This week’s parasha Beshalach is the culmination of the Exodus story. The children of Israel finally leave Egypt and then they find themselves confronted with two unenviable – impossible -- choices. No sooner have the Israelites left, than the Egyptians have remorse on setting them free, so Pharaoh gathers his charioteers and follows the Israelites into the desert. The Sea is on one side and the Egyptians on the other.
Moses, just days from his great triumph, does not know what to do. So he turns to God in prayer. God’s response according to the Torah is simple:
The Midrash complicates the story.
Moses turns to God in prayer. And God says to Moses annoyed at his lack of leadership: “There is a time to pray and a time to act: “Speak onto the Children of Israel and get going.” Read the Midrash:
In the meantime, Moses was standing and praying at great length. So the Holy One said to him, “My beloved are on the verge of drowning in the sea, and you spin out lengthy prayers before Me.” Moses spoke up to God, “{But Master of the Universe, what else can I do?” God replied, “Speak unto the children of Israel, that they go forward and lift up they rod,” etc. (Exodus. 14:15ff.).
Rabbi Eliezer protests. God would never utter a word against prayer. No God said: “There is a time for long prayer and a time for short prayer. This is a time for brevity. “Speak onto the Children of Israel and get going.”
“Speak unto the children of Israel, that they go forward” (Exod. 14:15). According to R. Eliezer, the Holy One said to Moses: There is a time to be brief and a time to be lengthy. My children are in great distress, the sea is enclosing them, the enemy is in pursuit, and you stand here praying away! speak until the children of Israel, that they go forward.
The children arrive at the sea. And let’s again listen to the Midrash.
It is taught that R. Meir said: When the Israelites stood at the Red Sea, the tribes were vying with one another, one saying, “I will be first to go down into the sea,” and the other saying, “I will be first to go down into the sea.” As they stood there wrangling, the tribe of Benjamin sprang forward and went down first into the sea. At that, the prices of Judah began hurling stones at them. Everyone wanted to be first. “I go first.”
Competition for the privilege of going is not restricted to recent generations of our people.
But perhaps it was otherwise. Listen to Rabbi Judah’s counter description:
R. Judah said to R. Meir: That is not quite the way it happened. In fact, on tribe said, “I will not be the first to go into the sea”; and another tribe also said, “I will not be the first to go into the sea.” And when they jostling one another, no one went into the Sea.
Finally one man, one leader among the Israelites stepped forward.
While they were standing there deliberating, Nahshon the son of Amminadab [of the tribe of Judah] sprang forward and was the first to go down into the Sea.
Only when the Sea reached his nostrils – only when he was committed all the way, did the miracle occur.
But listen even more carefully to the text: The Israelites went on dry land amidst the Sea/
The Rabbis ask the obvious: How could it be dry land if it was amidst the Sea?
And if it is amidst the Sea, how can it be dry land?
They answer: Each Israelite had to repeat the experience of Nahshon and wade into the Sea until his nostril and only then did the Sea begin to part.
Commenting on this Midrash, Emil Fackenheim, the great Canadian Jewish Philosopher who died about a year ago in Jerusalem said: “if you want to know the contemporary Jewish condition just think of this Midrash, remember that we live in an age without miracles and “welcome my fellow swimmers.”
The Rabbis add a measure of cruelty to their depiction of the drowning at the Sea. They notice a textual discrepancy: Pharaoh did not die at the Sea; he had to return to his people and explain the loss. There were consequences to failure; not the least of which was living with it.
One final comment: the Torah depicts celebration, unbridled joy at triumph Moses and the Children of Israel and then Miriam. The people are jubilant, at least for a time. And yet, by the time this reaches us in the Passover Seder centuries later, we diminish our cup by a drop of wine recognizing that even the Egyptians were creatures of God and all victory – however important, however necessary – is penultimate because of its costs. For every victory there is defeat, for every triumph, there is a loser, at least now, at least until.
And while we can rejoice at victory even when merited, God cannot for both the perpetrator and the victim is are God’s creation.
When the Holy One was bout to drown the Egyptians in the sea, Uzza, heavenly prince of Egypt, rose up and prostrated himself before the Holy One, saying: Master of the universe, You created the world by the measure of mercy. Why then do You wish to drown my children? The Holy One gathered the entire heavenly household and said to them: You be the judge between Me and Uzza prince of Egypt. At that, the heavenly princes of the other nations began to speak up in behalf of Egypt. What Michael perceived this, he gave the sign to Gabriel, who in one swoop darted down to Egypt, where he pulled out a brick with its clay enclosing a [dead] infant who had been immured alive in the structure. He then came back, stood before the Holy One, and said: Master of the Universe, thus did the Egyptians enslave Your children. Whereupon the Holy One sat in judgment over the Egyptians in accord with the measure of justice and drowned them in the sea.
It was just that they died; just and necessary but not an occasion for heavenly celebration.
In that instant the ministering angels wished to utter song before the Holy One, but He rebuked them, saying, “The works of My hands are drowning in the Sea, and you would utter song in My presence!”
Moses and Miriam sang; heaven wished to join in but the God of justice and mercy would not -- could not -- permit it.
Shabbat Shalom!