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CHAPTER 1
The Torah
Bo': Exodus 10:1–13:16
No doubt about it, Pharaoh has a problem. He has got to be one of the slowest learners in all of world history. Because Pharaoh's heart continues to be hardened, and because his stubbornness persists, God continues to bring plagues upon Egypt. This portion features the plagues of locusts, darkness, and, the worst of them all, the death of the firstborn. At that point, Pharaoh finally relents and lets the Israelites go.
God tells Moses and Aaron that they will depart from Egypt in the first month, and that on the tenth day of that month each Israelite household should acquire a lamb. At twilight on the fourteenth day, each household should slaughter their lamb, putting some of its blood on the doorposts so that their houses are spared the plague of the death of the firstborn. The Israelites must also eat unleavened bread (matzah) for seven days.
These observances — the sacrifice of the lamb and the eating of matzah — will become important parts of the festival of Pesach. The Israelites are further told to consecrate their firstborn to God, as a further remembrance of their departure from Egypt.
Summary
• Pharaoh still stubbornly refuses to let the Israelites go. The final plagues of locusts, darkness, and the death of the firstborn come upon the Egyptians. (10:12–11:10)
• God commands Moses to establish the festival of Pesach. (12:1–23)
• The Israelites are commanded to tell their children about the meaning of Pesach — which means telling them about the meaning of freedom itself. (12:24–27)
• God gives Moses the laws of the Pesach sacrifice. (12:43–49)
The Big Ideas
• Jews must be a distinct people. That is why the final act of liberation for the Israelites is to sacrifice a lamb. The lamb was one of Egypt's most important gods. Publicly slaughtering the lamb was how the Israelites would declare that they did not worship that god, and, by doing that, the Israelites had no choice but to leave Egypt.
• Rituals help us remember important ideas and keep them alive. Rituals help us feel that we, personally, are part of Jewish history. Whether or not the biblical account of the Exodus is historically accurate, when we remember it we relearn moral lessons that have shaped human history.
• Education is one of Judaism's most important values. It guarantees that Judaism will be passed down through the generations. Asking questions, as we do at the Passover seder, is the most important part of learning.
• When we celebrate, we must remember those who are poor or are without family. That is why the Torah commands Jews to join together with other families that cannot afford their own lamb for the Pesach sacrifice. Even though we do not sacrifice animals anymore, all our celebrations should remind us that there is a world beyond ourselves.
Divrei Torah
Why Do You Have to Kill the Egyptian God?
As many scholars have noted, the plagues that struck Egypt during the Exodus can be interpreted as being assaults on the various gods of Egypt: the Nile, the sun, even to the firstborn of Pharaoh. But after the "official" plagues have ended, one more Egyptian god will come under assault. "Speak to the whole community of Israel and say that on the tenth of this month [the first month, Nisan] each of them shall take a lamb to a family, a lamb to a household" (12:3). God told the Israelites to acquire a lamb — which is not just an animal, but an Egyptian animal god.
In other words, it seems as if God is telling the Israelites to get themselves an Egyptian lamb-god and therefore buy into the Egyptian religious system — which means becoming good Egyptians.
The Israelites must live with their lamb-gods for four days. That's enough time to become comfortable with their new gods. It is also enough time for their Egyptian neighbors to have seen them with their new gods and to have therefore assumed that the Israelites are (finally) prepared to fit into Egyptian life and to stop being outsiders.
Not so fast.
The Israelites then slaughter their lambs. They dab the blood on the doorposts of their houses — in a place where everyone can see it. That is why a midrash portrays God as understanding that "as long as the Israelites worship the Egyptian gods, they shall not be redeemed. Withdraw your hands from idolatry and take a lamb, and therefore slaughter the gods of Egypt and make the Passover."
The slaughtering of the lambs, therefore, did not only symbolize physical freedom and national redemption. It was also an outward manifestation of freedom from Egyptian idolatry — and, with that, the Israelites are ready to truly make their break with Egypt. As Rabbi Lawrence Kushner has written about the ill-fated lamb: "Come tomorrow and its blood is on our door, we leave with Moses, or they will surely kill us. A slave who can kill the master's god is no longer a slave. And if we are afraid to kill the lamb, then we may not leave with Moses."
Today, killing lambs (especially since they are no longer worshiped as gods) is not our idea of a good time, nor is it a symbolic act. But when our ancestors made their courageous break for freedom they had to break with every aspect of their enslavement. This has always been one of the great things about the Jews: the willingness to stand apart and to be different. Why? To make a better world.
Did the Exodus Really Happen? Does It Matter?
One of the most famous composers in American history was George Gershwin. He was also Jewish. In one of his most famous songs, we find the words: "The stuff that you're liable to find in the Bible, they ain't necessarily so." Gershwin had a good sense of humor. The melody of "It Ain't Necessarily So" sounds very similar to the traditional Torah blessing!
So is it "necessarily so" that the Israelites went forth from Egypt? Did the Exodus really happen? Well, as the song says, not necessarily.
First, the Torah says that six hundred thousand men (not counting the women and the children) left Egypt and then wandered across the Sinai Desert to get to the Land of Israel. But archeologists have not found a trace of evidence that anyone was ever there! And, if you put together all those who supposedly came out of Egypt, they would have created a long line of people that would have stretched all the way from Egypt to Israel!
What about in the Land of Israel itself? Here, again, archeologists tell us that there is no evidence for a huge group of people entering the Land of Israel at that time. If that had been the case, then, at the very least, there would have been a sudden, vast increase in the amount of pottery that was made, but archeologists have found no evidence for increased amounts of pottery. So, the general opinion among archeologists and historians is that while there were some Israelite slaves who left Egypt, most Israelites lived in the Land of Israel for many generations. They never left and they never had to return.
On the other hand: what nation would ever invent a history of itself that says that it started out in slavery? In the words of modern scholar Eli Barnavi: "It is highly improbable that a nation would choose to invent for itself a history of slavery as an explanation for its origins." And, as an old saying goes, "The absence of evidence is not evidence of absence." A group of nomads, even a large one, could have traveled across the great desert and, after these thousands of years, hardly left a trace.
The Torah is probably not one hundred percent historically accurate. But does that really matter? Whether or not it happened just the way that the Torah says, the Exodus from Egypt teaches us about the value of human freedom and of human hope. And not just for Jews. "In every generation, a person [not: "a Jew"] should see himself or herself as if he or she had personally gone forth from Egypt, states the Passover Haggadah.
We are probably not going to come to a definitive answer to the question "Did the Exodus really happen?" That's all right. We can live with not knowing for sure. No matter what the archeologists and historians finally conclude, the Exodus is part of our heritage and how we view our origins and character. The Exodus, our journey from slavery to freedom, politically and spiritually, didn't just happen once in history. It happens within each of us. And it happens all the time.
Connections
• Do you believe that the plagues were necessary in order for the Israelites to be able to leave Egypt? What alternatives could have been possible?
• What are the most important questions that you have about Judaism, or about life?
• How has Jewish education been important to you and your family?
• What kind of Pesach memories does your family have? Has it been a memorable holiday for you and your family? What does it mean to you?
• Do you believe that the Exodus really happened? Do you think that it matters if it did or not? In what way have you personally felt that you have gone out of Egypt? What is your Egypt? (For example, breaking a bad habit, overcoming a difficulty at school, etc.)
CHAPTER 2
The Haftarah
Bo': Jeremiah 46:13–28
Pharaoh just doesn't get it, whether it was the Pharaoh who lived in the time of Moses, or the Pharaoh who lived in the time of Jeremiah. The later Pharaoh has a starring role in this haftarah. In this week's Torah portion the earlier Pharaoh cannot make the right decisions, and here the later Pharaoh has the same problem.
The prophet Jeremiah who (like Ezekiel) preached in the time before the Babylonians destroyed the kingdom of Judah, counsels the Judeans not to make an alliance with Egypt against Babylon. He's concerned about his fellow Judeans' flight to Egypt. It won't work, he says. He predicts that the Egyptians will be unstable allies, and that their kingdom — like the regime of the Pharaoh of Moses's time — will fall to ruin.
Jerk Alert, Part Two
In last week's haftarah, the prophet Ezekiel warned the Judeans that it was no use trying to make an alliance with the Egyptians. This week, the prophet Jeremiah is saying pretty much the same thing about the Pharaoh of his time.
The Pharaoh who rules during Moses's time was totally arrogant because he thought that he was divine — that he had actually created the Nile for himself. And, this week, we see another symptom of Pharaoh's inability to get it. Jeremiah calls the Pharaoh of his time a "braggart who let the hour go by" (46:17). Actually, "braggart" is only an approximate translation of the Hebrew word sha'on. Rashi, the great medieval commentator, teaches: "Pharaoh was a big noisemaker who raised his voice." He was the loudmouth who never shut up. Pharaoh was, as they say, all hot air — a really big disappointment as a leader.
This should not surprise us. Go back to the Pharaoh of Moses's time. First, God hardened his heart and made him refuse to let the Israelites go, thus bringing on more and more plagues, each one worse than the last. It is as if Pharaoh encounters each plague as the first one. It is as if he has no memory of what has already happened to his land and to his people. More than that, he is so convinced of his own power — after all, he thinks he is a god — that he just lets the time slip away from him. He thinks that he has all the time in the world — and then, Egypt falls apart. That is the way it is with the Pharaoh of Jeremiah's time as well. In the process, they hurt not just themselves, but everyone and everything around them.
You probably know people like Pharaoh. There is always that kid who thinks she is so great — such a great athlete, such a great student — that she gets lazy. Sure, she brags a lot. But while she brags she wastes time that she could have devoted to becoming even better. She misses crucial opportunities. She is the "braggart who let the hour go by."
But there is something else going on here as well. Jeremiah knows something that all the Egyptians and the Judeans should have known as well. "Been there, done that." The Israelites had a bad experience with Egypt and Pharaoh (to put it mildly). They should know better than to think that Egypt is all-powerful. Back in the days of Moses, the plagues were a way of fighting the power of the Egyptian gods. That same battle is going on in the haftarah portion: "The Lord of Hosts, the God of Israel, has said: I will inflict punishment on Amon of No and on Pharaoh — on Egypt, her gods, and her kings" (46:25). And the Egyptians themselves should have learned from their historical experience. But they didn't.
When it comes to the Jews, nations don't learn their lessons. Nations that have oppressed the Jews, from ancient Egypt to medieval England and Spain, have come to regret it. Sir Winston Churchill expressed this in strong terms: "Some people like Jews and some do not, but no thoughtful man can doubt the fact that they are beyond all question the most formidable and the most remarkable race which has ever appeared in the world."
Nations and peoples need to stay humble, guard against arrogance, and guard against the tendency to belittle others and become aloof and cruel. Nobody wants to be a jerk, but it can happen. And that can be dangerous for your country, your community, and yourself.
(Continues…)
Excerpted from "Bo' (Exodus 10:1-13:16) and Haftarah (Jeremiah 46:13-28): The JPS B'nai Mitzvah Torah Commentary"
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Copyright © 2018 Rabbi Jeffrey K. Salkin.
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