B’ezrat Hashem, we begin reading Sefer Shemot. At the beginning of the Parsha, the Ramban discusses the structure of Sefer Shemot, which opens with the descent into Mitzraim and the onset of enslavement. The subsequent Parshiot recount the makkot, the Mitzvot of Pesach, Yetziat Mitzraim, and Kriyat Yam Suf. Yitro and Mishpatim focus on the giving of the Torah, while the remaining Parshiot primarily deal with matters concerning the Mishkan.
The Ramban asks why Sefer Shemot is structured as it is. He explains that Sefer Bereshit focuses on creation and renewal, and the events of the Avot are like a creation for their descendants, foreshadowing what their descendants will experience. At Brit Bein Ha’betarim, Avraham Avinu was told his descendants would be enslaved in a foreign land, and now Sefer Shemot narrates the fulfillment of this prophecy through the first galut.
The question arises – if the exile in Egypt ends in Parshat Beshalach, why does Sefer Shemot continue with the giving of the Torah at Har Sinai and the Mishkan? The Ramban says, the galut is not complete when Bnei Yisrael left Mitzraim; it ends only when they return to their rightful place and to the status of their forefathers. Upon leaving Egypt, they were still in a land not theirs, confused in the desert. When they came to Har Sinai and constructed the Mishkan, and Hakadosh Baruch Hu rested His presence among them, that is when they returned to the status of the Avot and that is the moment they were considered fully redeemed.
Today we will deal with a related, and very interesting, topic that will extend across three shiurim. The first preview of exile was given to Avraham Avinu back in Parshat Lech Lecha:
And He said to Avram: Know for sure that your descendants will be foreigners in a land that is not theirs. They will enslave them and oppress them for four hundred years. But also that nation whom they will serve I will judge; afterwards they will leave with great wealth.
Avraham Avinu, in that moment, sees all the exiles that Bnei Yisrael will endure through the generations – the galuyot of Bavel, Madai, Yavan, and Edom. Chazal say each of the terms found in Avraham’s vision – אֵימָה חֲשֵׁכָה גְדֹלָה נֹפֶלֶת עָלָיו – and each of the animals Avraham offered reference one of the future exiles. Therefore, all the troubles that Bnei Yisrael will go through until the coming of the Mashiach were seen by Avraham Avinu in the Brit Bein Ha’betarim.
The Netivot Shalom asks a wonderful question: Why is there an exile at this point? If we take as an assumption the well-known principle that exile is a result of punishment for sins – וּמִפְּנֵי חֲטָאֵינוּ גָּלִינוּ מֵאַרְצֵנוּ – at this stage of history, when Avraham was told there’d be exiles, there was no sin at all!
The Alsheich HaKadosh poignantly addresses this (Shemot):
It is fitting for every wise-hearted person to inquire and seek with wisdom, why did G-d do this to the holy ones who are in the land – Yaakov and all the souls. To put their children and grandchildren under the burdens of Egypt for 210 years, with mortar and bricks, and grueling work in the field. What was their crime and what was their sin?! And behold, Hakadosh Baruch Hu is not suspected of doing justice without justice, G-d forbid!
Everyone should ponder on why the children of Yaakov met such a dreadful fate. Another question posed by the Netivot Shalom is why are seventy tzaddikim, at the highest level of kedusha, taken down to Egypt so that 600,000 people – only a fifth of the population! – would emerge in an absolute lowest state of impurity? What is the purpose of this?
Additionally, how can we explain Avraham’s response after being told of Galut Mitzraim? When told of the impending destruction of Sedom, he rushed to daven for its people and plead with Hakadosh Baruch Hu to save them; yet here, with his own children at stake, he remains silent?! With the fundamental understanding that galut is a bad thing, and one should flee from it, it is stunning that Avraham Avinu would daven for the wicked but not plead and beg to annul the decree of exiles for his own children! He doesn’t ask that the four exiles be abolished, nor that they be reduced to two. For Sedom, he sought to lessen their punishment – maybe there are fifty righteous... maybe forty... maybe thirty? – but upon hearing that his children will be tortured in Egypt for four hundred years, he says nothing? Why does he not wake up and say, "Ribbono Shel Olam, four hundred years? Really?!? Could a discount be applied? Perhaps 100 years?” Nothing.
The Alsheich quotes a response he saw, whereby Hakadosh Baruch Hu had only intended to send Bnei Yisrael to Egypt for the many years, but it was the Egyptians themselves who decided to enslave them, on their own volition. He doesn’t accept this answer, however, stating there is no way that the arduous labor was without the hashgacha of Hakadosh Baruch Hu. Instead, Yaakov was destined to go down to Egypt, cruelly, in iron chains (Bereshit Rabbah 86:1), but Hakadosh Baruch Hu saved him the public humiliation and arranged it so that Yosef went down first. A parable is given to a cow that could not be led to the slaughterhouse, so they led its calf instead, and the cow immediately went after it. Hakadosh Baruch Hu intentionally brought Bnei Yisrael down to Egypt – the iron furnace (כּוּר הַבַּרְזֶל) – in order to be refined, cleansed, and purified. The Alsheich then proceeds to try and understand what exactly that refinement process was; what needed to be cleansed and purified.
In the final three pesukim of the Parsha, Moshe Rabbeinu asks Hakadosh Baruch Hu a question:
Moshe returned to Hashem and said, “My Master. Why have You brought harm to this people? Why did You send me?
Chazal say (Shemot Rabbah 5:22), Moshe said before Hakadosh Baruch Hu: “I took Sefer Bereshit and read it. I saw the deeds of the generation of the flood (Dor HaMabul) and how they were judged. I saw the deeds of the generation of the dispersion (Dor Hapalaga) and how they were judged. I saw the deeds of Sedom and how they were judged. What did Bnei Yisrael do that they were enslaved more than all the generations that passed? And if it is because Avraham Avinu asked בַּמֶּה אֵדַע כִּי אִירָשֶׁנָּה – how will I know that I will inherit it, and You responded that his children would be exiled to a foreign land, etc. if so, why do only Bnei Yisrael suffer because of his question? Eisav and Yishmael are his children too – why do they not also share in the suffering a bit?!”
These are some of the fifteen fundamental questions the Alsheich HaKadosh poses at the start of our Parsha. He methodically asks and answers them, layer by layer, until arriving at a key idea. We’ll follow his process and insights, eventually arriving at his key point – but not today. We’ll arrive at it in two weeks’ time.
It is brought in Chazal that the reason we went down to Egypt was to rectify חַטָּאֵי הַלָּשׁוֹן – the sins of the tongue or speech. Moshe Rabbeinu goes out to see the welfare of his brothers, he sees an Egyptian man striking a Jew and kills him using the Shem HaMeforash. The next day, he sees a Jewish man striking another Jew and he attempts to intervene, only to be told by the aggressor:
He said, “Who made you a man, officer and judge over us? Do you intend to kill me as you killed the Egyptian?” Moshe was frightened, and he said, “So the matter is known.”
What exactly was known? In addition to the straightforward meaning of Moshe’s earlier actions were known to the authorities, Rashi says, Moshe was puzzled about what sin Bnei Yisrael committed more than all the seventy nations to be subjugated to such hard labor. And he now understood. He saw they were deserving of it because amongst them were wicked informers – רְשָׁעִים דֵּלָטוֹרִין, and as a result, perhaps they were not worthy of redemption. The Kli Yakar adds this is why Hakadosh Baruch Hu revealed Himself to Moshe Rabbeinu from within a thornbush and not a flowery bush or tree. Bnei Yisrael were in distress more than all the nations because there are informers among them who raise their voices in insults and blasphemies like thorns that make noise when they burn in a fire. Bnei Yisrael, even while the fire of trouble burned around them, were a thorn of pain to one another – hatred and jealousy was pervasive and their tongues (speech) made them unclean.
Since we went down to Egypt because of the sins of speech, Chazal say, therefore the redeemer was כְבַד פֶּה וּכְבַד לָשׁוֹן – heavy of mouth and heavy of tongue, to signal to them that their problem was with speech. Additionally, when Moshe Rabbeinu asks Hakadosh Baruch Hu what signs to show the people should they not believe him, he was given two signs directly related to this root cause: transforming his staff into a snake and having tzara’at appear on his hand. The first to speak lashon hara in the world was the snake in Gan Eden, and for sins of lashon hara one receives tzara’at. Lastly, they were brought to Egypt, whose leader’s name, פַּרְעֹה, is a formation of the words פֶּה רַע – a bad mouth, and they left Mitzrayim with a mouth that spoke in holiness – פֶּה שָׂח or פֶּסַח.
Chazal say (Vayikra Rabbah 32:5), for four things Bnei Yisrael were redeemed from Egypt – that they did not change their name, nor their language, they did not speak lashon hara, and there was not found among them one who was immoral. Accordingly, we can understand a Pasuk that we say every day:
אָ נֹכִ י ה' אֱ לֹהֶיךָ הַמַּעַלְךָ מֵאֶרֶץ מִצְרָיִם הַרְחֶב פִּיךָ וַאֲמַלְאֵהוּ
What is the connection that Hakadosh Baruch Hu took us out of Egypt to "open your mouth wide and I will fill it"? The answer is very simple. If the entire reason we went down to Egypt was because of the sins of speech, then when Hakadosh Baruch Hu took us out of Egypt, we were automatically rectified from these sins, and this is the meaning of הַרְחֶב פִּיךָ – your mouth is rectified from the sins of the tongue, therefore וַאֲמַלְאֵהוּ – it will now be filled with words of Torah at Har Sinai!
Following these learnings, I would like to enter into the main topic of our shiur – a very interesting topic related to the donkey of Moshe Rabbeinu. You’ll surely ask, "Tell me, is the donkey of Moshe worth a full shiur?!" Please allow me to show you that it’s worth not one shiur, but at least three shiurim!
