ותתצב אחותו מרחוק לדעה מה יעשה לו
“His sister stood at a distance to learn what would happen to him.” (Shemos 2:4).
Moshe’s parents hid their son for three months. After three months, they could not hide him any longer. They put him in a basket and sent him floating down the river. Miriam, his sister, stood at the riverbank to see what was going to be with her baby brother.
Who should come down to bathe in the river? It is none other than Pharaoh’s daughter! Pharaoh was the perpetrator of the decree “All male children shall be thrown into the Nile” and his daughter comes down to bathe at that moment! Miriam must have been davening to the Ribbono Shel Olam at that moment: “Please, Hashem, don’t let her see the baby!” Miriam must have been thinking that Pharaoh’s daughter would certainly want to enforce her father’s decree.
What happened? It was just the opposite of Miriam’s worst fears. Pharaoh’s daughter does see the baby. She takes him into the palace with her and raises him in the house of Pharaoh. He becomes the savior of Klal Yisroel. The lesson of this story is: Be careful of what you daven for. A person never really knows what is good. Miriam thinks it would be the worst thing in the world for Pharaoh’s daughter to spot her brother. In the end, that turned out to be his salvation and the salvation of Klal Yisroel.
This is a classic example of the popular Yiddish saying, “A mensch tracht un G-t lacht” (a person thinks and G-d laughs). We see this in all areas of life. There are often situations where a bochur goes out with a particular girl and he wants the shidduch to happen. He davens to the Ribbono Shel Olam, “Please Hashem, make this shidduch happen! Please Hashem, make this shidduch happen!”. It doesn’t happen. The bochur is devastated. Oy vey is mir! (Woe is me!) Eventually, he marries someone else. Twenty years later, he sees what happened with that girl and what happened with the woman he married. He says, “You know G-d, You know what you are doing!”
The same thing happens in business. Sometimes a person has an opportunity in business and he thinks to himself “Oh! This is going to put me on Easy Street. This is how I am going to make my fortune!” At the last minute, the deal falls through and he thinks “Oh no! Woe is me! What does the Ribbono shel Olam have against me?” Then, three years later, he reads that his potential partner is indicted for criminal activity, and he had been a complete crook. The person who felt that G-d somehow had it against him, now realizes that he would have been in the same situation as the fellow in jail.
This is the lesson of “His sister stood off at a distance.” We need to leave solutions up to the Ribbono shel Olam. “That which is good in Your Eyes – do!” You know what is best. Hatov b’Einecha Aseh! (R’ Frand)
