Hi,

Finally.  The Exodus is about to begin.

But not so fast!

… G-d tells Moshe to give the Jewish People the good news. (Exodus, 6:1-13)

That G-d is about to free them. 

But they wouldn’t listen.  They didn’t believe Moshe.

Their spirits were broken. 

Then G-d tells Moshe to speak to Pharaoh and free the Jews.

Moshe’s response?

“Even the Jews won’t listen to me.  How can You expect Pharaoh to listen”?

G-d’s response?

He ignores the question!

And tells Moshe and his brother Aaron to go to Pharaoh.

… It seems strange.

Moshe raised a valid point.  A logical point.

And it’s not like we’re dealing with the pagan gods!

You try raising a point with them?

You’re history!  They strike you down!

But our G-d in the Torah is not that way.

Abraham challenged G-d when it came to Sodom. 

And Moshe tried to argue his way out of this job.

G-d responded to both.

But now, Moshe raises a valid point?

And G-d seems to say, “Can we go on”?

Here’s a suggestion from one of the great Jewish thinkers of our generation.

…G-d did respond.  Very powerfully.

By ignoring the question!

Because we’re talking about the birth of the Jewish People.  And their future.

And Moshe brings in logic.

… Logic is almost always relevant.

But not when it comes to Jewish history!

Our birth and our survival defy logic!

So when Moshe says, “Please get someone else.  I’m not a good speaker.

G-d responds.  “Request denied”!

But when Moshe says, “How can it be”?

… “Go speak to Pharaoh”!

Here’s how historian Cecil Roth ends his book “History of the Jews”.

The preservation of the Jew was not casual…

Time after time… he has been saved from disaster in a manner which cannot be

described except as “providential”. 

The author has deliberately attempted to write this book in a secular spirit.

He does not think that the reader can fail to see in it, on every page…a higher

Imminence”!

All the best,