Looking For Leader- Parhat Shemot 2018 /5779

Insights and Inspiration

from the

Holy Land
from

Rabbi Ephraim Schwartz

"Your friend in Karmiel"

December 28^th 2018 -Volume 9 Issue 13-20^th of Tevet 5779

Parshat Shemot

Looking for a Leader

So it's that time of year again. The Arabs have stopped killing us for about five minutes or so. It happens every now and again. (Note – how I said have stopped killing us not stopped trying to kill us- you have to read my words like Rashi to fully comprehend their depth- trying I don't think has ever stopped.) So in honor of the occasion and in order not lose that small window of opportunity, my blessed brothers here in this country of ours have quickly decided to call for elections, in order to increase fighting, divisionism, and in general hatred and vitriol between Jews. We don't get these chances often. Usually we have to hide in bunkers together and declare solidarity with our soldiers and support for the Government as we stand united against our enemies who seek to drive us into the sea. We all daven together, attend funerals sadly together, we see hareidi men going out to bring support to our front lines, visiting hospitals, we even have leftists  not hugging so many terrorists and actually even upon occasion condemning violence and not calling for us to vacate our homes. We're together and it's kind of awkward for many here. So at moments when we have a break, tragically we fall back to our far too familiar and comfortable traditional default status of Jew vs. Jew. Welcome to 2000 years of exile.

So in honor of the great occasion it I felt it behooves upon me to offer up some of my recommendations for candidates for Jewish leadership. I know many of you are clamoring for me to take that position. But frankly, Jerusalem gets me kind of dizzy, I like it here in Karmiel and I'm scared if I became prime minister I wouldn't have the time to share with you my weekly missives, And then what would you do? Now I know the pickings are slim out there in the running. There's not that many people in office or running for office that you feel you can trust not to sell you, your family and our country down the road for the opportunity to have a photo-op with a US president in the rose garden. Heck, there's probably no one you would even trust to babysit your pet rabbit. That being said I believe that the Torah's wisdom can share with us some really important insight into the types of people that Hashem choose for leadership. Some of their qualities, experience and strengths and let's see if we can kind of like-you know one of the Facebook "see-what-type-of-biblical-leader-you-are" type quiz's that they send you. Plug in the info and see who we come out with it.

So let’s start, as this week's Torah portion does, with perhaps our greatest leader, Moshe Rabbeinu. Would you back his candidacy? What do you think his chances would be of taking office? Now if I were asked to become his political campaign consultant- a job that I think too many Israelis feel they have- I would probably say that we would have to engage in an ancient Palestinian tradition of historical revisionism. Let's start from the beginning. First of all, the Jewish people are in a crucial critical moment. We have been persecuted in Egypt for quite a long time now. Babies are being thrown into the Nile, we are being forced and whipped into devastating slave labor and we have lost all hope. It's time for change. Nothing like a good crisis to kick-off a campaign. Enter one Moshe Rabbeinu. Nothing like a new fresh face to step in and save the day. Except, problem one, he's not really a new face. See Moshe is the adopted grandson of Pharaoh. In fact, when the verse tells us that Vayigdal Moshe and Moshe became great, Rashi quoting the Midrash notes that he was appointed to be Pharaoh's chief of staff, His Goebbels if you like. Hmmm… that doesn't seem to be something to put on his resume, although there is quite a tradition in this country of party leaders switching party’s affiliations and ideologies regularly. It's not something you generally play up, although we can certainly work with it and describe it as an awakening that he had.

OK, what's next? So the Torah tells us he went out to his brothers and in fact gets himself into a street fight with an Egyptian that is beating up a Jew. That wouldn't have been too bad, although it is quite radical, it would've probably played out better if he had just mediated and convinced him to back down, but it certainly shows a sense of willingness to get his hands dirty, which people generally like. But then he actually killed the guy, even worse he buries him in the sand to cover it up. Even worse he gets himself into another fight with two Jews fighting-never a good place to be, and word gets out and he is in fact arrested for the murder of the Egyptian and sentenced to death according to the Midrash. Now we certainly have important political figures in this country who have gone to jail. And perhaps we might even be able to sell the notion that why should we wait until after they are in office to send them to jail, Moshe served his time before hand already. But murder is kind of a harsh black spot to have on your resume.

Moshe flees, before they can kill him and the Midrash fills in the blanks over the next forty years or so of his life. Let's see maybe he can overcome these challenges to making him electable. So first off the Torah tells us that he comes to Midian, and once again it seems this guy can't seem to get off trouble. He sees some women getting harassed by some shepherds and does the whole JDL thing again. The woman that he saves is incidentally the daughter of the Pope of the world at that time, Yisro also a former adviser and collaborator of Hitler/Pharaoh. Moshe marries his daughter, who incidentally according to the Midrash might have been a Kushit or African-American (although there were no Americans…what do you call them…hmmm Colored…? Negro…? Black? Any politically correct options?) How do you think that would fly in Boro Park, Lakewood or Bnai Brak? I mean but let's leave the race card alone for a bit, but the Popes daughter?! Really? To make matters even worse for his campaign, the Midrash tells us that he eventually made it big there in Midian and became the ruler of the country there. Imagine the former king of Saudi Arabia running for Israel political office. Now I know former oil magnates make it big in the States, maybe pitch this as the Bush/Obama blend Oil meets African American…hmmmm…

Finally, the Torah tells us he ends up as an eighty year old shepherd running around with sheep in the Sinai desert. It is there where he comes to his real "found God...Halleluya" moment. Except it also doesn't seem to work out well. Rather than an expectant Moshe who we would hope would stand up for the Jewish people by the burning bush and jump at the opportunity to rescue them from their persecution and near-annihilation. Moshe tells Hashem "Who am I to take to go to Pharaoh and can I take out the Children of Israel from Egypt?" and as Rashi notes Moshe said, 

"Even if I am significant why is Israel worthy that a miracle should be done for them and that I should take them out of Egypt".  

I hope they don't have any video of that conversation to release to channel 2. In the following week of discussion about him "running for office”. The Torah spends an inordinate amount of time and ink telling us how reluctant he is to take this job. He offers up his brother, Aharon as a candidate instead, he is extremely skeptical of whether the Jewish people will believe him or not. He almost seems oblivious to the fact that the entire time this conversation is going on "the trains are still heading to the Egyptian Auschwitz".

 Perhaps the final faux pas comes when after Hashem finally convinces him to take the job and he comes to Pharaoh and he fails to convince him to release the Jewish people and the work is doubled on the Jewish people and the local Jewish Biblical Times are already condemning this radical that has just stirred up the pot, Moshe loses it. He turns to Hashem and protests.

 "Why have you done bad to the people and why have you sent me? From the time I came to Pharaoh to speak in your name he has harmed this people and you haven't saved your nation".

Now remember this is Hashem here. The Master of the World. Yet Moshe right after the first crisis seems to fall apart and seems ready to head for the door. Can this really be the true leader of the Jewish people. Oh by the way did I mention he had a lisp as well and forgot to circumcise his son on the way into Israel. Ohhh the Jewish tabloids will have a field day with this election campaign. Let the blogging begin.

The truth is I don't think the Jewish people would ever have a more unlikely leader than Moshe (although King David is a very close second). It is perhaps precisely because he is so unlikely though that Hashem chose him and he became the greatest leader of our people of all time. In fact, our sages tell us that if not for Moshe we would never have been able to leave Egypt, not ever received the Torah, no other individual who ever spoke to Hashem "face-to-face". The Zohar on a very deep level even tells us that there is a spark of Moshe in each and every Jew; The spark that is in the most unlikely of spots and the spark that will always connect us to the greatest of heights; to our redemption. What is that spark? What does is look like?

The Torah tells us the one thing about Moshe that was unique was that he was the humblest man on the face of the earth. Humility is not a feeling of inadequacy; it's not a feeling of wimpy-ness or a lack of appreciation of one's greatness. Humility is the recognition that I exist, and my power to accomplish is all only because it is the will of my Creator. I am nothing without Hashem and everything with Him. There is no 'God and I' there is only a "Moshe Moshe" -without the hyphen in between- that Hashem calls out to him from the bush as; A Moshe soul up above that has absolute clarity of the existence of Hashem how there is nothing that happens that is not His will, and a Moshe below that mirrors that exact sentiment and who's every fiber is governed by that.

Moshe doesn't see a difference between Egyptian fighting a Jew, a Jew fighting a Jew or some Midianites picking on the Pope's daughter. The will of Hashem is that truth and goodness must prevail. He doesn't even see Jews in Egypt's persecution as being worthy of redemption initially as they are meritless, until Hashem tells him that it is his will to take them out to bring them to Sinai. There's no black and no white, only Hashem. Once Moshe recognized that it is the will of Hashem to take them out he will even challenge Hashem based on His own will. Why then have You sent me, it is Your name. You told me it is Your people. Let the party begin. That's our candidate. That's our leader; The unlikely person who views his entire existence as that of being an Eved Hashem-literally a servant of Hashem who cannot do anything, but for the will of God.

We need a Moshe today. We have had enough politics and poli-shticks, enough agendas, enough campaigns and enough fighting. Ritzoneinu Liros Malkeinu- We want to see our King. Moshe within 50 days of us leaving the lowest place where Jews can fall was able to raise our nation up to the highest level of our entire existence. Because it was never about him, he was nothing and therefore he became everything. We knew that. We felt it and we were thus inspired to the degree where we became the nation of Hashem. We said Naa'she V'Nishma- we will do and we will hear- none of the details of what the Torah said were necessary for us to hear before our acceptance of it. It was the will of God and that's all that counted. Our inner Moshe was redeemed. We were ready to serve our Creator.

Now if we can only get that back again…

 Have a perfect mazeldike Shabbos,

Rabbi Ephraim Schwartz

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RABBI SCHWARTZ’S FAVORITE YIDDISH PROVERB OF THE WEEK

“Kain braireh iz oich a braireh.”- No choice is also a choice

RABBI SCHWARTZES COOL VIDEOS OF THE WEEK

https://soundcloud.com/ephraim-schwartz/rivkah -In honor of Rivky and Luzzy’s wedding this week, the song I composed for their Chuppah. Like and share!!

https://youtu.be/2RO5QCMgo4A - Cool New Brachos Song! Borhei Prie Hae’etz the most interesting words song I’ve heard in a while

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WxYcHAYHZjQ&index=13&list=PLhj2bbUa_1xYblDSJhSh8rBG7YLJFtjKA&t=0s-  The orginal ani maamin  (and in my opinion the nicest) by Pirchei COMPOSED BY MY DEAR DETROIT FRIEND AND NOT NEARLY CREDITED ENOUGH ITZY WEISBERG

https://itzyweisberg.bandcamp.com/track/sholom-aleichem -    And once we’re on the subject here’s another Itzy Classic- L’Kavod Shabbos Shalom Aleychem

https://youtu.be/_XwRdcKh4dg – A Bibi Sitter- Election campaign ad

RABBI SCHWARTZ'S TOUR GUIDE EXAM QUESTION OF THE WEEK

answer below at end of Email

Q According to Christian tradition, one of the sites where Satan tried to tempt Jesus (their founder) was at:

A. The Mount of Olives

B. The Quarantal

C. Mount Zion

D. Kathisma

RABBI SCHWARTZ'S “LOMDUS” CONNECTION OF THE WEEK

Parshat Shemos– One of the fantastic exercises of the serious lamdan is to try to take a midrash, which can be an aggadic interpretation, a story behind the text, a reflection of our sages, and try to figure out how the Rabbis inferred that from the text. See, I believe that there is a common misconception that midrash is just stories our rabbis passed down to us. The word midrash means to infer. And each midrash can be sourced in the text. You just have to be a lamdan sometimes to figure it out.

The parsha’s that have to do with the exile and exodus from Egypt perhaps have the most elaborate and are from the most embellished upon portions. We recount it each year by the Pesach Seder and we are told the ore you add the more praiseworthy you are. Let’s take one this week and explore. Shall we?

The Torah tells us

Shemos (2:23) And the king of Egypt died and the children of Israel groaned from the labor…

Rashi quotes the midrash that tells us that in fact Pharaoh didn’t die. Rather

Rashi (ibid) It teaches us that he became a leper and he would slaughter Jewish infants and bathe in their blood.

Yeah, that’s one of those famous midrashim that they make sure to teach your kids in kindergarten in Jewish day schools. Nothing like a few good nightmares. Now it would seem a very strange midrash being that the verse tells us that that he in fact died. How can they say that he didn’t? So there certainly are sources in the Talmud that teach us that a leper is one of four people that are considered dead even when they are alive. A pauper, a blind person and someone who doesn’t have children, are the others. So perhaps a leper could be considered dead, but why take it out of the simple understanding, the pshat. Where do they infer from the text that he in fact was not dead?

So the Gaon of Vilna, before whom the entire Torah was certainly an open book, tells us a rule. That actually has cool relevance to the Israeli Army today. The rule is that any time it mentions the death of any King in tanach, it just calles him by name and does not call him by title. As it says and Shlomo lay down with his fathers, and Aviya lay down, and Rechavam lay down. It never refers to them by the title King. In fact he says that David is mentioned 52 times as King all with the title  “King David” until he was dying and then it just reverts to calling him David in the words of our sages

Kohelet Rabba  (8:8)“Ein shilton b’yom ha’mavet- There is no authority on the day of death”

By the way that rule is implemented on graves of soldiers that are buried and killed in service. There are no ranks or titles on their graves. There is no ranking in death. We are all brothers on that day.

There is one place by king uziyahu where the Torah tells us

Isaiah (6) in the year of the death of King Uziyahu. And our sages over the note. And did he die? Rather he became a leper.

Their inference is of course from the above rule that if it calls him a king still then he must be alive.

So that being the case here as well if it says the King of Egypt died. That tells us as Rashi notes he must be alive. It calls him king. Now how do you know he was a leper. Be Lomdush! He certainly wasn’t poor. He was a King. As well we know that he wasn’t blind, as he would see all of the miracles and we even know he wasn’t childless, as Hashem said he would kill his first-born if he didn’t release our first-born. So that leaves leper.

Ok, now that we know he was a leper, why is the Torah telling us that here, now and what connection does it have to do with the Jews crying out. It must be that his becoming a leper was the source of their crying. Why? He must have been bathing in their blood.

And there you have it. A Midrash that sounded like a story or fable, but with a bit of lomdus and knowledge of rules of the Torah we can see it straight out of the text. Now see if you remember this one for your Pesach Seder.

RABBI SCHWARTZ'S ERA’S AND THEIR PLACES AND PEOPLE IN ISRAEL OF THE WEEK

Yehoshua’s spies 1272 BC  I’m very excited as we enter the next level of our exploration of Jewish eras and their people and places in Israel. We finished the 1270 years of world history until the Jews came into the land of Israel. In the process we covered the five books of the Torah. We know begin the books of the Prophets, the first being Yehoshua.

The book begins with the Jews still camped on the other side of the Jordan River, having just suffered the death of Moshe and his days of mourning. Yehoshua prepares for the entrance to Israel by sending two spies, Calev his fellow spy from the last time that went with him on Moshe’s mission 40 years prior, and Pinchas the grandson of Aharon. The spies cross over to the city of Yericho and stay by a house of “ill repute” where the “matron” of the home Rahav assists them in avoiding detection by the King who is looking for them. In exchange for her help (letting them hide on her roof amongst some flax while covering up and suggesting they left already, and then letting them climb out her window and escape) The agree to spare her and her families house when the will ultimately attack the city. The spies hide in the mountains and then cross back over to Yehoshua and give him the good news.

Now this story takes place in Yericho, which of course is inaccessible to us today without special military permission and accompaniment. Kind of like back then as well, the only difference is that today it is the State of Israel that is at fault for that, thank you very much Yitzchak Rabin in the Oslo agreements. There’s a big nice red sign outside that warns that entrance is forbidden to Israeli citizens and may be dangerous to your life. Nice! However, if one did make arrangements to tour Yericho, one can visit Tel El Sultan where they have the oldest wall in the world. Archaeologists date it about 7-8,000 years ago which of course would be before we date the Creation of the World. As well they find a tower that is the oldest and largest ever found. It certainly is cool to stand on top of ancient walls of a city the Torah tells us about, which is why it captured the attention of so many archaeologists.

I generally like to do lookouts there from Mitzpe Yericho porch where you can see the entire region. As well I like to point out when we are by the Lido gas station, at the intersection of Highway 1 from Jerusalem and the 90 Jordan valley highway, that the reason why this was the route chosen. Is because this is the only break in the mountain range in the to the center. In Hebrew it is called Matzok Haaeitikim- the break in the cliffs, the mountain range of course being formed by the colliding of continents at Creation, that formed the Syrian African Rift. Now in regards to spies and learning about their role in Israel in Ramat Hasharon there is the Israel intelligence center that is the museum dedicated to Israel spies and the various stories of them. One needs an appointment to get a tour there but from what I’m told it is well worth it.

RABBI SCHWARTZ’S ELECTION JOKES  OF THE WEEK

Yankel Meets Berel and tells him with pride. “My son was running for the Knesset seat in the government in the last election.”
“Wow!” Says Berel, “And what does he do?”
“Nothing… He got elected!”

At an international medical conference the various countries were discussing the advancement of medicine in their respective nations.
The British doctor said “in England we are so advanced that I can take a kidney from a person and transplant it in another and within 6 weeks he will be out and abut looking for work”
The German doctor said “Well in Germany we can take a lung from one person and transplant it in another and he will be out looking for work in one month
The Russian doctor one-upped them when he announced that “In Russia they can take half a heart from someone and both of them will be up looking for work in two weeks!”
Well the Israeli not be outdone told them all that in Israel “We can take someone with a half a brain make him Prime Minister and in a half year half of the country is looking for work…”

Traffic was heavy on the Ayalon highway, inching along bit by bit. Finally Avi’s car makes it to the front and he sees a police officer and asks him what all the traffic is about. He tells him that there is a representative of Shas (sefardic political party) there and he rented a semi-trailer and is standing on top with a megaphone threatening that unless he gets 5 million shekels he needs in order to run in the upcoming elections he will pour kerosene all over himself and set himself on fire and jump off.
“So how much did he get so far”
About 100 liters of Benzine

So Bibi comes to visit a first grade class and ask the children know what would be considered a tragedy. Little Baruch raises his hand and says that it would be if a boy was crossing a street and didn’t look and was hit god forbid by a car. Bibi nodded however and told the boy that although that was a painful incident  it was not a tragedy.
Then little Chaim raised his hand and said that a tragedy would be if a bus with students got into an accident and many children get injured and died. Again Bibi noted that this was not a tragedy but rather a devastating loss.
Finally little Dudu raised his hands and said that a tragedy would be if the Prime Minister and Knesset members were all in a plane and it crashed and they all died. Bibi nodded his head solemnly and said that Dudu was correct that would be a terrible tragedy. He asked Dudu how he knew and he said quite simply
“Because I knew it was not a terrible tragedy or a devastating loss.”

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Answer is C–  I guessed this one as well. Truth is I wasn’t even going to include it as I really don’t like the Christian stuff. But hey, it’s the season and you can’t run away from it. Even in Israel, unfortunately. In our tour guiding course we spent 2 days in the North visiting the J-Man sites around the Galile and we had at least three days of Chrsitian tours in Jerusalem. It’s so much baloney, I was just googling yoshka jokes by the end. Anyways, on this question I eliminated Mt. of Olives and Mt. Zion because although there are a lot of churches they had to do with the end of his life where he cried, bled and prayed and pished. The temptation thing was a rip off of the Eliyahu Hanavi story where he flees into the Midbar/ wilderness for 40 days and argues with Hashem about the Jewish people. I wasn’t sure if it was Korantal or Kathisma, somehow the Korantal sounded more familiar. It was actually right by Yericho, where Eliyahu was and I got it right. The Katchisma was the seat that Mary rested on somewhere between Beit Lechem and Jerusalem. But who cares? The important this that the….

score is Schwartz 10 and 1 for MOT (Ministry of Tourism) on this exam so far.