Copyright 2011 Neal Joseph Loevinger

Torah Portion: Bo

Shalom friends, we’re blessedly early with our drasha this week, let’s keep that trend up . . . . .

Speaking of trends, in this week’s Torah portion, Bo, Pharaoh’s standing in the “human king as Egyptian demigod” rankings continues to decline as the plagues take a terrible toll on his country, authority and self-confidence. Before the Israelites leave, however, they are told that they must have a ritual meal, not only while they are in Egypt, but every year following, in order to remember the great liberation. This, of course, eventually becomes our Pesach seder, or Passover meal, but in Biblical days, the central ritual was the Korban Pesach, an offering of a lamb or kid.

This offering had to be roasted and eaten in a very precise way; Sh’mot chapter 12 has all kinds of laws relating to this ritual, even specifying how the bones are treated during the meal:

“It shall be eaten in one house: you shall not take any of the flesh outside the house; nor shall you break a bone of it.”  (Shmot/ Exodus 12:46)

Our Conservative Torah commentary, Etz Hayim, explains that one might break the bone of a meat meal to suck the marrow out, and one can easily imagine that hungry slaves would indeed get every bit out of the meat that they could. The medieval textbook Sefer Ha’Chinuch explains that the commandment not to break the bone is about teaching the people honor and dignity- it is not the way of princes and nobles to chew on the bones like a dog, but that’s what poor or hungry people have to do.

Thus, while at the time of the first Pesach meal, the people were, in fact, poor and hungry slaves, they needed to claim their dignity and act as if they were nobles and free people. In so doing, they would come to internalize their own sense of honor and self-possession. The Exodus could not be only a physical process of moving from one place to another, nor even a purely political act of declaring that Pharaoh’s authority was overthrown. The Exodus also had to be a spiritual phenomenon within the Israelites themselves, in which they came to realize they were not inherently slaves, they had little to fear, and past suffering did not constrain future freedom.

That’s why they need to eat like nobility. Not only was it an overt act of defying Pharaoh, but more importantly, it enacted and illustrated the most importance remembrance: who they really were. They were not slaves, but children of Avraham and Sarah and inheritors of their sacred covenant. That’s our challenge, too: to remember who we really are- not slaves to our desires or anxieties and servants to no human power, but noble, spiritual beings, called to great works.

There’s no better way to remember, to claim truth, than to act. In AA, they often say “fake it till you make it,” but perhaps the Jewish way of expressing the same idea would be: do the mitzvah, and your soul will be lifted up.

Shabbat Shalom,

RNJL

Copyright Neal Joseph Loevinger 2010

Torah Portion Bo: Shmot/ Exodus 10:1-13:16

In the portion Bo, Moshe continues to confront Pharaoh with plagues. Laws of Passover are given and the people prepare to depart.

Hello one and all! This week, in the Torah portion Bo, the Israelites are about to leave slavery in Egypt, but before they go, they are given laws so that they will remember the Exodus in future generations. Among those laws is the commandment to put on tefillin, or “prayer-boxes,” on one’s arm and head:

“And this shall serve you as a sign on your hand and as a reminder on your forehead — in order that the Teaching of the Lord may be in your mouth — that with a mighty hand the Lord freed you from Egypt.”  (Shmot 13:9)

“And when, in time to come, your son asks you, saying, ‘What does this mean?’ you shall say to him, ‘It was with a mighty hand that the Lord brought us out from Egypt, the house of bondage.’ ” (13:14)

As some readers may know, it is a mitzvah to put on tefillin daily during the week (not Shabbat or festivals.) The tefillin contain passages from the Torah which speak directly of this mitzvah, but these passages, four in total, also speak of the Unity of Divinity, the centrality of Torah, and remembering the Exodus. Note how the passages above specifically use the image of the “strong arm” or “mighty hand” for a mitzvah which ends up being bound, literally, to our arms.

The symbolism is unmistakable: just as we were liberated from slavery by a “strong arm,” so too should our own arms be devoted to equally sacred purposes. Of course, “a mighty hand” is never meant to be taken literally, but rather as a metaphor for how the Divine operates within the human heart to break bonds of servitude and bring forth freedom and justice. Ultimately, anthropomorphic language in our sacred texts isn’t really about God, it’s about us- it challenges us to embody the Divine qualities relayed in the metaphors and poetry. Thus, in putting on the tefillin, we become- if we choose- the strong hand of God in bringing forth redemption and mercy.

We all choose our own path of sacred service, becoming the hands of the Holy One according to our unique strengths and talents. How we serve is a matter of individual reflection; that we serve is imperative, should we wish to be fully human, embracing our capacity to do the work of God.

Shabbat Shalom,

RNJL

P.S.- American Jewish World Service is doing work on the ground in Haiti. If you haven’t done all your giving to Haiti disaster relief, please consider AJWS along with other worthy organizations- and give now, and give generously.

Copyright 2011 Neal Joseph Loevinger

Torah Portion: Bo

What a week we’ve had: lots of bad news about the economy, and for the
first time in many years, an American governor has been impeached and
removed from office. It’s amazing to me that former Gov. Blagojevich
assumed a confrontational stance with the state legislature right till
the very end, when almost anybody who follows the news knew that he’d
be expelled from office. At any point before a few days ago, the
former governor of Illinois could have apologized and resigned with
dignity, thus preserving some chance of reentering public life, in
some form or another, in the future.

Of course, egocentrism which denies incipient reality is hardly a
modern phenomenon. In our haftarah this week, the prophet Yirmiyahu,
or Jeremiah, announces a prophecy of destruction against the Pharaoh
of his day, predicting that Egypt would be defeated by competing
empires and humbled for its arrogance. The Pharaoh of the haftarah,
like the Pharaoh in Exodus who appears in this week’s Torah portion,
Bo, is portrayed as a stubborn and prideful man:

” There they called Pharaoh king of Egypt:
‘ Braggart who let the hour go by.’ ” (Yirmiyahu/Jeremiah 26:17)

This verse causes the commentators some consternation, and there are
various interpretations of the Hebrew. Hirsch, for example, renders
the verse as “Pharoah is in the noisy turmoil, he has allowed the
appointed time to pass by,” and posits that the reference was to a
battle with the Babylonians in which Pharaoh’s army showed up too late
for its strategy to work and was thus soundly defeated.

Perhaps a simpler explanation is that Pharaoh, like everybody else,
has many chances in his life to do t’shuvah [repentance/ returning],
but rather than turn from his wicked ways, he pursues his course till
the bitter end, and meets his fate (according to our text) at the
hands of the Babylonian king and his army. The Pharaoh of our
haftarah- like the earlier Pharaoh in Moshe’s day- faced opportunities
to change, to grow, to admit his mistakes, to choose a different path,
to retreat from destructive pursuits, but he let those moments pass
by, until it was too late to avert the consequences of his impunity.

It’s not only kings- or governors- who must learn that the humble path
of t’shuvah can bring reward in this world, if not the next world as
well. A willingness to admit our mistakes, to give up the false
appearance of perfection, is a sign of great inner strength. Yet too
often we wait too long, letting the hour go by, letting the chance at
reconciliation fade, too preoccupied with the demands of ego to
nurture the growth of the soul.

I might even rephrase our verse above: it is the way of braggart
Pharaoh to let the hour go by, to leave unachieved what the simplest
word of modest and generous love might accomplish. Instead, Pharaoh
would rather be defeated that be humbled. Seen this way, Pharaoh is
not a person, as such, but a part of the human personality: we each, I
think, have within us a that hardness of heart which would rather face
armies than confess our sins and failures.

Pharaoh let the hour go by, but we don’t have to. We have the choice
to embrace this moment, this hour, as the one in which we turn back to
our best and truest selves.

Shabbat Shalom,

RNJL

Copyright 2011 Neal Joseph Loevinger

Torah Portion: Bo

This week’s Torah portion, Bo, continues the story of
the confrontation between Moshe and Pharaoh, and contains the first
commandments to the people Israel as a nation. These mitzvot concern
counting the months and preparing the Pesach [Passover] rituals, but
at the end of the Torah portion, among the commandments to remember
the Exodus events, there are two verses which mention signs upon our
hands and heads:

“And this shall serve you as a sign on your hand and as a reminder on
your forehead — in order that the Teaching of the Lord may be in your
mouth — that with a mighty hand the Lord freed you from Egypt.”
(Shmot/Exodus 13:9)

“And it shall be for a sign upon your hand and for ornaments between
your eyes, for with a mighty hand did the Lord take us out of Egypt.”
((Shmot/Exodus 13:16)

This “sign” is understood by the ancient rabbis to be tefillin, or
“phylacteries” (a word which means tefillin!), which are those little
black leather boxes containing passages of Torah that many observant
Jews wear upon their arms and heads during weekday morning prayers.
[This certainly includes women in an egalitarian synagogue like Temple
Beth-El.] A more complete description of the origins and construction
of tefillin can be be found in the link below, but for today, I only
wish to point out the Torah’s linkage of remembering the Exodus with
the mitzvah of “binding” our arms and foreheads with words of Torah.

Tefillin are bound upon the arm, symbolizing the strength of our
bodies, and upon our heads, symbolizing the orientation of our
intellectual powers, as an act of remembrance of liberation from
servitude. It might seem paradoxical that “binding” ourselves would be
connected with a story of freedom, but I think it points to a core
Jewish idea, perhaps most concisely summarized by that famous
philosopher Mr. Zimmerman: “you gotta serve somebody.”

The story of the Exodus is not only about physical freedom; it’s also
about freedom from what Pharaoh represents in human history, which is
the objectification of human beings into mere means to a more powerful
person’s ends. Judaism, on the other hand, teaches that every human
being is made in the Image of God, and thus mistreatment, humiliation,
manipulation or abuse of any person is a sin against God, against the
other person, and against our own Divine capacity for compassion and
justice. We always have a choice: we can be enslaved to Pharaoh- that
is, go with the Pharaoh way of doing things so prevalent in the world-
or we can be servants of the Holy One, Who commanded us to recognize
the sacredness of all life.

That’s why tefillin are both a symbol of “binding” and a symbol of
freedom: in wrapping ourselves in tefillin, we recognize that the way
to be truly free of Pharaoh every day is not be like him in the way we
treat others, but instead to bind ourselves to the ideals of Torah,
which demand our involvement in healing the world through compassion
and justice. We orient our thoughts- the head tefillin- and our
actions- the arm tefillin- towards an Exodus view of the world every
morning because the choice between Pharaoh and the God of Liberation
never goes away- it confronts each of us every day.

Shabbat Shalom,

RNJL

Copyright 2011 Neal Joseph Loevinger

Torah Portion: Bo

Our weekly Torah portion, Bo, continues the story of the Exodus, through
the penultimate plague and the laws of the Pesach [Passover]
offering. At the very end of the portion, God says that the Israelites
will tell the story of the Exodus in future generations, and perform
various rituals of remembrance. Among those is the mitzvah
[commandment] of tefillin, or “phylacteries,” the little leather boxes
that observant Jews (in egalitarian synagogues, both men and women)
wear during weekday services. These leather boxes contain passages
from the Torah in which tefillin are mentioned, including two passages
from parshat Bo.

In the first passage (13:9), tefillin are called a “zicharon,” or
remembrance, but in the second part of chapter 13, tefillin are called
“totafot,” a word which also appears in Deuteronomy. So what does
“totafot” mean, besides “tefillin,” in the traditional understanding
of the word? Well, we find “totafot” in one other ancient text, the
Mishnah, which is the first part of the book of Jewish law and lore
known as the Talmud. Admittedly, the Mishnah was compiled many
hundreds of years after the time of the Torah, but it’s still
interesting to compare word usage.

In this case, the word “totafot” (in a variant form, “totefet”) occurs
during a discussion of what women may or may not wear when they go
from place to place on the Sabbath. In this context, “totefet” means
something like “adornment,” which would not be part of one’s clothing
and thus not necessary to wear on Shabbat.

So the next question is- what does the idea of “adornment” have to do
with wearing tefillin, especially given that a primary meaning of
tefillin is remembering the Exodus? One idea, set forth in the book
called “Popular Halacha,” by R. Jacob Berman, is that wearing tefillin
as a “diadem” truly shows that we are no longer servants in Egypt, but
free people, practicing our religion as we choose, and not beholden to
any earthly “crown.”

That’s a beautiful idea, and yet one more interpretation occurs to me.
Tefillin are not particularly beautiful objects in the conventional
sense- they are black leather boxes with carefully written passages of
Torah inside them, without jewels or bright colors or fancy patterns.
So to call them “adornments” is to make a claim about what is
“adorning” or beautiful from a Jewish perspective. Perhaps we “adorn”
ourselves with tefillin because there is a moral beauty to daily
rededication of the strength of our arms and the power of our minds
(symbolized by the head tefillin) to religious and spiritual ideals.

Furthermore, what is most “real” and hence most beautiful about
tefillin is on the inside- the words from Torah which speak of
covenant and the Exodus. So (ahem) to wrap things up, we might say
that when we put these “totafot,” or “adornments” on our arms and
heads, we are living out the proposition that what is most beautiful
in life is not outward appearances but inner, spiritual qualities. We
are no longer servants in Egypt, but free to choose the actions which
are the true adornment of a life lived well.

Shabbat Shalom,

RNJL

Copyright 2011 Neal Joseph Loevinger

Torah Portion: Bo

Before we begin this week’s Torah study, we have an announcement from the
Department
of Overzealous Spellchecking: Last week, my overzealous Appleworks program
changed
“Pharaoh” to “parsha” in a couple of places- I trust nobody was too confused and
will look
for this in the future. With that-

Happy Groundhog Day! I don’t know how many more weeks of winter we have, but I
do
know that parshat Bo is the third parsha of the book of Shmot/ Exodus, and tells
of the
last few plagues and the instructions for the Pesach offering. The final plague
upon Egypt
is the death of the firstborn, which will bring upon the Egyptians the horrors
that they
themselves have inflicted upon the Israelites. Before this terrible blow to the
nation, Moshe
is told that the Egyptians will “cry out”, clearly evoking the “crying out” of
the Israelites*
under bondage:

“And there will be a great outcry throughout the entire land of Egypt, such as
there never
has been and such as there shall never be again.” (Shmot/ Exodus 11:6)

Samson Raphael Hirsch points out that this verse illustrates the tragedy of the
Egyptian’s
all-too-human indifference to the sufferings of anyone but their own group.
After all, the
Israelites had been enslaved and beaten and murdered for years, and no Egyptian
had
cried to a god or the king against the injustice! “Never again” would the
Egyptians cry out
like they did when their own first born died- perhaps this verse teaches us that
they
remained indifferent, and could not redeem themselves through introspection and
humility.

Maybe this is the true evil of Pharaoh and his nation: not only that they
imposed suffering
upon others, but were unable (unwilling?) to turn their own experience of grief
into
compassion and t’shuvah [repentance/ return] for what they had done. We all cry
harder
for a member of our own family than for someone far away, and that’s perfectly
natural,
but spirituality also calls us to feel another’s suffering as our own. If there
is a genocide in
Darfur (and there is)- we should be crying out. If the poor in America are
unable to access
basic health care or enough food (and many can’t)- we should be crying out. If
the actions
of our country are not consonant with our highest ideals of justice- we should
be crying
out.

To sum up: Pharaoh thought that there is no god other than myself, and therefore
I can
ignore others as less than human if I wish. Judaism teaches: we are all children
of the
Living God, and therefore every human is my brother or sister, and deserves
whatever
compassion and lovingkindness I can muster.

Shabbat Shalom,

rnjl

PS- As usual, the first link is to a page which leads to a summary of the parsha
and
additional commentary (including more by yours truly) and the second link leads
to the full
text of the parsha and haftarah:

http://www.myjewishlearning.com/texts/Weekly_Torah_Commentary/bo_index.htm

http://www.jtsa.edu/community/parashah/index.shtml

*(Cf. Shmot 2:23, for example.)

Copyright 2011 Neal Joseph Loevinger

Torah Portion: Bo

Greetings from rainy Massachussetts! I’m back in the USA, and although I’m
not altogether displeased at sleeping in my familiar bed, there is definitely a
feeling of “coming down” from time spent in Israel. Somehow life just seems
less intensely lived on this side of the Atlantic; even the small New England
states feel so big and roomy compared to Israeli travel distances!

Well, enough geographical rumination, there’s a Torah portion awaiting our
attentions.

The Torah portion Bo tells of the increasingly severe plagues brought upon
Pharaoh, his court, and his country. Nevertheless, as many of us remember
from childhood versions of the Passover story, Pharaohs heart was hardened
and he did not let the people go. Not until death itself appears in Pharaohs
house does he relent, and even then, perhaps more out of fear than moral
reflection. Upon the death of the first-born, Pharaoh lets the people go-
practically chases them out- and the Israelites then gather their possessions,
“borrow” garments and gold from their Egyptian neighbors, and skedaddle in
great haste toward their freedom.

One small detail in the story of the Exodus is both well known and also worth
revisiting:

“The people picked up their dough when it was not yet leavened, their
leftovers bound in their garments on their shoulders.” (Exodus 12:34)

Many of us remember this part of the story as the explanation for why we eat
unleavened bread- matzah- during Pesach; since our Israelite ancestors had
to leave in such a great hurry, the bread hadn’t had time to rise, and they had
to bake flat bread on their way. To me, this traditional meaning given to the
act
of eating matzah (remembering the haste of our ancestors) helps me connect
the mitzvah [commandment] of matzah with the struggles of peoples
worldwide who are aching for freedom and security, and who may only have
the barest essentials for sustenance. Matzah, in this understanding, is
“refugee” food, symbolizing the need to travel light and fast on the way to
freedom.

So far, so good. Yet our teacher Rashi notices one other detail in the verse
above. The Torah tells us that the Israelites carried the “leftovers” (Rashi
says
this means the leftover matzah and bitter herbs from the first Pesach feast, in
Egypt, that night) on their shoulders.
He points out that the Israelites were traveling fast, but they were also
bringing animals out with them, which presumably carried some of their
possessions. So why carry the matzah on their shoulders, rather than on the
pack animals?

Rashi’s answer is taken from earlier sources:

“Although they took many animals with them, they [carried the remaining
matzah and bitter herbs on their shoulders because] they loved the mitzvot
[commandments].”

This is the other side of the Pesach story: yes, our ancestors were bitterly
oppressed and in dire need of freedom and security, but they were also able
to find within themselves a core of faith, hope and love of God which
transcended their physical condition. The internal liberation from Pharaoh
may have preceded their physical liberation; as long as they felt commanded
by God, they knew that Pharaoh’s rule was only temporary, and ultimately
ineffectual.

In this reading, the matzah is not only the symbol of being refugees, it’s also
the symbol of being part of a community of faith; the Israelites could love the
mitzvot and bear witness to that higher calling even in Egypt. The image of
bearing the matzah on our shoulders is a challenging one, for it compels us to
ask how we too might make public our love for the mitzvot and desire to live
in their light.

Notice, too, that Rashi says “love the mitzvot,” not “fear of transgression.”
Love
-of God and each other- is the highest joy, and so it’s quite astounding to
think
of our ancestors finding within themselves the capacity for the joy of love even
after years of oppression. Think of all the kvetching people do about the
smallest things, and here are the Israelites leaving Egypt, with their capacity
for inner grace rekindled, carrying the matzah on their shoulders in an act of
joyous service!

Along with the image of our ancestors as refugees leaving in haste, the image
of carrying the matzah on their shoulders, in joy and love, also needs to be
part of our sacred memories. Serving God out of joy, from love of the mitzvot,
brings light into darkness, and raises up the human spirit- this too needs to be
part of our spiritual consciousness and daily practice. Such love and joy
would transform ourselves and our communities- so what are we waiting for?

Copyright 2011 Neal Joseph Loevinger

Torah Portion: Bo

This d’var Torah was originally distributed by Kolel: The Adult Center for Jewish Learning during the year 5761 and can be found in its archives.

Bo (Ex. 10:1-13:16)

OVERVIEW

The dramatic contest of wills between God and Pharaoh is coming to a climax: the plagues upon Egypt become steadily more punitive, culminating with the death of the first born. Before the final plague, Moshe and Aaron are given instructions by God to make a sacrifice, and to place the blood on the doorposts of the Israelite houses. Further instructions are given to eat unleavened bread and bitter herbs; this becomes the source of our Passover traditions. The firstborn of the Egyptians are struck dead; this is the final blow to Pharaoh, who sends the entire Israelite people in the middle of the night. Commandments concerning Passover and the sanctification of the firstborn are given as a remembrance of the Exodus.

IN FOCUS

“Pharoah called to Moshe and said: ‘Go, worship God! Only your flocks and your herds will remain; you little ones will go with you.’ ” (Exodus 10:24)

PSHAT

Pharoah is stubborn, and will not admit total defeat, even after nine afflictions upon his land and people. After the “plague” of darkness, he grudgingly allows the Israelites to leave Egypt; however, he wants them to leave their cattle behind, perhaps as the price of their freedom. Moshe won’t hear of it, and tells Pharoah that they need the cattle to make sacrifices to God out in the wilderness. Pharoah’s heart is hardened once again, and he does not agree to Moshe’s demands.

DRASH

The exchange between Moshe and Pharoah at the end of chapter 10 is, on the simplest level, a battle of wills between political opponents, each trying to get the best deal for their side. Not unlike other famous negotiations in the Middle East, the two parties don’t trust each other, and each tries to give up as little as he can to the other.

The Hasidic master Rabbi Yaakov Yitzhak from Pshi’scha, also known as the Yehudi HaKadosh [The Holy Jew], proposes a reading of the story far removed from the realm of political revolutions. The Yehudi imagines Pharaoh challenging Moshe over his understanding of spirituality in worship:

Pharoah said: “It is possible to worship God [only] in thought and in feeling. So if, in truth, you really desire to worship God – what do you need your flocks and herds for? ‘Go, worship God’- with an upright heart and pure intentions, and you won’t need to make any physical offerings, so ‘only your flocks and herds will remain.’ “

Moshe answered him: “Intentions alone, without any actions connected to them, aren’t important, aren’t anything! The main thing is real action, and thus intentions depend on actions and are deepened through them. Therefore, ‘our cattle will also go with us,’ (v. 26) because ‘we will take from them to worship Adonai our God.’

From actions one is aroused to worship God with great feeling and to embrace the Divine. (Source: Itturei Torah, translation mine.)

Clearly, the Yehudi doesn’t think that Pharoah was all that concerned with the Israelite’s spirituality- this is a parable about contemporary concerns. I understand the Yehudi to be addressing those people who want a purely internal spirituality, going deep inside themselves, spurning the physical world. The Yehudi, speaking through the character of Moshe, seems to be suggesting that the proper way to deepen one’s inner life is to align it with your physicality, your embodied being.

An example that comes to mind is ritual action, something often derided by those who seek a purely internal, detached kind of spirituality. (Think of the negative connotations of the word “ritualistic.”) A simple ritual is making a blessing before eating, which can help bring us to feelings of awe and gratitude. One might think that the best thing is to go directly to the proper feelings, and bypass the ritual, but I think it doesn’t really work that way. The action of the blessing can bring us to a depth of emotion and spiritual understanding unreachable by thought alone; sometimes we don’t even understand, on a spiritual level, what the ritual is all about until after we’ve done it many times.

I think I’ve quoted before one of my favorite teachings from another tradition: “It’s easier to act your way into right thinking than think your way into right acting.” Of course, a certain amount of intellectual preparation is crucial for Jewish practice, but I think the Yehudi reminds us that religious growth can’t happen only “from the neck up.” It happens when we bring physical and spiritual together, when we bring our whole being into the quest, when our actions in the social and religious realms become entirely aligned with our higher goals.

Copyright 2011 Neal Joseph Loevinger

Torah Portion: Bo

This d’var Torah was originally distributed by Kolel: The Adult Center for Jewish Learning during the year 5760 and can be found in its archives.

OVERVIEW
The dramatic contest of wills between God and Pharoah is coming to a climax: the plagues upon Egypt become steadily more punitive, culminating with the death of the first born. Before the final plague, Moshe and Aaron are given instructions by God to make a sacrifice, and to place the blood on the doorposts of the Israelite houses. Further instructions are given to eat unleavened bread and bitter herbs; this becomes the source of our Passover traditions. The firstborn of the Egyptians are struck dead, and this is the final blow to Pharaoh, who sends the entire Israelite people out in the middle of the night. Commandments concerning Passover and the sanctification of the firstborn are given as a remembrance of the Exodus.

IN FOCUS
“He [Pharoah] called for Moshe and Aaron in the night and said: ‘Up and depart from among my people, both you and the Israelites with you! Go and worship God as you have spoken! Take also your flocks and your cattle, as you said, and go- and bless me too! “ (Exodus 12:31-32)

PSHAT
The death of the first born is the final, most terrible plague that God brings upon the recalcitrant, stubborn Egyptian monarch and his people. After the previous afflictions upon Egypt, Pharoah had offered partial freedom or small concessions to Moshe, but now, finally, even the deified king Pharoah must admit defeat. He surrenders almost unconditionally, allowing Moshe to take all the Israelites and all of their property and leave behind forever the bonds of slavery.

DRASH
That Pharoah should finally concede to Moshe, as the agent of God, is not surprising; we knew that was going to happen from the very beginning of the slavery narrative. What we might not have expected was Pharoah’s request for a blessing from the man who has humbled and frightened him, the man he had previously scorned and ignored. It’s true that Pharoah had already conceded Moshe’s ability to mitigate particular plagues; for example, he asks Moshe to plead with God to remove the frogs (8:4-7). Still, one might have expected Pharoah, even in the moment of his defeat, to have sent Moshe and the Israelites out as fast as possible, simply to get rid of them- why does this tremendously proud man, revered as a human god, ask for a blessing? What does he think Moshe can do for him at this point?

There is no consensus among the commentators, either traditional or contemporary, as to what exactly this verse means. Rashi, basing himself on an earlier midrash, thinks that Pharoah is asking Moshe and Aaron to intercede and pray to God so that Pharoah, as a firstborn, will not die. This seems like a request for immediate action- i.e., pray for me right now, so that I won’t die like all the other firstborn.

Other commentators, such as Ibn Ezra, , think that Pharoah is asking Moshe for prayers and blessings when he and the Israelites make their sacrifices in the wilderness, as Moshe had spoken of several times before. (For example, 8:22-25) This interpretation probably takes into account the “flocks and cattle” mentioned in the same verse; since Pharoah knows the Israelites will sacrifice these animals to their God, he asks for a prayer at that time. Ramban seems to agree with this line of interpretation, only adding that the blessing on a king includes his kingdom. He also quotes a midrash from the same sources as Rashi that has a slightly different twist on it: please pray that all the retributions will end, that I will no longer be punished on your account [now that you are leaving.]

The 16th century commentator Chaim ben Attar*, known as the Or HaChaim ["Light of Life"], says that Pharoah’s request for a blessing- as opposed to simply a reprieve from the plagues- meant that he wanted something positive, a “cure,” as it were, not just the removal of the problem. Perhaps the idea here is that Pharoah wanted Egypt to be somehow changed for the positive after their terrible experience.

Rabbi Gunther Plaut, editor of the Torah commentary used in almost all contemporary Reform congregations, illuminates not only the practical meaning but the religious and literary significance of this verse:

Pharoah now acknowledges that God has dominion over him. The first meeting of a Pharoah with Jacob, upon his arrival in Egypt, [cf. Gen. 47] brought words of blessing, and so does the last- with Moses, upon this departure from Egypt.

Whatever Pharoah is asking Moshe to do for him- and it’s not quite clear- the remarkable thing is that the man who hardened his heart and ignored the suffering of his slaves is now acknowledging (even if only for a moment) that he is not, in fact, an invincible god-king as he presents himself previously. Yaakov’s blessing of the earlier Pharoah seemed to be the friendly meeting of equals; the earlier Pharoah seemed to be more humble, more open, more down-to-earth. The later Pharoah’s asking for a blessing seems to be an act of desperation and fear, illustrating the tragedy of arrogance. The Pharoah who stands cowering before Moshe missed so many opportunities- opportunities to act generously, to change his mind, to soften his heart, to learn from others, to acknowledge spiritual truths. He didn’t, and now must beg for help.

I see Pharoah is a tragic figure, and not merely a villain, because one can almost sense the fear in his voice as he asks his former adversary for help and salvation as his world crumbles around him. He must know, even if he wouldn’t admit it, that this disaster is his own fault; as Plaut points out, asking for a blessing means that he finally understands who is the real Sovereign. Of course, another cruel irony in the story is that his hard-earned humility proves to be fleeting; once the Israelites are gone, and the present punishments removed, his arrogance reasserts itself and he decides to chase after them. (Chapter 14)

The tragedy of Pharoah is not so much that he is a great man brought down by that special kind of over-reaching arrogance that the Greeks called hubris, but that for all of his trappings of kingship and deity, he is just an ordinary person, with ordinary human stubborness, pride, and selfishness. Consider his final change of heart after sending the Israelites out; how many times have people resolved to change their behavior in the midst of crisis, only to revert to old patterns once the immediate dangers have passed? Pharoah is the alcoholic lying in a hospital bed after crashing the car, vowing never to drink again, or the abusive husband who pleads with his wife to come back to him, because this time he’s really changed. Pharoah almost grasped the truth: that transformation of the self for the better requires effort all the time, not only desperate prayers in times of crisis. He almost grasped the truth, but apparently he wasn’t willing to face the personal consequences of holding on to this crucial insight.

Consider also all the other aspects of Pharoah’s personality that seem all to common when viewed as extreme examples of everyday tendencies: How often do we only ask for help when it’s too late? How many times have we all come to realise the truth in somebody else’s words only after we’ve stubbornly rejected them over and over? How often has each of us waited until crisis strikes before approaching God? How many of us have let our egos and self-centeredness get in the way of our generosity and compassion?

Last week I presented the idea that the story of Moshe, a shepherd with a speech problem, can be understood as the story of every human being who is challenged by God to become an instrument of Divine service, despite our frailties and limitations. Pharoah is Moshe’s opposite- instead of answering the call of the Divine, he resists it at all costs. If Moshe is the exemplar of relationship with God, Pharoah is the exemplar of spiritual blindness and immaturity. The tragedy is that he had opportunity after opportunity to grow and change, but could not or would not overcome his own worst character traits. The cartoon figure Pogo’s words were never more true than in the case of Pharoah: “we have met the enemy, and he is us.”

Chaim ben Attar: born in 1696, died 1743 (Morocco). He is called the “Or HaChaim,” after his somewhat kabbalistically oriented Torah commentary of that name, included in many editions of Mikraot Gedolot.