midrash session 3.3

[cellio]

More midrash (with some commentary) about God talking to Moshe at the bush. Why this sign? How did God speak? And was Moshe's reaction good or bad?

(1) "The bush burned with fire and the bush was not eaten (consumed)" -- why did the Holy One blessed be He show [a] to Moshe [b] this sign? (2) Since Moshe was thinking in his heart thus: (3) lest the Egyptians will be consumers (lit. eaters) (et) Israel [c], accordingly the Holy One blessed be He showed [d] him fire burning [and a bush] not consumed. (4) He said to him: just as the bush burns with fire and is not consumed, thus the Egyptians cannot consume Israel.

[a] The verb form is a little odd; it actually looks like a noun, but trying to render it "the sight" and eeking out a helping verb wasn't working for me.

[b] This is that "to him to Moshe" construction I mentioned last time; I eliminated the redundancy.

[c] A better but less literal rendering would be: lest the Egyptians will consume Israel; "Israel" has the direct-object marker (et), but the verbs are future (will be) and present tense (eat).

[d] Same verb construct as in [a].

New paragraph: (5) "Moshe Moshe" -- a pause did not come [between the two], why not? (6) A parable to a man [e] that is given upon him a great load [f] and calls: Ploni [g] and Ploni come to me! (7) Divide from me this load.

[e] That is, we're going to answer with a parable about a man who...

[f] A better not-quite-translation: a man who is bearing a great load.

[g] Ploni is rabbinic for "somebody" or "so-and-so".

The implication of the parable is that the man speaks hastily, not pausing after the first "Ploni" to see if anyone responds. It's sort of like "help help - I'm in trouble!". The rabbis are saying that God spoke that urgently to Moshe, even though the scale is somewhat different. (One hopes that Ploni will rush to help the overloaded man within seconds, but even if Moshe rushes to help an overloaded God -- and this raises the question of how God can be overloaded -- it's still going to be some weeks or more before anything happens.)

(8) Rav Yehoshua the Kohein son of Nechemiah said: at the time that the Holy One blessed be He revealed upon Moshe -- Moshe was a novice to prophecy. (9) The Holy One blessed be he said: if I reveal [myself] to him in a great voice -- I will terrify him, in a whisper -- he will not notice the prophecy. [h] (10) What did he do? He revealed to him in the voice of his father. (11) Moshe said: "here I am" -- what does father [i] wish? (12) The Holy One blessed be He said: I am not your father, rather the God of your father, in my need I came to you, so you would not fear.

[h] Loosely.

[i] Alef at the end -- Aramaic formation? Is it first-person possessive? That would make sense from context but I don't know Aramaic suffixes.

It's interesting that Moshe knows the voice of his father when at most he knew him for the first three months of his (Moshe's) life. One could read a deeper meaning into this, that God gave him the knowledge of the voice and its intended comforting effects along with the voice, but that could be stretching things.

New paragraph, and this next part is the one that engaged us the most in discussion.

(13) "And Moshe hid his face" -- Rabbi Yehoshua ben Karchai says: Moshe did not do good in hiding his face: if he had not hidden his face the Holy One blessed be he would have revealed to Moshe what is above and what is below, what was and what will be the future: (14) In the end [when] he asked to see, as it is written: "show me please your glory", the Holy One blessed be He said to Moshe: I came to show to you my face [j] and you hid your face; now I say to you "man cannot see me and live". (15) As I wanted you did not want, now you want -- I do not want.

(16) And Rabbi Hosha'yah Rabbah said: Moshe did good in hiding his face. The Holy One blessed be he said to Moshe: I came to show to you my face and you respected my honor and hid your face -- as you live, that you (?) [k] will be on the mountain forty day(s) and forty night(s) [l], not to eat and not to drink, and you (?) [m] from rays [of] the Shechina, as it is written: "and Moshe did not know that rays of light [were] on his face".

[j] Grammatically plural but not really?

[k] 'atid lihyot etzli -- from context something like "you'll be seeing me", but I can't quite parse it out.

[l] Grammatically singular but not really?

[m] 'atid lehanot

So we have a disagreement between R. Yehoshua, who says that Moshe was punished for not standing his ground, so to speak, and R. Hosha'yah, who says he was rewarded for showing deference. I tend to assume we should always show deference to God (siding with R. Hosha'yah), but then I remembered that when we pray the t'filah we bow at the beginning, not for the whole duration, and maybe there's a reason for that. We show deference and then we stand back up and continue with our business before the Holy One. So maybe R. Yehoshua is right too, if we understand him to be saying that Moshe should have initially deferred but then been willing to be more direct? An interesting question.

(Of course, with midrash many contradictory answers are supported; I'm not suggesting that there is one right way to read this.)

Comments

[cellio]

Thanks for commenting.

Moshe surely knew that those were his people out slaving in the fields even as he reclined in the palace. I wouldn't be at all surprised by a midrash that he knew then that it was his job to do something about it, but he didn't and God had to work more directly. So yeah, a sense of urgency does seem to be called for in that case.