A Word From The Rabbi
Dear Friend,
This week's Torah portion is Shemot, the first portion of the Book of Exodus. Near the beginning of Shemot we read, "Pharaoh charged all his people, saying: 'Every son that is born you shall cast into the river, and every daughter you shall keep alive'."
Pharaoh's main concern was that the boys be cast into the Nile River for he had been informed by his astrologers that a Jewish child would redeem the Children of Israel from Egypt. In decreeing death to male babies, the fate of the girls should not even have been mentioned by Pharaoh. In truth, however, t he decree concerning the girls was just as harsh as that of the boys.
Pharaoh ordered the Egyptians to cast the boys into the river in order to cause their physical death. The same Egyptians were also told that they must keep the girls alive, that is, raise them in the Egyptian way of life. This would cause not physical death like the boys, but a spiritual death.
Since the Torah mentions both decrees together in the same verse, this indicates that "every daughter you shall keep alive" is a decree no less harsh than "every son that is born you shall cast into the river." To destroy the soul is as bad as to kill the body, in fact worse - for spiritual death has an absolute finality that physical death does not.
The Nile was one of the Egyptian's gods. The Egyptians worshiped the Nile for the simple reason that it was the very source of their livelihood. "Cast the children into the river" indicates the two aspects of the Egyptian Exile. There was the physical exile in which the body was destroyed, and the spiritual exile in which the Jews were cast into the idolatry and hedonism of Egypt. The Egyptian Exile is the root of all subsequent exiles. Thus, the harsh decrees of this first exile are found in every subsequent exile, including our present one.
Today, too, there is a "Pharaoh". He can be found in the prevailing spirit of the times with its pressure to throw Jewish children into the "river" of the customs and practices of our society. Children become immersed in today's "Nile" because of the assumption that the "Nile" will assure them of a secure livelihood. Of the first redemption it is said that "by virtue of the righteous women of that generation our ancestors were freed from Egypt." What was the special virtue of those women? They raised a generation of Jews. They reacted to Pharaoh's decree to throw every new-born son into the river by arguing that no attention should be paid to it. If there is a Divine command, it alone must be heeded without calculating possible eventualities. By virtue of these righteous women our ancestors were freed from Egypt.
Wishing you a successful week and a Happy New Year,
Rabbi Yudy Shemtov
Senior Rabbi/Executive Director