Cary Hillebrand looks at Parashat Bo

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sts110-738-052 by NASA Johnson is licensed under CC-BY-NC 2.0

Parashat Bo

פרשת בא

שמות Exodus 10:1 to 13:16

Chapter 10, verses 1 through 6 – Moses threatens Pharaoh with an even more devastating plague

Why does G-d command Moses “come (בא) to Pharaoh” as opposed to “go (לך) to Pharaoh”?

Why was Pharaoh’s heart “hardened”? Why wasn’t he allowed to relent before the ten plagues all ran their course? Is G acting in bad faith, the plagues being inevitable, and the warnings and negotiations a charade?

Was G-d going through the succession of increasingly destructive plagues to mock the Egyptians and establish his credibility with the Israelites? Were the Egyptians mere pawns in this game? Did G-d want the world, and particularly the Israelites to be aware of his might, and to have a story to relate to future generations? If so, things had to happen as planned regardless of whatever Pharaoh may have decided if left to his own “free will”.

Verses 7 through 20 – Eighth plague strikes Egypt

While Pharaoh is still defiant, we see that his courtiers have had enough and dared to confront him, and in strong defiant terms spoke truth to power (“are you not yet aware that Egypt is lost? הטרם תדע כי אבדה מצרים). Pharaoh did partially relent and agreed to let the males go out to worship G-d, but on condition that they leave behind their young and old, women, and flocks, apparently as hostages. Moses did not agree to this unacceptable condition and walked out. To an Egyptian, it must have been unthinkable that anyone can just turn and walk out on Pharaoh without being dismissed. Conceivably, for Pharaoh, worship was between tribal leaders and anointed priests and their gods and does not involve the rest of society. If so, why allow everybody to go and participate?

The late Rabbi Jonathan Sacks postulated that Pharaoh may not have been evil as much as conservative, perhaps even stubborn. As absolute ruler of what was the most powerful empire in the known world, and one where stability and resistance to change were paramount, he feared that giving in would show the dynasty to be weak and vulnerable in the eyes of foreign powers bent on invading. Ignoring his courtiers’ advice and pleadings, he ruled that it is better to stand fast, whatever the cost.

With the eighth plague, locusts ruined all the crops. A seemingly contrite Pharaoh pleaded with Moses, even requested forgiveness (remember, this was Pharaoh, a god to his people, acknowledging that he was bested by a higher power). With the lifting of the plague, Pharaoh was once again locked into his course of refusal.

 Verses 21 through 29 – Ninth plague strikes Egypt

The ninth plague was “thick and total darkness. A darkness that can be touched” (חשך על ארץ מצרים וימש חשך) descended upon the Egyptians, but not the Israelites. How can darkness be “touched”? Some medieval commentators suggested that this was not physical darkness but emotional darkness or depression. At any rate, this plague caused Pharaoh to relent still further, by allowing all the Israelites to go into the wilderness to worship G-d, not just the men. Moses insisted that they be allowed to bring their livestock, and, perhaps just to rub it into Pharaoh’s face, he demanded that the Egyptians must provide the required sacrifices and burnt offerings. A humiliated Pharaoh has had enough of Moses and orders him away from his presence under pain of death.

Chapter 11, verses 1 through 10 – The Hebrews are charged to “borrow” gold and silver objects

G-d said “Please tell the people …” (דבר נא באזני העם). Why is G-d so polite in issuing his instructions to Moses? Why did he instruct Moses to have the Israelites ” ask” t heir Egyptian neighbors for objects of gold and silver? Why were the Egyptians disposed to fork them over, especially in light of the nine plagues that they endured? After all, their land was devastated and they were facing starvation. Note that the personage of Moses had risen among the
Egyptians, both in the court and among the people (Verse 3 – (”האיש משה גדול מאד בארץ מצרים בעיני עבדי פרעה ובעיני העם” Did this indicate that the people knew that the Pharaoh was bested and humiliated by Moses? Why did the final plague, death of the firstborn, strike across all of Egyptian society, from the nobility to the lowliest of the low, the slave girl? What was her guilt? Was this unjust collective punishment, or was the message that silence in the face of injustice bears a degree of guilt.

Chapter 12, verses 1 through 20 – Introduction to what will become the festival of Passover

Before the final plague, the narrative is interrupted. What is generally considered as the first commandment is given. This month (here unnamed) shall be the first month of the year (החדש הזה לכם ראש חדשים ראשון הוא לכם לחדשי השנה). Following, in chapter 13, verse 4 it will be named Aviv (אביב – spring). Later, during the Babylonian exile, the Babylonian calendar will be adopted and the month will be renamed with the Akkadian Nisan (ניסן). Detailed directions are given to observe an annual seven-day feast to be eaten with unleavened bread to remember the exodus from Egypt. Why is a calendar referred to here (first time in the Torah)? As an enslaved people, the Israelites would have had little use for a calendar as their day was ordered and scheduled by their overseers. Only as a free people would they bear responsibility and obligation to arrange their days for both religious and secular purposes.

Biblical scholars believe that the Feast of Unleavened Bread was originally an agricultural festival celebrating the beginning of the grain harvest. Passover Sacrifice was originally a separate festival performed by the pastoral tribes of Judea, first by each family and later including a pilgrimage to the Temple in Jerusalem. In time, probably during the Second Temple, the holidays merged. Note that the Samaritans still observe the Passover Sacrifice at Mount Gerizim.

Verses 21 through 42 – Tenth and final plague strikes Egypt (and it is a doozie!). Pharaoh finally gives in

Back to the narrative of the tenth and final plague.

Verse 29 – “… from the firstborn of Pharaoh … to the firstborn of the captive in the dungeon and all the firstborn cattle”. In other words, the punishment was across the board, from the guiltiest to the least guilty. Why the death of the innocents and of the powerless? Perhaps the answer lies in the realization that all layers of Egyptian society were complicit in the enslavement of the Israelites and even if they did not actively partake in their oppression, they bore collective responsibility through their silence in the face of injustice.

Verse 32 – ” Take also your flocks and your herds as you said, and be gone. And bless me also”. Why did Pharaoh request a blessing from such hated adversaries? Was he acknowledging, perhaps as a sign of surrender, that his fate is in the hands of G-d? Rashi surmises that Pharaoh, as a firstborn, needed this blessing so he will not die.

Verse 37 – The number of Israelite men leaving Egypt is generally translated as about 600,000 (כשש מאות אלף) not including women and children. Obviously, this is a grossly unrealistic number. Many contemporary scholars interpret the word aleph (אלף – thousand in contemporary Hebrew) to really mean contingent, perhaps about ten men, which would yield a more realistic 6,000 men.

Verse 38 – A “mixed multitude” (ערב רב) joined the Israelites. Commentators speculated that this was composed of people from the bottom of the Egyptian social strata, possible including non-Israelite slaves that took the opportunity of this great upheaval to escape. Rashi claimed that they were converts from among the Egyptians and perhaps other nationalities. The Torah does not hint at this, and as this was before the revelation at Mount Sinai, what would they have “converted” to? Later, in Numbers, chapter 11, verse 4, these people are referred to derogatorily as riffraff (אספסוף), having grown weary of mana and longing for the foods they regularly consumed in Egypt.

Verse 40 – The length of time that the Israelites lived in Egypt was four hundred and thirty years”. There is a discrepancy here. Elsewhere (Genesis, chapter 15, verse 13) gives the length of the sojourn in Egypt as 400 years. Genesis, Chapter 15, verse 16 and Exodus, chapter 6, verse 13 state that four generations resided in Egypt. Other interpretations peg the period as lasting “only” 210 years.

Chapter 12, verses 43 through 50; Chapter 13, verses 1 through 16 – More on the Passover observance

Verse 44 – A circumcised slave may eat of the Passover sacrifice (text not clear as to whether he may eat or if he must eat – יאכל). Verse 45 – But, a non-Jewish resident or hired hand (תושב ושכיר) cannot partake of the Passover sacrifice? Why is this?

Chapter 13, verse 1 – Command to observe the Passover Sacrifice, every first-born animal to be sacrificed, but every firstborn son to be redeemed (Pideon HaBen- פדיון הבן).

Verse 4 – The month including the Passover observance is called the month of Aviv – אביב (the season of spring in modern Hebrew). The month was renamed with the Babylonian name Nisan (ניסן) probably during the Babylonian exile.

Verse 8 – Obligation to tell the Passover story to the next generation. The Passover Seder as we know it is not described in the Torah. It evolved after the destruction of the Second Temple.

Verse 9 – “… and so it shall be as a sign upon your hand and as a symbol on your forehead that with a mighty hand the Lord freed us from Egypt (והיה לך לאות על ידך ולזכרון בין עיניך)”. Later (in the Talmud) interpreted to be a call to put on Tefillin.

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