Rav Haim Lifshitz
Sefer Shemot

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Sefer Shemot

 

 Translated from Hebrew by S. NAthan

l'ilui nishmat Esther bat mordechai


A LEADER IS BORN


    “‘And as they would afflict them, so they would increase.’ Everything they intended for afflicting [Israel] the Holy One would intend for multiplying them.” The Midrash adds: “This was the prophetic voice of the sacred speaking: ‘You say, ‘lest they shall increase,’ but I say, ‘so they shall increase.’” (Sota 1)

      “A man from the house of Levi went and took the daughter of Levi.”


This terse description reflects an obvious intention on the Torah's part to bypass identifying personal details. We are told nothing of the character or quality of these people. They same is true of the way the story opens to narrate the events that befell the Children of Israel in Egypt. There is the hint of a new beginning; it does not sound like a sequel, despite the first phrase: “And these are the names…” “And” serves to denote continuity as a general rule, and the recounting of the names of Jacob’s children conveys the impression that there is continuity here. Nevertheless, verse six already speaks of conclusion, of all these things coming to an end: “And Joseph died and all of his brothers and all that entire generation.” And as it continues to verse eight, “and a new king arose over Egypt,” Rashi brings the dispute of the Talmudic sages: “Rav and Shmuel [dispute]: One says ‘new in fact,’ and one says ‘his decrees were new.’” This comment points to the closing of a process, and to the opening of a new process that opposes and contradicts what has been achieved in the previous process, as becomes increasingly clear, in no uncertain terms, as the narration continues.

      As mentioned, even the description of his parents, those people who brought “the man Moshe” into the world -- the man who would become the savior of Israel – one would think they might deserve some mention of their qualities, a few brief remarks. Yet instead of a continuing description, a new description suddenly appears, of a socio-political situation, a new unfolding of objective conditions that justify, as it were, the Egyptians' devious and sinister treatment of the mass of strangers in their midst, whose stunning rate of increase threatens the delicate balance of Egyptian society. Everything happens by force of circumstance – as if by chance! Even the story of Moses being saved from drowning in the river sounds like a random event, wondrous indeed, but not related to any direct intervention by the Master of the universe – despite the fact that it is a bit difficult to pull all of these strange, coincidentally random happenings together into some sort of organized, unified chain of events that could reasonably be expected to unfold.

      One discerns, nevertheless, an obvious effort on the part of the “narrator” to establish the unfolding events upon a solid bedrock of value-driven behaviors, upon devotion and mesirut nefesh, self-sacrifice. “Pharaoh decreed only against the males, and you decree also against the females,” Miriam objects to her father, who has separated from her mother due to the distress of the times. The intensely active devotion of this savior sister is again clearly reflected in her intervention in Pharaoh’s daughter's plans.


    Moses too reveals inexplicable mesirut nefesh and sensitivity toward his brethren, despite the fact that he has grown up in the royal palace, and has not been educated among them. …To teach you that Godly quality does not reveal itself to the universe unless the people involved in the event take the first initiative.  Even if it is only in the merit of a few exceptional individuals, it is in their merit that the entire group survives.

      However, the powerfully unfolding chain of events does not stand in direct relation to the deeds of the people involved, nor to the deeds of the solitary individual who lives outside of the camp. It is the great hand of Providence that is now guiding the unfolding events on a cosmic scale. We have before us in Sefer Shemot, the Book of Exodus, an entirely new approach. A new path emerging that will transform the bond between God’s servant and his Possessor, and between the Creator and His universe.

      Whereas in Sefer Bereshit, the Book of Genesis, the bond was formed in the merit of individuals who took the initiative to seek God – in the merit of their exercise of free choice, in the merit of “the righteous person/the foundation of the universe,” as in “what a righteous person decrees, the Holy One carries out,” in the merit of our forefathers who attained what they attained by virtue of their own achievements – here we behold the beginning of a new path, coming from the opposite direction. The initiative of free choice is clearing the way in favor of the initiative of the hashgacha, Divine Providence. This is a itaruta dili’aila, an "initiative from above," that no longer restrains its response because it is awaiting the initiative of the righteous person exercising free choice. Rather, the hashgacha initiaties, and turns to respond to…a human cry of distress.

      This new way in
avodat Hashem, serving God, is reaching heights hitherto unknown in the Book of Genesis: “My Name of Hashem, I did not make known to them," to your forefathers. But henceforth, two mutually complementary approaches will coexist, with the center place and decisive role taken over by Supreme Providence.

      The signs and indicators of hashgacha transform the planetary foundations. They are a bit difficult for people to get used to, for after all, the principle that “one prefers one's own measure to one's friend's nine measures” is deeply embedded in human behavior, because of the human capacity for control and responsibility. This element comes with a feeling of mastery, one is enveloped by the feeling that one is the owner of the surround. The higher quality personality one is blessed with, the harder it is to ignore the need to use one's personal initiative.


    Yet it is specifically here that the once proud and powerful human being encounters a crisis, and sinks to the lowest low, to the nadir of human degradation, passing through all “forty-nine gates of impurity” almost to the point of no return. Crying out for rescue, for heaven’s pity, having reached the point of despair, having been cleaned out of all possessions, and emptied of all the achievements of one's great forefathers - here, in utter amazement, the human being discovers the heavenly connection – from the bottom of the pit.

      Anava: The Humility of Moshe Rabeinu

      “And the man Moses was more humble than any human being on the face of the earth.” Anava as a good mida, humility as a desirable character trait was not lacking in Abraham, who said: “I am dust and ashes.” Isaac and Jacob as well excelled in the virtue of humility. What was the Torah’s reason for attributing this trait only to Moses?

   
    Alternatively, why does the Torah not point to the perfect qualities of the human being who was privileged to draw closer to the Lord than any other human being? Moshe did not only attain contact with the Lord. Rather he was privileged to enter lifnai velifnim, into the innermost spaces of Godly Presence, to bring the Torah, the Divine teaching down from heaven.

      It appears that the Torah wishes to describe the new path – in which activity is initiated by hashgacha, Divine Providence, which offers man a bond with his Creator. This new bond is less sensitive and vulnerable than the bond formed by the initiative of human free choice – for the simple reason that the human element is not quite solid enough to consistently sustain this bond.

      Humility, Moshe Rabeinu’s anava does not point to any humanly initiated quality other than the training and cultivation of the human vessel to receive the Godly initiative. The exclusive emphasis upon this quality, to the point of ignoring every other quality, points to the Torah’s intention of describing anava as a pre-condition for receiving Godly hesed, and the only condition necessary for becoming the recipient of hashgacha.

      There is no doubt that heavenly initiative of this sort appears only during situations that find the human being utterly helpless, when all that is left of one is the sensation of needing yeshuah; it invites and implores God’s saving deliverance. If any consciousness of human ability is mingled with this sensation, it only delays the immanence of Godly Presence.

      The trait of anava requires the total elimination of the sensation of the human capacity to help oneself. Only under such conditions does one merit an activity initiated by siyata dishmaya, heavenly assistance.

      The leading element in humility is a belief in the Heavenly Presence as the exclusive cause of everything that happens – a belief that this Presence is not aided or furthered, God forbid, by any other or alien factor possessing any ability whatsoever – as in: “We have no one to lean on except our Father in heaven,” and all the rest is mere optical illusion.

      Such a perception includes canceling all expectation of succor from any natural source whatsoever, as well as a clear recognition that the forces and laws of nature fill no role in the unfolding of events, and this includes every expression of existential threat, as menacing or frightening as it may be.

      Moses incarnated this sensation in all its purity, and therefore deserved more than anyone else to lead a situation that, from an existentially logical perspective, could not have been more hopeless.

      Was Moshe Rabeinu also graced with qualities of human ability? Undoubtedly. Merely pointing to the fact that none of these qualities are mentioned is enough to substantiate our claim.

      Therefore, those who view Moshe Rabeinu as the symbol of leadership for all time are in error. Of all that might have been said of Moses, the Torah mentions only the one asset that was surely a liability, his speech handicap.

      Can one imagine a leader whose power does not lie in his ability to speak? To our great surprise, the Omnipotent One does not find it necessary to heal him of this critical handicap. …To teach you that Moshe was suited as no other to the task of representing the absolute power of the supreme hashgacha.

      We must distinguish between humility as a sense of one’s own nothingness – a result of failure and despair in the wake of which the one suffering from this condition loses any remnant of the confidence he accumulated during his years of success – and humility as a quality, as the queen of good character traits, in the sense of: “What wisdom takes as a crown for its head, humility takes as a sole for its heel.” It was indeed this latter trait of humility that characterized the father of all prophets.

      Anava as the fruit of failure is rooted in the brute-force-based survival mechanism. It is not to be found among the qualities of the self. The humility that belongs to the self is one that testifies to the innocence and goodness, to the “clean hands” of the self in all its purity, being clear and distant from ego and constituting its antithesis. It is the character trait that is the polar opposite of arrogance. True anava does not look down upon human beings from the outside, out of an egoistic need for comparison, in order to identify potential competitors who might block one’s path. The humility born of quality springs from the expressions of the self as it creates hesed toward another – as it seeks the most auspicious moment to do another a kindness.

      Anava produces hesed. Humility begets acts of generosity and loving kindness. It polishes one’s sensitivity to another’s needs in order to do another good. The humility of quality liberates the self from the shackles of ego, and directs one’s attention to the presence of the other, preventing an egocentric concentration upon oneself.

      Thus is the path opened to pure hesed, its wagon laden with sensitivity and burdened with good will and good-heartedness toward the needy.

      Indeed it was this humility of quality that had buffed Moshe Rabeinu’s life force to its lustrous shine – to the point of feeling compassion for the lamb that had fled the flock, and it was this same humility that had sharpened his senses to discern the miraculous phenomenon within the sneh, the desert bush.

      How is sensitivity to discerning a phenomenon of miracle related to the trait of hesed?

      Selfishness expresses the survival mechanism, which testifies to enslavement to the brute-force basis of the laws of nature that threaten to devour human quality, which the laws of nature view as an alien intruder. Sensitivity to the miraculous testifies to one's openness toward the dimension of height, to one's relating to the kingdom of heaven, and to one's coping with both parallel tracks: The one below, which is materialistic, brute-force-based, and arbitrary – and the one above, which beckons and rivets toward itself all that is beautiful and good in the one formed in God’s image. It awakens quality, and the capacity to control brute-force-based reality, which can be shattered by one glimpse from above – and this glimpse liberates one from the shackles of enslaving physical matter, which coerces and transmits its message of inescapable necessity.

      We can surmise that many travelers had passed by that spot, and countless caravans had traversed that place, since the time of creation when this desert bush first began to burn with its Godflaming fire. Yet no one sensed anything unusual. No one trembled before the vision of the Divine – until that lamb-pitier came along, and halted in his tracks – in the presence of the sacred that had burst into and halted the flow of secular reality, which had cleared out to give its place to the sacred, “for the place on which you stand is sacred earth.” Just like hesed: A generous act toward another constitutes a deviation from the selfish survival mechanism, which views another as an adversary and a threat.

      The Humility of a Leader

      It appears that a leader is blessed with the humility of hesed, with a sensitivity that invites the other to come and take over his (the leader’s) place, almost as though a leader’s reason for existence is not to cultivate his own place, by exploiting the other, but rather for the sake of the other, by sacrificing his own existence to the point of neglecting his own obligations within his own private world. Thus Moshe neglected his obligation to circumcise his son – so great was his dedication to his mission to redeem his brethren.

      Moshe views this conflict of interests as a serious and threatening flaw in the role of leadership. After all, he must invest a minute drop of effort at least, in defending his own survival, according to the rule of “one must live by them, and “you must greatly protect your lives,” and “your life comes before the life of your fellow.” And we do not appoint a public leader who is not “wise, strong, and wealthy,” so that he will not need the favor or charity of the people, and will be able to focus upon their situation and upon their distress with an unbiased, un-bribed eye. And if he does not protect his own status and is involved solely in their affairs, who will take care of his affairs?

      Here Hashem - God - reveals His new system for management of the universe to Moshe: “I have truly seen the affliction of My people in Egypt, and their cry I have heard…and I have come down to save them.” This is the initiative of a hashgacha that no longer waits for the initiative of free choice, as it has up to this point. Moses hears it, and cannot believe it! After all, “one prefers one's own measure to one's friend's nine measures.” What will become of one's faith in oneself, in one's own ability, in one's own talents, in one's willingness to assume responsibility for one's actions? Will God’s servant now not become vulnerable to the risk of losing self-respect, of losing control – of losing self control at least?

      For this same reason, there is not much chance that the Children of Israel will be willing to cast off their own honor, their own independence, and agree to eat the bread of charity – even if it is from the table of the One on high. “B’nei Yisrael will not believe me,” Moshe claims. Even from the depths of distress, one is not happy to renounce one's freedom. From this perspective, even the promise of the Land will be inadequate to persuade them, since after all, attachment to one’s own solid ground belongs more to the survival mechanism that to the heavenly mechanism.

      Here the Holy One uncovers – and reveals to Moses – the critical element in His new approach: “This is your sign that I have sent you…when you bring the nation forth from Egypt, you will worship the Lord on this mountain.”

      The Gift of Torah

      In the Torah dimension, learning and observance of Torah will serve as the challenge in which human beings will find expression for the best that their spiritual and personal powers can offer, beyond comparison with the challenge posed by the war for survival. In Torah’s war, human quality will find direct expression, which will extract every grain of energy and of quality, both spiritual and tangible. Human emotion will march arm in arm with Godly intellect toward the unifying goal of upholding Torah. Such upholding obligates one to bestow Godly meaning upon the tangibly material, and to bestow tangibility upon the spiritual, in order to create Godly Presence. No more wasting of precious and irretrievable resources on the war for survival, as in: “The righteous – their work is done by others.” The tsadik, the righteous one is one who willingly renounces his brute-force-based ability. The deeper his renunciation becomes, the greater the Godly involvement in his personal fate, and the more this involvement supports his devoted investment in serving his Creator.

      The phrase that is key to this new approach appears at the beginning of Sefer Shemot, the Book of Exodus:
“‘And as they would afflict them, so they would increase and so they would burst forth.’ Everything they intended for afflicting [Israel] the Holy One would intend for multiplying them.” The Midrash adds: “This was ruah hakodesh speaking, the prophetic voice of the sacred: ‘You say, ‘lest they shall increase,’ but I say, ‘so they shall increase.’” (Sota 1)


    That is to say, as their resources of existence decrease, and as their distress increases – and we must add, as they abandon their faith in the resources of existence and pin their hopes upon heaven – so does the hashgacha’s involvement increase, and intervene to tend to the affairs of their existence.

      It should be pointed out that this overturning of the method [of the creator’s management of His universe] is not absolute and not one-sided; it does not pass, and then reappear again only in times of distress.

      Renunciation as Power

      The new ideal grants power to the sense of helplessness, but only to the extent that this feeling liberates one from dependency upon the survival mechanism. This is the liberation that grows out of awareness, out of willingly renouncing. It is a milihatehila ideal first choice rather than a product of despair accompanied by existential fear, sadness and dejection. This willing renunciation opens a window to new horizons – of new goals of existence born of quality. This is a glad renunciation; one is moved and amazed in the face of new goals and challenges. Only renunciation of this sort preserves one’s belief in one’s own ability to cope, and preserves one’s belief in free choice, and in one’s own ability to weigh options and arrive at decisions – elements that remain always the foundation stones of human dignity, of the human ability to take control and to make decisions from a posture of accountability.

      Here is the challenge of creating a new world out of the materials of the old world; a new world grows and rises out of the ruins of the war for survival – because from the high view, the war for survival looks like a smoking ruin. A new challenge takes its place. It is a challenge of existence, it is true, but it is steeped in value-driven meaning. It is an existence that builds Godly Presence from the very materials of existence; it does not displace them, but makes new use of them.

      We find here both the Divine promise to our forefathers, which was built on the human initiative of free choice, and the new shem havaya, the Name of God that expresses the direct intervention of the hashgachah. Henceforth, a human being is charged with a role that is comprised of an internal contradiction. One must simultaneously cope with a condition of having everything and feeling that one has nothing, and with a condition of having nothing and feeling that one has everything. From here on, one is required to view nature as a thin and transparent layer that is inadequate to conceal the direct presence of the miracle. Hidden though it may be, yet it is indeed a miracle that cannot be pushed aside by the mechanical forces of nature. From here on, one will not live in a world that is split between nature and miracle. Rather one lives with the miracle, and it is natural, and one lives with nature, and it is miraculous.

      This sense of things will take hold also (and mainly) within the structure of his personality. No longer will he experience a split between contradicting inner tendencies, with one pulling him toward the hedonistic stimulations of physical matter while the other causes him to cringe in mortal terror before the war for survival.

      Instead, pleasure and duty will complement one another in the creative challenge inherent in the framework of Torah and mitzvos. Only such a framework can prevent the split that hinders human perfection. Within this framework, outside phenomena are viewed exclusively as an expression of miraculous hashgacha, while in man’s inner world, these two opposites meet and complement one another: “Nireh, la’aniyus da’asi, it appears to me, in my impoverished opinion…” “God will enlighten my eyes…” The sensation of the miraculous accompanies the oved Hashem, God’s servant who toils and labors to the point “‘that a man shall die in the tent’ – in Torah’s tent.” There is a sense of miracle despite the toil and the effort and a personal investment that is without limits. The oved Hashem who toils in Torah becomes transformed into Godly Presence, into a walking miracle. Therefore, “‘you shall be in very awe of God, your Lord,’ includes also Torah scholars.”

      “Moshe the man,” “more humble than any human being on the face of the earth” merited the privilege of becoming the symbol of Godly Presence made tangibly real through Torah. And “whoever questions him, becomes like someone who questions the shechina, the Godly Presence” that radiated from Moshe’s face. This is a leader who does not require the traits that characterize the ordinary brute-force-based leader. He is a leader rather by virtue of being the symbol of the perfect human being, a symbol who became a Godly Presence that was tangibly real.

 

 

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