Becoming Us: Shemot

Becoming Us
D’var Torah for Parashat Sh’mot (Exodus 1:1—6:1)
By Rabbi Boaz D. Heilman

The story of the Exodus is fundamental to our understanding of the human condition. It is, of course, the cornerstone of the history of the Jewish People, but it has also served as a symbol for many oppressed minorities. Most recently, it was the model for the liberation of the African American People.

A magnificent story so full of special events that it was made into several movies—both live and animated—it’s a clash between two civilizations, two opposing cultures and two religions.

At the same time, this drama isn’t so much the doing of God—though God is given much of the credit (particularly in the Haggadah version). As the story unfolds, more and more it is people who take charge of their existence to give it direction and purpose. To be sure, the Exodus is about God redeeming Israel. But it’s also the story of a growing tide of actions by human characters, each realizing and acting out his or her role as it unfolds before their eyes.

Exodus is a co-production. God and humanity work together as partners. When God commands Moses to call for the liberation of the Israelites, Moses asks: “Who am I that I should go to Pharaoh, and that I should take the children of Israel out of Egypt?” God responds: “For I will be with you” (Ex. 3:11-12). This theme is the recurrent message of Judaism. As individuals, we don’t amount to much. But together with God, we can achieve nearly impossible feats.

The Hebrew title of this book, the second book of the Torah, is Sh’mot, which means “names.” All the characters of this story are named, with one notable exception—Pharaoh’s daughter; the Rabbis much later will fix this, giving her the name of Batya, or “Daughter of God.” In fact, women are the true—and often unsung—heroes of Exodus. Whereas Moses begins his career as a cowardly whiner (“Send someone else—anybody!”), it is Moses’ mother, Yocheved, and his sister, Miriam, who will make sure that he survives. He will be rescued and raised by Pharaoh’s Daughter. Others heroes include the Hebrew midwives Shifra and Puah. As Pharaoh begins to carry out his genocidal plans against the Israelites, he commands the midwives to kill on the spot any new-born males. Shifra and Puah heroically refuse, and their names remain emblazoned in our memory and on the gates of the households they are blessed to establish.

Moses, on the other hand, has to be propped up to do his job. God gives him the powerful tools to perform all sorts of signs and wonders (although it will be God alone who will carry out the last, most terrible of the Ten Plagues). When Moses complains of being “slow of speech and of a slow tongue,” God assigns Aaron to be his spokesman.

And it will be Tzippora, Moses’ wife—dark-skinned daughter of the high priest of Midian—who will give Moses the final push he ultimately needs, as she demands that Moses give his whole-hearted commitment to the job he only half-heartedly accepted. She is yet one more individual who takes upon herself a role vital to the story, making sure that what needs to be done is, indeed, done.

As with many of the Torah’s tales of our ancestors, Exodus does not begin with glory. Joseph has been dead for nearly four centuries now. The Israelites, once free and proud, are enslaved. Our history as a nation begins poorly. Yes, the 70 households have grown to become a people of ½ million. Chapter 1 verse 7 describes the process: “The children of Israel were fruitful and swarmed and increased and became very, very strong, and the land became filled with them.” It is hardly a flattering description.

And indeed, what did the Israelites have to speak for themselves? As a religion, there wasn’t much there. In addition to some half-forgotten tales of long-ago ancestors, only circumcision—and their Hebrew names—remained as a legacy, reminding them of their connection to the past, to one another and to an unseen, unrecognized God. Without much history, without holidays or even Shabbat to call their own, their fate might have been like that of any other ancient tribe.

But there is a vast difference between a swarm and a people, and rising from the former and becoming the latter is one of the main messages of Judaism. In Exodus this is achieved when people take on an identity and fulfill the purpose that comes along with that. For the heroes of Exodus, this happens when they choose to rise against tyranny, each for his or her own reason. Moses’s family is first to be named: There is Amram, Moses’s father, whose name (“great people”) embodies the national pride he teaches his children. Yocheved has her maternal instinct that will move her to put the three-month-old infant Moses in a wicker basket and set it afloat on the Nile River (interestingly, the word for the basket—teivah—is the same word used for Noah’s ark!). Pharaoh’s daughter, as she draws the basket out of the water and comprehends the heartbreak behind this desperate act of preservation, is moved by compassion for the downtrodden Hebrews. Miriam, Moses’s sister, is consumed with sisterly care and concern, while Aaron, their brother, is filled with joy when, years later, he sees Moses returning to his old home, people and traditions.

Their names mark their roles for all eternity.

Even God’s name is discussed in this portion. Standing before the burning bush, Moses asks God for a name by which to announce Him to the Hebrews. God replies with a cryptic message (chapter 3, verses 14-15) that embodies all existence (“I shall be who I shall be”). In the next breath, however, God instructs Moses to tell the people that His name is Adonai (YHVH), the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. The difference between the two names is slight—a change in the tense of the verb “to be”—but it is of huge importance. Eh’yeh means “I shall be.” Adonai (the term used for God’s sacred and ineffable name in study and prayer) denotes God’s presence in the here and now. The difference is between “I shall be who I shall be” and “I am.” It’s all about God’s ability to intervene in history.

As with God, so too the meaning of our presence at this time and place is determined by the name and role we accept.

Exodus is about nations and peoples, but it is no less also about individuals and their personal struggles. It is the story of ordinary men and women who take a stand against tyranny and, by doing so, rise from the anonymous swarms and become immortal heroes.

©2010 by Boaz D. Heilman