behold, good to consume, and they give us life. Yes, there is danger within the good. The Eitz HaDaas is also there. But in essence, these are the sources of meaning and depth and wisdom.

And they need to be nourished. If there is no joy in the process, no pleasure in the pursuit, we won’t do it. But when you find that joy — nothing can stop you.

And so, there is a flow — from that state of pleasure which nourishes all that is good in this world. We take joy in our families. Joy in our studies. Joy in our work.

But it doesn’t stop there. That same flow, that same river, divides and drives so many other types of pleasures — money, power, and more.

Of course, this isn’t the literal meaning of the verse. But I think it’s hiding right behind the surface. The essence is the garden and all that it contains. But that nurturing water doesn’t stop at the garden. It continues on and nourishes other places, other pleasures — including the pleasure of gold and precious jewels.

And yet, for some reason, it is that gold and those jewels which end up on the shoulders of the Kohen Gadol, when he carries our names in front of G-d in the Holy of Holies.

And it is there, in that seemingly paradoxical place, that everything starts to come together.

The Reversal

Let us return yet once again to our working (and newly expanded) definition of the word Kedushah. Something is kadosh — it is holy — if it reminds us of God or God of us.

And yet, the Mishkan, which is known as a mikdash, a place of holiness, is filled with gold and with precious stones.

How can that be if gold and stones are downstream from the garden? After all, aren’t we reproducing the garden — not the actual place, but the actual experience, the actual connection? The Mishkan is the place where God and man meet. And the stones are downstream!

Or are they?

In Sefer Yechezkel, we find an interesting dirge in “honor” of the king of Tyre. In there, Hakadosh Baruch Hu mourns the loss of wisdom and beauty that the king of Tyre once had:

בֶּן־אָדָ֕ם שָׂ֥א קִינָ֖ה עַל־מֶ֣לֶךְ צ֑וֹר וְאָמַ֣רְתָּ לּ֗וֹ כֹּ֤ה אָמַר֙ אֲדֹנָ֣י יֱהֹוִ֔ה אַתָּה֙ חוֹתֵ֣ם תׇּכְנִ֔ית מָלֵ֥א חׇכְמָ֖ה וּכְלִ֥יל יֹֽפִי׃

Son of man take up a dirge over the king of Tyre and say to him, “Thus said My L-rd, Hashem: ‘You were a seal of perfection, full of wisdom and perfect in beauty’.

Wisdom and beauty. Where did he have this wisdom and beauty? In Gan Eden:

בְּעֵ֨דֶן גַּן־אֱלֹהִ֜ים הָיִ֗יתָ כׇּל־אֶ֨בֶן יְקָרָ֤ה מְסֻכָתֶ֙ךָ֙ אֹ֣דֶם פִּטְדָ֞ה וְיָהֲלֹ֗ם תַּרְשִׁ֥ישׁ שֹׁ֙הַם֙ וְיָ֣שְׁפֵ֔ה סַפִּ֣יר נֹ֔פֶךְ וּבָרְקַ֖ת וְזָהָ֑ב

In the garden of Elokim you were, every precious stone was your covering: Odem, pithdah, yahalom, tarshish, shoham, yishpeh, sapir, nofech, bareket and zahav. The workmanship of your settings and sockets was in you...

Did you see that list?
Does that list look familiar? If we read a little further on in our Parsha, it will become more familiar.

There are nine precious stones and gold. And those nine precious stones are nine of the twelve stones found in the Choshen Mishpat, which we will discuss soon enough.

But which nine?

All three stones from the first row of the Choshen are here. All three from the second row. All three from the fourth row. But the entire third row — לֶשֶׁם, שְׁבוֹ, אַחְלָמָה (leshem, shvo, achlamah) — is completely absent. Nine of twelve, and the three missing ones are all from the same row.

Why is that row absent? I have the beginning of a hunch. The Malbim has a fully worked out theory (you can read it in his commentary on Yechezkel).

But whether it is hunches or fully worked out theories — our point is that these stones (including the shoham) and the gold were all found in Gan Eden.

It’s not that in Gan Eden there was only wisdom and life and all the “good things” of life. There was also gold and precious stones.

But they were not the focus.

The focus was the trees and their fruit. The same river that nourished the trees also contained the gold and the precious stones. They just weren’t the essence.

But in Chavilah, that changed. Chavilah was known for its gold and precious jewels — and only for its gold and precious jewels.

The flow of pleasure continued beyond Gan Eden, but it was a lower form of pleasure. A pleasure solely of material wealth.

And that perspective took off — particularly after the sin and the exile from the garden.

But now, with the building of the Mishkan, came time for the reversal.

Yes, there is an abundance of gold and precious stones in the Mishkan. But they are not there for their own sake. They are there — at least in the case of Aharon HaKohein — for לְכָבוֹד וּלְתִפְאָרֶת (l’kavod ul’tifares), for honor and radiance.

But this is not for Aharon’s honor and beauty. This is not an act of self-aggrandizement.

No, we are turning Aharon HaKohein into a holy man. A man who, when you see him, reminds you of Hakadosh Baruch Hu — and who reminds HaKadosh Baruch Hu of us.

And the gold and precious jewels help with that. They still draw our attention, but they then take that attention and direct it to Hakadosh Baruch Hu.

It’s not gold and jewels for their own sake or for the sake of wealth, but because of the experience that they create — and the ability to channel that experience to help connect us to our Creator and our Creator to us.

That is why the clothes are holy. But even moreso, that is why Aharon HaKohein is holy. Because he is able to bear up those items which most naturally draw our attention away from G-d and use them to draw it towards G-d.

The Rest of the Stones

Of course, we have not yet covered all the stones. Until now, most of our focus has been on the shoham stone.

But there are many more stones in the bigdei kodesh. In particular, the Choshen Mishpat with its four rows of precious jewels — each jewel unique in its own precious way.

Twelve stones in all, each one with a name of one of the twelve tribes.

And I wonder about these twelve stones. I understand why we have gold and jewels in the Mishkan. They create an atmosphere, an impression, which, when used properly, can be quite holy.

But what about the names? We have the names on these stones, and as prominent as they are on the avnei shoham, they’re even more so on the Choshen Mishpat, where each tribe gets its own unique stone. What is the connection between the stones and the names?

So I have an idea, which seems to be true, but I don’t have a source for it.

Imagine you are looking at a diamond. Can you see the colors? Can you see that almost magical display of light that is unique to diamonds? The diamond doesn’t create that light — but it does reveal an otherwise hidden aspect of light.

So it is (I imagine) with every precious stone. Each one has its own unique property which makes it one of a kind.

And all in all, there are twelve of them. Which means twelve unique qualities and properties.

That’s what the twelve tribes are.

Each shevet sees and reflects the divine light differently. Yehuda sees it one way. Binyamin another. Yissachar yet another.

Twelve facets of the same infinite light.

And there’s a midrash that brings this home — one that we touched upon before.

When Yaakov laid down at Beis El, he placed stones around his head — some say twelve stones. And the stones argued with one another:

“On me this tzaddik will rest his head!” “No, on me.”

Each one insisted it was the right one. Not out of arrogance — each had a real claim. Each “rock” was aware of its unique quality and property.

And then Hakadosh Baruch Hu unified them into a single stone. Twelve became one.

Now, until now, I always thought of these rocks as the regular old, “boring” rocks that we find strewn around the natural world.

A regular old rock.

But no more. I now think of these twelve rocks as twelve precious stones. Each one with its own unique quality and property. Each one with its own unique way of reflecting the divine light.

It was these precious rocks (aka precious stones) that were fighting with each other. After all, in Hebrew it is the same word — אֶבֶן.

And when and how did HaKadosh Baruch Hu unify these rocks? In the Choshen Mishpat. There, on the heart of Aharon HaKohein, they found their unification and essentially became one rock.

A singular rock that can help us better see and understand HaKadosh Baruch Hu. A singular rock that can help HaKadosh Baruch Hu better see and understand us.

And one that can help HaKadosh Baruch Hu see and remember us.

Further Questions

• What is the Choshen Mishpat and how does it function? Why is it called mishpat — judgment?

• How do the twelve individual stones on the Choshen relate to their specific tribes?

• What is the relationship between the six-and-six names on the shoulders and the twelve names on the heart?

• The four rivers of Gan Eden, the four rows of the Choshen, the four camps of the degalim — is this a pattern?

• Why is the entire third row of the Choshen missing from Yechezkel 28? Is the Malbim’s explanation the whole story?

• The full context of Yechezkel 28 — what does the Gan Eden imagery in the prophecy against Tyre mean, and how do the mefarshim understand it?

• What does tiferes really mean in the context of the bigdei kodesh?

Share masmid

Let’s go back to the end of Parshas Mishpatim.

Moshe is about to go up to Har Sinai for forty days and forty nights. And right before he goes up, Hakadosh Baruch Hu tells him what he’s going to receive:

וַיֹּאמֶר ה׳ אֶל מֹשֶׁה עֲלֵה אֵלַי הָהָרָה וֶהְיֵה שָׁם וְאֶתְּנָה לְךָ אֶת לֻחֹת הָאֶבֶן וְהַתּוֹרָה וְהַמִּצְוָה אֲשֶׁר כָּתַבְתִּי לְהוֹרֹתָם

And Y-K-V-K said to Moshe: “Come up to Me to the mountain and stay there. And I will give you the stone tablets, the Torah, and the Mitzvah, which I wrote to instruct them.”

Three things:

The stone tablets (לֻחֹת הָאֶבֶן)
The Torah (הַתּוֹרָה)
The Mitzvah (הַמִּצְוָה)

Now, let’s pretend we don’t know anything.

We don’t know what the tablets are.
We don’t know what the Torah is.
We don’t know what the Mitzvah is.

Let us note — these terms aren’t explained here. Now, we obviously have a rather good idea of what the stone tablets are. But not necessarily as good an idea as what is meant by The Torah and The Mitzvah. Either way, I want to understand what these terms mean from within the experience of reading the Torah itself — not from any outside information or knowledge I may (or may not) have.

And on that front, the Chumash so far is silent. My expectation (or should I say hope) is that in the verses, chapters, and parshas to come, they will be explained.

And my expectation will be partially met.
It’s the part that will not be met, though, that interests me.

But first — let’s see where things “go right” (so to speak).

Tracking the Luchos

Let’s track the Luchos HaEven — the stone tablets. It’ll take us a little while. We’re at the very end of Parshas Mishpatim, the last few pesukim of chapter 24. We’re going to have to skip over the next two parshios and plant ourselves in the second aliyah of Parshas Ki Tisa.

What happens in these two-plus parshios?

We go step by step through the different keilim of the Mishkan.
We detail the structure of the Mishkan itself.
The clothes of the Kohen Gadol.
Who will be in charge of actually building the Mishkan.

Then, when all of that is done, Hakadosh Baruch Hu goes on a (seeming) tangent and reminds us to keep Shabbos. In other words, by all means, build the Mishkan. Just don’t violate Shabbos when doing so.

At this point, we are done. Fully done.

And then — two parshios and six chapters later — the promise is (partially) delivered. G-d gives Moshe the Luchos HaEidus — the stone tablets:

וַיִּתֵּן אֶל מֹשֶׁה כְּכַלֹּתוֹ לְדַבֵּר אִתּוֹ בְּהַר סִינַי שְׁנֵי לֻחֹת הָעֵדֻת לֻחֹת אֶבֶן כְּתֻבִים בְּאֶצְבַּע אֱלֹהִים

And He gave to Moshe (when he finished speaking with him on Har Sinai) the two testifying tablets — stone tablets, written by the finger of G-d.

And so we have it, (part of) the moment we have been waiting for. The Luchos HaEven have been given to Moshe. Just like G-d promised.

Of course, there is more to this moment than Moshe just receiving the tablets. There is what he is supposed to do with those tablets. But for now, I have a question.

Where are the Torah and the Mitzvah?

We all know that the Luchos are wondrous — indeed, miraculous.

Written by the finger of G-d.
The tablets themselves are the work of G-d.
Engraved completely through — from side to side.

And we know what happens to those tablets. Moshe takes them down from the mountain and destroys them in a rage when he sees the golden calf.

In short, the Luchos get a lot of press. In terms of narrative focus, they are prominently displayed.

But the Torah and the Mitzvah?

Zip.
Zilch.
Nothing.
Nada.

No mention.
No hint.
No indication.

Just silence.

What happened? G-d told Moshe that He would give him the Luchos HaEven (the stone tablets), the Torah, and the Mitzvah.

And now we have the stone tablets.
But where are the Torah and the Mitzvah?
What happened to them?
And why the silence?

The Aron

We are now ready for Parshas Terumah.

But no longer are we simply reading the Parsha. Rather, we are searching it. We are looking within the Parsha for some hint, even a simple clue of the Torah and the Mitzvah.

The Parsha begins (as always) with its namesake. With terumot — raising up our physical possessions by voluntarily dedicating them to the building of the Mishkan.

There is a lot hidden within this little section. But for now, we are going to skip over the opening and move on to the list of vessels that are to be built for the Mishkan.

First on the list, the Aron.

וְעָשׂוּ אֲרוֹן עֲצֵי שִׁטִּים

And they shall make an Aron of shittim wood.

Now this sounds promising. They’re going to build an Aron. And what’s going to be in that Aron?

Well, for one thing, the Torah — as we find out at the end of Sefer Devarim:

וַיְצַ֤ו מֹשֶׁה֙ אֶת־הַלְוִיִּ֔ם נֹ֥שְׂאֵ֛י אֲר֥וֹן בְּרִית־יְהֹוָ֖ה לֵאמֹֽר׃ לָקֹ֗חַ אֵ֣ת סֵ֤פֶר הַתּוֹרָה֙ הַזֶּ֔ה וְשַׂמְתֶּ֣ם אֹת֔וֹ מִצַּ֛ד אֲר֥וֹן בְּרִית־יְהֹוָ֖ה אֱלֹהֵיכֶ֑ם וְהָיָה־שָׁ֥ם בְּךָ֖ לְעֵֽד׃

And Moshe commanded the Levi’im, the carriers of the Aron of the Covenant of Y-K-V-K, saying: “Take this book of the Torah and place it from the side of the Aron of the Covenant of Y-K-V-K, your G-d. And it shall be there with you for a witness.”

That is quite interesting.

The Torah will be either on the side of the Aron HaKadosh or placed inside the Aron HaKadosh — alongside one of the walls.

Is this what was meant by “I’m going to give you the Torah and the Mitzvah”? Namely, I’m going to give you an Aron to house the Torah and the Mitzvah?

Perhaps, but it doesn’t sound quite right to me.

If I said to you, “I’m going to give you a beautiful set of jewelry.” If I show up with beautiful boxes — boxes for earrings, for bracelets, for necklaces — and they’re all empty — how impressed would you be?

“Just what I wanted! Beautiful boxes! I can’t wait to put my jewelry in there!”

The boxes, no matter how ornate they are, no matter how well-crafted — they are not the jewels that go inside them.

So it can’t be that the Aron in and of itself is the Torah and the Mitzvah that G-d promised to give Moshe. The Aron is the container. The Torah and the Mitzvah are the contents.

But perhaps it’s not that simple.

Back to the Luchos

Let’s take a (short) trip back to Parshas Ki Tisa — back to the moment when everything is finished. When all was said and done, what did G-d do? He gave Moshe the Luchos.

Now, let’s return to our Parsha when nothing was finished and nothing yet commanded. In essence, to the beginning. Yes, I know that the absolute beginning are the donations. The true beginning is when Am Yisrael collectively — albeit by individual volition — donate all the materials for the Mishkan.

But then, once we have all the “stuff”, everything that we need to start building the Mishkan, what is the first item mentioned before any other?

It is the Aron.
And that is interesting.

After all, it need not be so. Why not start with the foundation — with the boards and the bases that hold up the boards. Why not start with the structure of the Mishkan and then move to the vessels?

The Torah could have done that, but it didn’t. Instead, it started with the keilim (the vessels) — and not just any vessel, but the Aron.

And what is it that goes inside the Aron?
Yes, I know above we said it is the Torah.

But even if the Torah is inside the Aron, it is not there by itself:

וְנָתַתָּ֖ אֶל־הָאָרֹ֑ן אֵ֚ת הָעֵדֻ֔ת אֲשֶׁ֥ר אֶתֵּ֖ן אֵלֶֽיךָ׃

And you shall put into the Aron the testimony that I will give you.

The “testimony”. What is the testimony? The Luchos, as we saw before in Parshas Ki Tisa:

וַיִּתֵּן אֶל מֹשֶׁה כְּכַלֹּתוֹ לְדַבֵּר אִתּוֹ בְּהַר סִינַי שְׁנֵי לֻחֹת הָעֵדֻת לֻחֹת אֶבֶן כְּתֻבִים בְּאֶצְבַּע אֱלֹהִים

And He gave to Moshe (when he finished speaking with him on Har Sinai) the two testifying tablets — stone tablets, written by the finger of G-d.

In other words, the Mishkan begins with the Luchos and it ends with the Luchos. It begins with the Aron which houses the Luchos and it ends with the actual giving of those Luchos.

I know, I know — we are looking for the Torah and the Mitzvah. And I know that we still have not found them.

But this is what we have found. We have found that the Aron HaKadosh houses the Luchos and (eventually) will also house the Torah itself.

Or, alternatively, it houses the Luchos on the inside and will hold the Torah on the outside.

Either way, one Aron — two of the three promises.
I think we are on to something.
But we still have to look further.

And that something won’t be found inside of the Aron. But it will be found on top of it.

The Kruvim

The Aron HaKadosh is remarkable. Obviously I have never seen it, but I can see its beauty nonetheless. It is described meticulously in the Chumash and the details are quite stunning.

Gold plated (with pure gold) inside and out.
A gold crown surrounding it.
Gold rings on its sides.
And a cover made of pure gold.

And on top of this cover (the kapores) are two Kruvim also made of gold. Indeed, made of the very same gold as the covering itself.

We have seen Kruvim before.

We saw them in Gan Eden, when man was expelled from the garden:

וַיַּשְׁכֵּן מִקֶּדֶם לְגַן עֵדֶן אֶת הַכְּרֻבִים וְאֵת לַהַט הַחֶרֶב הַמִּתְהַפֶּכֶת לִשְׁמֹר אֶת דֶּרֶךְ עֵץ הַחַיִּים

He placed the Kruvim east of Gan Eden, with a revolving fiery sword, to guard the path to the Eitz HaChaim (the tree of life).

The tree of life — eitz hachaim. What is the tree of life?

In Gan Eden, I don’t know. Today, though, I have an idea.
Not my idea, Shlomo HaMelech’s idea.

The Tree of Life

Mishlei is a difficult sefer — but that difficulty is worthwhile.

Let us note its beginning. Here Shlomo HaMelech tells us that he will write a book of proverbs and parables — what he calls meshalim.

A mashal is a type of example. Let me focus your attention on something that you understand and use that as a means for you to understand something that you do not understand.

A stitch in time saves nine.
If I use one stitch now, while a tear is small, I’ll save myself the trouble of having to use nine stitches later, when the tear is big.

In short, nip the problem in the bud.

Of course, this phrase is not really about sewing, but rather about life. There are many “tears” that need “sewing”. Take care of them now, don’t wait until the problem is much worse.

So that is the heart of Sefer Mishlei, examples from every day life designed to teach something larger than the example itself.

Now, what is that larger something that Shlomo HaMelech wants us to learn. He has a list. We’ll focus on the first item on the list:

לָדַ֣עַת חׇכְמָ֣ה וּמוּסָ֑ר

To know wisdom and restraint (aka musar).

We’ll ignore the restraint part for now. It’s the wisdom that interests us.

What does Shlomo HaMelech have in mind when he speaks about chachma (חכמה) — which I translated as wisdom?

I’m not sure. But may I note the following. In one of the last speeches he ever gave to the nation, Moshe Rabbeinu tells Am Yisrael to keep and observe the statutes and judgments he has taught them:

וּשְׁמַרְתֶּם֮ וַעֲשִׂיתֶם֒ כִּ֣י הִ֤וא חׇכְמַתְכֶם֙ וּבִ֣ינַתְכֶ֔ם לְעֵינֵ֖י הָעַמִּ֑ים

Keep and observe them, for that is your chachma and your understanding in the eyes of the nations.

The nations, he says, will look at us and declare:

רַ֚ק עַם־חָכָ֣ם וְנָב֔וֹן הַגּ֥וֹי הַגָּד֖וֹל הַזֶּֽה

Surely a wise and understanding people is this great nation.

And what makes us wise? What are these statutes and judgments? They are:

כְּכֹל֙ הַתּוֹרָ֣ה הַזֹּ֔את

This entire Torah.

There is some essential connection between the Torah and its chukim and mishpatim that are wise and which give us chachma.

Is this what Shlomo HaMelech had in mind? Seems possible. Indeed, there are other proofs, but for now this will suffice.

Let’s continue in Mishlei. A few verses later:

שְׁמַ֣ע בְּ֭נִי מוּסַ֣ר אָבִ֑יךָ וְאַל־תִּ֝טֹּ֗שׁ תּוֹרַ֥ת אִמֶּֽךָ׃

My son, listen to the instruction of your father and do not forsake the Torah of your mother.

This is line eight of Sefer Mishlei (still the first chapter) and we finally have our first mention of the word Torah. But it’s not just any old mention, there’s another word hiding there in plain sight: מוסר (musar). The same “musar” that we found in the third verse alongside chachma.

All in all, there seems to be a close connection between wisdom (chachma) and Torah in Sefer Mishlei — and with both of them and musar.

And it is in this light that we take a look at the third chapter of Mishlei. Which begins with a reference to the Torah:

בְּ֭נִי תּוֹרָתִ֣י אַל־תִּשְׁכָּ֑ח וּ֝מִצְוֺתַ֗י יִצֹּ֥ר לִבֶּֽךָ

My son, do not forget my Torah, and let your heart keep my Mitzvos.

Here we have Shlomo HaMelech speaking as G-d’s messenger — enjoining them to not abandon His Torah (see Rashi to Mishlei, 4: 2).

Now, why should we not forget G-d’s Torah? Because the Torah will lengthen our days, grant us years of life and give us peace:

כִּ֤י אֹ֣רֶךְ יָ֭מִים וּשְׁנ֣וֹת חַיִּ֑ים וְ֝שָׁל֗וֹם יוֹסִ֥יפוּ לָֽךְ

Because they will lengthen your days and grant you years of life, and they will give you peace.

Thus starts the first section of the third chapter.

Let’s move on to section two and its opening line:

מוּסַ֣ר יְ֭הֹוָה בְּנִ֣י אַל־תִּמְאָ֑ס וְאַל־תָּ֝קֹ֗ץ בְּתוֹכַחְתּֽוֹ׃

My son, do not reject the musar of Y-K-V-K, and do not despise His rebuke.

Torah, then musar.
Interesting.

Want to make a guess what word appears in the third section of the third chapter:

יְֽהֹוָ֗ה בְּחׇכְמָ֥ה יָסַד־אָ֑רֶץ כּוֹנֵ֥ן שָׁ֝מַ֗יִם בִּתְבוּנָֽה׃

Y-K-V-K with chachma laid the foundation of the earth; and built the heavens with bina.

Torah > musar > chachma.

I think they are connected.

And with that said, let us return to the second section, the one that starts with musar — and note its transition to chachma:

אַשְׁרֵ֣י אָ֭דָם מָצָ֣א חׇכְמָ֑ה וְ֝אָדָ֗ם יָפִ֥יק תְּבוּנָֽה׃

Fortunate is the man who finds chachma, and the man who acquires understanding.

Chachma and understanding. The same chachma and understanding that G-d used to lay the foundation of the earth and build the heavens.

This chachma is more valuable than silver and fine jewels.
The length of days are in its right hand.
It is a tree of life for all who take possession of it.

A tree of life. Eitz HaChaim.

The Torah is a Tree of Life.

And now, my mind races back. Not to the Garden of Eden, but to the waters of Marah.
To the time that the Jewish people first travelled in the desert. When they were in need of water. They had travelled for three days — and found no water.

No water means no life.

But then, they make their way to Marah. And finally, water. Life itself, right in front of them. But, alas, it is bitter. They cannot drink it.

Bitter water means no life.

But Hashem instructs them.
He shows them.
He מורה them.

וַיּוֹרֵ֤הוּ יְהֹוָה֙

And Y-K-V-K showed them.

Look at the root. It is the same root as the word Torah.

What does He instruct them in? What does He show them? What is He מורה them?

About a tree.

וַיּוֹרֵ֤הוּ יְהֹוָה֙ עֵ֔ץ

And Y-K-V-K showed them a tree.

A tree which sweetens the waters when you throw it into the waters.

וַיּוֹרֵ֤הוּ יְהֹוָה֙ עֵ֔ץ וַיַּשְׁלֵךְ֙ אֶל־הַמַּ֔יִם וַֽיִּמְתְּק֖וּ הַמָּ֑יִם

And Y-K-V-K showed them a tree, and he threw it into the waters, and the waters were sweetened.

A tree of life! Sweet waters means life.

But this is the key — this is what makes this story so telling. What happens next? Once the waters are sweetened? Once they can drink water and live. What does Moshe (or is it Hashem) do?

He gives them some Torah!

שָׁ֣ם שָׂ֥ם ל֛וֹ חֹ֥ק וּמִשְׁפָּ֖ט

There he (or is it He) gave them chok and mishpat.

Do you see how it all comes together? Do you understand why, at that moment, He (or is it he) gives them Chok uMishpat?

Now they can appreciate life. And so now they can appreciate the Torah — which extends life and gives it vitality.

In other words, the Torah is also a tree that makes bitter waters sweet.

Of course, it doesn’t make literal waters sweet.
But then again, nipping a problem in the bud doesn’t mend a literal rip in a literal pair of pants either.

The Path to the Tree of Life

Back in Gan Eden, we partook of the Eitz HaDaas Tov v’Ra — the tree of knowledge of good and evil. And once we did, we could no longer partake of the Eitz HaChaim. You can’t have both.

But through it all — through the trials and tribulations of Avraham, Yitzchak, Yaakov, and the Shvatim, through the slavery and the redemption from slavery, through the desert, following G-d into the unknown — we had somehow removed ourselves from the venom of that first tree.

And so now we can partake of the Eitz HaChaim once again.

But not so fast. It’s one thing to be able to partake of the Eitz HaChaim. But first you have to reach the tree.

And that requires going down the right path.

Remember. After the chet of Adam and Chava.
After we were exiled from the garden.

Then (and only then) G-d stationed the Kruvim (vayashkein) to guard the path to the Eitz HaChaim.

וַיְגָ֖רֶשׁ אֶת־הָֽאָדָ֑ם וַיַּשְׁכֵּן֩ מִקֶּ֨דֶם לְגַן־עֵ֜דֶן אֶת־הַכְּרֻבִ֗ים וְאֵ֨ת לַ֤הַט הַחֶ֙רֶב֙ הַמִּתְהַפֶּ֔כֶת לִשְׁמֹ֕ר אֶת־דֶּ֖רֶךְ עֵ֥ץ הַֽחַיִּֽים׃

And He drove out the man, and He placed the Kruvim east of Gan Eden, with a revolving fiery sword, to guard the path to the Eitz HaChaim.

The English translation hides so much. The Hebrew word is (וַיַּשְׁכֵּן֩) which has the exact same root as the word Mishkan. As in the Mishkan that Hakadosh Baruch Hu is now commanding us to build. That same Mishkan which will have an aron which will have a cover which will have Kruvim on top of it.

What is the connection?

I don’t really know yet. But the word is there and so the (possible, I would say likely) connection is also there.

For now, though, we’ll focus on the word that is easier for us to understand — the word “shomer” (שְׁמֹ֕ר) — to guard.

What does it mean for the Kruvim to guard the path to the Eitz HaChaim?

On the one hand, it is obvious. They are to prevent unwanted visitors — those people who are unworthy — from getting to the tree of life.

After all, if you can’t get to the tree, you can’t partake of it.

But there is another sense which I think is equally obvious (once it is pointed out to you). And that is the sense of preserving.

There is a way to reach this tree. It’s not an obvious way. Not everyone knows it. But it is there. And it has to be preserved — even if no one is presently using it.

Because some day it will be needed. Someday there will be a people worthy of traveling down this road. And when that day comes, the path will still be there — because the Kruvim were entrusted (by G-d Himself) to preserve it.

If we put it all together: there is only one way to the Eitz HaChaim, and that is through the path to the Eitz HaChaim.

And there is only one way to walk that path, and that is by passing through its guards — aka the Kruvim.

Back to the Aron

So we have the Aron.
And on top of the Aron, we have the Kruvim.
And inside the Aron — the Luchos.

And now the Pasuk I have been waiting for.

וְנוֹעַדְתִּי לְךָ שָׁם וְדִבַּרְתִּי אִתְּךָ מֵעַל הַכַּפֹּרֶת מִבֵּין שְׁנֵי הַכְּרֻבִים אֲשֶׁר עַל אֲרוֹן הָעֵדֻת אֵת כׇּל אֲשֶׁר אֲצַוֶּה אוֹתְךָ אֶל בְּנֵי יִשְׂרָאֵל

I will meet with you there, and I will speak with you from above the Kapores, from between the two Kruvim which are upon the Aron HaEidus — everything that I will command you concerning Bnei Yisrael.

Did you catch that?
No?

Then read it again.
And again.
And again — until you see something.

Don’t just have me spoon-feed it to you. Read that verse and see what you come up with. Then, I’ll give you my thoughts.

G-d is going to meet Moshe (וְנוֹעַדְתִּי). And when He meets him, He is going to speak with him (וְדִבַּרְתִּי אִתְּךָ).

And what are they going to talk about?
Everything that G-d wants to command the Jewish people through Moshe (אֵת כׇּל אֲשֶׁר אֲצַוֶּה אוֹתְךָ אֶל בְּנֵי יִשְׂרָאֵל).

Remember what Bnei Yisrael said to Moshe at Har Sinai?

קְרַ֤ב אַתָּה֙ וּֽשְׁמָ֔ע אֵ֛ת כׇּל־אֲשֶׁ֥ר יֹאמַ֖ר יְהֹוָ֣ה אֱלֹהֵ֑ינוּ וְאַ֣תְּ ׀ תְּדַבֵּ֣ר אֵלֵ֗ינוּ אֵת֩ כׇּל־אֲשֶׁ֨ר יְדַבֵּ֜ר יְהֹוָ֧ה אֱלֹהֵ֛ינוּ אֵלֶ֖יךָ וְשָׁמַ֥עְנוּ וְעָשִֽׂינוּ׃

You draw near and listen to all that Y-K-V-K our G-d will say, and you shall speak to us all that Y-K-V-K our G-d will say to you, and we will listen and do.

In other words, G-d is going to communicate to Moshe the Torah.

And where is He going to communicate it — between the Kruvim (מִבֵּין שְׁנֵי הַכְּרֻבִים)!

That is the path to the Torah.
That is the road to the Eitz HaChaim.
Through the Kruvim who are on top of the Aron which house the Luchos.

Because that is the only way to get the Torah.

But I get ahead of myself (again).

The Other Direction

It’s starting to become clear.

וַיֹּ֨אמֶר יְהֹוָ֜ה אֶל־מֹשֶׁ֗ה עֲלֵ֥ה אֵלַ֛י הָהָ֖רָה וֶהְיֵה־שָׁ֑ם וְאֶתְּנָ֨ה לְךָ֜ אֶת־לֻחֹ֣ת הָאֶ֗בֶן וְהַתּוֹרָה֙ וְהַמִּצְוָ֔ה אֲשֶׁ֥ר כָּתַ֖בְתִּי לְהוֹרֹתָֽם

And Y-K-V-K said to Moshe: “Come up to Me on the mountain and be there, and I will give you the Luchos HaEven and the Torah and the Mitzvah that I have written to instruct them.”

How will I give you the Torah?
By giving you the Luchos.

It’s as if the vav of “and the Torah (וְהַתּוֹרָה֙)” means “therefore”.

I will give you the Luchos and (therefore) I will (be able to) give you the Torah...

Because by putting the Luchos in the Aron HaKadosh (inside the Mishkan), My word will be able to travel through the Kruvim to you.

You see, we had it all wrong.
We don’t travel through the Kruvim, onto the path to the Eitz HaChaim.
No, the Eitz HaChaim travels on the path, through the Kruvim to us.

We receive the Eitz HaChaim. We don’t take it.

That doesn’t mean we don’t have anything to do. That we just sit back and wait for it to come to us. It doesn’t work that way.

But the direction is clear.
What is not yet clear is why.
Why this way? Why through the Kruvim?

What is it about the Kruvim that makes this work?

A Closer Look at the Kruvim

Let’s look at the Kruvim a bit more carefully.

וְעָשִׂיתָ שְׁנַיִם כְּרֻבִים זָהָב מִקְשָׁה תַּעֲשֶׂה אֹתָם מִשְּׁנֵי קְצוֹת הַכַּפֹּרֶת

You shall make two Kruvim of gold, hammered from one piece, from the two ends of the Kapores.

Two points.

First: מִקְשָׁה — hammered from one piece. They come from the same stock. They are united in their source, in their etzem, in their essence.

Second: מִשְּׁנֵי קְצוֹת — from the two ends. The two extremes. Two opposites — as far apart as they physically can be while still being on top of the aron.

In short, same source, opposite positions. And our two extremists are facing each other.

And let’s not try and wiggle out of their extremism — the Torah emphasizes this over and over again:

וְעָשִׂ֛יתָ שְׁנַ֥יִם כְּרֻבִ֖ים זָהָ֑ב
מִקְשָׁה֙ תַּעֲשֶׂ֣ה אֹתָ֔ם
מִשְּׁנֵ֖י קְצ֥וֹת הַכַּפֹּֽרֶת׃
וַ֠עֲשֵׂ֠ה כְּר֨וּב אֶחָ֤ד מִקָּצָה֙ מִזֶּ֔ה
וּכְרוּב־אֶחָ֥ד מִקָּצָ֖ה מִזֶּ֑ה
מִן־הַכַּפֹּ֛רֶת תַּעֲשׂ֥וּ אֶת־הַכְּרֻבִ֖ים עַל־שְׁנֵ֥י קְצוֹתָֽיו׃

And you shall make two Kruvim of gold,
hammered from one piece,
from the two ends of the Kapores.
And make one Keruv on one end
and one Keruv on the other end,
from the Kapores you shall make the Kruvim on its two ends.

At the same time, it emphasizes their singular, shared source.

They will be “hammered from one piece“.
They will be made from the Kapores.

Each Kruv has its position. Each has its perspective. Each has its edge — its extreme.
And yet, they are both sourced from the same gold, from the same Kapores.
They are opposites, but they are unified in their source.

And they face each other.

Why?
What does it mean to face each other?
What does that look like?

Let me give you an example of two people who faced each other and tell me, is this the vision you have of the Kruvim?

Muhammad Ali and Joe Frazier.

In case I date myself, let’s put it this way. Imagine two boxers, in the ring. One in this corner, the other in the opposite corner.

Two extremists.
The bell rings and they each work their way to the center of the ring to face each other — and to try and knock each other’s face off.

Is that what you have in mind when you think of the Kruvim?

No? Why not? Isn’t that an example of two people facing each other — in battle, conflict, confrontation?

Why wouldn’t our Kruvim be like that? After all, they are opposites.
And what’s worse — they come from the same stock.

Tell me, who hates each other more.
A capitalist sitting in the United States and a communist sitting in Cuba

OR

A capitalist sitting in the United States and a communist sitting in the United States?
How about MAGA and leftists?
Bibi and leftists?

I could go on and on.

So is this the way to revelation?
By staking out our position, sticking to it and hating those who oppose it.

I don’t think so.
But it’s not as far off as we may imagine.

For now, though, let’s change the vision. Let’s leave behind the battles and hatred and be a bit more positive.

What is the phrase — opposites attract?
Or how about the idea that men and women are two halves of a whole?

That also sounds a bit like our Kruvim, doesn’t it?

Love, care and respect — all wrapped up in a strange sort of attraction alongside a natural sort of frustration. Husbands frustrate wives and wives frustrate husbands.

The modern way of saying this is that men are from venus (or is it mars) and women are from the other one.

The Torah way of saying this is that woman was created from the side of man — and thereby became a helper, opposite him.

Or perhaps we could just say that men are hewed from one side of the Aron and women from the other side.

So, which is it?

Opposites attract.
The battle of the sexes.
A fight to the death.

It’s all of the above.

And within the world of the Torah, we have one particular relationship which contains all of these elements in one — it’s called a chavrusa.

A chavrusa — from the word “chaver” — a friend. But what kind of friend?

The kind you yell at when they say something ridiculous.
The kind you battle against when they say something foolish.
And the kind you listen to when you (finally) realize that it was you who was saying something foolish and ridiculous all along.

Of course, it’s not just a Chavrusa.

It’s Satmar vs Chabad.
Or Satmar vs Zionism.
Or Zionism vs Chabad.
Or Daati Leumi vs Chareidi.
Or Modern Orthodox vs Chareidi.
Or Litvish vs Chassidish.
Or Musar vs Chassidus.

Battles.
Look at all these battles.
And look at all the Torah that has come out from them.

Is it pretty? No!
Is it enjoyable? Oftentimes doubly no.

And yet, we keep doing it. Because we care! Because it’s about the Torah and truth and values and what is right and what is wrong.

And I have a secret. Through all those battles. All that yelling and passion and more, there is something much deeper — love.

You don’t believe me?
Let’s see.

A number of years ago, a young man named Gilad Shalit was kidnapped by Hamas.
Now, that very same week, a young boy from Yitzhar was also murdered. I wish I remembered his name. I ask him and his family for mechila that I do not remember his name. But I remember him. He was hitch-hiking outside of Beitar and was picked up by Hamas (or some other similar terrorist group).

And minutes later, they brutally murdered him (because that is what Hamas does). Hashem Yikom Damo!

Now, all of this happened around the time of disengagement. I don’t remember if it was before, during or shortly after. But it was that time period.

And, as is often the case with the Jewish people — we were divided. We were each of us in our camps, in our extremes.

I remember my mother was sure that it was going to come to bloodshed. “I hope I’m wrong”, she said. But she didn’t see how such heated passions over such fundamental issues could end otherwise.

Thankfully, my mother was wrong. And that should already tell us something.

But that is not the point I want to make. The point I want to make is about this young man’s mother. Let us remember, she lives in Yitzhar. I don’t personally know her, but one can imagine Yitzhar on one extreme of the Jewish world. I’m not saying it’s good or bad, right or wrong. That’s not the point of this story. I’m just noting that it is on a polar opposite of the political spectrum of those who fervently believed in disengagement.

And during that week, she said something akin to the following:

There are big disagreements in our nation and heated passions surrounding those disagreements. We are in many ways divided. And I’m not going to pretend otherwise.

But this week, I saw something deeper. I saw that deeper than all of those divides is a love that unites us all. I saw Jews from all walks of life, all ends of the political and religious spectrum come to support us and show us their love.

So yes, there are differences. But there is a unity much deeper than those differences.

I think this is one of the most profound and honest truths that I have ever heard. And I think it describes our nation to the t.

And I don’t think this is a one-off occurrence. I think we all experienced it on October 8th (even if we don’t all still experience it right now).

We have seen the love that can shine. And we have for sure seen the divisions that can also shine.

And when these two elements are properly combined, you have a special unit known as Kruvim (notice the plural).

Divided in their extremism, united in their source — and therefore in their love.

And they are facing each other, but not only each other.

וּפְנֵיהֶ֖ם אִ֣ישׁ אֶל־אָחִ֑יו אֶ֨ל־הַכַּפֹּ֔רֶת יִהְי֖וּ פְּנֵ֥י הַכְּרֻבִֽים

And their faces, one towards the other, towards the Kapores shall the faces of the Kruvim be.

They are looking at each other while also looking down towards the Kapores (the Kapores which covers the Aron which contains the Luchos).

They see each other while they simultaneously see the Torah.

In other words, Kruvim don’t battle each other.
They battle for the Torah.
They aren’t trying to win.
They aren’t trying to overpower.
They are trying to understand.

They each come from their perspective. They each have their point of view. But it is a perspective focused on the Torah.

What does it mean?
What does Hashem want from us?
What am I supposed to do?

This is what I think the Torah says.
No, that’s wrong — this is what it says.

It’s about the Torah.
It’s what Chazal call a machlokes l’shem shamayim.
Machlokes — from the word “chalak” — to divide.
A division for the sake of heaven.

I am divided not because I’m distant from you, but because I see the Torah differently than you do. But I am facing you, because I am facing how you see the Torah. I face you as I face the Torah. And you do the same with me.

And through that, we remain divided — but in service of the same Torah. And through that honest division, we reach new understandings. And we even sometimes change our minds:

חזרו בית הלל להורות כדברי בית שמאי

The School of Hillel revised (their opinion) to teach according to the position of the School of Shamai.

So you have these two Kruvim. Made from the same Kapores, housing the same Luchos, but from the two different sides. The two different perspectives. The two different angles. Facing each other — hammering it out with love, with care, but with passion and with strength.

And that space between these two lovingly different perspectives has a name — the path to the Eitz HaChaim.

The path is found between this divide — in the space that is formed when two extremes can lovingly, yet honestly face each other in their unified, but different love for the Torah.

If you can master that, then you can receive the Torah which G-d sends down that path.

And the one man who could master that more than anyone else was Moshe Rabbeinu.

We all know (or should know) the different Gemaras and midrashim. That anything that a Talmid vatik was destined to say was already given over to Moshe on Har Sinai.

That he (Moshe) received the Tanach and the Mishnah and the Gemara.

Okay — but how? How could Moshe receive all of this? What did he possess that enabled this?

Let me make a suggestion — by mastering the art of being an extremist.

Because, let’s be honest. There is no reason why one man can’t be an extremist on both sides. Why he can’t see both sides of the argument and both perspectives.

After all, we walk into Yeshiva and spend our time understanding the machlokes between:

Beis Hillel and Beis Shamai.
Between Abaye and Rava.
Between Rashi and Tosfos.
Between the Rambam and the Raavad.

And then we stop. Some of us may go a little further — until it reaches something we care about. Then, we don’t try to understand, we try to be right.

But who says we have to wait until after the machlokes to understand both sides? There is no law of nature that that need be the case.

Indeed, if we can understand both sides of an issue after the fact, then it is at least theoretically possible to understand both sides of an issue before the fact.

And my guess is that Moshe Rabbeinu didn’t just understand both sides of a machlokes — he lived them. He stood at both ends of the Kapores. He felt the truth and passion of each position without being captured by either — holding the contradictions in his love for the Torah.

He was, in a sense, both Kruvim at once.

And that is why G-d spoke to him from between them.

Done, but Not Done

We aren’t done yet. We still have to find the Mitzvah.

But we are (basically) done for now with the hope that we can continue another time.

But I do want to leave you with a hint. I think the Mitzvah is also hidden within the Mishkan. Indeed, I think it’s hidden within the very next kli — the Shulchan.

Somewhere within there is the Mitzvah. I hope to write about it soon.

For now, though, take a look yourself and see what you see.

You can start from whichever extreme position you want. So long as you are also looking down at the Torah (while simultaneously lovingly sheltering it with your wings), I’m happy to meet you there.

B’hatzlachah.

Share masmid

There’s a certain kind of question that motivates me. It’s when you come across a phrase in the Torah — a law or idea — that seems cruel. Primitive. Obviously so. G-d’s command to totally wipe out Amalek — men, women, and children — obviously comes to mind, but as we shall soon see, there are other examples also.

For many people, the reaction and analysis stop there. They simply take the surface impression and walk away.

I can’t do that.

This is the same Torah that tells us that man is created in the image of G-d. The same Torah that says: do not murder, do not steal, do not lie in court. The Torah that commands us to love our neighbors as ourselves. To care for the stranger — because we know what it’s like to be a stranger, because we were strangers in Mitzrayim. To do what is good and what is straight in the eyes of Hashem. To have honest weights and measures. To take care of the poor. To be holy. And more (much more).

Time and again, the Torah is filled with moral depth and sophistication — and not merely filled with it, but revolutionarily so. It is unmatched in history. Thousands of years later, the moral clarity of the Torah rings out as brilliantly and as brightly as it always has — this is true on the level of peshat, and even more so when one takes the time to study the Torah in-depth.

As such, if we come upon what looks like an exception to that rule — something that seems immoral, uncaring, primitive, cruel — and we simply stop there, then the problem is not what’s written in the Torah.

The problem is how we approached the Torah. The problem is that we didn’t take the time to see how this too is moral. This too is just. This too is deep and sophisticated.

If we don’t search, we shouldn’t be surprised if we don’t find.

And there’s another issue.

We can’t simply treat the Torah like any other work — like the work of a great scholar, a great author, a great mind. We are talking about the Author of all authors, the Mind of all minds. The Creator Himself, revealing to us His will and how we are to live our lives.

To dismiss these words as primitive is to claim that the Creator of morality Himself somehow failed to understand basic moral principles.

I tell you all of this because it is the fuel which powers this week’s dvar Torah — and it relates to one of the most famous lines in the Torah:

“An eye for an eye” — עין תחת עין.

Time after time, from person after person and institution after institution, this line is presented as the basis for a cruel, primitive form of justice. We’ll start with Matthew — yes, that Matthew — who understood “an eye for an eye” as a base form of retaliation: doing unto an evildoer the very evil he has done to you.

From there we move on to the early Church Fathers — and those who followed in their wake — who understood this as a law of permitted retaliation: revenge is allowed, but limited to the extent of the damage that the victim suffered. A legalized form of revenge, a moral version of revenge — but revenge nonetheless.

So said the Church Fathers. So says the modern-day Catholic Church.

Tolstoy stated that the law of an eye for an eye was a law of violence. Mahatma Gandhi famously proclaimed that “an eye for an eye leaves the whole world blind.”

Now, may I pause for a moment to note that for all of its poetic beauty, Gandhi’s line doesn’t make any sense.

Even if we take the verse literally (as he does), his conclusion only follows if we live in a world in which people are continuously blinding one another. But if I do not take out your eye, and you do not take out mine, then neither of us will be blind.

Indeed — are we all dead because we execute murderers?

I certainly hope not; it would greatly reduce my readership ;-)

But I digress.

I will leave with one more quote — this one said all but yesterday by Pope Francis:

“If we live according to the law ‘an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth,’ we will never escape the spiral of evil.”

Here this law has been elevated to the status of a worldview and modus operandi, one that condemns us to a never-ending spiral of evil. Sounds like it doesn’t get much worse than that!

Over and over again, this line is taken literally — as prescribed revenge, as an immoral worldview. Over and over again, it is misconstrued and misunderstood.

And when I hear that, I feel like a young David standing before the mighty Goliath, listening as the giant confidently blasphemes the G-d of Israel.

So, like David, I pick up my weapon of choice — the very words of the Torah themselves — and prepare to forge a new path for all those who care about the truth of what this short little phrase actually means.

Where to begin?

Well, if we’re going to make sense of this phrase, we have two main paths to start with:

Path number one: the words themselves. Path number two: the context in which the words appear.

We’re going to take both paths — but we’ll start with the second one, context.

So where should we start for context?

I suggest that we start with the name of our parsha itself - Parshas Mishpatim. And let’s ask a simple question -- what is a mishpat? We know that there are different types of halachos -- there are chukim (חוקים) and mishpatim (משפטים). There are Torot (תורתות) and Mitzvot (מצוות). One would assume that there is some meaningful distinction between each of these types of halachos.

What are they?

I don’t know. I have ideas, but ideas are not the same thing as knowledge. For now, though, let’s see if we can come up with a working hypothesis. We’ll start by connecting our Parsha to another parsha of almost the same name -- Parshas Shoftim.

Shoftim and mishpatim, two sides of the same linguistic coin, both of which share the same root: shin-peh-tet (ש-פ-ט).

Shoftim are judges.
Is it such a stretch to suggest that mishpatim are the types of laws that judges judge.

What does that mean?

We’ll get there as we go through the context. It will start to naturally appear. For now, though, we can say the following. In our parsha, we expect to encounter a group of laws which share this particular quality of being judgeable (whatever that means). And since an eye for an eye (עין תחת עין) appears in our parsha, we will assume that it too has this quality (again, whatever that means).

With that said, let’s take an intellectual journey through the opening halachos of Parshas Mishpatim. In particular, we’ll start with the laws relating to murder.

From Murder to Money

Take a look at the following laws:

מכה איש ומת מות יומת

ומכה אביו ואמו מות יומת

וגנב איש ומכרו ונמצא בידו מות יומת

ומקלל אביו ואמו מות יומת

Strike a man and he dies — death he shall die.

Strike his father or his mother — death he shall die.

Steal a man and sell him...— death he shall die.

Curse his father or his mother — death shall he die.

Let us make a few observations on both the substance and presentation of these laws.

First, the format. These are short, pithy lines. You do this — this is the consequence. You do this — this is the consequence. All expressed essentially the same way.

Strike a man and he dies... Strike his father or his mother... Steal a man and sell him... Curse his father or his mother...

And what is true about the nature of the crime is doubly true about the consequence — capital punishment.

...death shall he die. ...death shall he die. ...death shall he die. ...death shall he die.

Notice the emphasis on “death”. We usually translate this as “he shall surely die”, but that misses the power of the phrase as it appears in Hebrew.

These are capital cases — and it is linguistically impossible to miss that fact.

Second, the nature of the crime. These all involve one human being committing a crime against another human being — and, in many ways, in their most severe form.

Murder is the most severe form of physical violence.

To kidnap someone and sell them into slavery is the most severe form of theft.

To physically or verbally attack one’s parents (the very people who gave you life and raised you) is the most severe form of ingratitude and disrespect.

Third, the progression. We go from physically striking someone — a violent attack on their body.

To physically taking control of someone — an (often times violent) attack on their freedom.

To verbal assault.

We will see variations of these progressions as we make our way through the parsha.

But there is something else quite significant almost hidden within these short, pithy laws. And that relates to the case of murder. There we find our first nuance — wherein the Torah distinguishes between premeditated and negligent homicide.

This type of distinction is more relevant than we realize right now. As we will soon find out.

A Different Style

We are done with our first set halachos. A new batch is about to begin — and with it, a new literary form.

Gone are the short pithy lines.
Gone is the clear, unambiguous consequence.

A new style is arising, and to appreciate and understand it we first have to note it.

We will start with the first word in every halacha that is about to follow: וכי.

We will translate this as: “when”. When as in: when this happens...

So, for example:

וְכִי־יְרִיבֻן אֲנָשִׁים

וְכִי־יַכֶּה אִישׁ אֶת־עַבְדּוֹ

וְכִי־יִנָּצוּ אֲנָשִׁים

וְכִי־יִגַּח שׁוֹר

וְכִי־יִפְתַּח אִישׁ בּוֹר

וְכִי־יִגֹּף שׁוֹר־אִישׁ אֶת־שׁוֹר רֵעֵהוּ

כִּי יִגְנֹב־אִישׁ שׁוֹר

When men quarrel...

When a man strikes his slave...

When men fight...

When an ox gores...

When a man opens a pit...

When a man’s ox strikes his fellow’s ox...

When a man steals an ox...

This is not a mere linguistic quirk, but rather the foundation of a different set of halachos. One that have one key component -- their variability. The actual halacha is not set within the situation itself. There are factors which will determine how we apply the law.

And that is indicated by the other lingustic element in these halachos, the inclusion (most of the time) of the conditional word “if”. Note that word conditional. It tells us that there are variations.

Sometimes this situation works out this way — if so, this is the law. But other times it works out this way — in that case, this is the law.

Let us see with some concrete examples.

Two men are quarreling (וְכִי־יְרִיבֻן) and then (unexpectedly) one of them strikes ( וְהִכָּה) the other with a deadly weapon (a stone or even his fist).

This sounds familiar. We just had a couple of laws about striking with deadly force. But here there is a twist. The man does not die. Rather, he is bed ridden (read, he may die, he may not).

So let’s say he dies. What then. Well, that was covered above.
But what if he doesn’t die:

אִם־יָקוּם וְהִתְהַלֵּךְ בַּחוּץ עַל־מִשְׁעַנְתּוֹ

If he will get up and walk outside with the help of a walking stick...

So now what.
What is the law? He did not die — but he could have. Well, in terms of capital punishment, he is absolved:

וְנִקָּה הַמַּכֶּה

And the one who struck him will be exempt

Exempt from what? From the punishment mentioned above (capital punishment).

But that’s not the full story.

רַק

But...

You see that word, but. We are not done. Yes, we don’t execute him, but there are still legal consequences.

What are those:

רַק שִׁבְתּוֹ יִתֵּן וְרַפֹּא יְרַפֵּא

But he must give his cessation and heal him.

Now let’s take this step by step.
What do you think it means that he has to heal him? That he has to become a doctor? That he needs to go to medical school for seven years and then treat him?

I’m sure that would make his mother proud, but somehow or other I don’t think his victim is so concerned about his mother’s happiness right now.

No, “healing him”, means paying for his medical costs.
And so it is with “his cessation”. Cessation here comes from the word Shabbas (shevet — שבת).

Shabbas means to cease. To stop. On the seventh day G-d ceased the creative process that He had been involved with for six days.

So too here. Reuven had a job. He was working. Making a living. But Shimon’s fist put a (temporary) halt to that. In general, it’s hard to work when one is recovering from almost being murdered.

And so Shimon owes Reuven money.

How much?

Well, we know the theoretical amount, but not the actual amount.

Did you catch that? Did that line mean anything to you or did you just read it and move on?

Don’t do that. No moving on. Because in that line we can finally complete our working hypothesis of what it means for a law to be a mishpat (משפט).

A mishpat is a law that has to be judged because the principle and situation are not enough to determine the outcome.

What were his medical expenses? How long was he bedridden? How much did he lose in wages?

These are questions that can’t be answered by principle alone, only by circumstance. The principle can tell us that he has to pay, but it can’t tell us how much. That has to be judged (by a shofet — שופט). Ergo mishpatim (משפטים — laws that are judged).

A Different Type of Fight

The previous quarrel was what I would like to call a transition case.

It was the case of one man attacking another.

מַכֵּה אִישׁ וָמֵת

וְכִי־יְרִיבֻן אֲנָשִׁים וְהִכָּה־אִישׁ אֶת־רֵעֵהוּ בְּאֶבֶן אוֹ בְאֶגְרֹף וְלֹא יָמוּת

Strike a man and he dies...

When men quarrel and one strikes his fellow with a stone or with his fist and does not die...

Almost the same case, just one slight variation. And that slight variation introduces us to the world of monetary damages.

We now come upon a different type of fight. One where they are fighting each other (וְכִי־יִנָּצוּ) — but not necessarily trying to kill each other. There are no striking blows (וְהִכָּה).

But there is pushing and shoving (וְנָגַף). And it is here that our first question arises. Who gets pushed?

It turns out that Reuven does not push Shimon. And Shimon does not push Reuven. Rather, one (or both) of them push Sarah.

Sarah? Who is Sarah?

Is Sarah involved in the fight?

No — and that’s the point. No one was trying to push Sarah. Not Reuven. Not Shimon.

But, it happens.
One (or both) of them pushes Sarah.
They were trying (or succeeding) at pushing each other. But one time they miss (each other) and don’t miss Sarah.

Now, here is the (legal) issue.
Sarah is pregnant.
Which is (legally) interesting — because it allows us to consider two different (legal) scenarios.

Scenario number one: Sarah lives, but she loses her child.

Scenario number two: Sarah dies.

Let’s start with scenario number one.
What is it that we need to (legally) figure out.

Legal question #1: Is Reuven or Shimon (or both of them) criminally liable for the loss of the child?

Legal answer #1: No.

Legal question #2: Are they financially liable for the loss of the child?

Legal answer #2: Yes.

But for our purposes — for the purposes of understanding an eye for an eye — it is scenario number two that we want to take a close look at.

For this is the situation in which Sarah dies.

So, what is the legal question here?

Legal question #1: Is Reuven or Shimon (or both of them) criminally liable for Sarah’s death?

Legal answer #1: Yes.

And no.

Well, honestly, it’s not clear. Indeed, it’s what we call a makhlokes Chazal (an argument of the Rabbis — to put it in the vernacular).

To live and understand the confusion, let’s take a look at the verse. We are told that if Sarah dies, then:

וְנָתַתָּה נֶפֶשׁ תַּחַת נָפֶשׁ

I would love to translate this verse. Every single word cries out for an explanation. And we will attempt to explain every single word.

But first, let’s just go with a “standard” translation:

And you will give a life for a life.

And let’s assume that what is meant here is that you execute Reuven or Shimon (or both of them) because we hold them criminally liable for the death of Sarah.

If that is what this phrase means, then why the linguistic change. We have just seen a number of references to the death penalty.

We started with a whole list of capital offenses. And each and every time, the Torah had a clear phrase to indicate that the punishment was execution: מוֹת יוּמָת.

There is, though, another phrase — one mentioned in a case that we skipped over. That where a man strikes (וְכִי־יַכֶּה) his slave or maidservant with a rod and they die.

In that case, we are told that נקם ינקם — he (the slave) shall be avenged. Meaning, even though they are a slave (male or female, makes no difference), it is still a capital offense to murder them.

For our purposes, though, we note the linguistic similarity. In both cases — מוֹת יוּמָת and נָקֹם יִנָּקֵם — the Torah uses the same grammatical construction: an infinitive absolute followed by a conjugated verb of the same root.

An infinitive absolute is the raw, unconjugated form of a verb — the action itself, with no subject, no tense, no specification. Think walking, talking, hitting, striking, etc.

It is the verb in its purest form — focusing solely on the action itself with no indication of who is doing the action or when.

A conjugated verb is the opposite — it tells you who, when, and in what form the action takes place.

I walked to school.
You will talk with father when he gets home.
He hit the ball. Lightning struck twice.

When the Torah places the infinitive absolute directly before the conjugated verb of the same root, the two work together. The infinitive sets up the action; the conjugated verb delivers it.

In our case, the action is the punishment. It is execution, death.

No ambiguity.

And it is the person who committed the crime who will be executed.

No ambiguity.

Thus:

מוֹת יוּמָת: dying (infinitive) — he shall be put to death (conjugated)

נָקֹם יִנָּקֵם: avenging (infinitive) — he shall be avenged (conjugated)

This is biblical Hebrew’s way of expressing a definitive punishment. This is how we are going to punish you as a consequence of what you did.

What is particularly noteworthy right now is that this very same grammatical form was just used one line earlier in this very same case.

In scenario number one, where Sarah survives but loses her child, the Torah says:

עָנוֹשׁ יֵעָנֵשׁ: punishing (infinitive) — he shall be punished (conjugated)

Onosh (ענש) is used to indicate financial fines (aka, punishments) — wherein the amount “owed” is not related to any damages done or money owed.

Same grammar. Same construction. Same point.

He — or they — are being financially punished for causing Sarah to lose her baby.

And so, I wonder, if נֶפֶשׁ תַּחַת נָפֶשׁ means execution — if we are being told that Reuven or Shimon, or both of them, must be executed for Sarah’s death — then why doesn’t the Torah just say מוֹת יוּמָת, or one of its variations?

That is clearly the grammatical form and phrase used in our parsha to indicate capital punishment.

So why the change?

It seems that something else is going on here. And indeed the words themselves indicate that something else is indeed going on (as we shall see when we more carefully translate them).

Perhaps at the end of the day, it will be the same old capital punishment. But even if that is the case, there is still something else going on.

But first, we need to finally get to the line that we have all been waiting for.

Not Moving On

Theoretically speaking, we should be done with this case. We have said all that needs to be said and related to all that needs to be related to.

There was a fight.
Sarah inadvertently got pushed. She lives, the baby dies — he pays. She dies — there is a consequence.

All angles have been covered.
Time to move on to the next case.

And yet, the Torah does not move on. Rather, it has a bit more to say. Actually, more than just a bit. It has a whole list of statements in almost the exact same form as וְנָתַתָּה נֶפֶשׁ תַּחַת נָפֶש (which is the phrase that we have not yet translated):

עַיִן תַּחַת עַיִן

שֵׁן תַּחַת שֵׁן

יָד תַּחַת יָד

רֶגֶל תַּחַת רָגֶל

כְּוִיָּה תַּחַת כְּוִיָּה

פֶּצַע תַּחַת פָּצַע

חַבּוּרָה תַּחַת חַבּוּרָה

Once again, we have to hold off on a “real” translation. But we’ll use a “standard” one for now — just so we have something to talk about:

An eye for an eye A tooth for a tooth A hand for a hand A foot for a foot A burn for a burn A gash for a gash A bruise for a bruise

Were we talking about eyes or teeth or hands or feet (let alone burns and gashes and bruises)? Were Shimon’s hands burning hot and burned Sarah when he (accidentally) pushed her.

I don’t think so.

No, that’s not what is going on here. Rather, the Torah is broadening the principle just laid out to numerous other similar (but still different) cases.

Don’t think that it’s only when Sarah dies that we have a life for a life (again, this is a placeholder translation). Not at all.

If Sarah loses her eye — then it’s an eye for an eye. If she loses her tooth — then it’s a tooth for a tooth.

And as it is for her eyes and teeth, so it is for her hands and feet or any other type of physical damage she may suffer.

This is an interesting legal move for the Torah to make — and we still do not know why it is making it. But that is what is happening.

And it will make much more sense once we get that better translation under our belt. And the beginnings of a better translation are waiting for us in the very next verse.

The Eyes (and Teeth) of Slaves

We are back to striking blows:

וְכִי־יַכֶּה אִישׁ אֶת־עֵין עַבְדּוֹ אוֹ־אֶת־עֵין אֲמָתוֹ וְשִׁחֲתָהּ לַחׇפְשִׁי יְשַׁלְּחֶנּוּ תַּחַת עֵינוֹ

But this time there is no death — or even threat of death. But there is blindness. A man has struck his slave or maid-servant and, in so doing, has blinded him or her.

Alternatively, it is not his eye that he has struck, but his tooth — which he has knocked out:

וְאִם־שֵׁן עַבְדּוֹ אוֹ־שֵׁן אֲמָתוֹ יַפִּיל לַחׇפְשִׁי יְשַׁלְּחֶנּוּ תַּחַת שִׁנּוֹ

So, we know the drill. Here is a case. What, then, is the law?

Simple (and quite telling). The slave or maid-servant will go free תחת their eye or tooth.

Did you catch that?
Did you see what just linguistically happened here.

We have an eye. We have a tooth. And we have an ever so important word — תחת.

Let us start on a better translation.

Instead of translating it as an eye for an eye, let’s try this:

an eye תחת an eye. a tooth תחת a tooth.

I know what you are thinking. That doesn’t seem like much of an improvement.

But notice that word. תחת.

It is the same exact word that we find in עין תחת עין and שן תחת שן.

And what does it mean here? It doesn’t say you take out the owner’s eye. It says you set the slave free — תחת עינו. In other words, in compensation for his eye.

The same with the tooth: ואם שן עבדו או שן אמתו יפיל לחפשי ישלחנו תחת שנו — if he knocks out his slave’s tooth, he shall send him free — תחת שנו — in compensation for his tooth.

Nothing is done to the owner’s body. No eye is taken. No tooth is knocked out. Rather, something is given to the slave — his freedom — in compensation for what was taken from him.

And why freedom rather than money? Because the slave has no financial independence. Any money you give a slave goes right back to the owner. Why is that the case — that’s another dvar Torah for another time.

The point is that the owner has to compensate his slave for the loss of his eye. He can’t do so with money. But he can do so with freedom. And so that is what he gives him.

Either way, linguistically it is clear that at least in this verse, the word תחת means “in compensation for”.

But is it only in this verse?

Let’s see.

We will fast forward a few cases — and leave the world of man against man. Now it is ox against ox.

In particular, Reuven has an Ox. And Reuven’s ox shoves (וְכִי־יִגֹּף) Shimon’s ox. And, alas, Shimon’s ox dies.

We know the drill, what is the law?

It depends (of course it depends, these are mishpatim). Was this a known, violent ox or not? Was Reuven officially warned in court that his ox was dangerous and nonetheless did not properly guard it?

No. Then Reuven pays half. Yes. Then Reuven pays the full amount.

But note how the Torah phrases it.

בְּעָלָיו שַׁלֵּם יְשַׁלֵּם שׁוֹר תַּחַת הַשּׁוֹר

His owner paying, he will pay — an ox in compensation for the ox.

Did you see that? An ox תחת an ox. The same word, the same construction. And it is once again about making financial restitution for the damage done.

Reuven’s ox killed Shimon’s ox.
Reuven must pay him the financial value of the ox that was killed.

That is what the phrase שַׁלֵּם יְשַׁלֵּם. Indeed, there is an earlier case, just a few lines back, where Reuven digs a pit in the public square and an ox or a donkey falls in. And the Torah clearly states:

בַּעַל הַבּוֹר יְשַׁלֵּם כֶּסֶף יָשִׁיב לִבְעָלָיו

The owner of the pit shall pay; he shall return silver to the owner of the animal...

Silver!
You know, money.
Cash. Not an ox (or, not necessarily an ox).

And so it is here with our case. You have a dangerous ox that you didn’t guard and it killed someone else’s ox:

שַׁלֵּם יְשַׁלֵּם

Paying, he shall pay.

Remember our grammatical rule. The infinitive absolute (שַׁלֵּם) sets up the action — the payment. The conjugated verb (יִשַׁלֵּם) delivers it — he shall pay.

He will definitely pay.
There is no question about that.

No question that he will pay. But there is a question as to how much.

And that is what the next phrase tells us. An ox תחת an ox. He will pay the financial value of the ox that was killed.

Read otherwise, (the financial value) of an ox in compensation for (the financial value) of the ox (that was killed).

Of course, no one is stopping you from giving an actual ox, but that is not what the line is saying. It is rather delineating the principle of reciprocity in cases of financial compensation.

We are talking here about a case where you owe them this money. This is not a fine. Not a punishment. This is paying that which you owe.

And the Torah is laying down as clear as can be that the amount that you pay is directly proportional to the damage that you caused.

You killed an ox, you pay the value of an ox.

And with that said, let us return to the case of Sarah and scenario number two. And let us remember that in scenario number one we already see the concept of a financial fine.

Why a fine?

Because, says the Ramban, no one really knows the financial worth of the baby lost.

But what about scenario number two where Sarah dies? There we can estimate her financial worth. Of course, that requires going to court — after all, these are mishpatim (laws which are judged).

In that case, how much do you pay?
Simple, you give the financial value of her life in compensation for her life.

Indeed, take a closer look at that phrase:

וְנָתַתָּה נֶפֶשׁ תַּחַת נָפֶשׁ

And you will give a life in compensation for a life.

Notice the word “give”. You are giving something. You are not taking something. And if we look closer, we see giving in the sense of financial payment throughout this parsha.

Remember when Reuven almost killed Shimon and he had to pay for his medical expenses and lost wages? Look at the phrase for paying his lost wages:

שִׁבְתּוֹ יִתֵּן

He must give his cessation.

Notice that word give: יִתֵּן.

Or how about a case that we didn’t look at — where one Reuven did not guard his ox and his ox went and killed Shimon. In that case, there is the concept of “redemption” money — wherein Reuven can help redeem his soul from heavenly punishment by giving money to the family of his victim.

Note how that is phrased: וְנָתַן פִּדְיֹן נַפְשׁוֹ

Once again, we have the word give: וְנָתַן. But guess what else is hidden in that line. We have the word soul (נפש). And we have the word give (נתן). And we have the concept of giving money in compensation for a life (נפש).

In short, in our parsha the word give (נתן) is used to indicate financial payment. Combined we have the concept of giving a life in compensation for a life.

And that word give (וְנָתַן) doesn’t end with a life in compensation for a life. Rather it carries on for all the other phrases also. It is as if it said that:

• you will give a life in compensation for a life and

• you will give an eye in compensation for an eye, and

• you will give a tooth in compensation for a tooth, and so on.

This, indeed, is common throughout the Torah (but again, that’s another Dvar Torah for another time).

Hammering the Point Home

I honestly do not want to leave any doubt in your mind that the word תחת can and does mean “in compensation for”. As such, here are a few more examples just for your edification.

Our chapter concludes with the case of a man who steals an ox or a sheep then either slaughters it or sells it. That is the case.

What is the law in such a case. The Torah tells us:

חמישה בקר ישלם תחת השור

Five cattle he will pay in compensation for the ox

וארבע צאן תחת השה

And four animals from the flock in compensation for the sheep.

There it is again. תחת השור. תחת השה.

In compensation for the ox. In compensation for the sheep.

The word תחת — in every single one of these cases — means the person who did wrong gives something of value to the person he wronged.

Kayin & Hevel, Chava & Shet

And it’s not just in halacha.

Remember Chava — yes that Chava. And do you remember Kayin and Hevel?

Do you remember that Kayin killed Hevel? Do you remember that Hevel was Chava’s son?

Which means that Kayin killed Chava’s son.

So far, so good.

Well, a number of years later, Chava has another son — Shet.

Why did she call him Shet?
She tells us.

כִּ֣י שָֽׁת־לִ֤י אֱלֹהִים֙ זֶ֣רַע אַחֵ֔ר תַּ֣חַת הֶ֔בֶל כִּ֥י הֲרָג֖וֹ קָֽיִן

Because G-d has given me another offspring in compensation (תחת) for Hevel, because Kayin killed him.

Let us put this all together. Chava originally had two sons and then lost one. And now, G-d is giving her another son in compensation for the one she lost.

Chava is receiving something to make up for her loss.

The Ayil at the Akeidah

Now let’s go to the Akeidah — the binding of Yitzchak.

HaKadosh Baruch Hu tells Avraham to take Yitzchak and offer him up as a korban, as an olah. Avraham goes through with it — he builds the altar, binds Yitzchak, takes the knife in his hand, stretches out his arm to actually perform the sacrifice.

And G-d sends His angel, who tells Avraham: stop. Don’t do it. Don’t sacrifice your son.

So Avraham stops.

And when he does he sees a ram caught in the thicket by its horns. And Avraham understands: HaKadosh Baruch Hu has prepared this ram for me to offer in place of my son.

So Avraham takes the ram and offers it up as an olah — תחת בנו — in place of his son.

Why in place? Because G-d is still “owed” his sacrifice. Avraham needs to give G-d something in compensation for the sacrifice that he just took away from G-d.

What is that something? Vicariously offering Yitzchak via the ram. See Rashi on that verse — and see our dvar Torah on that parsha for a deeper understanding.

Wrapping Up (for now)

Let us go back to where we started.

Matthew — yes, that Matthew — claimed that עין תחת עין is a base form of retaliation: doing unto an evildoer the very evil he has done to you.

Where in the world does he get that? Certainly not from our parsha.

Our parsha is not talking about taking away anyone’s eye. That doesn’t make any grammatical sense. It doesn’t make any contextual sense.

Look at the context — the full context.

This is a parsha about monetary cases.

You have to pay if your ox kills someone else’s ox. You have to pay if you dig a pit and someone else’s animal falls in. You have to pay if you are negligent and someone dies because of your animal. You have to pay — פדיון נפשו — for your own soul, so to speak. You have to pay if you steal someone’s ox and slaughter it or sell it.

The entire subject matter — from beginning to end — relates to one of two things: either I have acted criminally against someone else’s body, or I have acted negligently against their body or their property. And in either case, the question is the same: how do we deal with this in a court of law?

No one is taking the law into their own hands. There is no vigilante justice here. There is no taking of anyone’s eyes. There is no idea of revenge here. There is the principle of reciprocity.

Financial reciprocity.

When you cause someone a loss, you compensate them proportionally to the loss you caused. That’s the principle.

And Pope Francis. Such slander of G-d’s beautiful words.

This is not a spiral of evil. This is civil law. This is the Torah telling us: when you wrong someone, you go to court, and you pay them what you owe. The amount you pay is proportional to the damage you did. If there is a “worldview of עין תחת עין”, it is the worldview that financial restitution for the damage you cause is no more and no less than the damage you caused.

I should note that there is much more to say.

Not the least of which is the machlokes within Chazal themselves — for there are those among the Sages who hold that נפש תחת נפש is to be taken literally.

That position deserves serious engagement. And I hope to merit someday to give it the seriousness that it is due. For now, though, I am out of time.

In the meantime, though, if you want to further delve into this question, I remember the commentary of Rav Hirsch being particularly helpful. What’s more, when I did read him, I noted that I am in essence parroting much of what he has to say. Although he says much more, and I myself hope to one day go back over his words much more thoroughly.

In the meantime, I will leave you with this.

If you want to understand what the Torah has to say, there is only one way to do it: to study it deeply — with all your heart and with all your soul.

If we do that, then no amount of lies and no amount of slander can touch us.

The lies may carry far and wide and it may be that most people are not willing to hear what we have to say (yet).

But we’ll hear. We’ll know it. And we’ll live it.

And G-d will see that.

And no amount of lies and slander can touch that.

Share masmid

We begin this week’s dvar Torah not in the words of the Torah itself, but in the words of the Rambam.

In particular, we’re going to take a look at the first line in the first set of halachos in the first book of the Mishneh Torah. Why? Because this Rambam is going to relate directly to our parasha.

יְסוֹד הַיְסוֹדוֹת וְעַמּוּד הַחָכְמוֹת

The foundation of all foundations and the pillar of all wisdoms...

Now, we have to stop here for a moment.

These four words of the Rambam have to be understood in and of themselves before we get to the point that we actually want to discuss. Because the Rambam is telling us that he’s about to share an idea that is the foundational idea of all foundational ideas. And if that doesn’t make sense to you yet — hold on. We’re about to explain it.

He’s also telling us that this idea is the pillar of all the different types of wisdoms that exist. And again, if that sounds confusing — don’t worry. We’re going to explain that too.

Let’s start with the foundation of all foundations.

This first set of halachos of the Rambam — the one that this line is found in — is called Yesodei HaTorah. The Foundations (plural) of the Torah. It’s a set of halachos that the Rambam tells us are fundamental to the entire Torah.

Just as a foundation holds up a building, so too these halachos hold up the Torah. That’s why the Rambam calls them Yesodei HaTorah — the Foundations (plural) of the Torah.

But here, in this line, in these two words — *yesod ha-yesodos* — the Rambam is saying something more. This halacha that we are about to learn — it’s not only fundamental to the Torah — it’s fundamental to the other foundations of the Torah as well. In other words, the Rambam is about to define for us the idea upon which everything else — including all the other foundational ideas — is built.

It’s as if you have a building with two foundations. One foundation holds up the building. The other foundation holds up the first foundation.

And there is another point that the Rambam wants us to know — that this upcoming halacha is also the *amud ha-chochmos* (the pillar of all wisdoms — plural). In other words, there are different types of “wisdoms” in the world — and they too are held up by our halacha.

One last point before we actually get to this halacha itself — I would be remiss if I didn’t point out a beautiful linguistic detail in this line. Take a look at the first letter of each word:

יְסוֹד הַיְסוֹדוֹת וְעַמּוּד הַחָכְמוֹת

יסוד: Yud (י)
היסודות: Heh (ה)
ועמוד: Vav (ו)
החכמות: Heh (ה)

Combined, these letters make up the Shem Havayah (the “proper” name of Hashem). Which should give us a hint as to what this halacha is about to tell us.

But we won’t really need hints. Because we’re about to learn it ourselves right now.

Matzui Rishon

So — what is this foundation of all foundations and this pillar of all wisdoms?

The Rambam tells us right away:

לֵידַע שֶׁיֵּשׁ שָׁם מָצוּי רִאשׁוֹן. וְהוּא מַמְצִיא כָּל נִמְצָא.

To know that there is a First Existing Entity. And He brings into existence all that exists.

This is philosophical language — exact and precise. So let’s take a moment to read it as exactly as the Rambam wrote it. I’ll do so by “modernizing” the Rambam — relating to the world as we understand it today. But the concepts, I believe, are the same.

Two words need unpacking: “existence” and “first.”

Existence. We exist — you, me, the universe, everything in it. But our existence is finite and unstable. Ice melts into water. Water evaporates into air. Seeds become trees, trees produce fruit, and the right match on the right day turns it all to ash. Things are. But the things that are don’t stay the same.

First. This word carries two meanings. One is temporal — first in sequence, in cause and effect. I had parents. They had parents. At some point, there has to be a starting point. An infinite chain of cause and effect going back forever? I find that inherently absurd. Can I disprove it? I don’t know. But I see no reason to take it seriously. I look at it the way a chess grandmaster looks at a board — not every move is worth considering. I shrug my shoulders, roll my eyes, and move on.

The second meaning is structural — first in terms of building blocks. I’m made of organs,

which are made of cells,
which are made of molecules,
which are made of atoms,
which are made of particles,
which are made of quarks,
which are made of... I’m not sure we know yet.

At some point, there has to be a foundation. An infinite regress of smaller and smaller parts? I find that also inherently absurd. And if anyone wants to suggest otherwise, I give the same shrug and the same eye roll — unless, of course, HaKadosh Baruch Hu built that sort of infinity into the very fabric of the universe. A sense of the infinite within the finite. But then that just means that HaKadosh Baruch Hu Himself is the ultimate foundation. Either way, we arrive at the same place.

And here’s the key. Whether we approach it through time (cause and effect, going back to a beginning) or through structure (building blocks, going down to a foundation) — the Rambam is telling us we arrive at the same place. There is an entity which exists, which is the source of everything else that exists.

The Rambam calls this a *Matzui Rishon* — a First Existing Entity.

That’s all the Rambam tells us here. He doesn’t tell us *how* we know this. He doesn’t tell us what he means by “knowing” — whether it’s awareness, understanding, or rigorous proof. He leaves that unstated. For now, he simply wants us to know *that* such an entity exists.

The Dependency

So there exists a First Existing Entity — a Matzui Rishon — and everything else that exists comes from it.

But what exactly is the *relationship* between the Matzui Rishon and everything else?

The Rambam answers this with a thought experiment. Actually, two thought experiments — mirror images of each other.

Here’s an analogy that might help us feel what the Rambam is getting at.

Imagine someone invents a time machine. He travels back to the past, gets into a terrible car accident, and accidentally kills his parents — before he was ever born.

What happens to him?

He ceases to exist. Not dies — ceases. He’s erased from reality. Because his existence depends entirely on his parents. No parents, no him. He doesn’t have within himself the capacity for his own existence. He’s derivative. Dependent. And when the source is gone, so is he.

Now flip it.

Same time machine. Same car accident. But this time, he accidentally kills his younger self.

What happens to his parents?

Nothing. They’re fine. They’ll grieve, but they’ll still exist. Because their existence doesn’t depend on his. The dependency runs one way. He needs them for his existence. They don’t need him for their existence.

That is exactly what the Rambam is telling us about the Matzui Rishon and everything else.

וְאִם יַעֲלֶה עַל הַדַּעַת
שֶׁהוּא אֵינוֹ מָצוּי
אֵין דָּבָר אַחֵר יָכוֹל לְהִמָּצְאוֹת.

וְאִם יַעֲלֶה עַל הַדַּעַת
שֶׁאֵין כָּל הַנִּמְצָאִים מִלְּבַדּוֹ מְצוּיִים
הוּא לְבַדּוֹ יִהְיֶה מָצוּי.
וְלֹא יִבָּטֵל הוּא לְבִטּוּלָם.

If it were to arise in the mind
that the First Existent did not exist,
nothing else could exist at all.

And if it were to arise in the mind
that nothing exists besides Him,
He alone would still exist,
and He would not be nullified by their absence.

We don’t have within us the capacity for our own existence. We are entirely derivative. Entirely dependent. The Matzui Rishon doesn’t depend on us for anything.

The dependency runs one way.

We are one hundred percent dependent. The Matzui Rishon is one hundred percent independent.

Hashem Elokim Emet

Let’s recap what we’ve learned so far.

The Rambam has told us that there’s an ultimate source to all of reality — a Matzui Rishon. He brought all of reality into existence. All of reality is one hundred percent dependent upon Him. And He is in no way whatsoever dependent upon it.

Says the Rambam: this means something.

לְפִיכָךְ אֵין אֲמִתָּתוֹ כַּאֲמִתַּת אֶחָד מֵהֶם.

The nature of His reality is utterly different from ours. He is, in essence, the only truly existing entity.

Now, I don’t think the word *emet* here means “true” in the sense of true versus false. I think a better translation would be something like “real.” So: His reality is not like the reality of anything in the natural world. He is of a different nature than us entirely.

And the Rambam shows us that this idea is not his own — it’s found in the Navi Yirmiyahu:

הוּא שֶׁהַנָּבִיא אוֹמֵר וַה’ אֱלֹהִים אֱמֶת.

What did Yirmiyahu mean by *Hashem Elokim Emet*? Says the Rambam: he meant that Hashem is the true reality. Only Hashem is *Emet*. He alone truly exists. Nothing else exists the way He does.

הוּא לְבַדּוֹ הָאֱמֶת וְאֵין לְאַחֵר אֱמֶת כַּאֲמִתָּתוֹ.

And the Rambam adds: we find this same concept, in different words, in the Torah itself:

וְהוּא שֶׁהַתּוֹרָה אוֹמֶרֶת אֵין עוֹד מִלְּבַדּוֹ.

*Ein od milvado* — there is nothing else besides Him.

If you understand that everything exists only because of this Matzui Rishon, and that without Him nothing else could exist, then in the deepest sense — there really is nothing else. Everything else is an extension of His existence. A reflection of His reality. Dependent upon Him for every moment of its being.

The Mitzvah

Let’s take stock of what we’ve learned.

There is a First Existing Entity. He brings everything into existence. Everything depends on Him — if He didn’t exist, nothing could. But He depends on nothing — if nothing else existed, He would still be. His reality is not like our reality. He is the only truly existing entity. There is nothing else besides Him.

That’s the definition.

And now the Rambam tells us something remarkable:

וִידִיעַת דָּבָר זֶה מִצְוַת עֲשֵׂה.

And knowing this matter is a positive commandment.

According to the Rambam, everything we just learned is not simply philosophy or theology. It is a mitzvah — a commandment. This is something that we need to know, like we need to keep Shabbos and keep kashrus. Or perhaps even more so.

But of course, if there’s a commandment — and by commandment here, the Rambam means a mitzvat aseh min HaTorah, a positive commandment from the Torah itself — then it has to have a source in the Torah.

Where in the Torah does it tell us that we have a mitzvah to know all of this?

Says the Rambam: in our parasha. At Har Sinai. In the first of the Aseres HaDibros. When HaKadosh Baruch Hu said to us:

שֶׁנֶּאֱמַר אָנֹכִי ה’ אֱלֹהֶיךָ.

Anochi Hashem Elokecha.

Those three words, says the Rambam, are not just information. They are a commandment — a commandment to know and understand everything that the Rambam just explained to us.

And we should note: this is not something that the Rambam made up. This idea is found in the Gemara, in Masechet Makkos.

The Gemara is found at the bottom of daf 23b and continues to the top of 24a. It reads as follows:

דָּרַשׁ רַבִּי שִׂמְלַאי: שֵׁשׁ מֵאוֹת וּשְׁלֹשׁ עֶשְׂרֵה מִצְוֹת נֶאֶמְרוּ לוֹ לְמֹשֶׁה, שְׁלֹשׁ מֵאוֹת וְשִׁשִּׁים וְחָמֵשׁ לָאוִין כְּמִנְיַן יְמוֹת הַחַמָּה, וּמָאתַיִם וְאַרְבָּעִים וּשְׁמוֹנָה עֲשֵׂה כְּנֶגֶד אֵיבָרָיו שֶׁל אָדָם. אָמַר רַב הַמְנוּנָא: מַאי קְרָא – ״תּוֹרָה צִוָּה לָנוּ מֹשֶׁה מוֹרָשָׁה״, ״תּוֹרָה״ בְּגִימַטְרִיָּא שֵׁית מְאָה וְחַד סְרֵי הָוֵי, ״אָנֹכִי״ וְ״לֹא יִהְיֶה לְךָ״ – מִפִּי הַגְּבוּרָה שְׁמַעְנוּם.

Rabbi Simlai taught: Six hundred and thirteen mitzvos were said to Moshe. Three hundred and sixty-five negative commandments, corresponding to the days of the solar year, and two hundred and forty-eight positive commandments, corresponding to the limbs of a human being. Said Rav Hamnuna: What is the pasuk that tells us there are 613 mitzvos? He quotes a pasuk at the end of Sefer Devarim: *Torah tziva lanu Moshe, morasha kehilas Yaakov* — “Moshe commanded us Torah, an inheritance for the congregation of Yaakov.” The word *Torah* in gematria equals 611. “Anochi” and “Lo yihyeh lecha” — we heard directly from the mouth of the Almighty.

Now, you may notice that 611 and 613 are not the same number. Rav Hamnuna noticed that too. But he says: there are two more mitzvos. Anochi and Lo yihyeh lecha — the first two statements of HaKadosh Baruch Hu at Har Sinai. Those we heard directly from HaKadosh Baruch Hu Himself. So you take the 611 mitzvos that Moshe commanded us, add the two that Hashem commanded us directly, and you get 613.

For our purposes, we just want to note that Rav Hamnuna says that the phrase Anochi Hashem Elokecha — which is what he references when he uses the word Anochi — is a mitzvah. The Rambam didn’t make this up. This understanding already existed in the time of Chazal. The Rambam is simply explaining to us what the mitzvah is.

The Problem

But whether the idea comes from Chazal or from the Rambam, we still don’t understand what either of them is talking about.

Because where is the command?

Let’s look at the other mitzvah that came mi-pi ha-Gvurah, directly from Hashem: Lo yihyeh lecha — “There shall not be for you [other gods].” That’s command language. You cannot do this.

Or look later in the Aseres HaDibros. Zachor es yom haShabbos l’kadsho — Remember the day of Shabbos to sanctify it. That’s a command. Lo sirtzach — Don’t murder. That’s a command. Lo signov— Don’t steal. That’s a command. They’re all phrased as directives. HaKadosh Baruch Hu tells us: do this, don’t do that.

But Anochi Hashem Elokecha? That’s a statement. An introduction. A declaration. HaKadosh Baruch Hu is telling us who is speaking — but He’s not telling us to do anything.

So how does the Rambam, following Chazal, derive a mitzvah from this?

We need to understand these three words. Because evidently there’s a lot more hidden in them than we realized. We thought it was just information — a sort of introduction before the “real” commandments begin. But evidently we’re missing something. And we want to see what we’re missing.

In order to do so, we have to take the time to understand each of these three words: the word Anochi, the word Hashem, and the word Elokecha. We’ve already explored the names Hashem and Elokim a bit, so that will be easier. But even the word Anochi has hidden treasures in it that we didn’t think to look for.

And then — and this is the beautiful part — we’re going to have to figure out how these three words relate to each other. How to punctuate them, so to speak. Because the relationship of one word to the next is not at all obvious, as we will see when we start to explore the commentaries.

These three words. What they mean. And what they mean when put together — particularly in the context of Har Sinai.

Anochi

In order to see how this is a mitzvah, we first have to address a particular challenge — or one might say, opportunity — that exists within the Hebrew language.

Hebrew doesn’t have punctuation. And Hebrew doesn’t really have a word for “is” or “am.” Which means we have to figure out where to put them ourselves.

And that’s particularly true with our verse:

אָנֹכִי ה’ אֱלֹהֶיךָ אֲשֶׁר הוֹצֵאתִיךָ מֵאֶרֶץ מִצְרַיִם

I am Hashem your God who took you out of the land of Egypt.

How are we to translate this verse? It’s not so simple — particularly because we don’t know where to place the word “is” or “am” in this sentence. And there’s nothing in the actual words themselves that gives any indication. The answer comes from how we intone the verse, not from anything inherent in the words as they’re written on the page, on the daf, in the Torah.

As such, let me give you three possible translations.

Possibility One: I, Hashem your God, am the one who took you out of Egypt.

Let’s ask ourselves: according to this translation, what is the message of HaKadosh Baruch Hu? What does He want us to know?

He wants us to know that He is the one who took us out of Egypt. The phrase “Hashem your God” is what we call a parenthetical statement. It’s not what He’s trying to tell us. He’s not trying to tell us about Himself — that He is Hashem, our God. He’s just identifying who He is. So the point would be: He and no other god, no other power, is the one who took us out of Egypt. That is what He would be telling us if we intone the verse in such a way that this would be the proper translation.

Possibility Two: I am Hashem — your God, the one who took you out of Egypt.

Let’s ask the same question. What does He want us to know?

Here, the message is that He is Hashem — Yud-Keh-Vav-Keh. And He’s just identifying a bit more about who Hashem is, what His function is. His essence is Hashem, but He’s also our God, and He’s also the one who took us out of Egypt. But those are parenthetical statements.

Possibility Three: I am Hashem, your God — the one who took you out of Egypt.

We’ll ask our question one last time. What does He want us to know?

According to this reading, He wants us to know that He is Hashem. And He wants us to know that He is our God. Both of those points are being communicated at once. What the fact about taking us out of Egypt has to do with anything — that’s not our focus right now. It’s an interesting question, but not one we’re going to address today.

The Third Reading

Now, this third reading is the one we need.

If we are going to derive a mitzvah from this line, we need to understand what it means for Hashem to address the entire Jewish people all at once, to reveal Himself unmasked to all of them, and to say: Anochi Hashem Elokecha (אָנֹכִי ה’ אֱלֹהֶיךָ) — I am Hashem, your God. Where the main point is not something about what Hashem did, but something about who He is. That He is the entity represented by the combination of the proper name Hashem and the descriptive name Elokim.

Ani and Anochi

To get the full weight of this statement, we have to understand the difference between the word ani (אֲנִי) and the word anochi (אָנֹכִי).

It’s quite fascinating that in the Hebrew language, there are two ways to say the word “I.” One is ani (אֲנִי) — aleph, nun, yud. The other is anochi (אָנֹכִי) — aleph, nun, chaf, yud.

If there are two ways to say the word “I,” it stands to reason that there is some significant nuance in meaning between them.

And indeed, the Malbim offers one such nuance. He gives a very interesting example.

Imagine someone says, “I am standing.” In English, he could mean: I am standing as opposed to sitting. Or he could mean: I am standing, as opposed to the other people who are sitting.

In the first example, the focus is on what he’s doing. What am I doing? Standing or sitting? In the second, the focus is on him as opposed to other people. I’m the one standing — not others.

Says the Malbim: the word ani (אֲנִי) relates to the first idea — something about what one is doing. If I want to say that I am standing as opposed to sitting, I’d say ani omeid (אֲנִי עוֹמֵד). I’m not talking about me and my personhood. I’m not the focus — what I’m doing is the focus.

But if I want to talk about me — if the focus is on my personhood — I’d use anochi (אָנֹכִי). If I want to say I’m standing and no one else is, then it’s anochi omeid (אָנֹכִי עוֹמֵד).

As such: Anochi Hashem Elokecha (אָנֹכִי ה’ אֱלֹהֶיךָ).

When the message is that HaKadosh Baruch Hu wants us to know something about Him — that’s anochi. Not just “no one else” — although that’s part of it. But: I want you to know something about the essence of who I am. I want you to understand who is speaking to you. And that can be expressed in the two words: Hashem Elokecha.

The Names

Now, we have already spent time on these two names (though there is more to the names than we mentioned before). But for now, we just have to note that the philosophical definition the Rambam gave to God — everything we just went through at the beginning of Hilchos Yesodei HaTorah — can be derived from these names.

As a short reminder, the Shem Havayah (Yud-Keh-Vav-Keh) is considered Hashem’s “proper” name. Whereas Shem Elokim relates to His “position.”

It’s as if Bibi said, “I am Bibi Netanyahu, your Prime Minister.” His name is Bibi Netanyahu. His position is Prime Minister.

So it is with God. He has a proper name which tells us something about the essential nature of Hashem (as far as we can relate to it). And He has a position which tells us something about how Hashem created and runs the world.

Within that name and that position, if you understand what they mean, you understand everything the Rambam just laid out. It’s all in there. You just have to understand what the names mean.

And if you understand the grammar of the word anochi, then you understand that when all of Am Yisrael stood before Hashem at Har Sinai — this is what He wanted them to know.

I am of a totally different nature than anything else. I am the ultimate source of all reality. All reality finds existence within Me. I am totally independent of the world. And you are totally dependent upon Me.

That is who I am.

One Moment, One Message

But we still don’t have a mitzvah yet.

We can see how the concept is there — this is what Hashem is saying. And we can see how the philosophically exact language the Rambam uses at the beginning of his work is found within the names of God as expressed directly to the Jewish people at Har Sinai.

But where is the command?

So this is how I see it.

From the first moment that HaKadosh Baruch Hu spoke to Moshe Rabbeinu and told him that He was going to take the Jewish people out of slavery and bring them to Eretz Yisrael, He mentioned that they were going to serve Him on this mountain — Har Sinai. And indeed, the entire request to Paro was framed upon this revelation. They didn’t come to Paro and say, “Set us free and let us return to our homeland.” They said, “Let us go into the desert and serve Hashem.” Let us have Matan Torah.

And then finally, HaKadosh Baruch Hu brings the entire Jewish people before Him, and He is going to speak to them directly. One time.

According to Rav Hamnuna, this is the only line they heard directly from Hashem. The rest was conveyed through Moshe (see Rashi). Anochi Hashem Elokecha and Lo yihyeh lecha — I am Hashem your God, and you will not have any other gods.

But only one part of this says anything about Hashem Himself. Lo yihyeh lecha is just saying: you’re not going to have anyone else. It’s as if your wife says, “I am your wife — you’re not going to have any other girlfriends.” When you get married to me, that’s it. It’s just the two of us. But only one part says something about who she is.

So there’s only one line in which Hashem says to the Jewish people directly anything about Himself.

And this, evidently, is the one message He wanted them to hear directly from Him. Not through Moshe Rabbeinu. When the whole nation was in front of Him, and He could say whatever He wanted to say to them — what did He want to say? What did He want them to hear directly from Him, while the rest could be passed on through Moshe?

Understand who I am. Understand the relationship between the two of us — the nature of that relationship. Because everything else flows out from it. It is the yesod of all the yesodos. It is the basis of the entire relationship. It’s why we do everything we do. The entire structure and relationship and everything else flows out from that.

And so — if I only have one moment, and only one thing to say to you — this is what I want to say.

The Command is Understood

And so I ask you.

If Hashem thought that this was the most important message to give over to the Jewish people — and this was the one message He wanted all the Jewish people to hear directly from Him — do you think this was just something they were supposed to hear and get for the moment, but afterwards they could remember it if they wanted to or forget if they wanted to?

Do you think Hashem wanted them to know this — and their children, and their grandchildren, and their great-grandchildren?

It is self-evident. It is obvious. This is what Hashem wants every single Yid in every single generation to know.

And therefore — there’s no need to command.

Because once you hear it, you know. This is what we’re supposed to know. Not just on an intellectual level, but in our guts. Intuitively. At the foundation and the deepest level of who we are. Because when we hear Hashem say that — we get it. We live that. We experience that connection.

The mitzvah is built into the entire way the statement was given over. The fact that it was to everyone. From Hashem directly to them.

When you’re talking to Moshe, then you have to tell Moshe: command them. But when I’m speaking to them directly — you don’t have to say that.

If your wife says to you, “I’m your wife,” she doesn’t have to add, “Remember that.” It’s self-evident. It’s understood.

If your parent says to you, “I’m your father, I’m your mother,” they don’t have to add an explanation of how to act. They do sometimes — but if the child gets it, they don’t need to.

If a friend says, “That’s your father — you shouldn’t act that way. That’s your mother — you shouldn’t talk that way. That’s your wife — you shouldn’t treat her that way” — then they add in the command.

But when it comes directly from the source?

The command is understood.

Share masmid

Freedom. That is where we start this week’s parsha — with full freedom.

Paro attacks.
G-d responds.
We sing.
And now we are free.

But then what?

First things first — we travel three days into the desert and don’t find any water. That, of course, is a problem.

We travel further — to Marah — and we do find water. But we can’t drink it; it’s bitter. The problem persists. And we complain (וַיִּלֹּ֧נוּ): ‘What will we drink (מה נשתה)?’

As far as I can tell, this is a perfectly reasonable question. There is no indication that God, or Moshe, or anyone else is upset by it. And indeed, there is a solution.

Moshe davens.
God instructs — throw a certain tree into the water.
And we have water to drink.

Problem solved.

But it gets better.

We then arrive at Elim and find twelve springs of water.

At this point, we have clearly moved beyond crisis. This is no longer a story of scarcity or emergency. In the desert, water is life — and here there is abundance.

But of course, it seems like there is something more going on here than our technical needs being taken care of. After all, there are twelve springs. It is hard to read Chumash and come across the number twelve without taking note. That number carries meaning in the literary way God guides the Jewish people.

Something is being hinted at here.

And when we move beyond water into the world of food, that suspicion only grows stronger. For not only are there twelve springs of water — there are also seventy date palms.

Twelve and seventy.

Could this have anything to do with the twelve names and seventy souls that came down to — and were freed from — Egypt?

Let us recall:

וְאֵ֗לֶּה שְׁמוֹת֙ בְּנֵ֣י יִשְׂרָאֵ֔ל הַבָּאִ֖ים מִצְרָ֑יְמָה
אֵ֣ת יַעֲקֹ֔ב אִ֥ישׁ וּבֵית֖וֹ בָּֽאוּ׃
רְאוּבֵ֣ן שִׁמְע֔וֹן לֵוִ֖י וִיהוּדָֽה׃
יִשָּׂשכָ֥ר זְבוּלֻ֖ן וּבִנְיָמִֽן׃ דָּ֥ן וְנַפְתָּלִ֖י גָּ֥ד וְאָשֵֽׁר׃
וַֽיְהִ֗י כׇּל־נֶ֛פֶשׁ יֹצְאֵ֥י יֶֽרֶךְ־יַעֲקֹ֖ב שִׁבְעִ֣ים נָ֑פֶשׁ
וְיוֹסֵ֖ף הָיָ֥ה בְמִצְרָֽיִם׃

English translation:

And these are the names of the children of Israel,
who were coming into Egypt —
with Yaakov,
each man and his household came.

Reuven, Shimon, Levi, and Yehudah.
Yissachar, Zevulun, and Binyamin.
Dan and Naftali, Gad and Asher.

And all the souls who came forth from the loins of Yaakov
were seventy souls;
and Yosef was already in Egypt.

Indeed, let’s take this one step further — these dates trees were able to grow because of these springs of water. They literally drew water from these springs and used them to blossom.

So too, the seventy souls sprang up from the twelve sons of Yaakov. And just as the water of the streams are literally present within the fruit of the date palms, so too the 12 sons of Yaakov — and their 12 names — are themselves counted among the seventy souls who went down to Egypt.

Now, as compelling as this is — it’s worth noting that the Midrash Halacha (which Rashi brings down) has a different understanding of the significance of the number seventy — they hold that it relates to the seventy elders (presumably of the Sanhedrin).

Seems a bit out of left field.

For now, though, let’s just note that this does not seem to be a coincidence — there is clearly something going on with these twelve springs and seventy date palms. For some reason or other — right here, right now — at the beginning of our journey, we need to encounter these springs and these trees.

Why?

We don’t know — and hopefully I will someday be able to delve into this aspect of the story further. For now, we’ll note it and move on.

We travel from Elim and arrive in Midbar Sin — on the fifteenth day of the second month after leaving Egypt. In other words, on the day that will eventually become Pesach Sheni.

Is there any connection? I don’t know yet. I’m just reading and wondering.

Either way, we once again complain (וַיִּלּ֜וֹנוּ). But this time, it sounds anything but reasonable:

וַיֹּאמְר֨וּ אֲלֵהֶ֜ם בְּנֵ֣י יִשְׂרָאֵ֗ל
מִֽי־יִתֵּ֨ן מוּתֵ֤נוּ בְיַד־יְהֹוָה֙ בְּאֶ֣רֶץ מִצְרַ֔יִם
בְּשִׁבְתֵּ֙נוּ֙ עַל־סִ֣יר הַבָּשָׂ֔ר בְּאׇכְלֵ֥נוּ לֶ֖חֶם לָשֹׂ֑בַע
כִּֽי־הוֹצֵאתֶ֤ם אֹתָ֙נוּ֙ אֶל־הַמִּדְבָּ֣ר הַזֶּ֔ה
לְהָמִ֛ית אֶת־כׇּל־הַקָּהָ֥ל הַזֶּ֖ה בָּרָעָֽב׃

English translation:

And the children of Israel said to them:
‘Would that we had died by the hand of Hashem in the land of Egypt,
when we sat by the pot of meat,
when we ate bread to fullness;
for you have brought us out into this wilderness
to put to death this entire assembly in hunger.’

Whoa — what happened?

Why not simply ask, ‘What will we eat?’ — just as they earlier asked, ‘What will we drink?’ Why this extreme response?

And did they forgot that just a week or two ago they had no water — and that, in the end, they found not just water, but abundance: twelve springs of water?

Yes, it took a moment. But the problem was solved.

Why the doom and gloom?
Why the death wish?
Why the sense of no hope.

After all, lack of water is far more dangerous than lack of food. And yet here, in the desert, the (seeming) absence of food is perceived as a death sentence for the nation as a whole.

Why?

Clearly, they viewed this situation as significantly worse than the lack of drinkable — or any — water that they had experienced not long before. And interestingly, G-d’s response suggests that they may have a point.

Because this time, G-d does not lead to them to a place of bounty. He does not reveal a hidden resource. Instead, He bends — or suspends — the natural order itself and rains food down from the heavens.

Which suggest that, on some level, their assessment of reality was correct.

From a natural perspective, there was no way to bring an entire nation through this desert and have them survive. And from that perspective, the complaint has a certain logic to it. They were not interested in freedom for freedoms sake if the cost of that freedom was national suicide.

But I suspect that this was precisely the point.

G-d intentionally brought them into a place where logic, experience and reason all said: this cannot work.

And it was precisely there — in that arational space — that G-d introduces a test: whether or not we could walk in His Torah:

וַיֹּ֤אמֶר יְהֹוָה֙ אֶל־מֹשֶׁ֔ה
הִנְנִ֨י מַמְטִ֥יר לָכֶ֛ם לֶ֖חֶם מִן־הַשָּׁמָ֑יִם
וְיָצָ֨א הָעָ֤ם וְלָֽקְטוּ֙ דְּבַר־י֣וֹם בְּיוֹמ֔וֹ
לְמַ֧עַן אֲנַסֶּ֛נּוּ הֲיֵלֵ֥ךְ בְּתוֹרָתִ֖י אִם־לֹֽא

English translation:

And Hashem said to Moshe:
‘Behold, I am about to rain down for you bread from the heavens;
and the people shall go out and gather a day’s portion on its day,
in order that I may test them —
whether they will walk in My Torah or not.’

Which brings us to the questions.

Why the need for a test at all?
Why is the test through food?
What is the connection between food and the Torah?
What is the connection between food and Shabbos?
And why now?
- Why not immediately create this test?
- Why wait until after Marah — after the twelve springs and seventy date trees?

I hope to deal with some of these questions this week (others will have to wait to another time).

And while we’re asking: what is the deal with Marah and the twelve springs and seventy date trees.

Those stories go almost as quickly as they come. A brief mention and that is it.
But — and this is an important but — let’s note what is hiding in plain site within those stories.

At Marah, there is Torah:

וַיִּצְעַ֣ק אֶל־יְהֹוָ֗ה
וַיּוֹרֵ֤הוּ יְהֹוָה֙ עֵ֔ץ
וַיַּשְׁלֵךְ֙ אֶל־הַמַּ֔יִם
וַֽיִּמְתְּק֖וּ הַמָּ֑יִם

שָׁ֣ם שָׂ֥ם ל֛וֹ חֹ֥ק וּמִשְׁפָּ֖ט
וְשָׁ֥ם נִסָּֽהוּ׃

וַיֹּ֩אמֶר֩
אִם־שָׁמ֨וֹעַ תִּשְׁמַ֜ע לְק֣וֹל ׀ יְהֹוָ֣ה אֱלֹהֶ֗יךָ
וְהַיָּשָׁ֤ר בְּעֵינָיו֙ תַּעֲשֶׂ֔ה
וְהַֽאֲזַנְתָּ֙ לְמִצְוֺתָ֔יו
וְשָׁמַרְתָּ֖ כׇּל־חֻקָּ֑יו
כׇּֽל־הַמַּחֲלָ֞ה אֲשֶׁר־שַׂ֤מְתִּי בְמִצְרַ֙יִם֙
לֹא־אָשִׂ֣ים עָלֶ֔יךָ
כִּ֛י אֲנִ֥י יְהֹוָ֖ה רֹפְאֶֽךָ

English translation:

And Moshe cried out to Hashem;
and Hashem showed him a tree.
He cast it into the waters,
and the waters became sweet.

There He set for them statute and judgment,
and there He tested them.

And He said:
‘If you will surely listen to the voice of Hashem your God,
and do what is upright in His eyes,
and give ear to His commandments,
and guard all His statutes,
all the illness that I placed upon Egypt
I will not place upon you—
for I am Hashem, your healer.’

Here we see some sort of connection between water and Torah. Okay, it’s not food — but food and water are essentially two sides of the same coin. And we have already noted the (seeming) connection between the twelve springs and seventy date trees on the one hand and the twelve names and seventy souls that came down to Egypt on the other.

And now we note that it is the descendants of those twelve sons and seventy souls who are here, at this moment in this desert, being given this Torah.

They are the ones who are receiving the chok u’mishpat (חֹ֥ק וּמִשְׁפָּ֖ט).
They are the ones who G-d will test — to see whether or not they will walk in G-d’s Torah.
They are the ones who will soon stand at Har Sinai, hear G-d declare that He is Hashem, their G-d.
And they — or their children — will be the ones who fully receive the Torah at the end of forty years in the desert.

And it is here — at Marah and Elim, the first two post-Yam Suf stops in this forty-year journey — that we are given an introduction to the story of the manna, and to its test: whether we will walk in G-d’s Torah.

It all seems pretty connected to me.

The Torah connection we will have to explore another time — but just note, it is there and it needs to be understood.

For now, though, I just want to focus on the element of food.
And I would like to do so by first going back to the beginning.
The very beginning.
As in day one beginning.

The Heavens and the Earth

We all know that in the beginning, G-d created the heavens and the earth. But, interestingly enough — the Torah does not seem to be so interested in the heavens, just the earth.

For example, take a look at the second verse of the Torah (the one that follows in the beginning):

וְהָאָ֗רֶץ הָיְתָ֥ה תֹ֙הוּ֙ וָבֹ֔הוּ
וְחֹ֖שֶׁךְ עַל־פְּנֵ֣י תְה֑וֹם
וְר֣וּחַ אֱלֹהִ֔ים מְרַחֶ֖פֶת עַל־פְּנֵ֥י הַמָּֽיִם

English translation:

And the earth was tohu va-vohu,
and darkness was upon the face of the watery-depth,
and a G-dly wind hovered over the face of the waters.

Note the subject — the earth. The earth (ארץ) is tohu va-vohu (whatever that means). And the waters in this verse refer to the waters that are upon the earth (at least that is how Rashi reads it — and we’ll go with Rashi for now).

And speaking of the waters — they reappear in day two — when G-d splits them into the upper and lower waters. And those lower waters — they reappear on day three, when G-d gathers them into one place so that the dry land can appear.

But what about the upper waters? If we assume that they refer to the rain as the Ibn Ezra, Sforno, the Malbim (and perhaps also Rashi) do, then the upper waters are those waters which fall upon the earth.

In short, the Chumash starts out with a broad view and slowly and methodically moves towards the earth in the more limited sense of the word (aka dry land).

We start with (celestial) heavens and the (planet) earth.
We then move to just the planet earth.
We then move to just the dry land.

And now — with the dry land and the rain it needs firmly established, we narrow our focus again — to food.

וַיֹּ֣אמֶר אֱלֹהִ֗ים תַּֽדְשֵׁ֤א הָאָ֙רֶץ֙ דֶּ֗שֶׁא
עֵ֚שֶׂב מַזְרִ֣יעַ זֶ֔רַע
עֵ֣ץ פְּרִ֞י עֹ֤שֶׂה פְּרִי֙
לְמִינ֔וֹ אֲשֶׁ֥ר זַרְעוֹ־ב֖וֹ עַל־הָאָ֑רֶץ וַֽיְהִי־כֵֽן׃

וַתּוֹצֵ֨א הָאָ֜רֶץ דֶּ֠שֶׁא
עֵ֣שֶׂב מַזְרִ֤יעַ זֶ֙רַע֙ לְמִינֵ֔הוּ
וְעֵ֧ץ עֹֽשֶׂה־פְּרִ֛י אֲשֶׁ֥ר זַרְעוֹ־ב֖וֹ לְמִינֵ֑הוּ

English translation:

And God said:
‘Let the earth bring forth vegetation —
seed-bearing grasses,
and fruit trees producing fruit,
each according to its kind,
whose seed is within it, upon the earth.’
And it was so.

And the earth brought forth vegetation —
seed-bearing grasses according to their kinds,
and trees producing fruit
whose seed is within it, according to their kinds.

We are focused on plant life. But notice the focus — grasses (עֵ֚שֶׂב) and fruit trees (עֵ֣ץ פְּרִ֞י). And then let’s fast forward to the sixth day — and to G-d’s blessing to man:

וַיֹּ֣אמֶר אֱלֹהִ֗ים
הִנֵּה֩ נָתַ֨תִּי לָכֶ֜ם אֶת־כׇּל־עֵ֣שֶׂב ׀ זֹרֵ֣עַ זֶ֗רַע אֲשֶׁר֙ עַל־פְּנֵ֣י כׇל־הָאָ֔רֶץ
וְאֶת־כׇּל־הָעֵ֛ץ אֲשֶׁר־בּ֥וֹ פְרִי־עֵ֖ץ זֹרֵ֣עַ זָ֑רַע לָכֶ֥ם יִֽהְיֶ֖ה לְאׇכְלָֽה׃

וּֽלְכׇל־חַיַּ֣ת הָ֠אָ֠רֶץ
וּלְכׇל־ע֨וֹף הַשָּׁמַ֜יִם
וּלְכֹ֣ל ׀ רוֹמֵ֣שׂ עַל־הָאָ֗רֶץ אֲשֶׁר־בּוֹ֙ נֶ֣פֶשׁ חַיָּ֔ה
אֶת־כׇּל־יֶ֥רֶק עֵ֖שֶׂב לְאׇכְלָ֑ה וַֽיְהִי־כֵֽן׃

English translation:

And God said:
‘Behold, I have given you every seed-bearing grass
that is upon the face of all the earth,
and every tree in which there is the fruit of a tree, bearing seed —
to you it shall be for food.

And to every beast of the earth,
and to every bird of the heavens,
and to everything that creeps upon the earth in which there is a living soul,
every green grass for food.’
And it was so.

What an interesting connection. G-d tells man that he has given him for food

• Every seed-bearing grass (עֵ֣שֶׂב ׀ זֹרֵ֣עַ זֶ֗רַע)

• And every tree that bears fruit (כׇּל־הָעֵ֛ץ אֲשֶׁר־בּ֥וֹ פְרִי־עֵ֖ץ)

Which is exactly what was mentioned on day three. Take a look.

GRASSES:

• Day three: seed-bearing grasses (עֵ֚שֶׂב מַזְרִ֣יעַ זֶ֔רַע)

• Day six: seed-bearing grass (עֵ֣שֶׂב זֹרֵ֣עַ זֶ֗רַע)

FRUIT:

• Day three: trees producing fruit (עֵ֧ץ עֹֽשֶׂה־פְּרִ֛)

• Day six: every tree in which there is the fruit (כׇּל־הָעֵ֛ץ אֲשֶׁר־בּ֥וֹ פְרִי)

Of course, in the plant world — there is much more than just grasses (read vegetables) and fruit. There are bushes and flowers and more. But that is not the focus of the Chumash. The Chumash focuses solely on food (including the food that the animals eat).

And that is interesting. It’s almost as if we are slowly zooming in and moving towards food. In the beginning, G-d worked towards creating food!

A Slight Tangent

Before continuing, I’d like to go on a tangent — a short one, but a tangent nonetheless.

I’ve just argued that the first three days are essentially about setting up the conditions for food. The vegetation created on day three is precisely what G-d later tells man He is giving him to eat.

But what about the other days?

I don’t yet have an answer for day four — the sun, the moon, the stars. That will have to wait.

But days five and six? Those are about creating animal life: fish, birds, land animals — and then man. And here, too, we see the same pattern. The Torah is not giving us a comprehensive catalog of creation. It is telling us about creation in relation to man.

Let’s trace it through.

Before G-d speaks to man about food, He speaks to him about dominion.

In verse 26, before G-d actually makes man, He clearly articulates what man’s position will be in the creation vis-a-vis the other animals:

וַיֹּ֣אמֶר אֱלֹהִ֔ים
נַֽעֲשֶׂ֥ה אָדָ֛ם בְּצַלְמֵ֖נוּ כִּדְמוּתֵ֑נוּ

וְיִרְדּוּ֩ בִדְגַ֨ת הַיָּ֜ם
וּבְע֣וֹף הַשָּׁמַ֗יִם
וּבַבְּהֵמָה֙
וּבְכׇל־הָאָ֔רֶץ
וּבְכׇל־הָרֶ֖מֶשׁ הָֽרֹמֵ֥שׂ עַל־הָאָֽרֶץ

English translation:

And G-d said:
Let us make man in Our image, after Our likeness,

and they will rule over the fish of the sea,
and the birds of the heavens,
and the domesticated animals,
and all the earth,
and every creeping thing that creeps upon the earth.

In short, G-d notes that man will be made in the “image of G-d” (b’Tzelem Elokim — בצלם א-לקים) — and that because he will be made in Tzelem Elokim, he will rule over these creatures.

All this G-d stated before He made man. And then, once He actually made man, he essentially repeated this point — but this time He articulated it to man himself:

וַיְבָ֣רֶךְ אֹתָם֮ אֱלֹהִים֒
וַיֹּ֨אמֶר לָהֶ֜ם אֱלֹהִ֗ים

פְּר֥וּ וּרְב֛וּ
וּמִלְא֥וּ אֶת־הָאָ֖רֶץ
וְכִבְשֻׁ֑הָ

וּרְד֞וּ בִּדְגַ֤ת הַיָּם֙
וּבְע֣וֹף הַשָּׁמַ֔יִם
וּבְכׇל־חַיָּ֖ה הָֽרֹמֶ֥שֶׂת עַל־הָאָֽרֶץ

English translation:

And G-d blessed them,
and G-d said to them:

Be fruitful and multiply,
and fill the earth
and conquer it,

and rule over the fish of the sea,
and the birds of the heavens,
and every living thing that moves upon the earth.

Now, notice the parallelism.

On day five, G-d creates first the fish, then the birds.
And then — on day six — the land animals.

In short — the animals that G-d created on days five and six are the animals that He gives man dominion on when He blesses him. Just like He gave as a gift to man the food that He created over the first three days of creatin.

The parallelism is quite noticeable.
So what is going on here?

According to this reading, the Torah is not attempting to explain or catalog every facet of G-d’s creation — nor is it trying to answer some deep or mysterious philosophical questions.

Rather — the narrative focuses on those things which relate to man.
The animals that man will have dominion over.
The food that man (and those very same animals) will eat.

But more than that — in terms of food — the narrative notes that G-d gave us our food:

And more than that, G-d went out of His way to tell us that:

וַיֹּ֣אמֶר אֱלֹהִ֗ים הִנֵּה֩ נָתַ֨תִּי לָכֶ֜ם

English translation:

And G-d said: take note, I have given all of you…

From Creation to the Garden

So we’ve just finished the story of creation. The heavens and the earth, the vegetation and the animals, the gift of food and the blessing of dominion — all of it building toward man, and all of it given to him.

And no sooner do we finish than the Torah seems to start again. A second creation story. The story of Gan Eden.

And here, something shifts.

Creation is about the natural order. Hashem sets up a world that works — sun and rain, seeds and soil, animals and plants — and gives man access to all of it. It’s a gift. And Hashem wants us to know it’s a gift.

Gan Eden is different.

Gan Eden is not about the natural order. It’s about a garden.

What is a garden? A garden is an act of love. Someone plants it, tends it, cultivates it. A garden is not wild nature. It’s nature shaped by care.

And in this garden, Hashem places man. Not to survive. To enjoy.

וַיַּצְמַח יְהֹוָה אֱלֹהִים מִן הָאֲדָמָה כׇּל עֵץ נֶחְמָד לְמַרְאֶה וְטוֹב לְמַאֲכָל

And Hashem G-d caused to grow from the ground every tree that is pleasant to look at and good to eat.

Pleasant to look at. Good to eat. This is not just sustenance. This is beauty. This is pleasure. This is experience.

And then Hashem says to man:

מִכֹּל עֵץ הַגָּן אָכֹל תֹּאכֵל

From every tree of the garden you may surely eat.

Eat. Enjoy. Experience the goodness of My world.

There is, of course, one exception — one tree that is off-limits. We know how that story ends. But for now, let’s just note the setup: Hashem creates a place of beauty and pleasure, fills it with food, places man inside, and invites him to enjoy it.

And more than that — Hashem is there. In the garden. With man.

This is not just provision. This is relationship.

Think about it. When you remember the food your grandmother used to make — the cookies, the soup, whatever it was — what do you remember? The recipe? The ingredients?

No. You remember the love. You remember her. The food was an expression of care, of relationship, of wanting to give you something good. The love was baked into it.

That’s what Gan Eden is. Hashem and man, together in a garden, with food as the medium of relationship. Not just “here are resources, use them as you wish.” But “I made this for you. Enjoy it. I’m here with you.”

Man has a job in the garden, of course. L’ovdah ul’shomrah — to work it and to guard it. There is responsibility. But the responsibility exists within a framework of love and gift.

In the first chapter of Bereishis, the story of creation ends with Hashem telling man: I have given you the food of the natural world.

In the second chapter, the story continues — but now it’s not about all the food in the world. It’s about a special place. A garden. Where enjoyment and responsibility come together. Where Hashem and man dwell together. Where food is not just sustenance, but relationship.

Keep that in mind. We’re going to need it.

The Food Hidden in Shabbos

We might think we’re done with creation and food. After all, once G-d makes His declaration to man, the Chumash lets us know:

G-d saw everything that He had made, and behold — it was very good. And it was evening and it was morning, the sixth day.

And then:

וַיְכֻלּ֛וּ הַשָּׁמַ֥יִם וְהָאָ֖רֶץ וְכׇל־צְבָאָֽם

The heavens and the earth were completed, and all their hosts.

Creation is over. The story of creation and food must be over as well.

But we have to look a little further.

וַיְכַ֤ל אֱלֹהִים֙ בַּיּ֣וֹם הַשְּׁבִיעִ֔י מְלַאכְתּ֖וֹ אֲשֶׁ֣ר עָשָׂ֑ה וַיִּשְׁבֹּת֙ בַּיּ֣וֹם הַשְּׁבִיעִ֔י מִכׇּל־מְלַאכְתּ֖וֹ אֲשֶׁ֥ר עָשָֽׂה וַיְבָ֤רֶךְ אֱלֹהִים֙ אֶת־י֣וֹם הַשְּׁבִיעִ֔י וַיְקַדֵּ֖שׁ אֹת֑וֹ כִּ֣י ב֤וֹ שָׁבַת֙ מִכׇּל־מְלַאכְתּ֔וֹ אֲשֶׁר־בָּרָ֥א אֱלֹהִ֖ים לַעֲשֽׂוֹת

And G-d completed on the seventh day His work that He had done, and He ceased on the seventh day from all His work that He had done. And G-d blessed the seventh day and sanctified it, because on it He ceased from all His work that G-d created to do.

Two words stand out: blessing and sanctification. Vayevarech and vayekadesh.

What does it mean to bless a day? What does it mean to sanctify a day? How does one take a period of time and make it blessed? Make it holy?

And what does any of this have to do with food?

To find out, let’s take a look at Rashi.

Rashi picks up on these two words — vayevarech and vayekadesh — and says something striking:

He blessed it with the manna. He sanctified it with the manna.

The manna from our parsha. The manna that is falling right now in the story.

How did He bless it with the manna? Rashi explains: All the days of the week, manna fell in the amount of one omer per person — the same amount for everyone. But on the sixth day, a double portion fell. That is the blessing.

How did He sanctify it with the manna? Because the manna didn’t fall at all on Shabbos. That is the holiness.

And then Rashi adds something important: u’mikra katuv al ha’atid — the verse is written about the future. The pasuk isn’t saying that G-d, at the moment of creation, actually made Shabbos blessed or holy. Rather, Shabbos was prepared from creation for this future purpose — but the actual blessing and sanctification happened later. In our parsha. When the manna fell.

Are you with me so far?

I hope only partially. Because this Rashi, as beautiful as it will turn out to be, right now doesn’t make sense. And I hope you’re noticing that.

If not, let me help.

Before we can see the problems clearly, we need working definitions of bracha and kedusha.

The word bracha, as I understand it, means to give more. And that intuitively makes sense. When we bless someone, we mean more of the good things — health, sustenance, security. More of what makes life stable and allows us to flourish. Adding more of that is a bracha.

Kedusha — holiness — is different. Something is holy when it is set aside entirely for connecting to HaKadosh Baruch Hu.

A Sefer Torah is holy. Its sole purpose is to capture the word of G-d.

A Beis Knesses is holy. You enter that space to think about G-d, to relate to G-d, to speak to Him.

Tefillin and mezuzos are holy. They exist to help you remember and connect to G-d. They are G-d-centered objects.

And there’s one more element. It’s not simply that I decide to make something focused on G-d. It’s that G-d commands it, I respond, and then I create it with the intention that it be entirely for Him. The holiness emerges from that combination.

Now, these are objects. But evidently, G-d can also make time holy — setting aside periods that are designated for thinking about and relating to Him.

With those definitions in mind, let’s go back to Rashi.

Problem one: The blessing.

The Chumash tells us that G-d blessed the seventh day — vayevarech Elokim et yom hashevi’i. And Rashi says He blessed it through the double portion of manna.

That sounds nice. A double portion is more than a single portion. More food, more sustenance — that’s a bracha.

Except for one glaring problem.

The double portion fell on the sixth day. But the Chumash says G-d blessed the seventh day.

The sixth day is not the seventh day.

And it gets worse. Even if you say the extra manna on Friday was for Shabbos — at the end of the week, I have the same total amount I would have had anyway. One omer on Friday and one on Shabbos, or two omers on Friday and none on Shabbos. Either way, the total is identical. I just got paid early.

Where is the extra? Where is the bracha?

Problem two: The sanctification.

Rashi says G-d sanctified Shabbos with the manna — because it didn’t fall on Shabbos.

But how does the absence of manna make Shabbos holy?

If kedusha means something is set aside entirely for G-d, we need to find something here that points to Him. Not having manna fall doesn’t automatically mean I’m connecting to G-d. And Rashi doesn’t even mention not working. He just says the manna didn’t fall.

But I still have manna. It fell double the day before.

So if I’m not lacking food, and I’m not told to refrain from work — where is the holiness? What makes Shabbos about G-d?

We need something here that screams out His presence.

Maybe you have an idea already. But we have to find it. We have to put a finger on it.

And I don’t know if we have it yet.

Back to the Complaint

With all that behind us — creation, the gift of food, the garden — let’s return to our parsha. To the wilderness. To the manna. And to the complaint that preceded it.

We’ve already noted that the complaint about food was dramatically different from the complaint about water. When they lacked water at Marah, they simply asked: Mah nishteh? — “What will we drink?”

A reasonable question. No drama. No accusations. And Hashem answered it.

But when it comes to food, something shifts:

וַיֹּאמְרוּ אֲלֵהֶם בְּנֵי יִשְׂרָאֵל מִי יִתֵּן מוּתֵנוּ בְיַד יְהֹוָה בְּאֶרֶץ מִצְרַיִם בְּשִׁבְתֵּנוּ עַל סִיר הַבָּשָׂר בְּאׇכְלֵנוּ לֶחֶם לָשֹׂבַע כִּי הוֹצֵאתֶם אֹתָנוּ אֶל הַמִּדְבָּר הַזֶּה לְהָמִית אֶת כׇּל הַקָּהָל הַזֶּה בָּרָעָב

Would that we had died by the hand of Hashem in the land of Egypt, when we sat by the pot of meat, when we ate bread to fullness — for you have brought us out into this wilderness to kill this entire assembly with hunger.

What in the world happened here?

Why the death wish? Why the longing for Egypt? Why the accusation against Moshe and Aaron — that they brought us out, as if Hashem had nothing to do with it?

And what does it mean that they wanted to die “by the hand of Hashem”? That’s a strange phrase. It doesn’t sound like dying of old age. It sounds like punishment. Why would anyone want that?

Let’s slow down and try to understand.

Yad Hashem

The phrase Yad Hashem appears elsewhere in Tanakh — and the Malbim points us to a striking example.

In Sefer Shmuel, David is given a choice of punishments: famine, fleeing before enemies, or plague. And David chooses plague. Why? He says: Niplah na b’yad Hashem ki rabim rachamav — “Let us fall into the hand of Hashem, for His mercies are great.”

There are two noticeable points here.

One — that the phrase יד ה׳ (the hand of G-d) is clearly used by Dovid HaMelech in reference to a “plague” (read, dying by some disease that is not at all understood and over which we have no control). As such, it is a reasonable reading to suggest that too is the meaning of the phrase in our verse.

Two — dying via a plague in some way or other is more merciful than dying via starvation.

But how? Why is wasting away via starvation worse than wasting away from some horrible, debilitating disease?

The answer, the Malbim notes, is that when Hashem brings a plague, not everyone dies. There is suffering, yes. Perhaps even greater than dying by starvation (although, not necessarily so). But nonetheless, not everyone dies from the disease. At the very least, a remnant survives.

Starvation, on the other hand, has the potential to be total and absolute. If there is no food, then there is no food. And if that goes on long enough, then death follows. And it follows for everyone. No one ultimately speaking survives starvation.

As such, if you are in the desert and run out of food — then everyone dies. And now the complaint starts to make sense.

They’re not just saying they’d rather die full than hungry. Rather, they’re making a calculation about national survival. They’re saying: If we had stayed in Egypt and refused to leave — and G-d had struck us with a plague, then there is hope that at least some of us would have survived. There would have been a remnant. The Jewish people would have continued.

But you, Moshe and Aaron — you convinced everyone to leave (including those who didn’t want to go — see the Netzviv). And now look where we are. In a wilderness. With no food. And no way to get any.

This isn’t just hunger. This is national extinction.

And indeed, from a purely natural perspective, they had a point. There was no way to sustain an entire nation in the desert. The math didn’t work.

But that, of course, was precisely the point.

The Full Experience of Food

There’s another layer hidden in their words. Look carefully at what they longed for:

B’shivteinu al sir habasar — when we sat by the pot of meat B’ochleinu lechem lasova — when we ate bread to fullness

So we have sitting by the pot of meat.
And we have eating bread and being satiated.

Let’s start with the pot meat — the one we were sitting next to.

At this point — we are pre-eating. But what does it mean to be sitting by the pot? One possibility — it is the smell of the food and the joyful anticipation that comes with that.

That is one aspect of eat. That we don’t just enjoy the food itself, we enjoy the idea of the food. And that is an experience we have when we sit next to the pot.

But, of course, we don’t sit and wait — eventually we eat. And here we need to distinguish between the satiation of bread and the experience of eating meat. If you want to feel satiated, eat bread. If you want to experience some of the deeper pleasures of food — have meat.

And so, in this one verse — we can derive three aspects of the experience of eating food:

1. Anticipation — sitting by the pot, smelling what’s cooking, that joyful expectation of what’s to come

2. Pleasure — the experience of eating itself, the taste, the texture, the enjoyment

3. Satiation — the feeling afterwards, the sense of fullness and well-being

In other words, there is so much more to food than just surviving. There is the experience of food — and part of their complaint relates to that.

But even here, we have not fully explored the gamut of emotions and experiences wrapped up in food. There is more. And some of them are not nearly as positive — as we understood all too well when faced with the challenges of the desert.

The Fourth Element: Freedom from Worry

Rav Hirsch makes a remarkable observation. He writes:

“The threat of hunger — real or imagined — undermines all principles, and rescinds all noble resolves. As long as a man cannot disengage himself — not from the responsibility to provide for his family, but from the overwhelming anxiety resulting from this responsibility — he is unable to fully realize G-d’s Torah.”

There it is. The fourth element.

It’s not enough to have food. It’s not enough to enjoy food. You also need to be free from worry about food.

Think about a child in a healthy home. Does he worry about where dinner is coming from? Does he lie awake at night anxious about tomorrow’s breakfast? Of course not. He just shows up at the table and eats. The worry isn’t his. And because the worry isn’t his, he can more fully enjoy the meal (except, of course, for the vegetables).

That freedom — that trust — is itself part of the experience of eating.

In Egypt, strangely enough, they had this. Not because Egypt was a good place. But because slaves don’t worry about food. Their masters feed them — not out of love, but out of practicality. You feed your workers because you need them to work. It’s a degraded security, a shameful security. But it is security.

In the wilderness, they had none of that. No fields to plant. No masters to provide for them. Just the open desert and the terrifying, consuming question: What will we eat tomorrow?

And here’s the thing about that question. Even if you have food today, if you don’t know where tomorrow’s food will come from, you cannot fully enjoy what’s in front of you. The anxiety eats away at the pleasure. The worry poisons the satiation.

That anxiety — that overwhelming, gnawing worry — is itself a form of starvation. A starvation of the mind, even when the body is fed.

The Answer to Rashi

Now — finally — we can return to Rashi.

Remember what he said? Hashem blessed Shabbos with the manna — because a double portion fell on Friday. And He sanctified Shabbos with the manna — because it didn’t fall on Shabbos.

And we asked two questions:

First: Where is the bracha? The total amount of manna is the same whether it falls one omer per day or two on Friday and none on Shabbos. I’m not getting more. I’m just getting it earlier. Where is the blessing in that?

Second: Where is the kedusha? How does the absence of manna make Shabbos holy? If kedusha means something is set aside for connecting to Hashem, we need to find Hashem somewhere in this picture. And “the manna didn’t fall” doesn’t obviously point to Him.

Here is an answer (I never like talking about the answer).

The bracha of Shabbos is not that you get more manna. It’s that on Shabbos, you get the full experience of food — all four elements — without anything getting in the way.

On the six days of the week, you go out and collect. You grind, you prepare, you cook. You are involved in the work of food. And even as you eat, part of your mind is on tomorrow. Will the manna fall? Will there be enough? The worry doesn’t fully leave.

But on Shabbos?

Everything has already been provided. You wake up, and the food is there. You don’t have to collect it. You don’t have to prepare it. It’s ready. All you have to do is sit down and enjoy.

The anticipation. The pleasure. The satiation. And, crucially, no anxiety about food — not about today’s, not about tomorrow’s . For one, when you live Shabbos, you are in the moment of Shabbos — and therefore free of the anxiety about tomorrow. At the same time, in the desert, Hashem was showing us (week after week) that He provides. That we don’t need to worry — that we can rely on Him.

What’s more, G-d had already taken care of Shabbos. He made sure the day before all the food needs were met.

Without work.
Without effort.
Without concern.

The table was already set.

That is the bracha. The ability to fully experience and enjoy food, without labor, without distraction, without worry.

And the kedusha?

The kedusha comes from recognizing who is behind all of this.

When the manna doesn’t fall on Shabbos, and yet you still have food — because Hashem doubled it the day before — you are forced to see something. This isn’t just nature. This isn’t just your own effort. This is Hashem. He designed it this way. He structured the week so that Shabbos would be different.

And what makes Shabbos different is precisely this: on Shabbos, you see clearly that Hashem is the one providing. Not you. Not the natural order. Him.

That recognition — that awareness of Hashem as the giver — is what makes the day holy.

But there’s something more.

Remember Gan Eden? Remember what made it different from creation?

In creation, Hashem provides through the natural order. He sets up a system, and the system works. It’s a gift, yes — but a gift mediated through nature.

In Gan Eden, Hashem is there. Present. With man. The food isn’t just provision. It’s relationship. It’s love.

Shabbos, in the desert, is Gan Eden again.

On Shabbos, Hashem isn’t just providing through a system. He’s caring for us directly. He’s giving us the full experience of food — not just the sustenance, but the joy, the peace, the freedom from worry. He’s enabling it, arranging it, making it possible.

Like a grandmother placing cookies in front of her grandchild. Not just feeding him. Loving him. Wanting him to enjoy. Being present with him as he eats.

That is what Shabbos is. Hashem with us. Caring for us. Giving us not just food, but the experience of being cared for.

That is the kedusha. That is why the day is holy.

All in all — the bracha provides the experience, and the kedusha shows Who (out of love) gave us that experience.

The Gift, Again

And this brings us back to where we started.

In the creation narrative, Hashem didn’t just create food. He gave it. And more than that — He told us He was giving it:

וַיֹּאמֶר אֱלֹהִים הִנֵּה נָתַתִּי לָכֶם

And G-d said: Behold, I have given you...

The manna is the same gift — but given in a way we cannot possibly miss.

In creation, the gift is hidden inside nature. The sun shines, the rain falls, the crops grow. We can forget where it all comes from. We can think the food just is — that it emerges from the ground, from our labor, from the natural order of things.

In Gan Eden, the gift was clearer. Hashem planted a garden, placed man inside it, and said: Enjoy. But even there, the line between Hashem’s gift and our own work could blur. After all, man had to tend the garden. L’ovdah ul’shomrah. It’s easy to start thinking that the fruit comes from your effort.

But the manna?

The manna falls from heaven. It cannot be stored overnight. It comes fresh each day, exactly the amount you need. And on Shabbos, it doesn’t come at all — and yet you eat. Because Hashem already provided.

There is no way to look at the manna and think: I did this. There is no way to experience Shabbos in the desert and not see Hashem’s hand.

The manna teaches us to see what was always true — that even the bread that seems to come from the earth, even the fruit that seems to grow from trees, even the food that seems to emerge from nature and our own labor — all of it is manna from heaven.

All of it is a gift.

The joyful anticipation.
The pleasurable experience.
The satiated feeling.
The lack of worry.
The awareness and experience of love.

It’s all there in the manna.
It’s all there in the fields.
It’s all there in the kitchen

And it’s all there at the Shabbos table — if we just stop long enough to fully see it.

Share

Share masmid

We begin this week's Parsha with a declaration by God to Moshe about Paro. He's going to harden Paro's heart and the heart of his ministers. And there's a purpose to this, but it's not that purpose that we're interested in right now. It's the hardening that we'd like to focus on. Not in general, but one particular type of hardening, one particular instance.

That instance begins with Moshe and Aharon going to Paro and making yet another declaration in the name of HaKadosh Baruch Hu. This time it is locusts — and, I have to admit, it doesn’t sound like a lot of fun.

A swarm of locusts so massive that one won’t be able to see the land. And not just in any one spot, but throughout the entire land of Egypt. And when they are done -- any and everything that grows in the field will be consumed.

But it doesn’t end there -- they will be in the houses. Everyone’s houses. Paro’s, his ministers -- and the rest of the nation.

In short -- it will be a swarm the likes of which they had never seen before.

And it’s not just me who doesn’t think that this sounds like a good time. Paro’s advisors also weren’t too keen on this idea. As such, they make a plea to Paro — the essence of which goes something like this: “enough is enough”.

Yes, they didn’t quite phrase it like that — but that was the gist of it. And, for a moment, it worked. Paro agreed. It was enough. He and his advisors had gotten the message. They would let the Jews worship HaKadosh Baruch Hu in the desert.

Finally.

An Interesting Question

Well, almost finally.

As we know, it didn’t work out that way. True, Paro did call back Moshe and Aharon and let them know that they can go. But then he asked a rather interesting question:

מִ֥י וָמִ֖י הַהֹלְכִֽים

Loose translation: “Who is going?”
Literal translation: “Who and who is going?”

Now I have to admit, I do not understand this question. What does Paro mean “who is going”? Moshe and Paro (and HaKadosh Baruch Hu) have literally been fighting about this for 7 plagues now. Through all the blood and boils and lice and (now) locusts Paro does not yet know who wants to go.

This topic never came up before?

What did Paro think when Moshe first stated: send my nation and they will hold a festival for me in the desert:

שַׁלַּח֙ אֶת־עַמִּ֔י וְיָחֹ֥גּוּ לִ֖י בַּמִּדְבָּֽר

When Moshe said let us travel three days in the desert and offer sacrifices to Hashem, Our G-d — who did Paro think that “us” referred to:

נֵ֣לְכָה נָּ֡א דֶּ֩רֶךְ֩ שְׁלֹ֨שֶׁת יָמִ֜ים בַּמִּדְבָּ֗ר וְנִזְבְּחָה֙ לַֽיהֹוָ֣ה אֱלֹהֵ֔ינוּ

At the very least, Paro thought it included the male slaves. After all, let us note his response to Moshe’s request:

וַיֹּ֤אמֶר אֲלֵהֶם֙ מֶ֣לֶךְ מִצְרַ֔יִם לָ֚מָּה מֹשֶׁ֣ה וְאַהֲרֹ֔ן תַּפְרִ֥יעוּ אֶת־הָעָ֖ם מִֽמַּעֲשָׂ֑יו לְכ֖וּ לְסִבְלֹתֵיכֶֽם

English translation: “And the king of Egypt said to them: Why, Moshe and Aharon, do you disrupt the people from their work? Go back to your burdens.”

By the people, Paro seems to mean at the very least the male slaves — as the very next line from Paro indicates:

וַיֹּ֣אמֶר פַּרְעֹ֔ה הֵן־רַבִּ֥ים עַתָּ֖ה עַ֣ם הָאָ֑רֶץ וְהִשְׁבַּתֶּ֥ם אֹתָ֖ם מִסִּבְלֹתָֽם

English translation: “And Paro said: Look, the people of the land are now many, and you are stopping them from their burdens.”

“The people of the land” (the Am HaAretz — עַ֣ם הָאָ֑רֶץ) — think the people who work the land — which is why immediately afterwards he stops giving straw to the nation (לעם). Because they — read, the nation, read, the (male) slaves — have too much free time on their hands. That is why they are requesting to partake in a national sacrifice to HaKadosh Baruch Hu:

כִּֽי־נִרְפִּ֣ים הֵ֔ם עַל־כֵּ֗ן הֵ֤ם צֹֽעֲקִים֙ לֵאמֹ֔ר נֵלְכָ֖ה נִזְבְּחָ֥ה לֵאלֹהֵֽינוּ

English translation: “…for they are too idle; therefore they cry out, saying: ‘Let us go and offer sacrifices to our G-d’.

Therefore, Paro loads up the male slaves with an even heavier burden:

תִּכְבַּ֧ד הָעֲבֹדָ֛ה עַל־הָאֲנָשִׁ֖ים וְיַעֲשׂוּ־בָ֑הּ וְאַל־יִשְׁע֖וּ בְּדִבְרֵי־שָֽׁקֶר

English translation: “Let the work be made heavier upon the men, so that they engage in it and do not pay attention to false words.”

Again, by “men”, Paro means the male slaves. Because they — the male slaves — are paying attention to the false words of Moshe.

And as it was at that very first meeting, so was it plague after plague.

Before the first plague, Moshe went to Paro and requested in the name of HaKadosh Baruch Hu: “send my nation and they will serve me in the desert” (שַׁלַּח֙ אֶת־עַמִּ֔י וְיַֽעַבְדֻ֖נִי בַּמִּדְבָּ֑ר).

Or how about before the frogs — when Paro had finally had enough, he sent for Moshe and Aharon and asked them to beseech Hashem to remove the frogs in which case he (Paro) would “send the nation and they could offer sacrifices to Hashem”.

Now, who did Paro have in mind at this point? Who did Paro think that Moshe had in mind at this point? We don’t know — but presumably that very same group of Jews that Paro understood Moshe was referring to from the very beginning.

And note — there is no questions here from Paro. He doesn’t say: “who do you want to send — let me know and I’ll send them”.

And as it was with the frogs, so it was with the rampage of wild-animals. Once again, Paro proclaims: “go, sacrifice to your G-d in the land” (לְכ֛וּ זִבְח֥וּ לֵאלֹֽהֵיכֶ֖ם בָּאָֽרֶץ).

I could go on, but I think the point has clearly been made — by this time Paro should have a rather clear idea who exactly Moshe has in mind when he says “send my nation and they will offer sacrifices to me in the desert”.

And yet — Paro asks.

Why does he ask?
What does he mean?

But it’s not just the content of the question that is strange, it’s also the way that it is phrased. Literally, “who and who is going” (מִ֥י וָמִ֖י הַהֹלְכִֽים). Why doesn’t he simply ask: “who is going (מִ֖י הַהֹלְכִֽים)”?

All in all, Paro is asking a question which presumably he already has the answer to — and he is asking it in a way that seems rather strange and convoluted.

An Interesting Answer

However strange we may find the question, Moshe Rabbeinu seemed to have no problem with it. Indeed, he had a ready made answer — everyone. And by everyone — he really meant everyone.

Our young men and our elders (בִּנְעָרֵ֥ינוּ וּבִזְקֵנֵ֖ינוּ).
Our sons and our daughters (בְּבָנֵ֨ינוּ וּבִבְנוֹתֵ֜נוּ).
Our flock and our cattle (בְּצֹאנֵ֤נוּ וּבִבְקָרֵ֙נוּ֙).

Now, I have to admit — I am a bit surprised by this answer. When Moshe — speaking in Hashem’s name — first stated “send my nation and they will hold a festival for me in the dessert (שַׁלַּח֙ אֶת־עַמִּ֔י וְיָחֹ֥גּוּ לִ֖י בַּמִּדְבָּֽר)” — what did he (Moshe) have in mind.

At that point in time did he have every man, women and child (and every cow, sheep and goat)? If so, did he make that clear to Paro when he made that first request? It doesn’t seem so — because Paro seems to immediately give a more limited understanding of that phrase “my nation”. An interpretation that Moshe does not correct.

Now, on a practical level, we can understand why Moshe wouldn’t want to correct Paro. Paro’s immediate reaction was to lash out against the male slaves. It would be quite foolish for Moshe to point that actually he meant more than just the male slaves — that would just needless invite Paro to create even greater suffering for the Jewish people.

But that’s not my real question — my question is before Paro lashed out, what did Hashem and Moshe have in mind? With that first, more limited request of a three day journey, were they requesting that every man, women and child go serve Hashem in the desert?

If so, why didn’t Paro understand that? Did Moshe not clearly articulate the request? If so, was that a “mistake” — or purposeful? If purposeful, why? Why be purposely ambiguous?

On the other hand, if Moshe was only asking permission for the men to be granted permission, then what changed? Why at the very moment that Paro finally agrees to Moshe’s request does he (Moshe) change it in such a way as to undermine his original request?

Fully Against

Whatever Moshe originally had in mind, it’s clear what he is asking for now — and that is a request that Paro is not (yet) willing to accept.

And let us understand Paro’s objection in full context. Paro understands what is coming next — a swarm of locust beyond anyone’s imagination. A devastation of untold horrors for Egypt. And yet, Paro prefers that horror to the “horror” of sending all of the Jewish people on a short, limited excursion into the desert for a national festival.

True, his preferences will magically shift 180 degrees once he actually experiences that horror — then he will admit that he has sinned and will be willing to send the full nation (man, women, child — cow, sheep and goat):

וַיְמַהֵ֣ר פַּרְעֹ֔ה לִקְרֹ֖א לְמֹשֶׁ֣ה וּֽלְאַהֲרֹ֑ן וַיֹּ֗אמֶר חָטָ֛אתִי לַיהֹוָ֥ה אֱלֹֽהֵיכֶ֖ם וְלָכֶֽם׃ וְעַתָּ֗ה שָׂ֣א נָ֤א חַטָּאתִי֙ אַ֣ךְ הַפַּ֔עַם וְהַעְתִּ֖ירוּ לַיהֹוָ֣ה אֱלֹהֵיכֶ֑ם וְיָסֵר֙ מֵֽעָלַ֔י רַ֖ק אֶת־הַמָּ֥וֶת הַזֶּֽה׃

English translation:

And Paro hurried to summon Moshe and Aharon, and he said: ‘I have sinned against the L-RD your G-d, and against you. And now, please, bear my sin just this once, and plead with the L-RD your G-d, that He remove from upon me only this death.

At that point Paro will have been broken — and is 100% willing to send out the full Jewish nation. And at that point, HaKadosh Baruch Hu will have to harden his heart so as to prevent Paro from actually sending out that the full nation.

But all of that was after the plague actually occurs.

But at this point, Paro is not yet broken. At this point, HaKadosh Baruch Hu does not need to harden his heart. And here, with will not yet broken and heart not yet hardened, Paro has a clear preference — I would rather face the death and destruction of the locusts than send the full nation on a limited, one-time journey into the desert.

And that is remarkable.

Why is Paro so completely and absolutely against this idea? Indeed, in just a moment he is going to exile Moshe and Aharon from his presence:

וַיְגָ֣רֶשׁ אֹתָ֔ם מֵאֵ֖ת פְּנֵ֥י פַרְעֹֽה

English translation: “And he forcibly expelled them from Paro’s presence”.

Forcibly expelled (גשר), like when HaKadosh Baruch Hu forcibly expelled (גרש) Adam and Chava from Gan Eden.
And like when Avraham forcibly expelled (גרש) Yishmael from his (Avraham’s) home.
And like when Paro will forcibly expel (גרש) the Jewish people from the land of Egypt after the death of the first born.

Paro didn’t just reject the scope of Moshe and Aharon’s request — he utterly rejected it with all of his being. He is so totally and absolutely against this request that he has Moshe and Aharon forcibly removed from his presence — presumably with the intent that they will never be allowed to see him again (and intent temporarily undermined by the severity of the plague of darkness).

After all — when HaKadosh Baruch Hu forcibly expelled Adam and Chava, he did so permanently. So too, when Avraham forcibly expelled Yishmael from his home and Paro the Jews from Egypt. In all of those cases, the exile was permanent.

Presumably, that was the intent here also.

Which leads us to wonder — why does this request so greatly “insult” Paro. Why is he so fundamentally against this idea that he is willing to put up with the death and destruction of the locusts and to permanently ban Moshe and Aharon from his presence?

An Interesting Response

Well, interestingly enough, Paro himself articulates his objection:

וַיֹּ֣אמֶר אֲלֵהֶ֗ם יְהִ֨י כֵ֤ן יְהֹוָה֙ עִמָּכֶ֔ם כַּאֲשֶׁ֛ר אֲשַׁלַּ֥ח אֶתְכֶ֖ם וְאֶֽת־טַפְּכֶ֑ם רְא֕וּ כִּ֥י רָעָ֖ה נֶ֥גֶד פְּנֵיכֶֽם׃ לֹ֣א כֵ֗ן לְכֽוּ־נָ֤א הַגְּבָרִים֙ וְעִבְד֣וּ אֶת־יְהֹוָ֔ה כִּ֥י אֹתָ֖הּ אַתֶּ֣ם מְבַקְשִׁ֑ים

English translation: not yet.

I have to be honest, it’s not so easy to translate what Paro is saying — for one simple reason, it’s not at all clear what he is saying. True — I could translate the words. But there is so much more to meaning and understanding than the mere words.

Take, for example, the following sentence:

You believe that

What is being said here? Well, it could be a statement - as in someone reminding someone of what they actually believe:

You believe that.

But it could be a question - as in someone wondering if their friend actually believes what they are saying:

You believe that?

It could be a statement of wonder or awe — like when witnessing something that is seemingly impossible:

You believe that!

Or a sarcastic statement — as in (eyes rolling) right - sure you do:

You believe that?!

And I’m sure there are more possibilities.

In short, there is so much more to meaning than just words. And one indication of meaning is intonation — how we say the words. The pitch or tone says as much as the words themselves. Of course, intonation is something we say and hear. In the written word, there is a close cousin — called punctuation. That is something we read and see.

And none of this exists in the written Torah. Open up a Sefer Torah. There is no punctuation. No commas, no periods, no question marks, no exclamation points. And obviously, whatever intonation Paro had was not preserved in the text of the Torah itself — text can’t preserve intonation.

Which means that there is a certain inherent ambiguity when it comes to reading and understanding the Torah. It’s not just that the text itself doesn’t reveal everything (although that at times is clearly true), it’s that it can’t reveal everything.

Ambiguity is built into its very structure.

And, as they say in the vernacular — that is a feature, not a bug. The Torah loves playing with lack of clarity, of hiding more than it reveals, of limiting rather than expanding. Because of the intellectual (and other) opportunities that this creates.

Now, initially, this is a prospect that is difficult for many of us to accept. We are used to difficult ideas and concepts being clarified so that we can understand them. From boring textbooks to engaging speakers — modern education thrives on the concept of helping us to providing us with all the relevant information, clearly laid out and explained.

And even in those areas where modern education likes a little bit of ambiguity (such as the engaging question) it likes to quickly resolve that ambiguity.

And this makes sense to us.

What does not make sense to us is to take an idea or statement is clear and muddying it up. Of purposely confusing us. Of hiding rather than revealing.

But there is an exception — art.
In the world of art — clarity is not always the goal.

Who wants to read a murder mystery where it is obvious who did it?
Who wants to watch a thriller where you know how the hero will save the day?

And even if the murder mystery will eventually tell you who did it, not every movie or novel closes every open question or issue. Moral questions are left as questions. The deepest motivations and drives of characters actions are never resolved.

Purposely so.

And it’s not just in stories.

In music, songs can end “unresolved” — on a haunting note or chord.
Abstract paintings are — well — abstract.
In photography — motion (and those who are moving) can be blurred.

And so on.

In art — it is the ambiguity that creates the curiosity.
And it is the curiosity that creates the personal and intellectual investigation.
And it is the investigations that leads us to new ideas and insights.

In short, skillful use of ambiguity leads to skillful use of our minds. And that is something that HaKadosh Baruch Hu wants us to do.

And so, He skillfully injects purposeful ambiguity into the Torah. Not just into the narratives and how they are told, but into the very structure of the Chumash itself.

And so — no punctuation. No intonation.
Meaning, we have to provide the punctuation and intonation.
We have to figure it out.

That’s true in general.
And it’s true here with Paro’s statement.
We are going to have to figure out what he means.

But to do that — we first have to explore the difficulty in what he says. To enjoy that difficulty and sit with the questions — rather than run towards the answers.

Filling in the Blanks

As such, let’s take a deeper look at what Paro says. We’ll start with the first phrase

יְהִ֨י כֵ֤ן יְהֹוָה֙ עִמָּכֶ֔ם כַּאֲשֶׁ֛ר אֲשַׁלַּ֥ח אֶתְכֶ֖ם וְאֶֽת־טַפְּכֶ֑ם

Let’s first ask — is this a statement or a question? Is Paro being serious or sarcastic? Not sure, so let’s consider our options.

Statement: Hashem will be with you when I send you and your ‘dependent ones’.

That doesn’t seem right. It’s not like Paro is giving Moshe and Aharon a beracha (blessing). It fits into the words, but not the content. Initial verdict — doesn’t work.

Question: Will Hashem be with you when I send you and your ‘dependent ones’?

If we take this as a literal question, then it’s still hard to understand. Paro is not curious about how serving HaKadosh Baruch Hu works. He’s not a talmid asking his Rebbe how to best prepare for the chagim.

So, let’s try again.

Rhetorical question: Will Hashem be with you when I send you and your ‘dependent ones’?!

OR

Sarcastic question: Hashem will be with you when I send you and your ‘dependent ones’?!

Now note — you really need to intone this line to make it work. I can give you the direction, but only you can sound it out (either in your head or out loud). My recommendation, try and put as much ridicule and derision in this reading as possible — that is how I imagine Paro saying it.

With that said, this reading is more plausible. We may not yet know what Paro’s point is — but having him make a cynical or sarcastic comment works with the general “feel” of the story. It would certainly fit with him following up by forcibly removing Moshe and Aharon.

But what does it mean? For that, we need to focus on one particular word (or phrase) in Paro’s statement: “dependent ones (טַפְּכֶ֑ם)”

That word is interesting, because Moshe Rabbeinu didn’t explicitly use that word. Rather, he talked about “our sons and our daughters (בְּבָנֵ֨ינוּ וּבִבְנוֹתֵ֜נוּ)”. True, he did mention na’areinu (בִּנְעָרֵ֥ינוּ) — but that is a difficult word to translate and I don’t think that it means toddlers or infants (i.e., those who are dependent on their parents).

Binyamin was called a ne’ar (נער) at a time when he had 10 kids.
Yehoshua is called a ne’ar at a time that he was Moshe’s right hand man.
The ne’arim were punished for gazing upon the Divinity at Har Sinai while they ate and drank (hard to imagine we are referring to infants or toddlers there).

As such, the only reference to “dependent ones” is in Moshe’s general statement about our sons and daughters.

But even so — there is a deeper issue. Why does Paro solely focus on the toddlers and infants? Why not mention the senior citizens (וּבִזְקֵנֵ֖ינוּ) or the ne’arim that we just mentioned? Or the cattle and flocks?

Why single out the young ones?

And why does Paro care whether or not Hashem will be with them when he sends these babies? Has Paro gone from I don’t know who Hashem is to worrying about how the Divine presence will rest upon the Jewish people?

Some how or other I doubt it.

So what’s the issue?

Indeed, let’s modify for a moment Moshe’s request. Instead of a festival to the Creator of the Universe, imagine that Moshe wanted to have a national festival to the Tooth Fairy — and that he needs the entire nation there (even those little babies who don’t yet have teeth).

To which Paro replies: “Will the Tooth Fairy really be with you when you take your babies?”

That wouldn’t make any sense. Paro doesn’t believe in the Tooth Fairy. He doesn’t care about the Tooth Fairy. Paro just wants the plagues to stop — and he believes that somehow or other sending out the Jewish people to their “festival” will help with that.

The point is, it’s not an issue that Paro is personally invested in.

But that does not seem to be the case here. Paro’s sarcasm comes from a place of deep caring (as I hope to point out). It is the idea that bothers him.

In the Tooth Fairy example, it would be the idea that the Tooth Fairy would be with the Jewish people if he sends the infants that bothers him.

In the real world, it is the idea that HaKadosh Baruch Hu would be with the Jewish people if he sends the infants that bothers him.

That is the reading which I want to read into the ambiguity of the Torah. There are other readings (I’ll present one). But I think that this reading is there — in this text. And we can discover it.

But I get ahead of myself.

See What?

Paro continues:

רְא֕וּ כִּ֥י רָעָ֖ה נֶ֥גֶד פְּנֵיכֶֽם

English translation: well — you know the drill.

Let’s start with the obvious — Paro is not asking Moshe and Aharon to physically see the “evil” that is “opposite” their faces.

So what kind of “seeing” does Paro want them to do.

Here’s one possibility — see as in acknowledge or admit. In this case, Paro would be talking about Moshe and Aharon’s intentions. It’s as if Paro was saying to them — I see what you are doing. Your evil intent is written all over your faces.

You want to flee, to escape — to permanently leave Egypt. This is all a ruse. That is why you want to take the kids. In English, we have semi-equivalents — such as: “You see perfectly well what you’re doing”.

But, I have to admit — I don’t see it as the easiest read.

Nonetheless, it does seem to have backing from Onkelos as understood by the Ramban (according to one of the extant versions of Onkelos).

And honestly, this reading would fit quite well with the story and what Paro says next:

לֹ֣א כֵ֗ן לְכֽוּ־נָ֤א הַגְּבָרִים֙ וְעִבְד֣וּ אֶת־יְהֹוָ֔ה כִּ֥י אֹתָ֖הּ אַתֶּ֣ם מְבַקְשִׁ֑ים

English translation: “Not so. Go now — the men — and serve the LORD, for that is all you are asking for.”

Meaning: only the men.
No kids.
No toddlers.
No infants.
No wives.

Just the men.

This would line up beautifully with everything that we noted about Paro’s initial understanding of Moshe and Aharon’s initial request.

In other words — I will let the men go if (and only if) they have some serious incentive to come back. So let their wives and kids stay here — and then (and only then) they can go.

Why?

Presumably because Egypt needed these slaves. They were fundamental to their economy. As such, as bad as the locusts will be (and they will be bad) — it’s still just a one-time disaster.

But losing one’s labor force. That’s not something that can so easily be replaced. That’s a long-term problem. And so, if forced to choose — Paro would choose the short-term pain over the long-term loss.

Indeed, from this perspective — there is a certain rational and logic to Paro’s position (however immoral it may be).

And I have to admit — I like this reading. It sounds to me like one of the layers of meaning inherent in the verse. Remember, skillful use of ambiguity can skillfully insert multiple readings into the same text.

And so while I like this reading — it’s not the one I want to explore right now. No, there is a different reading — one that I think also works that I would like to develop.

And that depends on a different understanding of the word “see” (רְא֕וּ).

Back to the Snake

Let’s take a slight detour. For just a moment, I want to revisit Gan Eden and the snakes seduction of Chava. The snake, we all know, was cunning — and he managed to convince Chava to do that which she knew was forbidden.

But how?

By asking her to open her eyes.

“G-d knows,” said the snake, “that on the day you two eat from it, your eyes will be open and you will be like G-d — knowing good and bad”.

כִּ֚י יֹדֵ֣עַ אֱלֹהִ֔ים כִּ֗י בְּיוֹם֙ אֲכׇלְכֶ֣ם מִמֶּ֔נּוּ וְנִפְקְח֖וּ עֵֽינֵיכֶ֑ם וִהְיִיתֶם֙ כֵּֽאלֹהִ֔ים יֹדְעֵ֖י ט֥וֹב וָרָֽע

And, at that moment — when the snake used those words — Chava then saw the tree differently.

She saw that it was good for eating.
She saw that it was desirable to the eyes.
She saw that it was pleasant for gaining understanding.

And so she took and she ate (and convinced her husband to do the same):

וַתֵּ֣רֶא הָֽאִשָּׁ֡ה כִּ֣י טוֹב֩ הָעֵ֨ץ לְמַאֲכָ֜ל וְכִ֧י תַֽאֲוָה־ה֣וּא לָעֵינַ֗יִם וְנֶחְמָ֤ד הָעֵץ֙ לְהַשְׂכִּ֔יל וַתִּקַּ֥ח מִפִּרְי֖וֹ וַתֹּאכַ֑ל וַתִּתֵּ֧ן גַּם־לְאִישָׁ֛הּ עִמָּ֖הּ וַיֹּאכַֽל

In other words — she understood that which she did not understand before. And it is in this sense of the word “see” that I want to try and understand Paro’s words:

Understand Moshe and Aharon — evil is facing you.

In this reading — Paro is not accusing Moshe and Aharon of duplicity. He’s not worried about some sort of economic loss. Rather, he’s worried about Moshe and Ahron’s naivite — which, of course, seems to make no sense.

But bear with me.

Through the Eyes of Rashi

Let’s take a look at Rashi:

וּמִ”אַ שָׁמַעְתִּי, כּוֹכָב אֶחָד יֵשׁ שֶׁשְּׁמוֹ רָעָה, אָמַר לָהֶם פַּרְעֹה, רוֹאֶה אֲנִי בָּאִצְטַגְנִינוּת שֶׁלִּי אוֹתוֹ כוֹכָב עוֹלֶה לִקְרַאתְכֶם בַּמִּדְבָּר, וְהוּא סִימַן דָּם וַהֲרִיגָה; וּכְשֶׁחָטְאוּ יִשְׂרָאֵל בָּעֵגֶל וּבִקֵּשׁ הַקָּבָּ”ה לְהָרְגָם, אָמַר מֹשֶׁה בִּתְפִלָּתוֹ, לָמָּה יֹאמְרוּ מִצְרַיִם לֵאמֹר “בְּרָעָה” הוֹצִיאָם (שמות ל”ב), זוֹ הִיא שֶׁאָמַר לָהֶם, רְאוּ כִּי רָעָה נֶגֶד פְּנֵיכֶם; מִיָּד וַיִּנָּחֶם ה’ עַל הָרָעָה וְהָפַךְ אֶת הַדָּם לְדַם מִילָה, שֶׁמָּל יְהוֹשֻׁעַ אוֹתָם, וְזֶהוּ שֶׁנֶּ’ “הַיּוֹם גַּלּוֹתִי אֶת חֶרְפַּת מִצְרַיִם מֵעֲלֵיכֶם” (יהושע ה’), שֶׁהָיוּ אוֹמְרִים לָכֶם, דָּם אָנוּ רוֹאִין עֲלֵיכֶם בַּמִּדְבָּר:

There’s a lot here — so I won’t translate. Rather, I’ll explain.

Let’s start with the word “evil”. Rashi is giving a Midrashic explanation. There is a certain star called “ra’ah” (רעה). Yes, the word רעה technically means “evil”, but in this case it is the name of a constellation which has the same name.

Now, I don’t know if this is connected — but the name of the Egyptians son god was ra. Linguistically, I don’t think there is any connection to the Hebrew word רעה. But phonetically it may sound quite similar (certainly it does in the English transliteration).

Is ra, then, the “star” that the Midrash is referencing here? Is Paro perhaps making a play on words — using the Hebrew word for “evil” which sounds like the Egyptian word for their son god in order to make two points at once?

I don’t know — but I think it’s an interesting idea to explore.

Either way — let’s get to Paro’s main point (as understood by the Midrash). This star, Paro claimed (in the name of his astrologers), is going to rise up and “meet” you in the desert. And that is a sign of blood and death.

That is what Paro meant by:

• see [i.e., understand]

• that ra [the star named ra]

• is opposite your faces [i.e., is rising up to greet you in the desert].

And (continues the Midrash) — this accusation stuck with the Jewish people. This notion that they would die in the desert followed them all the way until the land of Israel itself.

At the Chet HaEgel, when G-d sought to kill off the Jewish people and start over, Moshe Rabbeinu (according to the Midrash), made a reference back to this claim of Paro’s.

“Why,” asked Moshe “should Egypt say He brought them out with רעה.” In the Midrashic reading, Moshe is referencing this line here made by Paro — that according to the Egyptian astrologers, the Jewish people were destined for death in the desert. As such, if HaKadosh Baruch Hu punishes the Jewish people with death, then He (HaKadosh Baruch Hu) is validating the Egyptian world-view.

How, asks Moshe, can HaKadosh Hu take an action which would validate Egyptian idolatry as Paro publicly declared when he said that רעה was rising to greet us?

What’s more, says Rashi (in the name of the Midrash), it wasn’t until we actually entered the land of Israel that the shadow of this claim finally left us. Until we actually made it, it was not clear who was right. After all, death and destruction could hit at any moment — and, as we know, there were plenty of opportunities along the way:

• The lack of water at Marah

• The hunger crisis in the wilderness and the complaints about food

• The war with Amalek

• The sin of the Spies

• The rebellion of Korach

• The plague after the sins with the Midianite women

But, once they crossed into Eretz Yisrael — and circumcised everyone — then that shadow lifted. Or, as the verse in Yehoshua phrased it — the “shame” of Egypt had been removed:

הַיּוֹם גַּלּוֹתִי אֶת חֶרְפַּת מִצְרַיִם מֵעֲלֵיכֶם

In other words — there was blood in the desert. But it was the blood of mila (circumcision). So, in a sense — Paro and his astrologers were right. There was blood in the desert. But they were also wrong — it wasn’t the blood of death, but the blood of circumcision.

Putting the Midrash into Peshat

Let’s take the point of the Midrash and see if we can fit it into the words of the Chumash — that is, read it into peshat.

First, the essence (in terms of pesha) of what Paro is saying. Do you really think that G-d will be with you if I send you and your children into the desert? Don’t you see the evil that will befall you?

Where are you going to get food to feed everyone?
Where will you get water for them to drink?
How will you deal with the infighting that arises when you can’t provide them with their basic needs?
How will you deal with the external threats of those who wish to physically attack you?

In short, what you want to do is insane. The world does not work this way! You are being naive!

With that in mind, let’s read our verse again:

יְהִ֨י כֵ֤ן יְהֹוָה֙ עִמָּכֶ֔ם כַּאֲשֶׁ֛ר אֲשַׁלַּ֥ח אֶתְכֶ֖ם וְאֶֽת־טַפְּכֶ֑ם רְא֕וּ כִּ֥י רָעָ֖ה נֶ֥גֶד פְּנֵיכֶֽם׃ לֹ֣א כֵ֗ן לְכֽוּ־נָ֤א הַגְּבָרִים֙ וְעִבְד֣וּ אֶת־יְהֹוָ֔ה כִּ֥י אֹתָ֖הּ אַתֶּ֣ם מְבַקְשִׁ֑ים

English translation:

“Will Hashem really be with you if I send you and your children out [into the desert]? See the evil that is awaiting you. Not this way. Please, let the men go and serve Hashem — because that is (after all) what you are asking for.”

Read this way, one almost gets the impression that Paro cares for the Jewish people (which seems a bit hard to believe). Of course, one could translate the word נא as “now” (like I originally did).

Either way, that’s not the main point. The main point is the nature of what Paro is saying that Moshe and Aharon are out of touch with reality. That the world does not work according to their assumptions. That it is not possible to do what they are now requesting to do.

And it is this worldview which threatens Paro. Behind the request is an assumption of how the world works — one which evidently challenges Paro’s worldview and (perhaps) the worldview upon which Egyptian society itself is set up.

That is why he is willing to risk the wrath of G-d’s locusts rather than accede to Moshe’s terms.

Putting it All Together

We still have a few loose ends. Let’s see if we can put it all together.

Let us remember our first question about Paro’s question. About why he didn’t know who Moshe and Aharon wanted to send. And why he phrased it as who and who will be going.

As I see it, it was obvious to Paro all along that only the men would be going. And by asking “who and who” will be going — he was essentially asking, which of the slaves would be going. He never imagined that Moshe and Aharon had in mind the entire nation.

Rather, he assumed that it would be a subset of the slave population. And so now that he is finally willing to send a congregation to go serve G-d in the dessert, he needs to know which slaves.

But that is not what Moshe and Aharon (or HaKadosh Baruch Hu) had in mind. But it is what they allowed Paro to believe. Not because they mislead them, but because Paro mislead himself.

In Paro’s worldview — even a small congregation going to a small, limited celebration nearby was unfathomable. For whatever reason, it was something that he fundamentally objected to — to the point that he was willing to put up with plague after plague (before G-d hardened his heart) so as to not even grant this small request.

But G-d’s vision was much grandeur than Paro’s narrow worldview. G-d imagined an entire exodus of the entire slave population permanently leaving Egypt.

But how was G-d going to bridge that gap?

I’m not 100% sure — but I do find it striking that it is G-d Himself who instructs Moshe and Aharon to make this more limited request of a three day journey into the desert. The same G-d Who lets Moshe and Aharon know that He is going to redeem the Jewish people from the land of Egypt, instructs them to make this small, limited request.

And the entire battle with Egypt is over this request. Paro isn’t fighting against a mass exodus, he is fighting against a mini “vacation”.

And yet, through Paro’s battle, the stage is set for the full exodus.

After all, what would have happened if Paro had originally agreed to a small contingency of slaves to worship Hashem in the desert? Would we have had all of these plagues?

What if had negotiated with Moshe rather than constantly resisted him? Would G-d have hardened his heart?

It’s hard to know — but my suspicion is no. My suspicion is that the plagues came because of the absolute opposition of Paro to any slave going for any period of time outside of Egypt. Because behind that opposition was a worldview fundamentally opposed to the moral monotheism that Moshe and Aharon represented.

In Moshe and Aharon’s worldview — you can just enslave a nation because you want to. You can’t just kill babies in the womb or throw them in the nile because you want to. There are limits. There are rights and there are wrongs.

And, as such, Paro could not allow himself to give an inch to Moshe and Aharon.

And, as such he totally and utterly rejected their claim. And so, the plagues got stronger and stronger — so much so that not only did Paro kick out the Jewish people, but so to did the entire Egyptian nation:

וַתֶּחֱזַ֤ק מִצְרַ֙יִם֙ עַל־הָעָ֔ם לְמַהֵ֖ר לְשַׁלְּחָ֣ם מִן־הָאָ֑רֶץ כִּ֥י אָמְר֖וּ כֻּלָּ֥נוּ מֵתִֽים

English translation: Get out!

Okay, that’s a loose translation — but you get the idea.

Share masmid

If you want to see the brilliance of the Torah, look no further than the names of G-d Himself. And if you want a single pasuk that makes clear that G-d’s names carry depth and meaning — look no further than the opening of this week’s parsha:

וַיְדַבֵּ֥ר אֱלֹהִ֖ים אֶל־מֹשֶׁ֑ה וַיֹּ֥אמֶר אֵלָ֖יו אֲנִ֥י יְהֹוָֽה׃
וָאֵרָ֗א אֶל־אַבְרָהָ֛ם אֶל־יִצְחָ֥ק וְאֶֽל־יַעֲקֹ֖ב בְּאֵ֣ל שַׁדָּ֑י
וּשְׁמִ֣י יְהֹוָ֔ה לֹ֥א נוֹדַ֖עְתִּי לָהֶֽם׃

And E-lokim spoke to Moshe and He said to him: “I am Y-K-V-K,
And I presented myself to Avraham, to Yitzchak and to Yaakov as E-l Sh-Dei
But my name Y-K-V-K, I did not make known to them.

Let’s note how striking (and interesting) this verse is.

For starters, “Who” is speaking with Moshe Rabbeinu? E-lokim (א-לקים). This is one of the two primary names used to describe G-d in the Chumash. It is the name used exclusively in the story of creation — and appears countless times afterwards.

And what does E-lokim want Moshe to know — that He is Y-K-V-K (יקוק). This is the second of the two primary names used to reference G-d in the Chumash.

And it is interesting that G-d — revealing Himself to Moshe from the perspective or aspect of His being E-lokim wants to communicate to Moshe that He is the entity best known as Y-K-V-K.

In essence, G-d is telling Moshe his “real” name. What does that mean? Well — that’s kind of what this article is all about. Meaning, we’ll get there shortly enough.

But there is more — after informing Moshe about his “real” name, E-lokim has another message for Moshe — namely; that He (E-lokim) appeared to the forefathers by yet a third name: E-l Sh-Dei (א-ל ש-די).

But E-lokim is not revealing this name to Moshe. Rather, he is noting that he only appeared to the Avos as E-l Sh-Dei and not by the name Y-K-V-K — the name that he just revealed to Moshe is His “essential” name.

Is This True?

Now — as interesting (or confusing) as all of this is — it seems to also be false. Indeed, the very first time that HaKadosh Baruch spoke with Avraham (as recorded in the Chumash), He did so as Y-K-V-K:

וַיֹּ֤אמֶר יְהֹוָה֙ אֶל־אַבְרָ֔ם לֶךְ־לְךָ֛ מֵאַרְצְךָ֥

And Y-K-V-K said to Avrahm, Go (for your own benefit) from your land…

And later, when Avraham arrived in Eretz Yisrael, He appeared to him as Y-K-V-K:

וַיֵּרָ֤א יְהֹוָה֙ אֶל־אַבְרָ֔ם וַיֹּ֕אמֶר

And Y-K-V-K appeared to Avrahm and He said…

Avraham’s response is equally telling. He builds an altar and publicly calls out in the name of Y-K-V-K:

וַיִּֽבֶן־שָׁ֤ם מִזְבֵּ֙חַ֙ לַֽיהֹוָ֔ה וַיִּקְרָ֖א בְּשֵׁ֥ם יְהֹוָֽה

And he built an altar to Y-K-V-K and he called out in the name of Y-K-V-K

These verses describe Avraham’s very first recorded encounters with HaKadosh Baruch Hu. But they are far from the last.

Let us move on to Bris Bein HaBesarim. There we are told that the “word of Y-K-V-K came to Avram”. And during that encounter, HaKadosh Baruch Hu explicitly identifies Himself as Y-K-V-K:

וַיֹּ֖אמֶר אֵלָ֑יו אֲנִ֣י יְהֹוָ֗ה
אֲשֶׁ֤ר הוֹצֵאתִ֙יךָ֙ מֵא֣וּר כַּשְׂדִּ֔ים

And He said to him:
“I am Y-K-V-K,
who took you out from Ur Kasdim…

Now this line is familiar — quite similar to the very words that HaKadosh Baruch Hu says to Bnei Yisrael at Har Sinai:

אָֽנֹכִ֖י֙ יְהֹוָ֣ה אֱלֹהֶ֑֔יךָ אֲשֶׁ֧ר הוֹצֵאתִ֛יךָ מֵאֶ֥רֶץ מִצְרַ֖יִם מִבֵּ֣֥ית עֲבָדִ֑͏ֽים׃

I am Y-K-V-K,
who took you out from the land of Egypt,
from the house of bondage.

At Sinai, the very first thing G-d wanted Bnei Yisrael to know was His name: Y-K-V-K.
And here is G-d using (seemingly) the exact same language to make the exact same point.

But we aren’t done yet.

Later on, after forming a covenant with Avimelech, Avraham once again calls out in the name of Y-K-V-K — this time adding a crucial phrase:

וַיִּ֨קְרָא־שָׁ֔ם בְּשֵׁ֥ם יְהֹוָ֖ה אֵ֥ל עוֹלָֽם

And he called out in the name of Y-K-V-K, the E-l of the world

That word E-l is rather similar to E-lokim. Indeed, it is essentially the same word (or name) in singular form. So here we have Avraham noting that Y-K-V-K is the E-l of the world — similar to how E-lokim in our verse let’s Moshe know that He (E-lokim) is Y-K-V-K.

And finally, we have the Akeida itself, where E-lokim tests Avraham. And there, once Avraham passes the test, he (Avraham) gives a name for that very place:

וַיִּקְרָ֧א אַבְרָהָ֛ם שֵֽׁם־הַמָּק֥וֹם הַה֖וּא יְהֹוָ֣ה ׀ יִרְאֶ֑ה
אֲשֶׁר֙ יֵאָמֵ֣ר הַיּ֔וֹם בְּהַ֥ר יְהֹוָ֖ה יֵרָאֶֽה

And Avraham called the name of that place Y-K-V-K will see

All in all, it seems rather hard to argue that Avraham did not know Y-K-V-K. After all,

• G-d first appeared to Avraham as Y-K-V-K

• Avraham made public proclamations in the name of Y-K-V-K

• G-d Himself “informed” Avraham that He (G-d) is Y-K-V-K

• G-d named the very place of the Akeida after Y-K-V-K

So how is it possible for E-lokim to state that He did not make His name Y-K-V-K known to the avos?

Only Avraham?

Perhaps you will say that this is only Avraham — that he knew the name Y-K-V-K, but that Yitzhak and Yaakov did not.

Well, let’s see.
We’ll start with Yitzhak.

There is a famine in the land — and Yitzhak knows what to do. Like his father (Avraham), he’ll go down to Egypt. But, says Y-K-V-K, not so fast:

וַיֵּרָ֤א אֵלָיו֙ יְהֹוָ֔ה
וַיֹּ֖אמֶר אַל־תֵּרֵ֣ד מִצְרָ֑יְמָה

And Y-K-V-K appeared to him
and said: ‘do not go down to Egypt’

So, like Avraham, HaKadosh Baruch Hu appeared to Yitzhak as Y-K-V-K.
And this was not the only time that HaKadosh Baruch Hu appeared to Yitzhak as Y-K-V-K. After the repeated “altercations” with the Pelishtim, HaKadosh Baruch Hu appeared to Yitzchak at night as Y-K-V-K:

וַיֵּרָ֨א אֵלָ֤יו יְהֹוָה֙ בַּלַּ֣יְלָה הַה֔וּא

And Y-K-V-K appeared to him on that night…

Granted, this is not as exhaustive a list as with Avraham — but, truth be told, the stories about Yitzhak are much sparser than those of Avraham (or Yaakov). So, given what we have — it seems reasonable to argue that Yitzhak also knew the name Y-K-V-K.

What about Yaakov?
Let’s see.

We’ll start with his famous dream of a ladder connecting heaven and earth. Who, we ask, was “standing” upon that later: Y-K-V-K. And who spoke to Yaakov in that dream? Again, Y-K-V-K:

וְהִנֵּ֨ה יְהֹוָ֜ה נִצָּ֣ב עָלָיו֮
…
וַיֹּאמַר֒ אֲנִ֣י יְהֹוָ֗ה אֱלֹהֵי֙ אַבְרָהָ֣ם אָבִ֔יךָ וֵאלֹהֵ֖י יִצְחָ֑ק

And Y-K-V-K was standing upon it…
And he said: ‘I am Y-K-V-K, the G-d of Avraham your father and the G-d of Yitzha

And when Yaakov woke up, he proclaimed that Y-K-V-K was in this place (and he did not know):

וַיִּיקַ֣ץ יַעֲקֹב֮ מִשְּׁנָתוֹ֒
וַיֹּ֕אמֶר אָכֵן֙ יֵ֣שׁ יְהֹוָ֔ה בַּמָּק֖וֹם הַזֶּ֑ה
וְאָנֹכִ֖י לֹ֥א יָדָֽעְתִּי

And Yaakov woke up from his sleep
And he said, indeed there is Y-K-V-K in this place
And I did not know

That was when Yaakov was on his way to Lavan. And when it was time for him to leave Lavan, Y-K-V-K once again appeared to him:

וַיֹּ֤אמֶר יְהֹוָה֙ אֶֽל־יַעֲקֹ֔ב
שׁ֛וּב אֶל־אֶ֥רֶץ אֲבוֹתֶ֖יךָ

And Y-K-V-K said to Yaakov
Return to the land of your fathers…

And when Yaakov davened to be saved from the Eisav, he davened specifically to that very Y-K-V-K who had told him to return to Eretz Yisrael:

וַיֹּ֘אמֶר֮ יַעֲקֹב֒
אֱלֹהֵי֙ אָבִ֣י אַבְרָהָ֔ם
וֵאלֹהֵ֖י אָבִ֣י יִצְחָ֑ק
יְהֹוָ֞ה הָאֹמֵ֣ר אֵלַ֗י שׁ֧וּב לְאַרְצְךָ֛

And Yaakov said,
the G-d of my father Avraham,
and the G-d of my father Yitzhak,
Y-K-V-K, who said to me; ‘return to your land’…

When all is said and done, it seems very difficult to say that the Avos did not know the name Y-K-V-K. Over and over again we see that G-d spoke to them using that name, told them that that was His name, and that they themselves proclaimed and/or utilized that name.

So then — what is our verse talking about?

The Need for Definitions

If we are going to make sense of all of this, then we need to establish some clear definitions. In particular, we are going to have to understand what the names Y-K-V-K (יקוק) and E-lokim (א-לקים) mean — as well as the word “know” (daas — דעת).

Why?

Because these names have meaning. They represent fundamental concepts, perspectives, and experiences through which we relate to — and encounter — the Divine.

As such, we cannot really understand what our verse is talking about until we first gain some understanding of what these names of G-d represent in terms of our interaction with, and understanding of, the Infinite One.

The same is true of the word daas, which we usually translate as “know.” That translation does not capture the full depth of what daas means in the Torah. But what that depth actually is will only become clear once we establish a deeper understanding of the names of G-d themselves.

And we will begin that process in the most natural place of all: with the creation of nature itself.

Divine Names in Context

Creation and the Natural Order

Perhaps the most obvious place to begin in understanding the names of G-d is with the very first line — and the very first story — of the Torah.

The opening line, perhaps the most famous line ever written, tells us: “In the beginning, G-d created the heavens and the earth.” But in Hebrew, the verse reads:

בְּרֵאשִׁית בָּרָא אֱלֹהִים
אֵת הַשָּׁמַיִם וְאֵת הָאָרֶץ

It is E-lokim who creates the heavens and the earth.

And as anyone even somewhat familiar with the Chumash knows, throughout the entire narrative of creation, only the name E-lokim appears. The Torah tells the story of the natural order — light, sky, land, vegetation, animals, and finally man — using that name alone.

This does not mean that Y-K-V-K is unrelated to creation. Soon enough, when the Torah refers back to creation, the name Y-K-V-K does appear:

בְּיוֹם עֲשׂוֹת יְהֹוָה אֱלֹהִים
אֶרֶץ וְשָׁמָיִם

But there is an important distinction here. When the Torah references creation, Y-K-V-K can appear. When it tells the story of creation itself — when it describes the unfolding of the natural order — the name used is E-lokim.

Gan Eden: Unification of the Divine Names

Immediately afterward, the Torah turns to a second foundational narrative: the creation of man, his placement in Gan Eden, the commandment he is given, his sin, and his exile.

Here, the name Y-K-V-K enters the text — joined with E-lokim. Throughout this entire section, the two names appear together: Y-K-V-K E-lokim.

At this stage, there is no clear distinction between the natural order and relationship. They flow together as a single, harmonized unity. G-d is both Creator and Commander, the One who brings the world into being and the One who speaks to man, walks with him, and commands him. Nature and relationship are not yet separate domains.

That unity is ruptured by sin — but it is not destroyed.

Man is expelled from Gan Eden. The relationship is damaged, but it still exists. G-d continues to speak to man, to guide him, and to respond to his actions. Relationship remains possible, even if it is no longer fully integrated with the natural order.

Kayin and the Degradation of Relationship

The first clear separation appears with Chava. When she gives birth to Kayin, she declares:

קָנִיתִי אִישׁ אֶת־יְהֹוָה

“I have acquired a man with Y-K-V-K.”

Soon afterward, Kayin brings an offering:

וַיָּבֵא קַיִן מִפְּרִי הָאֲדָמָה
מִנְחָה לַיהֹוָה

Y-K-V-K turns toward the offering of Hevel, but not toward the offering of Kayin. A moral dialogue follows — a direct conversation between Y-K-V-K and Kayin, warning him about sin and responsibility.

But Kayin refuses to repair what he has done. After murdering Hevel, the Torah tells us:

וַיֵּצֵא קַיִן מִלִּפְנֵי יְהֹוָה

Kayin does not merely leave a location; he removes himself from relationship.

History Without Relationship

What follows is a further degradation of Kayin’s line. The Torah traces his descendants and describes the development of human culture and power — the forging of tools and weapons, the spread of violence, and the turning of human creativity toward domination rather than repair.

This descent culminates in the figure of Lemech, who does not merely commit violence, but turns it into poetry and song:

כִּי אִישׁ הָרַגְתִּי לְפִצְעִי
וְיֶלֶד לְחַבֻּרָתִי

Violence has now been aestheticized. Murder is no longer tragic; it is something to boast about, something to sing about. This is not merely sin — it is the normalization and celebration of sin.

Replacement, Not Repair

It is in this context that Chava gives birth again. And when she explains the name of this child, the language shifts:

כִּי שָׁת־לִי אֱלֹהִים
זֶרַע אַחֵר תַּחַת הֶבֶל
כִּי הֲרָגוֹ קָיִן

Here, the child is not presented as the beginning of renewed relationship, but as a replacement — “another seed in place of Hevel.” And the name invoked is not Y-K-V-K, but E-lokim.

What follows is no longer narrative, but history. The Torah moves into genealogies and generations. There is no plot, no central tension, no relationship being explored — only the continuation of human existence across time. And throughout this section, the name used is E-lokim.

Even Chanoch, a figure of spiritual distinction, is described in these terms:

וַיִּתְהַלֵּךְ חֲנוֹךְ אֶת־הָאֱלֹהִים

At the end of this lineage, something shifts again.

A different Lemech — not the violent poet — names his son Noach and says:

זֶה יְנַחֲמֵנוּ
מִמַּעֲשֵׂנוּ וּמֵעִצְּבוֹן יָדֵינוּ
מִן־הָאֲדָמָה אֲשֶׁר אֵרְרָהּ יְהֹוָה

Here, Y-K-V-K returns — in the context of pain, curse, and the hope for repair.

Noach: Preservation and Relationship Revisited

The pattern continues in Parshas Noach.

When the Torah describes the moral state of humanity, it says:

וַיַּרְא יְהֹוָה
כִּי רַבָּה רָעַת הָאָדָם בָּאָרֶץ

And then:

וַיִּנָּחֶם יְהֹוָה
כִּי עָשָׂה אֶת־הָאָדָם בָּאָרֶץ

Here we are firmly in the realm of relationship — moral concern, pain, regret, and response — and the name used is Y-K-V-K.

But when the Torah shifts to describing the world itself as corrupted, the language changes:

וַתִּשָּׁחֵת הָאָרֶץ
לִפְנֵי הָאֱלֹהִים

This is not yet described as moral evil, but as nishchas — ruined, distorted, broken as a system. And here, the name used is E-lokim.

Noach himself is described as someone who:

וְאֶת־הָאֱלֹהִים הִתְהַלֶּךְ־נֹחַ

When E-lokim speaks to Noach, He speaks in terms of preserving the natural order: build a teivah, save yourself, bring two of every living creature so that life can continue.

But Y-K-V-K speaks to Noach as well — and the instruction changes:

מִכֹּל הַבְּהֵמָה הַטְּהוֹרָה
תִּקַּח־לְךָ שִׁבְעָה שִׁבְעָה

This has nothing to do with survival. It has everything to do with korbanos — with relationship.

Indeed, Noach will later bring offerings to Y-K-V-K from those very animals.

What emerges, simply by following the text, is a distinction. E-lokim relates to the natural order — creation, preservation, structure, and history. Y-K-V-K introduces something more: relationship, moral concern, closeness, pain, regret, and response.

All of this emerges simply by observing how the Torah uses these names in context, before saying anything about their linguistic roots or philosophical meanings.

This is only the first round of understanding. But even at this stage, it becomes clear that the names are not interchangeable.

And that brings us one step closer to the question we began with: what it truly means to “know” the name Y-K-V-K.

The Grammar of the Names

Now that we have the context, let’s turn to the grammar of the names.

“Grammar” is a word that many of us tend to shun. But grammar is actually our friend — because through grammar we can often access layers of meaning and ideas embedded in the Torah. And this won’t be hard. Some grammar is hard; this is not.

We’ll start again at the beginning, with the name E-lokim. We’ll begin with some basic observations, and only afterward turn to what the mefarshim have to say.

Initial Grammatical Observations: E-lokim

Let’s start with the name itself.

First observation: the root of this name appears to be E-l (א־ל) — meaning power or might.

For example, Lavan says to Yaakov that he has the power to harm him — literally, “there is el in my hand”:

יֶשׁ־לְאֵל יָדִי לַעֲשׂוֹת עִמָּכֶם רָע

So on one level, E-lokim seems connected to el — power, capability, potency.

Second observation: E-lokim appears in the plural form, ending with the י־ם suffix.

Despite this, when used in reference to G-d, E-lokim consistently takes a singular verb. For example:

בְּרֵאשִׁית בָּרָא אֱלֹהִים

The verb bara is singular. If E-lokim were actually plural, the verb would have to be plural as well. Yet throughout the Torah, when E-lokim refers to G-d, it takes singular verbs.

We are left, then, with an odd grammatical tension: a word that looks plural, but functions as singular.

Third observation: the word elohim (with the same exact spelling) is often used to refer to entities that are clearly not G-d.

Judges, for example, are called elohim:

וְהִקְרִיבוֹ אֲדֹנָיו אֶל־הָאֱלֹהִים

“Its owner will bring him to the judges.”

And foreign gods are called elohim:

לֹא יִהְיֶה לְךָ אֱלֹהִים אֲחֵרִים עַל־פָּנָי

“You shall not have other gods in My presence.”

Fourth observation: even when referring to G-d Himself, E-lokim behaves in ways that proper names normally do not.

For example, it can take the definite article — “the E-lokim”:

אֶת־הָאֱלֹהִים הִתְהַלֶּךְ־נֹחַ

“Noach walked with G-d.”

And it can appear in construct (or possessive) form:

אָנֹכִי אֱלֹהֵי אָבִיךָ
אֱלֹהֵי אַבְרָהָם
אֱלֹהֵי יִצְחָק
וֵאלֹהֵי יַעֲקֹב

“I am the G-d of your father —
the G-d of Avraham,
the G-d of Yitzchak,
and the G-d of Yaakov.”

Proper names usually do not work this way. We do not say “ha-Moshe” (המשה), nor do we speak of “Avraham of Yitzchak” (אַבְרָהָם שֶׁל יִצְחָק).

All of this suggests that although E-lokim is called a “name of G-d,” it does not function exactly like a proper name.

Unless it functions more like a title — something akin to “king,” “president,” or “pharaoh.” Titles can function almost like names in certain contexts, even though they primarily describe role or function.

For example, “Mr. President.” “Mr.” is normally reserved for a personal name — Mr. Rosenberg. Yet it is also used for the President of the United States (though, interestingly enough, not for presidents of companies).

We’ll return to this point shortly. But first, let’s take a closer look at the other Divine name.

Initial Grammatical Observations: Y-K-V-K

Now compare all of this to the name Y-K-V-K.

It does not share most — if any — of the features of E-lokim.

First observation: it comes from a different root entirely — ה־ו־ה / ה־י־ה — the language of being. It is difficult to translate cleanly into English, but it points toward existence, being, “is-ness,” so to speak.

Second observation: it is always singular. There is no plural form of this name.

Third observation: it is never used for other entities.
Judges are not called Y-K-V-K.
Angels are not called Y-K-V-K.
Foreign gods are never referred to as Y-K-V-K.

Fourth observation: it appears in a construct-like form only in relation to the heavenly realm — not in relation to human beings.

For example, Y-K-V-K of the heavenly hosts (קוק צְבָאוֹת — Y-K-V-K Tzevaos), but not Y-K-V-K of Avraham.

Think of this as similar to the phrase “William of England” — who ruled England, but was not from England. In the same way, Y-K-V-K Tzevaos indicates sovereignty over the heavenly realm, not origin or possession.

All of this suggests that Y-K-V-K functions like a proper name.

Putting It All Together

Already, just from this grammatical comparison, we may be beginning to see what is happening in our verse: E-lokim says to Moshe, “I am Y-K-V-K.”

Y-K-V-K points toward something essential — who G-d is. In that sense, it functions as a proper name. E-lokim, by contrast, describes role and function — a title.

And this fits remarkably well with what we observed earlier in the narrative context.

When the Torah speaks about creation and the natural order, it uses the title E-lokim. When narrating the story of creation itself, that is the name employed. But when we later reflect on creation within the context of relationship, we attach the proper name to the title — because we understand that creation was for us.

After the sin, that unity was damaged. We could still relate to G-d — and therefore still use His proper name. And we could still see Him as Creator — and therefore still use His title. But we could no longer see the connection between the two.

It is like a father whose work his children do not appreciate — they fail to see the connection between his long hours at the office and their food on the table.

Later, when Kayin further sins and “leaves home,” so to speak, the relationship itself is damaged. All that remains is G-d’s functional title. And so the Torah reverts to E-lokim alone.

The same is true when the Torah lists the generations from Adam to Noach. This is history as natural process — one generation following the next — but without relationship.

Yes, there are individuals like Chanoch who attempt to walk in line with G-d’s natural laws. But that is abstract — like a good employee doing his job properly. There may be appreciation, but not intimacy.

It is only with Lemech (Noach’s father) that we return to the name Y-K-V-K — because he attempts to repair the damaged relationship.

This is also why the Torah uses Y-K-V-K when G-d makes a moral assessment of humanity. G-d is relating to man as a moral being — not as an object in a system.

And finally, this explains the usage of the names in the story of the flood. When the concern is simply maintaining the natural order, the title E-lokim is used. But when G-d seeks to rekindle relationship — symbolized by the seven tahor animals — the name Y-K-V-K appears.

The Meaning of the “E-lokim”

At this point, we have enough on the table to say something simple — but very powerful.

We’ve already seen that E-lokim does not behave like a standard proper name. It behaves much more like a title. It can be shared with other beings (judges, foreign gods, even malachim in certain contexts), it can take the definite article (ha-E-lokim), and it can enter construct (E-lohei Avraham…).

All of that would be very strange if this were a purely personal name — but it makes perfect sense if we are dealing with a title that describes a role.

So what does E-lokim mean — in the way the Torah actually uses it? Here is the simplest formulation: E-lokim is the name of unified power.

It describes the mastery of HaKadosh Baruch Hu over the many forces that make reality run — forces that appear separate, even independent, but are in truth all sourced in one will and governed by one authority.

If you want an image for this, you don’t need philosophy. You need a kingdom.

A king rules a vast and complicated system. He has generals, ministers, courts, officers, and messengers. He may or may not personally go out to war. He certainly is not building bridges, collecting taxes, or enforcing the law himself. But the entire structure runs because authority flows from and through him. Everyone in the kingdom who acts with power is doing so under the king’s authority — whether they recognize it or not.

That is the basic model of E-lokim.

And this also explains something we noticed earlier but hadn’t yet fully closed: why the Torah can use the word elohim for judges, for malachim, and even for foreign gods.

Judges are called elohim because they wield real authority — sometimes over life and death — and they enforce din: law, structure, and order.

Malachim can be described in this language because they are empowered “messengers.” They do not act independently; they execute command. They are forces through which the will of the King is carried out.

Foreign gods are called elohim because that is precisely what idolatry is: taking one force inside the system — one koach — and inflating it, absolutizing it, treating a part as though it were the whole.

And now the plural form itself comes into focus.

The Torah is not teaching “many gods.” It is teaching the opposite. The plural form expresses many powers unified in one ruler. This is the same linguistic phenomenon we see in other words of authority and honor — where a single individual is described in the plural because he bears multiple domains of power and responsibility.

So when the Torah calls HaKadosh Baruch Hu E-lokim, it is saying: all powers are one, because they are all unified under a single Source.

This also helps us understand why Chazal associate the name E-lokim with the midah of din.

The phrase midat ha-din is often translated as “the attribute of judgment,” but that translation can be misleading. In Lashon HaKodesh, din means far more than judging. It also means law, logic, structure, and order. In fact, the act of judging flows out of this deeper meaning.

Here, din refers to the fact that the universe is a system — a world governed by consistent rules and intelligible structures.

A kingdom cannot function if everything is improvised. It cannot survive if every decision is purely emotional or made ad hoc. Systems exist not because the king is distant or uncaring, but because stability requires structure.

True, there is something impersonal about systems. A system, as a system, may be indifferent to individual circumstances. But that does not negate the need for structure; it simply highlights its limitations.

This, then, is din.

And this is what the name E-lokim represents: G-d as the Source and Master of all the forces of reality — the One who gathers those many powers, orders them, and governs them as a single, logical, and consistent system.

Not in opposition to relationship, but as the necessary framework that makes a stable world possible at all.

At this point, we have a solid understanding of Shem Elohim.

Now we need an understanding of Shem Havayah.
And for that, we turn to Rav Hirsch.

The Meaning of the Name Y-K-V-K (Shem Havayah)

At this point, Chazal tell us something essential: while E-lokim is associated with din, the name Y-K-V-K is associated with rachamim.

To understand why, we have to be very careful about what these words actually mean.

Din does not mean harshness, and rachamim does not simply mean kindness. These are not emotional labels. They are descriptions of modes of governance.

As we’ve seen, Shem Elohim describes G-d as the One who brings the world into existence as a system — a structured, ordered reality governed by consistent rules and interlocking forces. Logic, structure, causality, and stability all flow from this name. That is why Chazal associate it with din: not judgment in the narrow sense, but lawfulness, coherence, and order.

Shem Havayah is something else entirely — it is not about structure, but about purpose.

In other words, if E-lokim is G-d as King in the sense of being the ultimate source of authority, then Y-K-V-K is the King in a very different — and deeper — sense.

Y-K-V-K is the King in the sense of someone who decides how to use that authority — moment by moment. Not merely power and rights and capabilities, but intention and desire.

It is the King who cares about his subjects.
The King who has goals for his kingdom.
And therefore the King who looks at the system as it has been established — the laws, the institutions, the resources — and decides how best to utilize them for the benefit of his citizens and subjects, and for the advancement of the goals of the kingdom as a whole.

He decides which resources to deploy.
Which problems demand attention now.
Where strict enforcement is needed — and where patience, flexibility, or forbearance are required.

That is Havayah.

It is G-d not merely as the source of all power, but as the One who actively governs — who continuously uses the systems He Himself created to guide reality toward its purpose, and to shape the world in accordance with His care, concern, and goals for mankind.

In short, Y-K-V-K is a name of G-d, but not in the sense of “who” or “what” G-d is, but how rather in terms how G-d acts and what He wants.

And once we see that, we can begin to understand why Chazal associate the name Havayah with rachamim — not as emotion, but as purposeful, attentive, and loving involvement in the running of the world.

From here, the next step is clear: we now need to see how this idea is built directly into the grammar and vocalization of the Name Y-K-V-K itself.

How the Name Itself Expresses This Idea

Up to this point, we have described what Shem Havayah represents.
Now we need to see how the name itself says all of that.

Because unlike E-lokim, this name does not describe a role, a system, or a function.
It does not describe G-d as the architect of reality.

It describes G-d in motion.

The four-letter name Y-K-V-K is built on the root היה / הוה — the language of being and existence. But here we need to be very precise, because this is where the meaning is often misunderstood.

This name is not describing who G-d is.
It is describing what G-d does.

Grammatically, this is crucial. The four-letter name is not a noun. It is a verbal form. That alone tells us that the Torah is not presenting a static description of G-d’s essence, but an ongoing action — an activity, a mode of engagement with reality.

However, at this stage we still do not yet know exactly what the verb is saying.

Why?

Because a Sefer Torah has no vowels.

Without vowels, the same root can be read in multiple ways, each implying a very different meaning. The written Torah gives us the letters — but not the full grammatical meaning. For that, we need the Masorah, the Oral Tradition, which preserves how the name is to be understood.

And this is where Rav Hirsch makes his decisive point.

According to the Masorah, the Name Y-K-V-K is understood as a future-oriented, causative form of the root of being.

Not “the One who exists.”
Not “the One who is.”

But rather:

The One who brings being into being.
The One who grants existence.
The One who is constantly re-constituting reality.

And the future tense here is not about time in the simple sense. It does not mean “someday.” It describes ongoing readiness — a constant orientation toward what comes next.

In Rav Hirsch’s formulation, this name describes G-d as:

“The One who is always ready to bestow new being.”

That phrase captures the essence of the name.

It means that G-d is not only the source of existence at the beginning of time, but the One who, at every moment, looks at the world, looks at human beings, looks at their needs, their failures, their growth, and grants reality its next moment of existence accordingly.

This is not abstract metaphysics.
This is responsive governance.

Think in human terms.

If someone is sick, you do not respond the same way you would if they were healthy. If there is an emergency, you mobilize resources immediately — you call for help, you act decisively, you break routine if necessary. If there is no crisis, maybe what is needed is patience, attention, teaching, or simply presence.

You are constantly assessing the situation and responding to what is needed now.

That is Shem Havayah.

It is G-d watching reality unfold — the world as a whole, and each individual within it — and constantly granting existence in a way that serves purpose, growth, and relationship.

Usually, this happens within the system He Himself created — the laws, the structures, the natural order described by Shem Elohim. But when necessary, He can also override or redirect that system to further His goals, His purposes, and His love for humanity.

This is why Chazal associate Shem Havayah with rachamim.

Not emotion.
Not softness.
But attentive, purposeful involvement.

If Elohim is G-d as the source of all power and structure,
then Havayah is G-d as the One who actively uses that power — moment by moment — to guide reality toward its intended end.

And with this understanding in place, we are finally ready to return to our original verse — and to understand what it means for Moshe to be told that E-lokim says:
“I am Y-K-V-K.”

Putting It All Together: What E-lokim Is Telling Moshe

Now we can finally return to our opening verse and hear it the way it is meant to be heard.

To do that, we need to remember where we are in the story.

We are standing on the cusp of the Ten Makos.

In just a moment, HaKadosh Baruch Hu is going to begin dismantling the entire Egyptian worldview. He will manipulate the natural order openly and decisively in order to free the Jewish people and to judge Mitzrayim. And He will do so in a way that leaves no ambiguity about who is in control.

He will begin with the Nile — the river the Egyptians worshipped as a god.
He will move to the land itself.
He will demonstrate mastery over living creatures, from microscopic insects to swarming locusts to wild animals.
He will control disease and health, darkness and light.
He will reach into the heavens, affect the sun, and ultimately touch life and death itself.

In short, He will display complete technical mastery over every domain of the created world.

This is Elohim in full force.

Power. Authority. Control over nature. Absolute command of the system.

But before any of that begins, HaKadosh Baruch Hu stops Moshe and says something essential:

“I am Y-K-V-K.”

Meaning: Do not misunderstand what you are about to see.

This is not power for its own sake.
This is not domination.
This is not a cold display of authority.

What you are about to witness is power being used — deliberately, carefully, purposefully — for love, for redemption, and for moral truth.

E-lokim — the Master of all forces — is telling Moshe that behind this display of authority stands Havayah: the One who is watching the world at every moment, seeing what is needed now, and granting existence accordingly.

Right now, the world requires disruption.
Right now, the system must be bent — even broken — in order to free an enslaved people.
Right now, the full weight of divine power must be brought to bear — not because power demands expression, but because love and purpose demand action.

And that is what Moshe must understand.

When HaKadosh Baruch Hu says:

“I appeared to Avraham, Yitzchak, and Yaakov as E-l Shaddai, but My name Y-K-V-K I did not make known to them,”

He is not saying that the Avos never heard the name, nor that they lacked theological knowledge.

They knew the name.
They spoke it.
They believed in it.

But there is a kind of knowledge that cannot remain abstract.

There is a kind of knowing that only comes through lived experience — through seeing history bend, through watching the system itself respond to moral necessity, through witnessing power mobilized entirely in service of redemption.

That is the knowledge of Y-K-V-K.

The Avos lived with promise.
Moshe will live through fulfillment.

And so, just before the Makos begin, HaKadosh Baruch Hu tells Moshe what kind of King He is.

Yes — He is Elohim, the source of all power.
But that power itself flows from something deeper:
from will, from care, from love — from a desire to guide the world toward its purpose, and to use power only as that purpose and that love demands.

Share masmid

Before we even look at the beginning of Sefer Shemos, we need to stop and take a closer look at how Sefer Bereishis actually ends. After all, Sefer Shemos is the continuation of the narrative that ends in Sefer Bereishis. As such, understanding how Sefer Bereishis ends can help us get some clarity on how and why Sefer Shemos begins the way it does.

And yet, when we take that closer look, we get the sense that Sefer Bereishis ends rather abruptly — and that the beginning of Sefer Shemos really belongs at the end of Sefer Bereishis.

To see why that is the case, we need to revisit the last chapter of Sefer Bereishis. We’ll start with the death — or rather burial — of Yaakov.

Not Yet Slaves

There is something disturbing about Yaakov’s last request. Why does he need Yosef to take an oath to bury him in Eretz Yisrael? Why does he have to command the brothers to do so? What is this so complicated?

Already at this stage, we see a certain limitation. It’s not so simple or obvious that Yaakov can be buried outside of Egypt. Rather, he needs Yosef’s political standing and stature and the brothers special dedication. In particular, he needs permission from Paro. That is why he needs Yosef — so that Yosef can intercede on his behalf and request special dispensation from Paro.

Why is that necessary?

Why can’t Yaakov, the patriarch of the family, simply decide where he will be buried? Evidently, the family is no longer as free as it once was. A decision that should have been private now requires state approval.

And when we look at Yosef, the situation is even more striking.

Yosef mirrors his father and also makes his brothers swear that he will be buried in Eretz Yisrael. And yet, when we look a bit closer at this request, we notice that it’s not quite the same as his fathers.

For starters, his actual brothers brothers are not going to bury him in Eretz Yisrael. No will anyone that he currently knows. No, this request will be carried out far in the future — when all that is left of Yosef’s physical presence in this world are his bones.

If all that is left are his bones — then that means quite a bit of time must have. So, unlike Yaakov, Yosef will have to wait a while to be buried in Eretz Yisrael.

Why?

Perhaps because with the passing of Yosef, the political clout of the Jewish people also starts to pass away. Yosef does not leave behind a political equivalent of himself to the Jewish people. He was a one-time phenomenon.

As such, there is no one left who can intercede on Yosef’s behalf. No one who can go to Paro and request that he be buried in Eretz Yisrael. As such, for now, Yosef will have to contend with the reality that he will be buried in Egypt and that his remains will remain there until the Geulah (some 71 years later).

In short — when Yaakov passed away, the Jewish people lost their spiritual center. With Yosef’s death, they now lose much of (if not all) of their political clout. And with that, they are even less free now than before he passed away.

In short, they are not yet slaves, but they are also no longer free. They are somewhere in-between — a state we can call subjugation (שעבוד — shibud).

Slavery Comes Next

But, as we know, this is not a static state. The loss of freedom does not stop and stay at the state of being subjugated. It deteriorates even more until the point that they are fully enslaved.

And, as we also know, that story is told in the opening chapter of Sefer Shemos. There we here about a new king — one who does not know Yosef. This king is suspicious of the Jewish people, worried about them, threatened by them. And he begins a process of enslavement and affliction.

And what is striking is that this story flows perfectly out of the end of Bereishis.

Yaakov dies. There is still a Pharaoh who knows Yosef and respects him. As such, Yaakov is allowed to be buried.

Yosef dies. There is no Yosef-equivalent left to intercede. Yes, Paro still knows Yosef — but they have no access to him. And it’s not even clear that he would grant Yosef’s request if it was made. As such, Yosef (for now) will be buried in Egypt.

And now — there is a new Pharaoh arises. This Paro either doesn’t know Yosef or doesn’t respect or care about him and all that he did for Egypt. And this Paro doesn’t merely refuse to grant certain rights to the Jewish people, but rather actively takes them away. In short — he turns the subjugation (שעבוד — shibud) into slavery (עבדות — avdus).

As a narrative — the story of the new king flows so naturally from the previous one, that its proper place actually seems to be the end of Sefer Bereishis.

Which leads to the first question.

Why not continue the story of the last chapter of Sefer Bereisish to its natural conclusion inside of Sefer Bereishis?

Why not end Sefer Bereishis with the Jewish people actually becoming enslaved, and then begin Sefer Shemos with the story of redemption—with the birth of Moshe, with “וילך איש מבית לוי”?

Thematically Fits

That structure would also align beautifully with Brit Bein HaBesarim. At that moment, Avraham received a particular nevuah (prophecy) — and in many ways the rest of Sefer Bereishish and the beginning of Sefer Shemos tell the story of the content of that prophecy.

Let’s note the relevant lines:

וַיֹּ֣אמֶר לְאַבְרָ֗ם יָדֹ֨עַ תֵּדַ֜ע
כִּי־גֵ֣ר ׀ יִהְיֶ֣ה זַרְעֲךָ֗ בְּאֶ֙רֶץ֙ לֹ֣א לָהֶ֔ם
וַעֲבָד֖וּם
וְעִנּ֣וּ אֹתָ֑ם
אַרְבַּ֥ע מֵא֖וֹת שָׁנָֽה׃

וְגַ֧ם אֶת־הַגּ֛וֹי אֲשֶׁ֥ר יַעֲבֹ֖דוּ דָּ֣ן אָנֹ֑כִי
וְאַחֲרֵי־כֵ֥ן יֵצְא֖וּ בִּרְכֻ֥שׁ גָּדֽוֹל

And he said to Avram
Know that your offspring
Will be strangers in a land that is not theirs
And they will enslave them
And afflict them —
Four hundred years

And also, the nation that will enslave them — I will judge
And afterwards they will go out with great wealth

Let’s group this prophecy into two separate themes.
The first are the trials and tribulations that the Avos and Shevatim have to go through.
The second is the redemption that will take place afterwards.

In terms of the first theme — the trials and tribulations — there are three aspects:

1. Being geirim (strangers) in a land that is not theirs

2. Slavery

3. Affliction

Now — by the time we get to the end of Sefer Bereishis, we have already told the story of geirus. And we also see the first signs of slavery. In other words, we are well into the first theme and have only one more chapter until we complete the story of this particular theme.

In other words, it’s not just the first chapter of Sefer Shemos flows naturally from a narrative perspective, but it fits in beautifully from a thematic perspective also — as indicated by the prophecy in the Brit Bein HaBesarim.

As such, we once again wonder — why stop in the middle. Why not tell the full story of the trials and tribulations of the Jewish people — as would make thematic sense?

The “Right” Way to Start Sefer Shemos

Let’s grant for a moment that for some reason or other Sefer Bereishish should end exactly where it does. That despite the narrative and thematic reasons for continuing, the story should end with Yosef dead and buried in a coffin.

Sefer Shemos itself could still preserve the narrative flow. It could begin with the natural continuation of the story — namely, with a new king arising in Egypt who did not know Yosef. That is, indeed, the next stage in the narrative.

Instead, the Torah opens with a section that does not move the story forward at all:

וְאֵ֗לֶּה שְׁמוֹת֙ בְּנֵ֣י יִשְׂרָאֵ֔ל הַבָּאִ֖ים מִצְרָ֑יְמָה
אֵ֣ת יַעֲקֹ֔ב אִ֥ישׁ וּבֵית֖וֹ בָּֽאוּ׃
רְאוּבֵ֣ן שִׁמְע֔וֹן לֵוִ֖י וִיהוּדָֽה׃
יִשָּׂשכָ֥ר זְבוּלֻ֖ן וּבִנְיָמִֽן׃
דָּ֥ן וְנַפְתָּלִ֖י גָּ֥ד וְאָשֵֽׁר׃

וַֽיְהִ֗י כׇּל־נֶ֛פֶשׁ יֹצְאֵ֥י יֶֽרֶךְ־יַעֲקֹ֖ב שִׁבְעִ֣ים נָ֑פֶשׁ
וְיוֹסֵ֖ף הָיָ֥ה בְמִצְרָֽיִם׃
וַיָּ֤מׇת יוֹסֵף֙ וְכׇל־אֶחָ֔יו וְכֹ֖ל הַדּ֥וֹר הַהֽוּא׃

וּבְנֵ֣י יִשְׂרָאֵ֗ל פָּר֧וּ וַֽיִּשְׁרְצ֛וּ וַיִּרְבּ֥וּ וַיַּֽעַצְמ֖וּ בִּמְאֹ֣ד מְאֹ֑ד
וַתִּמָּלֵ֥א הָאָ֖רֶץ אֹתָֽם׃

And these are the names of the children of Israel who came to Egpyt
with Yaakov — each man and his household came
Reuven, Shimon, Levy, Yehuda
Yissachar, Zevulen, and Binyamin
Dan and Naftali, Gad and Asher

All the souls who came out of the loins of Yaakov were seventy souls
But Yosef was in Egypt
And Yosef passed away — and all of his brothers — and all of that generation

And the children of Yisrael were fruitful and swarmred and multiplied and became exceedingly mighty

This whole section makes no sense.

For starters, it repeats information we already know (as the major commentaries point out).

We already know the names of the children of Israel. Not only did we have story after story about them in the Sefer Bereishis, but we had a story about the birth of each and every one and an explanation for the name that was given to them. We don’t need to be retold their names.

And we already know that they all came to Egypt — that story was told also — in great detail.

And we already know that in total, seventy souls (all the offspring of Yaakov) came down to Egypt.

And we already know that Yosef was in Egypt — that story too has been told in great detail.

And we know that he died — that was the very last narrative told in Sefer Bereishis.

And we even know that Bnei Yisrael were fruitful and multiplied. That was the very last line of Parshas Vayigash:

וַיֵּ֧שֶׁב יִשְׂרָאֵ֛ל בְּאֶ֥רֶץ מִצְרַ֖יִם בְּאֶ֣רֶץ גֹּ֑שֶׁן וַיֵּאָחֲז֣וּ בָ֔הּ וַיִּפְר֥וּ וַיִּרְבּ֖וּ מְאֹֽד׃

And Yisrael settled in the land of Egypt — in the land of Goshen — and they took possession of it and were fruitful and tremendously increased.

There is only one bit of information that is actually new — that all of the brothers had passed away and the entire generation. But that we could have either added at the end of Sefer Bereishis:

And Yosef and his brothers and the entire generation passed away. And Yosef was110 years old when he passed away — and he was embalmed and put into a coffin in Egypt.

Or we could have mentioned it at the very beginning of Sefer Shemos:

Yosef and his brothers and the entire generation passed away and a new king arose in Egypt — one who did not know Yosef.

More than Just Unnecessary

The point is — this is entire section is totally unnecessary from an information point of view — with the exception of one line. So why start the Sefer with it?

But what’s worse — not only is this information unnecessary, but by adding it Sefer Shemos interrupts the narrative flow. Instead of naturally flowing from Yosef passing away to a new king who did not know Yosef — it instead takes us back to the time that Yaakov and his sons came down to Egypt.

And there is yet another problem with this opening section. Sefer Bereishis, for the most part, tells the story of the Avos and the Shevatim. Sefer Shemos tells the story of the Am Yisrael.

In other words — the subjects of the two sefarim (books) are totally different. So why reopen Sefer Shemos by returning to a group of people who are no longer the subject of the narrative?

Why temporarily step backward to Yaakov and the Shvatim, when the Torah itself is about to move into an entirely new era?

What Kind of Answer Are We Looking For?

Before trying to answer these questions, we need to be clear about what would count as a real answer. In my mind, a real answer will offer an explanation of the benefit of adding this section.

In particular, I have in mind some idea or concept that adds something to the telling of the story that we would lack otherwise. That is why the Torah was willing to:

a) sacrifice the narrative flow
b) abandon the thematic consistency and
c) reference characters who are not central to the story of Sefer Shemos.

I have an idea — semi developed. I think it’s good enough, though to finally share. And we’ll start by changing one of our questions into the beginning of an answer — namely the point about the central characters.

As we noted above, Sefer Shemos is not about the Avos or the Shvatim — rather it is about Am Yisrael (the nation of Yisrael). But at this point, it my be more accurate to say Bnei Yisrael (the children of Yisrael). Children in terms of ancestors — a few generations on, but still the inheritors of what Yaakov and his sons bequeathed to the budding nation.

And one of those gifts that they had to offer were there very names. Because those names are not merely labels or means of technically referencing a particular person. No, the names of the Shevatim carry meaning — meaning based on a particular worldview. A worldview that was articulated by the Imahos (the founding mothers) the moment they were born.

In particular, the Imahos took their particular experiences and used them to understand and express a particular perspective of how G-d interacts with man — and how man relates to G-d’s world. They took their pain, longing, gratitude and hope and transformed those personal experiences and desires into the particular names that they gave their children.

And that perspective on how to relate to their experience was brought down to Egypt. That is what it means by “These are the names of the children of Yisrael who came to Egypt.” Put otherwise, these are the worldview and perspectives that the children of Yisrael brought down to Egypt.

And that is significant — because they were going to need that worldview and perspective while in Egypt.

The Names in Egypt

For example — let’s take a look at Reuven. Not just the name, but the context of the name — and how that context lead to the name:

וַיָּבֹא֙ גַּ֣ם אֶל־רָחֵ֔ל וַיֶּאֱהַ֥ב גַּֽם־אֶת־רָחֵ֖ל מִלֵּאָ֑ה
…
וַיַּ֤רְא יְהֹוָה֙ כִּֽי־שְׂנוּאָ֣ה לֵאָ֔ה
וַיִּפְתַּ֖ח אֶת־רַחְמָ֑הּ
…
וַתַּ֤הַר לֵאָה֙ וַתֵּ֣לֶד בֵּ֔ן
וַתִּקְרָ֥א שְׁמ֖וֹ רְאוּבֵ֑ן
כִּ֣י אָֽמְרָ֗ה כִּֽי־רָאָ֤ה יְהֹוָה֙ בְּעׇנְיִ֔י
…

And he came also to Rachel — and he loved Rachel more than Leah…
And Hashem saw that Leah was hated
And He opened her womb…

And Leah became pregnant and gave birth to a son
and called his Reuven
Because she said that Hashem has seen my affliction

It’s right there — in the name. Hashem sees that Leah is hated and Leah recognizes that Hashem sees her affliction.

And soon enough, the Jewish people would be in a place of affliction (remember the prophecy of the Bris Bein HaBetarim — about slavery and affliction). And when that happens — Hashem will see that affliction:

וַיְהִי֩ בַיָּמִ֨ים הָֽרַבִּ֜ים הָהֵ֗ם וַיָּ֙מׇת֙ מֶ֣לֶךְ מִצְרַ֔יִם
וַיֵּאָנְח֧וּ בְנֵֽי־יִשְׂרָאֵ֛ל מִן־הָעֲבֹדָ֖ה
וַיִּזְעָ֑קוּ וַתַּ֧עַל שַׁוְעָתָ֛ם אֶל־הָאֱלֹהִ֖ים מִן־הָעֲבֹדָֽה׃

וַיִּשְׁמַ֥ע אֱלֹהִ֖ים אֶת־נַאֲקָתָ֑ם
…
וַיַּ֥רְא אֱלֹהִ֖ים אֶת־בְּנֵ֣י יִשְׂרָאֵ֑ל
וַיֵּ֖דַע אֱלֹהִֽים׃

And those numerous days, the King of Egypt died
And the children of Yisrael groaned from the slave labor
And they cried out and their pleas reached the Divinity from the slave labor

And G-d heard their moans…
And G-d saw the children of Yisrael
And G-d was aware

He are the Jewish people reaching their breaking point under the affliction of Egypt. And when that happens — G-d sees. Whether or not the Jewish people were aware then that G-d saw — or afterwards is not the issue. The point is that at some point that fact became none to us. And my claim is that it was these names — and the worldview that they carried — which helped us understand that fact.

But it’s not just the seeing. Take a closer look at this passage. G-d also hears. And that leads us to Shimon (Leah’s second son). Which reminds us of Shimon — named because Leah recognized that G-d saw that she was hated. And we remember that the Egyptians could not stand the Jewish people:

וַיָּקֻ֕צוּ מִפְּנֵ֖י בְּנֵ֥י יִשְׂרָאֵֽל

And they sickened because of the children of Yisrael

And as I look further, I feel like I find more and more connections. With Levy, Leah expresses the hope that her husband will “accompanying” her. And we note — that Moshe came about because a man from the house of Levy went and took a daughter of Levy. And we read the Rashi and all that that union entailed — and we see that the principle of that connection lead to our salvation.

We read that with Yehuda, Leah finally offers thanks and recognition to Hashem. And we remember Shiras HaYam — the song of thanks and recognition that we sang when the redemption was finally and ultimately fulfilled.

And then we hear about Dan — and Rachel’s proclamation that G-d is judging her cause. And we remember that at Bris Bein HaBesarim that Hakadosh Baruch Hu promised that he would judge the nation that oppressed us. And, of course, we remember the story of that judgement — the ten plagues.

I do not have them all worked out yet — but here is are (potentially) two more. Yissachar — where Leah notes that G-d gave Leah the wages that were due to her. And, of course, we remember that Bnei Yisrael went out with the wealth of Egypt — which Geviah ben Pesisa argued were simply the wages due to the Jewish people for all the slave labor that they were forced to perform.

And finally — we have Binyamin. The son of her affliction — who was also the son of her right hand. And we see that the affliction of Egypt turned into the right hand of Hashem (as noted in Shiras HaYam).

What This Means for Sefer Shemos

We can now return to our original questions.

Why does Sefer Bereishis end where it does?
Because it has completed the story of the family.

Why does Sefer Shemos not simply continue the narrative?
Because before telling the story of slavery and redemption, the Torah must define who this nation is.

Why return to the Shvatim when the story is now about Am Yisrael?
Because Am Yisrael does not emerge out of nowhere. It emerges carrying these names—these worldviews—into history.

These names came down to Egypt for a reason.
They shaped how slavery was endured.
They shaped how redemption was experienced.
And they shaped how the opportunities created by redemption—Torah, covenant, nationhood—could eventually be realized.

Share masmid

There’s something striking about how Ephraim and Manasseh became two of the twelve tribes of Israel.

Yaakov tells Yosef that the two sons who were born to him before Yaakov came down to Egypt — Ephraim and Manasseh — will each be considered a full tribe. They’re not just Yosef’s children. They’re part of the core structure of the Jewish people.

וְעַתָּ֡ה שְׁנֵֽי־בָנֶ֩יךָ֩ …לִי־הֵ֑ם אֶפְרַ֙יִם֙ וּמְנַשֶּׁ֔ה כִּרְאוּבֵ֥ן וְשִׁמְע֖וֹן יִֽהְיוּ־לִֽי׃

And now, your two sons…belong to me. Ephraim and Menashe will be like Reuven and Shimon

But Yaakov adds something curious. Any sons Yosef has after Yaakov arrives in Egypt won’t form tribes of their own. They’ll be absorbed into Ephraim or Manasseh.

וְעַתָּ֡ה שְׁנֵֽי־בָנֶ֩יךָ֩
הַנּוֹלָדִ֨ים לְךָ֜ בְּאֶ֣רֶץ מִצְרַ֗יִם
עַד־בֹּאִ֥י אֵלֶ֛יךָ מִצְרַ֖יְמָה
לִי־הֵ֑ם
אֶפְרַ֙יִם֙ וּמְנַשֶּׁ֔ה כִּרְאוּבֵ֥ן וְשִׁמְע֖וֹן יִֽהְיוּ־לִֽי׃

וּמוֹלַדְתְּךָ֛ אֲשֶׁר־הוֹלַ֥דְתָּ אַחֲרֵיהֶ֖ם
לְךָ֣ יִהְי֑וּ
עַ֣ל שֵׁ֧ם אֲחֵיהֶ֛ם יִקָּרְא֖וּ בְּנַחֲלָתָֽם׃

And now, your two sons
(the ones born to you in the land of Egypt —
before I came to you in Egypt)
belong to me.
Ephraim and Menashe will be like Reuven and Shimon.

But your children who you had after them
will belong to you.
They will be called by the names of their brothers with regard to their inheritance.

That distinction is strange.

Why should it matter when they were born? Why does “before I arrived” versus “after I arrived” suddenly become the deciding factor? If Yosef has more children, why not let them become tribes as well? Let there be thirteen tribes. Or fourteen. What’s the problem?

And if there is a problem with Yosef’s children becoming tribes, then the whole thing shouldn’t work at all. Ephraim and Manasseh should be no different from any other sons Yosef might have. So clearly, that’s not the issue.

So then what is the issue?
What is Yaakov actually drawing a line around here?
What is it about about Yaakov arriving in Egypt that makes all the difference?

The Tangent that Goes Nowhere

There’s another question in this story — and it might be even stranger than the first.

Right after Yaakov makes this distinction between his pre and post Egyptian days, he goes off on a seemingly irrelevant tangent:

וַאֲנִ֣י ׀ בְּבֹאִ֣י מִפַּדָּ֗ן מֵ֩תָה֩ עָלַ֨י רָחֵ֜ל

As for me — when I came from Padan, Rachel died…

How did Rachel — and her tragic death on the road home — end up in this conversation? What does this have to do with Ephraim and Menashe being considered on par with their brothers?

And it’s not just that Yaakov notes that Rachel died, but he goes into great detail. He mentions that she died:

• In the land of Israel (בְּאֶ֤רֶץ כְּנַ֙עַן֙ )

• On the road (בַּדֶּ֔רֶךְ)

• Just a short distance from Beit Lechem/Efrat (בְּע֥וֹד כִּבְרַת־אֶ֖רֶץ לָבֹ֣א אֶפְרָ֑תָה)

And then he adds that he buried her:

• There (שָּׁם֙)

• On the road (בְּדֶ֣רֶךְ)

And then, as soon as he mentions Rachel he stops talking about her and returns his focus to Ephraim and Menashe.

In short, this tangent comes from nowhere and then goes nowhere.

And what makes this even stranger is that there actually was a time when this story about Rachel was completely relevant — namely, the previous time Yaakov and Yosef spoke.

Let us recall that Yosef is here now because he was told Yaakov is sick — presumably with the illness that will lead to his death. But earlier, before Yaakov became sick, when it was already clear that he was nearing the end of his life, Yaakov summoned Yosef himself.

And when he did, Yaakov made a request. “Please, Yosef. Take an oath that you will not bury me in the land of Egypt. Please, make sure I’m buried in Eretz Canaan”.

Now here is the key point — this point about Rachel dying makes perfect sense there — at that meeting when Yaakov requested that Yosef bury him in Eretz Yisrael. To see how, let’s return to Yaakov’s tangential statement about Rachel dying and read it through the eyes of Rashi.

According to Rashi, Yaakov is addressing an issue that exists between Yosef and Yaakov — and it relates to where Yaakov buried Rachel. Or, more importantly, where he did not bury her.

Let’s start with some geography. Rachel died in Beit Lechem/Efrat which is not so far from Me’erot HaMachpelah in Chevron (Hebron).

That is where Avraham and Sara are buried.
That is where Yitzchak and Rivka are buried.
That is where Leah is buried.

But it is not where Rachel is buried.
No, Rachel is buried on the road.

Or, put otherwise — no where.
Not in Me’erot HaMachpelah.
Not in Chevron.
Not even in Efrat (which is even closer).

What’s more — there was nothing that was stopping Yaakov from doing so. He had not debt to the people of Beit Lechem or Efrat and he had no enmity with them either. And the weather conditions were just fine.

It was not the rainy season when it was hard to travel.
Rather the dry season — when the roads were full of holes live a sieve.
That is what he means by כִּבְרַת־אֶ֖רֶץ.

In short, Yaakov did not put even the most minute amount of effort to give Rachel a proper burial. And yet, he is now asking Yosef to great lengths to bury Yaakov in Eretz Yisrael.

He’s asking him to take a long trip from Egypt to Chevron.
And yet Yaakov didn’t even take a short trip from Efrat to Chevron.

He’s asking him to politically and socially put himself on the line with Paro and the Egyptians.

The Egyptians, who welcomed Yaakov and his family into the land of Egypt.
Egypt, the land where Yaakov lived for 17 years.
Paro, who granted all the requests of Yaakov and the brothers.
Paro, who freed Yosef from jail and made him a viceroy over all of Egypt.

After all that, when all is said and done — Yaakov is going to clearly state that he does not want to be buried in Egypt.

It’s insulting.

And to add insult to injury, Yaakov himself isn’t even making the request. He is asking Yosef to do it.

To make the request.
And then to make the arrangements.
And then to go with Yaakov to Eretz Yisrael, bury him there — and then return.

And yet, Yaakov himself couldn’t even be bothered to travel a small distance when there was no political or social cost and give Rachel (Yosef’s mother) a proper burial.

This request — and its larger context — bothered Yosef. And Yaakov knew that. That is why he is mentioning what happened with Rachel. We just need to get the emphasis right:

וָאֶקְבְּרֶ֤הָ שָּׁם֙ בְּדֶ֣רֶךְ

I buried her there, on the road

That is to say — I purposely buried her there. Not because I didn’t care or want to bury her in Chevron — but because we (the Jewish people) need her (Rachel Imeinu) to be buried there, on the road:

“Know,” says Yaakov, “I purposely buried there because I know that in the future Nevuzaradan (the chief executioner of Nevuchadnezzar) will exile the Jewish people to Bavel (Babylonia).

“And I further know that when they are on their way to galus (exile), the Jewish people will pass on this road and this very spot. And when they do, Rachel will leave her grave, cry and request mercy on them.

“That is why I buried her there, on the road. Because we, the Jewish people, need her buried there.”

That, says Rashi, is what Yaakov is saying to Yosef in this tangential line. It’s a fine reading — and it would make perfect sense — in the other story. The one where Yaakov is talking to Yosef about where to bury him.

But that is not where it appears.

Instead (as I understand it), Yaakov purposely waits and relates this point to Yosef specifically when he is discussing elevating Ephraim and Menasheh to founding members of two of the twelve tribes of Israel.

But if so — why? It doesn’t seem to make any sense.

So now we have a set of questions.

• What is the connection between Yaakov coming to Egypt and whether or not Yosef’s sons are considered like Yaakov’s sons or not?

• Why didn’t Yaakov mention Rachel’s burial when he discussed being buried in Eretz Yisrael?

• Why did Yaakov mention her burial specifically when discussing the tribal status of Ephraim and Menashe?

What Does it Take to be a Tribe?

So let’s try to put all of this together.

I’m going to start with an assumption — to be one of the Twelve Tribes, you need to contribute something fundamentally unique to Am Yisrael.

Each shevet represents a distinct koach — a quality, a capability, a way of serving Hashem — that no other tribe has in quite the same way. It may overlap somewhat with others, but not to the same degree, not with the same depth, and not with the same clarity. And that koach has to be something that can be passed down, generation after generation, and serve the Jewish people as a whole.

That’s my starting point.

And based on that, I want to suggest that Ephraim and Manasseh possessed such a koach — something no other brother had, and something no other child of Yosef could have had.

And it’s something that Am Yisrael would desperately need throughout its history.

What was it?

The ability to stay Jewish — to stay connected to Am Yisrael, to HaKadosh Baruch Hu, to Torah — no matter the circumstances.

No matter where you are.
No matter how isolated you are from other Jews.
No matter how powerful the surrounding culture is.
No matter how attractive it is, or how overwhelming it is.

To still be in.

Nobody had that like Ephraim and Manasseh.
Not even Yosef himself.

Yosef grew up in Yaakov’s house.

He knew his mother. He lived with his brothers. As difficult as things were, he had a deep connection to the family, to its story, to its destiny. He knew who he was before he was ever alone.

But Ephraim and Manasseh? All they had was Yosef.

And Yosef was the viceroy of Egypt.

He dressed like an Egyptian. He spoke Egyptian. He lived Egyptian. Whatever happened inside the house, outside the house he was fully embedded in that world.

They had no Yaakov.
They had no uncles.
They had no extended family.
They had no Jewish society, no institutions, no community.

They were raised in the heart of Mitzrayim — completely assimilated — before Yaakov ever arrived.

And yet, they stayed connected.
They believed what Yaakov believed.
They identified with Am Yisrael.
They were worthy of the bracha: Yisimecha Elokim k’Ephraim v’chi’Menashe.

That koach belonged to them — and only to them.

And that’s why no later children of Yosef could qualify. Any children born after Yaakov arrived would grow up surrounded by Yaakov, by the brothers, by their families, by the emerging Jewish collective. They wouldn’t face the same test. They wouldn’t need to summon the same inner strength.

Ephraim and Manasseh did.

And Yaakov says: that is a tribe.
That is a foundational pillar of Am Yisrael.
That is a koach the Jewish people will need again and again.

The Connection to Rachel

Which brings us back to Rachel.

According to Rashi, what is Yaakov saying when he speaks about her burial? He’s describing a future moment when the Jewish people will be exiled — stripped of their land, their institutions, their sovereignty.

No Malchut.
No Nevi’im.
No Beis HaMikdash.
Surrounded by a foreign culture, on the road into galut.

And at that moment, they will need Rachel’s tefillos.

But I want to suggest something further.

The koach of Ephraim and Manasseh comes from Rachel herself.

Rachel embodied this idea before anyone else did. When she gave Leah the simanim, she didn’t know she would marry Yaakov a week later. For all she knew, that was it. She was giving up her place in the story. Her children. Her future.

And yet she did it anyway.

Not because it was easy.
Not because she didn’t care.
But because she was utterly loyal to Hashem’s ways, no matter the personal cost.

Then, later on — she has trouble having kids. Her sister has children. Her maidservant has children. But not her.

In short — Rachel knows what it is to want to be connected to Yaakov and the dream of the Jewish people. She has felt that longing — lived it.

It is that longing and that dedication which she passed on to Yosef and Yosef to Ephraim and Menashe.

And it was they (Ephraim and Menashe) who brought it to its ultimate fruition — who stayed connected with nothing but the idea of Yaakov.

So when Yaakov speaks about Rachel here, now it makes sense. He’s revealing the source of the koach he’s recognizing in Yosef’s sons. The same reason why I buried Rachel on the road is the reason why Ephraim and Menashe are going to be tribes in and of themselves.

And this, I think, is why Yaakov waited.

He waited for this moment so that the point he was making could fully crystallize for Yosef. Only now — when Yosef sees who his sons have become, and why they are worthy of being tribes — can he truly understand what his father is saying, and why his mother had to be buried on the road.

Yaakov’s Gift

And with this, we can also begin to see one of the unique kochos that Yaakov himself possessed — perhaps more than anyone else.

Yaakov had an extraordinary ability to understand what the foundational pillars of Am Yisrael needed to be. He could identify those kochos in each of his children — not just see them, but draw them out, strengthen them, and then weave them together into a single, unified nation.

That’s why Yaakov had the koach of brachos.

And that’s why he had the ability to extend the status of being a shevet even to his grandchildren.

Because it was never about biology alone. It wasn’t about whether someone was technically a son or a grandson of Yaakov. It was about whether they carried a koach that the nation he was building would need — a koach that could serve as a foundation for Am Yisrael going forward.

And if someone had that koach, Yaakov knew how to recognize it, how to validate it, and how to establish it as one of the fundamental building blocks of the Jewish people.

That’s what he did with Ephraim and Manasseh.

And later, when he blesses all of the tribes together, he does the same thing again. He helps each shevet understand what it uniquely contributes, what it may need to work on, or both — all in service of creating a nation that could endure, remain connected, and fulfill its role in history.

That was Yaakov’s greatness.
And that’s why the story unfolds exactly the way it does.

Know someone who would appreciate Masmid.org?
Please feel free to share it with them:

Share masmid

I find the name of this week’s Parsha quite interesting.

ויחי

And he lived…

If all we had to go on were this single word, we would naturally assume that one of the central themes of the parsha is life. And yet, embedded within this very word is an allusion to Yaakov’s death — as Rashi famously notes.

Rashi asks:

לָמָּה פָּרָשָׁה זוֹ סְתוּמָה?

Why is this Parsha “closed”?

And he answers:

לְפִי שֶׁכֵּיוָן שֶׁנִּפְטַר יַעֲקֹב אָבִינוּ נִסְתְּמוּ עֵינֵיהֶם וְלִבָּם שֶׁל יִשְׂרָאֵל מִצָּרַת הַשִּׁעְבּוּד, שֶׁהִתְחִילוּ לְשַׁעְבְּדָם:

Because once Yaakov Avinu passed away, the eyes and hearts of the Jewish people were closed from the pain and suffering of the subjugation of Egypt (for that is when they first started to enslave them).

At first glance, this Rashi is puzzling. What does it mean that the parsha is “closed”? And how is this closure connected to Yaakov’s death?

To understand Rashi’s comment, we need to pause and look not only at what the Torah says, but at how the words are written. That requires a brief visual detour.

Begin by noticing the places where a verse ends and the remainder of the line is left blank.

Just to be clear, I am referring to the areas highlighted in blue:

These spaces are known as a petuach (פתוחה) — literally an “open” space. The text stops before the end of the line and begins the next verse on the next line.

There is another kind of spacing used in a Sefer Torah known as a setumah (סתומה) — literally a “closed” space:

Here, the gap appears in the middle of a line and is surrounded by text on both sides and the next verse continues on the same line.

In practical terms, a petuach creates a full visual break, while a setumah creates a smaller pause within the flow of the text. That full visual break is called an “open” break, because the space is open on one side. An the smaller visual break is called “closed,” because that space is closed in an both sides by text.

In other words, these terms are named after their visual appearance.

Now, it is important to note that these spaces are the only intrinsic structural divisions found in a Sefer Torah. The chapter and verse numbers with which we are familiar are a much later development, introduced only several centuries ago.

Even the weekly parshiyot — Bereis***, Noach, Lech Lecha, and the rest — are not inherent to the Torah’s original structure. They were established by Chazal as part of the system of public Torah reading. Nevertheless, they are not arbitrary: Chazal consistently align the beginning of a new parsha with one of the Torah’s natural divisions — a petuach or a setumah.

In other words, there is always some sort of space or gap before the beginning of a new parsha — though not every gap signals the start of a new one.

There is, however, one exception.

Our parsha.

Parshas Vayechi begins with neither a petuach nor a setumah. Instead, it flows directly from the previous section, without any visible break at all.

And it is precisely this anomaly that Rashi (following Chazal) draws our attention to. Why does our parsha — uniquely — begin “closed”? And by “closed,” we mean as closed as possible: nothing more than the ordinary space that separates one word from the next. There is no smaller division in the Torah.

And yet, that minimal space — rather than the expected gap of nine letters or a new line — is what marks the transition from the last section of the Torah to the one we are about to read.

And we should make no mistakes — this clearly seems to be a new section. For starters, Chazal clearly understood it as such, or they would not have begun a new parsha here. And the narrative itself (once again) show us that Chazal were on to something.

We have just concluded the account of Yosef sustaining Egypt during the years of famine. With the words Vayechi Yaakov, we enter an entirely new story. Under ordinary circumstances, one would reasonably expect these narratives to be separated by either a setumah or a petuach.

But that separation never comes.

Intellectually, we see the break.
Visually, it does not appear.

Rashi explains that this absence is intentional — a purposeful stylistic choice meant to convey a deeper idea. Here, the Torah communicates through art, using an unexpected departure from the norm to seize our attention and invite us to look more closely.

In music, it is the unexpected chord change.
In painting, it is the unexpected figure.
In literature, it is the unexpected plot twist.

And in the Torah, it is the unexpected structure.

We instinctively expect a gap here — and yet there is none. Why not? Because, says Rashi, Yaakov is about to die. And with his passing, the subjugation of the Jewish people will already begin.

That reality lies just beneath the surface of the opening narrative of our parsha, as we shall soon see. For our purposes here, it is enough to observe that the Torah is hinting at Yaakov’s impending death through the artistic use of structural form.

And if we wish to appreciate the Torah’s full artistic mastery, we need only notice that this closed structure is layered upon a word that means life. It is a striking union of ironic contrast and deliberate form — meaning conveyed not only by what the Torah says, but by how it is written.

But the hints do not end there.

The Torah tells us that Yaakov lived in Egypt for seventeen years — a detail that subtly points us forward, for we know what follows those years: Yaakov’s death.

And lest we miss the point, the verse concludes:

וַיְהִ֤י יְמֵֽי־יַעֲקֹב֙ שְׁנֵ֣י חַיָּ֔יו שֶׁ֣בַע שָׁנִ֔ים וְאַרְבָּעִ֥ים וּמְאַ֖ת שָׁנָֽה

…and the days of Yaakov’s life were seven years and forty and one hundred years

In short, while the name of our parsha speaks of life, both the structure and substance of its opening verse quietly but unmistakably point toward death.

It’s Not Just the First Line

At this point, we have a hypothesis: a parsha named after Yaakov living which seems to be preoccupied with Yaakov dying. And no sooner do we formulate this hypothesis than the Torah seems to confirm it.

The very next verse reads:

וַיִּקְרְב֣וּ יְמֵֽי־יִשְׂרָאֵל֮ לָמוּת֒

And the days of Israel drew near to die…

Yaakov is nearing the end of his life — and he knows it. He therefore summons Yosef and requests that, after his passing, Yosef bury him in the family burial place, the Me’arat HaMachpelah, in the land of Israel.

This, strikingly, is the first subject of our parsha: Yaakov’s impending death and burial.

Let us move to the next narrative.

וַיְהִ֗י אַחֲרֵי֙ הַדְּבָרִ֣ים הָאֵ֔לֶּה וַיֹּ֣אמֶר לְיוֹסֵ֔ף הִנֵּ֥ה אָבִ֖יךָ חֹלֶ֑ה

And it came to be after these things that Yosef was told that his father was sick…

Here, Yaakov appears to move even closer to death. He is elderly, already contemplating his burial — and now he is ill, presumably with the sickness that will end his life.

This time, Yosef takes the initiative. He brings his two sons, Ephraim and Menashe, to receive a blessing from their grandfather. On the surface, this narrative seems to have little to do with death at all.

And then — the unexpected.

Without warning, Yaakov begins speaking about the death of Rachel. He recalls how she died on the road, on the way to Efrat, and how that is where he buried her.

The remark is jarring. It appears entirely out of place — and that very dissonance urges us to probe more deeply. If Yaakov wished to discuss burial, surely the appropriate moment was earlier, when he was speaking explicitly about his own burial. Why introduce Rachel’s death here, in the midst of blessing Ephraim and Menashe?

The narrative then resumes — but notice how it does so:

וְעֵינֵ֤י יִשְׂרָאֵל֙ כָּבְד֣וּ מִזֹּ֔קֶן לֹ֥א יוּכַ֖ל לִרְא֑וֹת

And the eyes of Yaakov were heavy from old age, he could not see…

Yaakov is blind.

And here Chazal make a striking observation. They teach:

וְתַנְיָא, אַרְבָּעָה חֲשׁוּבִין מֵת: עָנִי, וּמְצוֹרָע, וְסוֹמֵא, וּמִי שֶׁאֵין לוֹ בָּנִים

It is taught [in a braisa]: Four are considered as if they were dead:

— A poor person
— A leper
— A blind person
— One who has no children

Blindness, in the language of Chazal, is already a kind of death.

Is this yet another quiet signal pointing us in the same direction?

Finally, after Yaakov blesses Ephraim and Menashe, he turns to Yosef with one last message. He promises him an additional portion in the land of Israel. And notice how Yaakov introduces this gift:

וַיֹּ֤אמֶר יִשְׂרָאֵל֙ אֶל־יוֹסֵ֔ף הִנֵּ֥ה אָנֹכִ֖י מֵ֑ת וְהָיָ֤ה אֱלֹהִים֙ עִמָּכֶ֔ם וְהֵשִׁ֣יב אֶתְכֶ֔ם אֶל־אֶ֖רֶץ אֲבֹתֵיכֶֽם׃

And Yisrael said to Yosef: take note — I am going to die and Elokim will be with all of you and will return all of you to the land of your forefathers.

Once again, death is brought into the conversation.

Yaakov’s Final Moment

We now arrive at the end — the final moments of Yaakov’s life — when he gathers his sons to bless them. The blessings themselves are a world unto their own. For our purposes here, however, we want to focus on what frames those blessings.

They begin with a summons — just as earlier Yaakov summoned Yosef.

וַיִּקְרְב֣וּ יְמֵֽי־יִשְׂרָאֵל֮ לָמוּת֒ וַיִּקְרָ֣א ׀ לִבְנ֣וֹ לְיוֹסֵ֗ף

And the days of Israel drew near to die and he summoned his son, Yosef and he said to him…

And again:

וַיִּקְרָ֥א יַעֲקֹ֖ב אֶל־בָּנָ֑יו וַיֹּ֗אמֶר

And Yaakov summoned his sons, and he said…

The blessings then conclude with a command — that after his passing, his sons bury him in the family burial place, the Me’arat HaMachpelah, in the land of Israel.

וַיְצַ֣ו אוֹתָ֗ם וַיֹּ֤אמֶר אֲלֵהֶם֙
אֲנִי֙ נֶאֱסָ֣ף אֶל־עַמִּ֔י
קִבְר֥וּ אֹתִ֖י אֶל־אֲבֹתָ֑י
אֶ֨ל־הַמְּעָרָ֔ה אֲשֶׁ֥ר בִּשְׂדֵ֖ה עֶפְר֥וֹן הַֽחִתִּֽי׃

בַּמְּעָרָ֞ה אֲשֶׁ֨ר בִּשְׂדֵ֧ה הַמַּכְפֵּלָ֛ה
אֲשֶׁ֥ר עַל־פְּנֵי־מַמְרֵ֖א
בְּאֶ֣רֶץ כְּנָ֑עַן
אֲשֶׁר֩ קָנָ֨ה אַבְרָהָ֜ם אֶת־הַשָּׂדֶ֗ה מֵאֵ֛ת עֶפְרֹ֥ן הַחִתִּ֖י לַאֲחֻזַּת־קָֽבֶר׃

שָׁ֣מָּה קָֽבְר֞וּ אֶת־אַבְרָהָ֗ם וְאֵת֙ שָׂרָ֣ה אִשְׁתּ֔וֹ
שָׁ֚מָּה קָבְר֣וּ אֶת־יִצְחָ֔ק וְאֵ֖ת רִבְקָ֣ה אִשְׁתּ֑וֹ
וְשָׁ֥מָּה קָבַ֖רְתִּי אֶת־לֵאָֽה׃

מִקְנֵ֧ה הַשָּׂדֶ֛ה וְהַמְּעָרָ֥ה אֲשֶׁר־בּ֖וֹ
מֵאֵ֥ת בְּנֵי־חֵֽת

Then he instructed them, saying to them:
I am about to be gathered to my people.
Bury me with my fathers
in the cave which is in the field of Ephron the Hittite,

the cave which is in the field of Machpelah,
which faces Mamre,
in the land of Canaan,
the field that Avraham bought from Ephron the Hittite for a burial site

there they buried Avraham and his wife Sarah;
there they buried Yitzchak and his wife Rivka;
and there I buried Leah

the field and the cave in it,
bought from the Hittites.

Just like he asked Yosef:

וַיֹּ֤אמֶר לוֹ֙
אִם־נָ֨א מָצָ֤אתִי חֵן֙ בְּעֵינֶ֔יךָ
שִֽׂים־נָ֥א יָדְךָ֖ תַּ֣חַת יְרֵכִ֑י
וְעָשִׂ֤יתָ עִמָּדִי֙ חֶ֣סֶד וֶאֱמֶ֔ת
אַל־נָ֥א תִקְבְּרֵ֖נִי בְּמִצְרָֽיִם׃

וְשָֽׁכַבְתִּי֙ עִם־אֲבֹתַ֔י
וּנְשָׂאתַ֙נִי֙ מִמִּצְרַ֔יִם
וּקְבַרְתַּ֖נִי בִּקְבֻרָתָ֑ם

And he said to him,
If (please) I have found favor in your eyes
Please place your hand under my thigh
And do with me kindness and truth
please do not bury me in Egypt

When I lie with my fathers
carry me up from Egypt
And bury me in their burial plot

When it is all said and done — Yaakov has one request for after he passes away — bury me in Eretz Yisrael, in the burial plot that Avraham bought, where they, their wives and Leah are all buried. He makes that request when he is nearing death to Yosef. And he makes that request moments right before he actually passes away.

And when all is said and done — Yaakov has one gift to give — his berachos. He gives them to Ephraim and Menashe when he gets sick (again, presumably with the ailment that will claim his life) and he gives them to the rest of his sons moments before he passes away.

This, then, is the substance of our parsha so far.

Yaakov is dying.
He makes his last request — to be buried in Eretz Yisrael.
He gives his last gift — the berachos.

And yet all of this is introduced by with the phrase And Yaakov lived.

We are back, again, to the unexpected. Which means that we are being urged to dig deeper.

After Yaakov Dies

But we aren’t quite done yet.

Yaakov has died — and with that comes a question. What now?

Yosef cries and gives him a kiss.

Yosef honors his father’s request - the brothers his command.
They bury him in Me’arat HaMachpelah, in Eretz Yisrael.

So far, everything seems standard.

But now Yaakov is truly gone.
He’s passed away and been buried.
And Yosef is in charge.
And the brothers sold him as a slave many years ago.

Now what?
What will Yosef do?

We don’t know — and Yaakov did not leave any commands or requests here.

Or did he?

The brothers claim that such a request was made — but that doesn’t seem likely (as Rashi notes).

So here is the first big, post Yaakov test.
If Yosef wishes, he can take revenge.
And if he did?
The end of the berachos.
Perhaps the end of Am Yisrael.

But Yosef does not take revenge.
Instead, he acts like…

Yaakov.

He reassures his brothers.
He speaks to their hearts.
He offers the type of beracha that he can offer — physical sustenance.

And with this, we see a transition.

A while back we had a Parsha called VaYeishiv (וישב) — where we were told that Yaakov dwelt in the land of Canaan.
And now — we are told that Yosef dwelt (וישב) in the land of Egypt.

At the beginning of this Parsha we were told that Yaakov lived (ויחי)
And now we are told that Yosef lived (ויחי)

When Yaakov reached the end of his days, he requested/commanded that his sons take him out of Egypt and bury him in the land of Israel — he even had Yosef take an oath to such effect.
And now — Yosef requests of the brothers that they take his bones from Egypt (and bury them in Eretz Yisrael). Not now — but when the redemption comes. He even has them take an oath to such an effect.

And then — Yosef dies.
And he is placed in a coffin.

And thus ends Sefer Bereishis — with darkness and death.

Or did it.

Yaakov Lives

We are told that Yaakov lived in Egypt for 17 years.

What does it mean to live?

For much of Yaakov’s life Yaakov responded to and dealt with the challenges facing him.

He dealt with the dangers posed by Esav.
He dealt with the manipulations of Lavan.
He dealt with the sibling rivalry of the brothers.

Over and over again he responded to the challenges that he faced.

But in Egypt — he lived. Here, he is in control. He is living as he dies.

He knows that the subjugation is coming — but he will not give into that. He will be buried in Eretz Yisrael. He does everything in his power to assure that.

He knows that there will be a redemption — and a Jewish nation. And he helps set that up with his berachos.

Yaakov is acting, taking the initiative to help pave the future for after he is gone. He will not be physically around, but the life he lives now (in these seventeen years) will live on in the future.

And the first sign of that is Yosef.

Yosef picks up the mantle.

He gives berachos of his own.

He knows that the subjugation will come to a close.

He himself does everything in his power to assure that that will happen.

And then he passes away as Yaakov did.

And the story (and the sefer) end in death and darkness, not because that is the essence of this story (or this sefer) — but because it is the backdrop for the light that is about to shine forth in the chapters to come.

And indeed, that light starts in the very first line of the very next Sefer: These are the names of the sons of Yaakov:

Yaakov lives.

Know someone who would appreciate Masmid.org?
Please feel free to share it with them:

Share masmid

This week, I want to try something a little different.

I’m not starting with a question, and I’m not starting with a thesis. I just want to read a particular story in this week’s Parsha — the confrontation, if that’s the right word, between Yehuda and Yosef — and see what it reveals.

Because even before we begin, it’s clear that something profound is happening here.

What we are witnessing is the meeting of two power structures within the Jewish family.

On one side stands Yehuda.

Yehuda — the one who suggested that they sell Yosef as a slave.
Yehuda — the one who admitted that Tamar was right.
Yehuda — the one who gained Yaakov’s trust.

On the other side stands Yosef.

Yosef — the one who carries Yaakov’s love.
Yosef — the master of the dreams.
Yosef — the viceroy of Egypt who is carefully orchestrating events from behind the scenes.

And now these two forces finally meet.

And already I have a question. Now that Yehuda has stepped up, has Yosef lost some of his control? Is he still orchestrating events like he used to?

And I also have my first thought — this story is not foreign to the Jewish people.

This may be the first time a Jew stands before someone far more powerful, but it is certainly not the last. We will see it again with Moshe and Pharaoh, and again throughout Jewish history, in moments when we are David facing a contemporary Goliath.

In that sense, Yehuda — the progenitor of David — is already playing that role here. Yosef is not a villain, but he is the power structure. He has authority and control that Yehuda does not.

And yet Yehuda steps forward anyway.

That negishah is familiar to us: the willingness to confront power, not because the odds are equal, but because the cause is just.

Setting the Stage: Yosef in Control

So let’s begin — though not at the beginning of our parsha. For me, the real beginning is at the end of last week’s.

Up until this point, Yosef is still the conductor. He is orchestrating every move. And now he arranges matters so that Binyamin will be found guilty.

They catch up to the brothers. Everyone rushes to take down their bags and open them. The search begins, starting with the oldest and moving down the line. One by one, each bag is opened. Nothing. Ten brothers are found completely innocent.

And then, at the very end, the cup is found in Binyamin’s bag.

That detail matters. It’s not just that Binyamin is found guilty — it’s that everyone else is explicitly discovered to be innocent, and therefore free to go.

The Offer — and the Trap

Look carefully at the conversation before the search even begins. Yosef tells his servant exactly what to say: Why are you repaying good with evil? We treated you well — is this how you repay us?

The brothers respond with complete confidence. Whoever the cup is found with should die, and the rest of us will be slaves. They are certain of their innocence — because they are innocent. They don’t yet realize they are being set up.

Yosef then changes the terms.

No. The one the cup is found with will be my slave. The rest of you will go free.

The brothers had offered collective responsibility: if one of us is guilty, we are all guilty. Yosef rejects that. Only the guilty party. Everyone else walks.

And that is exactly what happens.

They find the cup in Binyamin’s bag. The brothers tear their garments. And they return to the city.

Yehuda Steps Forward

And now the focus shifts.

Until this point, the brothers act as a single unit. They speak together. They respond together. But now the Torah singles someone out.

Yehuda and his brothers come back to Yosef’s house. They bow before him. Yosef repeats his accusation.

And Yehuda speaks.

“What can we say to my lord? How can we justify ourselves? God has found the sin of your servants.”

He is not admitting guilt for the cup. He is saying something deeper: God is involved here. This is bigger than the moment. And then he says it clearly: We are all your slaves — both us and the one the cup was found with.

No separation. No leaving anyone behind.

But Yosef still insists on control.

“Far be it from me to do that. The one the cup is found with will be my slave. You — go back in peace to your father.”

They are free to leave. No one is stopping them. Everything has been arranged so that they should go — and leave Binyamin behind.

And then comes the turning point.

Vayigash elav Yehuda.

Yehuda approaches.

He was already speaking. But this is different. This is not just conversation. This is movement. Drawing closer. Stepping forward.

Whatever vayigash means precisely, one thing is clear: Yehuda is no longer simply responding to Yosef’s orchestration.

He is stepping up.

And the confrontation is about to begin.

What Kind of Approach Is This?

So what exactly is this negishah?

On the one hand, it is clearly assertive. Yehuda is stepping forward. There is courage here, inner strength, even a kind of daring. This is not the posture of someone retreating.

And yet, listen carefully to how he speaks.

“Bi adoni… please, my lord.
Let your servant speak in my lord’s ears.
Please do not be angry with your servant — for you are like Pharaoh.”

The language is deferential. Soft. Careful. Almost the opposite of confrontation.

So which is it?

Strength Within the Structure

The answer is that Yehuda is operating inside a political and diplomatic reality that he cannot ignore. He knows exactly who holds power here — and he speaks accordingly. Not because he is weak, and not because he is afraid, but because he understands that access itself is not guaranteed. It is not obvious that he will even be allowed to speak.

The supplication is not surrender. It is strategy.

By fully acknowledging Yosef’s power — “you are like Pharaoh” — Yehuda creates room for himself. He recognizes Yosef’s authority in order to engage it, not to deny it. And in doing so, he subtly boxes Yosef in. Once Yosef is acknowledged as absolute power, there is a political and moral cost to shutting Yehuda down.

He speaks softly, but he steps forward.
He lowers himself in language, but advances in action.

By admitting his relative weakness, he gains relative strength.

Why Tell a Story Yosef Already Knows?

Why is Yehuda telling a story that Yosef already knows?

And once we ask that, the deeper question follows: why tell it at all?

To answer that, we have to understand Yehuda’s endgame.

Yehuda is moving toward a very specific offer: that he, Yehuda, be taken as a slave instead of Binyamin. And more than that, he is going to argue why Yosef should accept that deal.

Before we go further, we should pause and notice something important. Did Yehuda have to make this offer at all?

Could he have argued legally?
Could he have appealed to justice?
Could he have insisted on Binyamin’s innocence?
Could he have made some other claim that would allow Binyamin to go free without Yehuda offering himself up as a slave?

Perhaps. But Yehuda does not try any of those arguments. And that choice itself is telling. It suggests that, in Yehuda’s assessment, none of those paths were likely to succeed.

So he accepts the reality: Yosef wants a slave. If Binyamin goes free, someone else must take his place. And Yehuda understands that someone else has to be him.

Why him? We’ll get there.

But once that is clear, another question emerges. Why make this argument? Why not argue self-interest? Why not say: I’m older, stronger, more experienced, more useful. Take me — I’ll be the better slave.

He doesn’t say that.

Instead, Yehuda tells a human story. He speaks about his father. About emotional dependence. About what it will mean if Binyamin does not come home.

Why?

For one of two reasons — and likely both.

First, because Yehuda believes that compassion is the strongest appeal available to him. He assumes that even the viceroy of Egypt, operating within power and authority, is still capable of being moved by human suffering.

But second — and this is just as important — Yehuda is explaining himself.

Who offers to be a slave for the rest of his life in Egypt? Yosef needs to understand Yehuda’s motivation. Yehuda is saying: I am not acting irrationally. I am acting out of responsibility and compassion. I cannot live with myself if I do not do everything in my power to bring Binyamin home.

And that brings us to the idea of collateral.

Yehuda explains that he made himself the arev — the guarantor — for Binyamin. Binyamin was, in effect, loaned to the brothers by their father, and Yehuda pledged himself as the collateral.

Collateral exists to guarantee repayment. If the loan cannot be repaid, the collateral is taken instead.

But here Yehuda does something subtle. He uses the collateral to ensure the loan is repaid.

I am the collateral, he is saying. Take me — so that the loaned son can be returned to his father.

Put together, Yehuda’s appeal has two layers.

One is inward: this is why I must make this offer.
The other is outward: perhaps you, too, can act with compassion.

Just as I am willing to give up the rest of my life so that my father does not go down to the grave in agony, perhaps you can give up this slave and accept another in his place — out of compassion for an old man you have never met, but whose suffering you can still recognize.

Yosef Breaks — and Why

And now we come to the response.

Yosef breaks down. Yehuda has won. The orchestration is over.

At this point, it’s worth pausing to notice how this happened.

Yehuda did not know who he was dealing with. He did not understand the larger picture. He did not know that Yosef was his brother, or that this entire encounter had been carefully engineered from the beginning.

And yet, he did one crucial thing — one move that set off a cascade of consequences.

He stopped reacting.

Until this moment, Yosef had been in complete control. He set the terms, and the brothers responded. They explained. They defended themselves. They complied. They went down to Egypt. They brought Binyamin because Yosef demanded it. Everything they did was reactive.

But here, something changes.

Because Yehuda made himself an arev. Because he bound himself fully to the responsibility of bringing Binyamin home — not as a tactic, but as a genuine commitment — he breaks the pattern.

He takes initiative.

Not initiative for its own sake, and not as a power play. Initiative that grows directly out of responsibility he accepted before he ever returned to Egypt.

And that is the moment Yosef loses control.

Because once Yehuda was acting honestly and independently, Yosef's ability to control events had ended. And Yehuda's ability to influence them had begun.

A First Reading

That’s my initial reading of this story.

I haven’t looked at the mefarshim this time around. I had the impulse to, but I’ll admit — I’m comfortable with where this landed. For now, I’m going to share it as is.

I’d love to hear any thoughts, questions, or ideas you’d like to add.

Good Shabbos.

Know someone who would appreciate Masmid.org?
Please feel free to share it with them:

Share masmid

The brothers have come back from Egypt, but the famine isn’t over. What’s more, Shimon is still there. So they will have to return again.

But there is a two-part problem.

Part #1 is that the viceroy of Egypt has made it clear that without Binyamin, they will neither receive food nor have Shimon released.

Part #2 is that Yaakov does not want to send Binyamin.

But the brothers see a solution — convince Yaakov to send Binyamin with them. But that is easier said than done.

The brothers make an attempt and it doesn’t go well.
Reuven makes an attempt, and Yaakov rejects it.
Yehuda makes an attempt, and Yaakov accepts it.

The question is: why?

What is it about Yehuda’s approach that Yaakov accepts, and about Reuven’s (and the brothers) that he rejects?

Hearing the Story as Yaakov Hears It

As we noted, the brothers have returned. And they immediately set about telling Yaakov their version of what happened to them in Egypt.

They note that the lord of the land spoke harshly to them.
They note that he accused them of being spies.
They note that he forced them to leave Shimon with him.
They note that he insists that they come back with Binyamin.
And they note that if they do not come back with Binyamin then:
— They will not be able to buy any more food and
— Shimon will not be released

Soon after, the brothers open their bags and discover that the money they had taken to buy food is right there. This is strange.

They had received all the food.
They know they gave them this money.
And yet, here it is, sitting in their bags.

They all see this — and they are all afraid.

Yaakov Speaks

Now, ask yourself — what do you think is going through Yaakov’s mind right now?

Yaakov has just seen & heard that:

• the ruler of Egypt spoke harshly with them

• accused them of being spies

• is holding one of his sons ransom

• demands that they bring Binyamin

• all their money has mysteriously been returned

Is Yaakov thinking, “yes, of course, let’s send Binyamin so we can get Shimon back”?

Or is he thinking that something sounds off here — and is he remembering that this is not the first time that the brothers have come back, with one of them missing?

If we have any doubts, Yaakov himself puts them to rest. Let us listen to his response:

אֹתִ֖י שִׁכַּלְתֶּ֑ם

יוֹסֵ֤ף אֵינֶ֙נּוּ֙
וְשִׁמְע֣וֹן אֵינֶ֔נּוּ
וְאֶת־בִּנְיָמִ֣ן תִּקָּ֔חוּ

עָלַ֖י הָי֥וּ כֻלָּֽנָה

Me, you have bereaved

Yosef is no more.
Shimon is no more.
And Binyamin — you will take

Upon Me has happened all of this

Do you hear the pain?
Do you hear the accusation?

Me, you have bereaved.
Not, you have bereaved me.

Me, you have bereaved.
Not, I am bereaved.

In short: I have suffered. You have caused it.

I sent Yosef to you — when you were in Shechem. And all that came back was a bloody jacket.

I sent Shimon with you — to Egypt. And all that came back was a story.

And now — you want to take Binyamin with you to Egypt?

Rachel, the Brothers & the Road

Let’s return to Yaakov’s mind and journey with him back in time. He is in Aram — and he meets Rachel for the first time.

He gives here a kiss — an act of love.
And he cries — an act of pain.

This is the story of Yaakov and Rachel — loved combined with pain.

He works for her seven years — but then is deceived.
He finally marries Rachel — but she doesn’t have children.
She finally has children — but then dies on the road home.
Her oldest son grows up — but is killed (Yaakov is told) on the road to Shechem.

This is Yaakov’s experience with Rachel — a story of never ending love and hope clashing with never ending loss and disappointment.

And now — all that is left of this love and hope is Binyamin. And he is being sent back on the road.

The road — where Rachel died.
The road — where Yosef died.

But it’s worse than that — it’s not simply that Rachel’s son (the son of her pain) is going on the road, but it’s that the brothers are the ones to take him.

The brothers — who were on the road when Yosef died.
The brothers — who were on the road when Shimon never returned.

These brothers want to take yet another one of Rachel’s son on the road.
Yaakov knows this road. It is the road of loss and disappointment.

And Yaakov is dead set against letting Binyamin travel down that road. That, indeed, is why Yaakov didn’t let Binyamin go with the brothers in the first place:

וְאֶת־בִּנְיָמִין֙ אֲחִ֣י יוֹסֵ֔ף לֹא־שָׁלַ֥ח יַעֲקֹ֖ב אֶת־אֶחָ֑יו כִּ֣י אָמַ֔ר פֶּן־יִקְרָאֶ֖נּוּ אָסֽוֹן׃

As for Binyamin — the brother of Yosef — Yaakov didn’t send him.
For he said: lest an ason (אסון) happen to him.

It’s all right here in this verse. Yaakov will not send Binyamin (Yosef’s brother) with the other brothers, on the road lest there is an ason (אסון).

In other words, we can sum up everything we have said up until now in a simple equation:

Rachel + Road = ason

It’s an interesting word ason — we will meet it again in Sefer Shemos. There, we will hear about two men who are fighting. One of them attempts to hit the other, but misses. Instead, he strikes a pregnant women. And there is an ason — she loses the child.

Does this sound familiar — losing one’s child?

Me, you have bereaved

Yosef is no more.
Shimon is no more.

And does fighting sound familiar?

• וַיָּבֵ֥א יוֹסֵ֛ף אֶת־דִּבָּתָ֥ם רָעָ֖ה אֶל־אֲבִיהֶֽם׃
  And Joseph brought bad reports of them to their father.

• וַֽיִּשְׂנְא֖וּ אֹת֑וֹ וְלֹ֥א יָכְל֖וּ דַּבְּר֥וֹ לְשָׁלֹֽם׃

  … and they hated him and could not speak a friendly word to him.

• וַיּוֹסִ֤פוּ עוֹד֙ שְׂנֹ֣א אֹת֔וֹ

  And they hated him even more for his talk about his dreams.

• וַיְקַנְאוּ־ב֖וֹ אֶחָ֑יו

  So his brothers were jealous up at him…

It’s all there.

The bad reports.
The hatred.
The inability to speak peacefully with him.
The jealousy.

This is fighting — just not with fists.

Of course, one could argue that this was Yosef. Binyamin may be different.

He didn’t have a special coat.
He didn’t tell their father the problematic things they were doing.
He didn’t have any dreams.

But that would miss the point.

The source of the fighting wasn’t Yosef or how Yaakov related to Yosef. It was about how the brothers related to and interpreted the actions of Yaakov & Yosef.

If the brothers had been different, then no matter how they felt about what happened, they would have been able to deal with it without the hatred and jealousy.

But they weren’t different. Rather, they were fighters who got caught up in a battle — and the end result was ason.

And so, when it came time to go to Mitzrayim Yaakov said that he could not send Binyamin. The brothers are still the brothers. For all their wonderful qualities, they have not (yet) left behind the fights. Which means that I have to worry about an ason — particularly when it comes to Binyamin.

Reuven’s Offer

All of that was before the brothers went to Mitzrayim. Now, matters are worse.

Now you tell me that the leader of the land speaks to you harshly — reminds me of how you couldn’t speak peacefully to Yosef.

Now you tell me that he suspects you of being spies — reminds me of how you thought Yosef was spying on you.

Now you tell me that Shimon is gone — reminds me of how Yosef is gone.

And with all of this, you now want me to send Binyamin:

• The son of Rachel

• The brother of Yosef

• On the road

• With all of you

And yet, Yaakov has still not said no. He is in agony, he doesn’t want to do send him. But he hasn’t flat out rejected the idea yet.

And so, in steps Reuven.

Reuven understands that he needs to reassure Yaakov that he can protect Binyamin and bring him home. And he gives it his best shot:

אֶת־שְׁנֵ֤י בָנַי֙ תָּמִ֔ית אִם־לֹ֥א אֲבִיאֶ֖נּוּ אֵלֶ֑יךָ

You can kill my two sons if I don’t bring Binyamin back to you

Is this what you expected? Is this the approach you would have taken? I imagine not.

After all — what a jolting, disturbing statement! Indeed, we wonder — does Reuven mean this literally? Is he literally offering to murder his two sons if he does not succeed?

Beyond it’s shock value — we have another problem with Reuven’s statement. Why two sons? After all, Reuven has four sons — why not all four? Alternatively, why not offer only one son — parallel to Binyamin?

What is so special about the number two?

My guess — it is a reference to Shimon & Binyamin (the two sons whose lives are at risk right now). And the one I read it, Reuven is offering to join Yaakov in his pain. He is saying:

I understand your fear of loss.
I am willing to experience the same loss if I fail.
I will vicariously put myself in your shoes.

Your pain will be my pain.
Your fear will be my fear.

As such, I will guard Binyamin as you would guard him.
I will be your stand-in.

This is a powerful offer. It’s deep. It’s empathetic. It shows profound understanding.

And yet Yaakov still says no.

And when Yaakov says no, he does something strange. He does not respond to Reuven as an individual. Rather, he responds to the brothers as a group:

וַיֹּ֕אמֶר לֹֽא־יֵרֵ֥ד בְּנִ֖י עִמָּכֶ֑ם

And he said; Binyamin will not go with all of you

And so, we wonder:

• Why does Reuven’s answer not speak to him?
  It’s so personal and caring.
  And it relates directly to Yaakov’s pain.

• And why does Yaakov reject Reuven’s offer by addressing the brothers as a whole rather than Reuven himself?

Yaakov’s Response Reconsidered

Let’s take a closer look at Yaakov’s response.

וַיֹּ֕אמֶר
לֹֽא־יֵרֵ֥ד בְּנִ֖י עִמָּכֶ֑ם
כִּֽי־אָחִ֨יו מֵ֜ת
וְה֧וּא לְבַדּ֣וֹ נִשְׁאָ֗ר
וּקְרָאָ֤הוּ אָסוֹן֙ בַּדֶּ֙רֶךְ֙ אֲשֶׁ֣ר תֵּֽלְכוּ־בָ֔הּ

And he said:
Binyamin will not go with all of you

Because his brother is dead
And he alone remains

And an ason will happen to him on the road that you are walking on

Yaakov doesn’t just tell the group that he will not send Binyamin with them, but he explains why.

One: the stakes are high. He is the only living descendant of Rachel, since his brother (Yosef) is dead. If I lose him, then — in essence — I have totally lost Rachel.

Two: the chance of failure is high. Given the road all of you are taking, an ason is likely.

In this one line of Yaakov, everything finally comes together:

• Rachel

• Yosef

• Death

• Ason

• The brothers

And — of course — the road. Indeed, it is the road that gets special emphasis: the road that you are walking on. We can understand that line in two ways:

• The literal road that they are traveling on

• The way that they travel (through life)

Both readings fit into the same phrase — because both factors are at play.

Traveling carries with it certain dangers. The heat, the cold, the wild animals, the bandits and thieves.

But those dangers one can deal with — if they know how to travel. What truly worries Yaakov is not the dangers of the road, but rather how the brothers travel down those dangerous roads.

It’s their conduct, their attitudes, their approach. That is what makes the road so dangerous — and that is why Yaakov can’t send Binyamin with the brothers. Because the way they travel the chances of an ason too high.

A modern day example may help.

There is an inherent danger driving a car. Accidents happen — indeed they happen all the time. And yet, we get in cars day-in and day-out.

But take a reckless driver. Someone who drives too fast, weaves in and out of traffic, texts while driving — maybe even has a drink or two. He gets into an accident — and can explain it. The other guy ran a red light.

It’s true.

Then he gets into another accident. It’s not my fault — the other guy turned left without signaling.

Again — it’s true.

But it’s not the whole truth. People run red lights — it’s terrible. They turn left when they shouldn’t — also bad. But if you are paying attention and aren’t driving too fast — well, then that accident may not happen.

But if you keep driving the way you do — you and the other drivers who run red lights will find a way to meet up. And then, they’ll be an ason.

And so, Yaakov says to Reuven — your offer is beautiful. But it doesn’t address the core problem. The issue isn’t that I need a surrogate to go in my place and love Binyamin as I would.

Love is not the issue.

My love wasn’t enough to save Rachel.
My love wasn’t enough to save Yosef.
And it won’t be enough to save Binyamin.

No — the problem is not love. It is rather how all of you walk down the paths of life and relate to each other. That is what has to change — and that has not changed yet.

Yehuda’s Offer

So, it’s been settled. Binyamin is not going — and therefore the brothers are not going — and therefore Shimon is not coming home.

But the famine is not going away. Indeed, it’s as strong as ever. And the need to return to Mitzrayim is stronger than ever. And still, Yaakov won’t send Binyamin.

And it is here that Yehuda steps up. He makes his offer — and this is the one that Yaakov will accept. Yehuda starts by emphasizing the desperation of their situation. But he doesn’t end there — desperation in and of itself is not enough to convince Yaakov to entrust the brothers with Binyamin.

So Yehuda continues:

אָֽנֹכִי֙ אֶֽעֶרְבֶ֔נּוּ
מִיָּדִ֖י תְּבַקְשֶׁ֑נּוּ
אִם־לֹ֨א הֲבִיאֹתִ֤יו אֵלֶ֙יךָ֙ וְהִצַּגְתִּ֣יו לְפָנֶ֔יךָ
וְחָטָ֥אתִֽי לְךָ֖ כׇּל־הַיָּמִֽים

I will be an arev for him.
From my hand you can request him
If I do not bring to you and place him before you
Then I will have wronged you for all of my days

There is something different in this speech — something that will finally touch Yaakov. We’ll take it step-by-step.

אָֽנֹכִי֙ אֶֽעֶרְבֶ֔נּוּ

I will be an arev for him.

Once again, we hit upon a word whose meaning holds the key to our understanding. And once again, we’ll look throughout the pages of Tanach to get a sense of what it means.

Interestingly enough, the story we need to turn to still involves Yehuda — it’s the story of Yehuda and Tamar.

Yehuda at this point in time has “gone down” from his brothers — and has suffered personal tragedy. Two of his sons have died. His wife has died.

And he is on the road (how interesting) and sees a women whom he believes to be a prostitute. Alone, mourning & vulnerable — he makes an offer and she agrees.

But, there is a problem — the price.

What, she asks, will you give me?
A goat from my flock, Yaakov replies.
A goat — very nice. Do you have the goat here?
No.

No goat — that, is a problem. But she has a solution:

וַתֹּ֕אמֶר אִם־תִּתֵּ֥ן עֵרָב֖וֹן עַ֥ד שׇׁלְחֶֽךָ׃

And she said: If you will give me an eravon (עֵרָב֖וֹן) until you send it.

An eravon — otherwise known as a pledge or collateral.

If you (Yehuda) give me (Tamar) something that you need and want, then we have a deal. I’ll hold on to them — and if you pay me, then I’ll return them. If not, I’ll keep them.

That is the essence of an eravon — something of value that is given so as to ensure repayment. That is the word that Tamar used. And that seems to be what Yehuda means also.

• Tamar: ערבון

• Yehuda: ערבנו

Both words share the same root: ע-ר-ב (ayin, reish, beis) — and both words seem to share the same meaning.

So let’s fit this into our story:

Yehuda: Lend me Binyamin — I need him in Mitzrayim.
Yaakov: How do I know you’ll return him to me?

Yehuda: I will give you an eravon — a pledge.
Yaakov: What pledge will you give me.

Yehuda: Me. I, in my personhood — will be the pledge.

Sounds interesting, a human pledge.

And yet — we don’t quite know what it means? How is Yehuda “leaving himself” with Yaakov until he returns Binyamin?

To understand that, we need to take a deeper look at this word and note that we have seen this root all the time:

וַֽיְהִי־עֶ֥רֶב וַֽיְהִי־בֹ֖קֶר י֥וֹם אֶחָֽד

And it was evening and it was morning — one day

You might wonder — what does evening time (erev) have to with a pledge?

Erev is a time of mixture.
Light and dark are mixed together.
There is light, but less than before.
There is darkness, but not yet fully.

An eravon is also a kind of mixture.
You have something of mine;
I have something of yours.
For now — we are financially entangled.

So Yehuda is saying: I am going to entangle myself. I am going to mix myself in.

And with that, we can now better understand what Yehuda is saying:

We need Binyamin in order to get us the food we need to live.
We also need Binyamin in order to free Shimon.

I understand, though, that Binyamin “belongs” to you.
As such, I am asking you — can you please lend him to me. Not to us — but to me.

For a pledge, I offer myself (אָֽנֹכִי֙ אֶֽעֶרְבֶ֔נּוּ).
I, in my personhood and being, am the collateral given as assurance that I will return him to you. I have mixed myself up with Binyamin (your son, from Rachel). He is with me and I am with you.

I am mixed in that I will sacrifice myself for him.

If it is hot, I will give him the covering on my head.
If it is cold, I will give him my blanket.
If there are wild animals, I will take them on.
And if there are bandits, I will fight them

And this entanglement will persist until the time comes for “payment” — at which point you will be able to request him from me (מִיָּדִ֖י תְּבַקְשֶׁ֑נּוּ )

And I further understand that if I do not live up to my obligations — if I do not properly watch over and protect this “loan” so that I can directly return him to you — then I have grievously wronged and sinned against you in a way that I can never repair (אִם־לֹ֨א הֲבִיאֹתִ֤יו אֵלֶ֙יךָ֙ וְהִצַּגְתִּ֣יו לְפָנֶ֔יךָ וְחָטָ֥אתִֽי לְךָ֖ כׇּל־הַיָּמִֽים)

In short, Yehuda has made a switch.

He is no longer the reckless driver — careening down the highway, inviting danger and offering explanations when things go wrong. No, he drives differently now — focused on the road and on where he is going and on how to get there.

In other words, Yehuda is no longer the fighter of old — no longer consumed by the hatred and jealousy which plagued him and the entire family before. He has left that world and replaced it with an attitude of love, care and dedication.

And Yaakov sees this and is no longer worried about an ason on the road. Yes, Yehuda will walk down the same road, but he will do so with a new attitude and perspective.

And so, Yaakov says yes.

Know someone who would appreciate Masmid.org?
Please feel free to share it with them.

Share masmid

NOTE: I was not able to finish this article before Shabbos. I therefore added several addendums throughout the article to clarify a few points and fill in the gaps.

Yosef is sitting in an Egyptian dungeon — far from home, far from his father, and far from the dreams that once hinted at greatness. Into this dark, forgotten space are thrown two new prisoners, men who once served in Paro’s palace: the Sar HaMashkim (aka the Chief Cupbearer) and the Sar HaOfim (the Chief Baker).

In time, both of these royal officials experience troubling dreams. Yosef notices their anxiety and offers to interpret the dreams for them, insisting — as he always does — that “interpretations belong to God.”

The first dream he interprets is that of the Sar HaMashkim:

In three days, Paro will lift your head, restore you to your position, and take you out of this prison.

This is obviously good news for the Sar HaMashkim. But Yosef sees it as (potentially) good news for him also. And so, he makes a personal request. I paraphrase:

“When things go well for you, remember me. When you are restored, please mention me to Paro. Help me get out of this prison.”

Now we fast-forward just a few pesukim to the very end of the parasha. Yosef’s interpretations of both dreams come true. The Sar HaOfim is executed, and the Sar HaMashkim is restored to his post — serving Paro once again.

And here it is — Yosef’s opportunity to go free. All that is needed is for the Sar HaMashkim to mention Yosef to Paro. He could note how he had looked after them in jail. He could mention how he had accurately interpreted both dreams. He can even add Yosef’s proclamation that he is innocent of any wrongdoing.

In essence, the Sar HaMashkim can be G-d’s emissary to Yosef’s freedom. All it requires is a word with Paro.

But the Sar HaMashkim doesn’t mention Yosef. He doesn’t say a single word. And, in due time, he forgets Yosef altogether.

And so, the hope has now faded. The opportunity is lost, and Yosef remains in jail.

But, of course, we know the continuation of the story. In due time, Paro will have his own dreams and will require someone who can properly interpret them. At that point, the Sar HaMashkim will not only remember, but will also mention Yosef to Paro. And then, Yosef will go free.

But Yosef will have to wait for that moment. How long? Two years. We know it’s two years, because the Torah tells us that it was two years.

And that is interesting.

Why Two More Years?

Let’s put this all together.

Yosef asks the Sar HaMashkim to mention him when he goes free. And our parsha ends by noting that not only did he not mention him, but that he also forgot him:

“וְלֹא זָכַר… וַיִּשְׁכָּחֵהוּ”

He did not remember Yosef — and then he forgot him.

And then the very next line lets us know that at the end of two years, Paro had his dreams:

“וַיְהִי מִקֵּץ שְׁנָתַיִם יָמִים…”

“And it was, at the end of two years…”

If Paro’s two dreams were the end, then what was the beginning?

Perhaps we could say that the beginning was the two dreams of Paro’s advisors — the Sar HaMashkim and the Sar HaOfim. There is a nice symmetry there — and on one level I think that is obviously true.

But there is another beginning — hidden within the juxtaposition of our verses; namely, two years from the moment that the Sar HaMashkim did not mention Yosef. Two years after that, Paro had his dreams — and therefore two years after that, the Sar HaMashkim mentioned Yosef.

This is not some minor point — there is something deeper going on here — and Chazal pick up on that something. As such, they ask:

Why is it that the Sar HaMashkim did not mention Yosef to Paro?
And why did he then forget him entirely?

According to Chazal, the answer lies in the dual request Yosef made when he interpreted the Sar HaMashkim’s dream. Yosef said:

• “זכרתני” — remember me

• “והזכרתני” — and mention me

Two separate mentions. Two explicit appeals.

And Chazal say for each request, Yosef was required to spend one extra year in prison. Evidently, there was something off or inappropriate about this request — and that ‘something’ resulted in Yosef being in prison for two more years.

But what is that ‘something’?

Indeed, wasn’t Yosef’s response the appropriate one? Why else would G-d place these two men in Yosef’s cell and give them these dreams, if not for Yosef to take advantage of this opportunity to set himself free?

Says Chazal — yes, you may have thought that. But the Chumash — through its clever telling of the story — is indicating otherwise. It is indicating that there was something wrong with Yosef’s request.

Addendum: Deeper textual analysis

Let us look more closely at the pesukim themselves.

When Yosef speaks to the Sar HaMashkim, he makes two distinct requests. First, he says: “זכרתני איתך” — remember me with you. Then he says: “והזכרתני אל פרעה”. Literally speaking, the second request means ‘cause Paro to remember me’.

This raises a couple of questions.

1. What does “with you” mean in the phrase “remember me with you (זכרתני איתך)”

2. Why would Paro release Yosef simply because the Sar HaMashkim mentions him? At this point, Paro does not need Yosef. Yosef only goes free later because Paro has dreams and requires him. So why would Paro free him now?

The key to answering both questions lies in the phrase איתך — “with you.” Based on the Ramban and his careful reading of the Hebrew, we can understand “with you” as meaning for your benefit.