Parshas Bo, 5763 The Silence of the Dogs  
By Rabbi Joshua (silently known as The Hoffer) Hoffman

With gratitude to the Almighty for sustaining me, this week's issue marks the completion of five years of Netvort. Thanks to my readers for their comments and suggestions, and a special thank you to my editor and distributor for his continued assistance. 

  When Moshe warns Pharaoh about the last plague that God will bring upon Egypt, the smiting of the first born, he tells him : There shall be a great outcry in the entire land of Egypt - But against all the Children of Yisroel, a dog will not sharpen its tongue, against man or animal, so that you shall know that God will distinguish between Egypt and Yisroel" (Shemos 11 : 6-7). The simple meaning of this comment about the dogs is that it is a message to Pharaoh and the Egyptians, that while the Egyptian people will be screaming as a result of the plague, Yisroel will be completely tranquil, without even a dog barking at them. However, the rabbis tell us that there was also a message for Yisroel in the behavior of the dogs. The Torah later, in parshas Mishpotim (Shemos 22 : 30) commands the people that they not eat flesh that was torn from an animal - treifoh. Rather, it must be thrown to the dog. The rabbis explain that the flesh is thrown to the dogs as a reward for remaining silent on the night of the plague of the first-born. Although the two messages seem to be unrelated, I would like to demonstrate that they are, in fact, connected.

Rabbi Avraham, the son of the Rambam, writes that complete silence was needed in the Israelite camp on the night of the final plague. However, he does not explain why this was so.  Rabbi Avraham Ibn Ezra explains that the barking would have frightened them. Rabbi Shmaryohu Arieli, in his commentary Mishmar Ariel, without citing the comment of the Ibn Ezra, writes that the Israelites, as slaves, were easily intimidated, due to their lowly spirit, and, therefore, even the barking of a dog would have frightened them. Actually, Ibn Ezra writes elsewhere that the generation that came out of Egypt was not ready to enter the Holy Land, because, due to generations of subjugation, it was not ready to live as a free nation in its own land. Their slave mentality, then, was, apparently, so internalized within them that even the bark of a dog would have deterred them from proceeding with the redemption process. The Torah's directive to give the treifoh to one's dog, then, would seem to be grounded in a need for an expression of gratitude to the dogs for having aided in this process. 

  Interestingly, Ibn Ezra on parshas Mishpotim notes that the word 'lakelev' - to the dog - is refers to a specific dog. He says that it means the watchdog, who is loyal to its master and guards his animals from attack. Rabbi Meir Leibush Malbim, expanding on the comments of the Ibn Ezra, says that the Torah is teaching us that God rewards even animals for their good deeds. This comment is in line with what Rashi, in his commentary to that verse in Mishpotim, brings from the rabbis, that this directive to give the treifa to a dog teaches us that God does not deprive any creature of its reward. I believe, however, that , in addition to this important lesson of divine reward and punishment, we an also learn a lesson in gratitude from the Torah's concern for the welfare of the dog. The notion of gratitude, in fact,  can be inculcated in a person even if the outward action is directed toward an inanimate object. The rabbis tell us that one should not throw stones into a well from which one has had a drink. In any case, according to the Ibn Ezra, the dogs who remained silent and were not sassy in Egypt in the shadow of night were the watchdogs of the slaves, and normally would have been expected to bark. By remaining silent, they demonstrated their loyalty and gratitude to their masters by aiding them in attaining freedom, and, in turn, were owed a debt of gratitude. 

  Rabbi Bachya ibn Pakudah writes in his Chovos Halevovos - Duties of the Hearts - that a sense of gratitude is the foundation of one's service of God. In fact the Mechilta on parshas Yisro explains the verse, "I am the Lord your God who took you out of the land of Egypt" with the parable of a king, who issued commands to his people only after he did various things for their benefit. The silence of the dogs on the night of the final plague in Egypt thus served to cultivate a sense of gratitude within the people, so that they could further develop it and use it in serving God. Pharaoh and his people, on the other hand, had a complete lack of gratitude for the Jewish people, who were descendants of Yosef, the viceroy who saved them during the years of famine. Rabbi Menachem  Kasher, in his Torah Shleimah to parshas Bo, cites midrashim that tell of two magic, silver dogs that were set up by the Egyptians next to Yosef's coffin, to prevent his people from taking him with them. Apparently, the midrash is telling us that the Egyptians understood the benefit they had derived from Yosef, and, despite that, subjugated and tortured his descendants. Their sense of ingratitude was so great that they used the image of a dog, the symbol of loyalty, to prevent the Jews from retrieving Yosef's body. Perhaps, then, Moshe, by telling Pharaoh that the dogs would not bark on the night of the final plague, was telling Pharaoh that the actions that his nation and he had carried out against the descendants of Yosef demonstrated that, ethically, they were on a lower level than those dogs. Mark Twain once observed that if you take a starving dog in out of the rain and feed it and take care of it, that dog will not bite your hand. That, he quipped, is the main difference between a dog and a human being. Although Twain's observation is typically cynical, in the case of Pharaoh and the Egyptians it appears to be correct.