NEXT

DAY, MOSES SAT AS MAGISTRATE AMONG THE PEOPLE, WHILE THE PEOPLE STOOD ABOUT

MOSES FROM MORNING UNTIL EVENING. BUT WHEN MOSES' FATHER-IN-LAW SAW HOW

MUCH HE HAD TO DO FOR THE PEOPLE, HE SAID, "WHAT IS THIS THING THAT YOU

ARE DOING TO THE PEOPLE? WHY DO YOU SIT ALONE, WHILE ALL THE PEOPLE STAND ABOUT

YOU FROM MORNING UNTIL EVENING?

(Shemot 18:13-14)

From morning until evening – Is it really possible to say so

– [that Moses sat the whole day long?] But [the explanation is that] any judge

who gives a rightful decision as truth demands it, even though [he spends] but

one hour [on it], Scripture accounts it to him as though he had occupied himself

with the Torah the whole day long, and as though he became co-partner with the

Holy One, blessed be He, in the work of Creation of which it is stated, It

was evening and it was morning, one day (Bereishit 1:5).

(Rashi on Shemot 18:14, Silbermann

translation)

The "Law of Man" Preceded the Giving of the Torah

…and do not be

troubled by the question of how Moses judged the people

before the Torah was given. Many laws are deducible by human reason even

when they are not commanded, such as [the prohibition of] theft, robbery,

perjury, and the like. And had they not already received the

commandments of Shabbat, and circumcision, and [the prohibition of] human

bloodshed, and all of the other rational commandments which are called the "law

of man," or "the seven Noahide laws?"

Moses spent the whole day applying those laws.

(R. Yitzhak Shemuel Reggio, Italy 19^th cent.)

From

Servitude to Treasured People

Rami Pinchower

The

sharp transition from Shabbat Shira to Shabbat

Matan Torah best symbolizes Israel's great and

instantaneous transformation from a people whose fate and daily life were

determined by the Egyptian master, to that of freed slaves, who have apparently

gained autonomy.

The

first moments of liberation are moments of happiness and elation, but the

moments following them are "as difficult as the splitting of the Red Sea."

The Shawshank Redmption

is an excellent film version of Stephen King's novel, which portrays the

brutality of American prison-life in the 1940s and 1950s. A memorable scene shows

us the release of one of the film's heroes after decades of terrible

incarceration. After a short time, he feels himself incapable of contending

with an environment of freedom, and longs to return to awful yet familiar

prison existence. Trapped, he ends his own life.

The

Israelites passed through a similar process. As soon as their singing ended,

they forgot the horrors of enslavement and the great miracles that had occurred

in Egypt and during the Exodus from it. All of the wonders they had witnessed

by the sea were wiped from their consciousness. They encountered a problem and

were immediately struck with feelings of helplessness. All they could do was to

cry out and complain to Moses Why did you take us

up from Egypt… (Shemot

17:3). They had left Egypt for but a few hours, leaving their drudgery

behind them, bursting into euphoric song, and then they were already longing to

return to the "warm" and familiar embrace of servitude.

The solution

arrives immediately: So he cried out to the Lord, and the Lord showed him a

made for them a fixed rule, and there He put them to the test (15:25). In the Mekhiltah

and Tanhuma, the Sages ponder the question which kind

of tree gave the sweetening wood. The "deep darshanim"

of the Mekhilta offer a wonderful derasha:

"He showed him words of Torah, which are compared to a tree, for it is

said, It is a tree of life for those who grasp it (Proverbs 3:18)" (Mekhilta Beshalah, Horowitz-Rabin edition, pg. 156). As soon

as one's life gains meaning, the moment Torah enters one's life, one's attitude

towards life changes. The bitter waters become living waters, and perhaps even

bitter people become sweet. (See R. Levi in Tanhuma VaYakhel 9). It

might be said that this derasha almost gives the

plain meaning of the passage. There are two pieces of evidence for this claim. First:

The word vayoreihu [He instructed him]

is used, rather than vayira'eihu [He showed

him] (as noticed by R. Shimon bar Yohai in the Mekhiltah and Tanhuma). Second: A

fixed rule was given to them, along with the water. As

it says: and the water became sweet. There He made for them a

fixed rule, and there He put them to the test. According to the "deep darshanim" the word there refers to in the

water.

However,

only a few days passed before the complaints resumed, stronger than ever. It

seems that the localized therapy did not produce a wonder-cure.

That

short bit of experienced showed the Holy One blessed be He that a nation which

had grown accustomed to the yoke of slavery over hundreds of years becomes

incapable of freeing itself from it. That nation requires a new yoke; it needs

responsibilities, a fixed rule. Lacking direction from above to set out

what is permissible and what is forbidden, man will lose his way. The

transition from euphoria to despair, from eminence to abasement, from a unique

moment of song – be it ever so glorious – to the grind of daily life can be

sudden and painful if it falls upon a person unprepared, upon one who lacks the

tools for contending with transition.

How

can this crisis be transformed into a far-reaching source of positive impetus

in one's life? How is the newly freed slave to be fitted with a non-threatening

yoke of obligation?

Here

we reach the event which Prof. M. D. Cassuto referred

to as "the climax of the entire book… its

central and most elevated concern; everything preceding it came as a preparation,

everything following it is its outcome and supplementation."

According

to the original plan explained to Moses during his consecration at the burning

bush, God promised him that one day You [plural] shall worship God on this

mountain (Shemot

3:12). The unspecified term worship does not specify the nature

of future events. However, when the day does arrive, Israel experiences its

foundational event – the theophany at Sinai and the

reception of the Ten Commandments.

What

is it about the Ten Commandments that makes them the "central

and most elevated concern?" "After all, there is not a single duty or

prohibition included among the Ten Commandments (excepting

You shall not covet) which does not appear in similar form elsewhere in

the Torah." (So Prof. Weinfeld asks in his

article, "Aseret ha'Dibrot

– Yihudam U'mekomam Be'masoret Yisrael" in

the volume Aseret Ha'Dibrot

Be'Re'ee Ha'Dorot). Prof.

Weinfeld responds to his own question:

The

commands of the Ten Commandments are formulated in a succinct and precise

fashion. They are universal, timeless, categorical, incumbent

upon each and every individual, regardless of situation or circumstances. The

commands are formulated in the present, as if they were directed personally to

each individual, and they do not include abstract moral principles. The Ten

Commandments are concrete commands. They constitute the essence of the demands

made by the God of Israel upon those who have entered His covenant, commands

that include, in the first section, particularistic commandments stemming from

Israel's special relationship with its God, and in the second part,

commandments of a social and ethical nature.

There

is no doubt that the unusual formulation of the Ten Commandments is only a part

of their uniqueness. The event itself is no less important, both in its

preparative stages and especially in the moment in which God spoke directly to

each and every Israelite from every generation: I am the Lord your God, making the event into an eternal

covenant between God and His people. If Moses was sanctified at the burning

bush, all of Israel was sanctified at Mount Sinai. (That is the reason why the

story of Jeremiah's sanctification was chosen as the haftorah

for parashat Shemot, in

which Moses was sanctified and the story of Isaiah's sanctification was chosen

to serve as the haftorah for parashat

Yitro.) The descent to Egypt begins with God's personal revelation to Jacob, I am

the God, God of your father, do not be afraid to go down to Egypt (Bereishit 46:3), and

it ends with a very similarly phrased communal

revelation to all of Jacob's children of all the generations: I am the Lord

your God, Who took you out of the land of Egypt… This is the transition

from a personal covenant between God and the Patriarchs to a covenant between

God and the entire nation.

This

covenant re-inserts the nation of freed slaves into an obligatory framework; it

establishes limits to their freedom, allowing them to become treasured from

among the nations – only if they uphold their part of the covenant.

Rami Pinchover in an engineer

And you shall be for me… (Shemot 19:5) – That you shall be available for Me and occupied with Torah, not busy with other things. … a treasure… – as a person

favors his special treasure, so I shall favor you. R. Yehoshua

ben Korha says: Take note! A

wife is unconditionally tied to her husband, and a son to his father, and a

slave to his master, and a maidservant to her mistress. Could it be that you

are unconditionally bound to me? [No], we learn from the verse: … for all the land is mine.

 (Mekhiltah parashat Ba'Hodesh 2)

Yitro's Advice and the Giving of the Torah

Parashat

Yitro does not begin with the giving of the Torah and

the revelation at Sinai, but rather with the arrival of Moses' father-in-law, Yitro, to Moses and the Israelite camp, and with the advice

he gave Moses, in accordance with which Moses instituted a system of national

government by appointing captains over thousands, and over hundreds to serve as

judges and magistrates.

This matter must be

considered from a number of standpoints. The passage implies that Moses did not

originally intend to appoint a system of national administration. Rather, he

intended the people to be administered by divine inspiration as transmitted

through him – the man who knew God face to face. He also attempted to execute

this plan. We read that he sat from morning until evening, judging the

people through the holy spirit within him.

Later he was to learn

from his gentile father-in-law – who had drawn near to Israel – that even

divinely instructed leadership required human instruments, drawn from the

skills and abilities present within human beings themselves. And so human

beings are appointed to administer and judge the people. They must posses very

high moral qualities – men of valor, God-fearing, men of truth, who hate