parshas Beshalach 5762 Give Me Five
By Rabbi Joshua (cinqtfully known as The Hoffer) Hoffman
              
                  Beginning our fifth year, with gratitude to the Almighty.

 
  In memory of my mother Yoninah bas Zevi Hirsch, whose yohrzeit is this Shabbos, the thirteenth of Shevat. May her memory be a blessing. 
 
   In this week's parsha we are told of the Jewish people's exodus from Egypt. The Torah tells us "And the children of Israel were armed when they came up from Egypt" (Shemos 13 : 18). The Hebrew word that is translated as 'armed ' is 'chamushim,' which seems to be related to the word chamesh, or 'five.' Rashi cites a midrash that explains this verse to mean that only one in five people came out from Egypt. The others, who didn't want to leave, died during the plague of darkness, so that the Egyptians would not see their disgrace. Another explanation working with the allusion to 'five' is brought in the Targum Yonasan ben Uziel. He writes that each person who came out of Egypt brought five infants with him. A third explanation of this verse, brought in the Targum Yerushalmi, translates the word 'chamushim' as 'armed,' but explains that the nation left Egypt armed with good deeds. Although these three explanations seem to be distinct and unrelated, Rabbi Yosef Salant, in his Be'er Yosef, shows that each one really completes the others.
 
   Why, asks Rabbi Salant, does the Targum (whose source is most likely a midrash, or which itself can be viewed as a midrash) say that each person brought five children with him? Does it mean that each family that went out had exactly five children, no more and no less? Rather, says Rabbi Salant, these children were the orphans of the people who, as Rashi mentions, died during the plague of darkness, and were left as orphans. Although their parents deserved to die, there was no reason why they should suffer as a result. Therefore, since four - fifths of the Jewish people died, each family took another four families together with it as they left, in order to care for their needs. When the Targum then says that each person left Egypt with five children, it means that they went with five families of children. Each family head went with his own family, and with four additional families who he took upon himself to care for. These were the good deeds that the nation was armed with as they left Egypt, a mentioned by the Targum Yerushalmi.   
 
  Why was it neecessary for the Torah to tell us, albeit through an allusion, of the benevolent acts of kindness. Rabbi Mattisyohu Solomon, in his Matnas Chayyim, suggests that since the nation was about to embark on its journey in the desert, where the people would constantly be thirsty and hungry, and would need to cry to God to provide them with their needs, as an orphan cries out for its needs, God wanted them to witness the suffering of an orphan and deal with it, so they would have an understanding of and feeling for what it means to care for one. In this way, they would be able to open up God's divine channel that would provide for their needs in the desert, as well. I would like to suggest another explanation for the Torah's alluding, at this point, to the orphan care that the nation engaged in.  
 
   We have mentioned in the past that the book of Shemos is referred to by the Bahag, the author of the work Halachos Gedolos, as 'chumash sheni', or 'the second book. The Netziv explains that since the creation of the nation of Israel is recorded in this book, through the process of the redemption from Egypt, it is a fitting companion volume to Bereishis, which tells us of the creation of the physical world. Shemos is called the second book because it records the creation of klal Yisroel, which constitutes another creation - of a spiritual universe. I believe that it is for this reason that the Torah alludes, at this point, to the acts of kindness done by the children of Israel. King David writes in Tehillim 89 : 3, "the world is built with kindness." The mystics explain that God created the world in order to bestow people with His kindness. Moreover, the rabbis tell us that God began and ended the Torah with acts of kindness. In parshas Bereishis we are told that He made clothing for Adam and his wife, and in parshas Vezos Habreacha that God buries Moshe at Har Nevo. Because the nation of Israel was in the process of being created as it left Egypt, then, it had to engage in acts of kindness as part of that creation, in emulation of God, who created the world through kindness.