From: Netvort@aol.com
Sent: Friday, December 31, 2004
3:02 AM
To: JoshHoff@aol.com
Subject: Netvort : parshas
Shemos, 5765
I
Feel Your Pain
By
Rabbi Joshua (presidentially known as The Hoffer) Hoffman
In
memory of the victims of this week's tragic events in Asia.
Moshe, upon learning that Pharaoh is after him because he killed
an Egyptian taskmaster who was attacking a Jew, flees to the wilderness and
saves Yisro's daughters from a group of shepherds who had been attacking them.
He then meets Yisro, marries his daughter Tzipporah, and becomes a shepherd
himself, tending the flocks of his father-law. Decades later, when Moshe is
already eighty years old, he has his first prophetic vision. An angel of God
appears to him from within a burning thorn bush, which, although aflame, is not
consumed. When God sees that Moshe turned aside to look closer at this vision,
he tells him not to proceed, but, first, to take off his shoes, because he is
treading on holy ground. What was the purpose of removing his shoes in a holy
place? Many explanations have been given, as we shall see, but I would first
like to mention a seemingly very strange one, given by Rabbi Ya'akov Moshe
Helin, a 17th century rabbinic scholar, in his commentary on the Midrash Rabbah,
Yedei Moshe.
When God first speaks to Moshe, He says, " I am the God
of your father the God of Avrohom, the God of Yitzchok, and the God of Ya'akov "
(Shemos 16:6). The Midrash Rabbah (Shemos 3:1) says that when God told Moshe
that he was the God of his father, he was referring to Moshe's father, Amram.
Since Moshe was a novice to prophecy, God did not want to frighten him, and so
He spoke to Moshe in the voice of his father. Moshe at first thought that his
father was speaking to him, but God explained that He was communicating with him
using his voice, and that when He referred to himself as 'the God of your
father, he meant 'the God of Amram.' Rabbi Helin writes that since there is a
principle that God does not mention His name in connection with a tzaddik who is
still alive, Moshe understood that his father had died, and that is why he took
his shoes off ! When I first saw this comment many years ago, I felt that it
could scarcely be taken seriously. Even if we assume that Moshe kept all of the
laws of the Torah before they were given, including the rabbinic laws, as the
midrash tells us regarding our forefather Avrohom, it seems difficult to explain
that God told him to take his shoes off because his father had died. After all,
God Himself told Moshe to take his shoes off because he was on holy ground!
However, I believe that there is a way of understanding this explanation in a
plausible manner, within the context of Moshe's development as the man who would
lead his people out of slavery and into redemption.
When God asked
Moshe to lead the people out of Egypt, Moshe declined, and presented repeated
arguments for not being the person to go on this mission. God answered all of
his arguments, until, finally, Moshe said, "send by the hand of whomever you
will send" (Shemos 4:13). Rabbi Avraham, son of the Rambam, points out that
Moshe, here, does not present any reason for his reluctance to go. Rabbi Avraham
suggests, based on a later incident in Moshe's life, that Moshe preferred
staying in the wilderness and perfecting himself, enjoying his closeness to God.
Rabbi Moshe Lichtenstein, in his book Tzir Vetzohn, writes, in a more expanded
way, that although Moshe, earlier in life, had taken an active interest in the
well- being of his fellow Israelites, and placed himself into mortal danger by
saving one of them from an Egyptian tormenter, he had now been staying with
Yisro for many years, working as a shepherd and developing his spirituality and
connection with God, just as Yisro had been doing after renouncing his
idolatrous beliefs and moving to the wilderness. Seen in this context, we can
now examine some of the other explanations given for the need for removing one's
shoes while standing on holy ground, and, specifically, why God told Moshe to do
so at that time.
Ralbag explains that the reason that God told Moshe to
remove his shoes was simply to show reverence to a holy place, and not treat it
in the same manner as one treats an ordinary place. Thus, the Talmud, in
Berachos (54a), tells us that one should not enter the Temple Mount while
wearing shoes. Chizkuni, similarly, says that in the course of walking, a person
may step on some filthy object, and it is not fitting to be in a holy place
while having such substances attached to his shoes. On a more essential level,
my teacher, Rav Aharon Soloveichik, explained that shoes represent adaptability.
By wearing shoes, one is able to protect himself from any harmful substances
that he may step on, and thus walk securely on any terrain. On a wider level,
then, shoes represent man's ability to adapt to any circumstances that may
confront him, protecting himself from any situations that he may find
uncomfortable. When one is standing on holy ground, or, on a wider level, when
he is dealing with matters of holiness, he dare not adapt himself to
circumstances and, out of convenience, protect himself from performing his
duties.
Rabbi Levi Meier, in his book, Moses: The Prince, the Prophet,
writes, gives a somewhat different perspective to the need for Moshe to remove
his shoes. He writes, "Shoes protect us from the harshness of the ground, and
Moshe was being told to divest himself of anything that might be a barrier
between him and the ground upon which he walks. He was to feel the earth beneath
him, the pebbles and grains of sand under his feet. This sensitivity would be
necessary for him to lead. Since a leader's sensitivity must be fine-tuned to
the feelings of the people." With the comments of Rabbi Avraham and Rabbi
Lichtenstein in mind, perhaps we can add that Moshe simply needed to feel the
pain of his people. The rabbis tell us that the message of the burning bush was
that God, represented by the flame, is with His people in their pain. By telling
Moshe to remove his shoes, he was telling him, that, he, too, must feel that
pain. The cryptic reference to his father's death was a way of moving him to
feel a sense of personal loss, and through it, transfer the resultant feeling of
pain onto the wider plane of the suffering of his nation. Thus, Moshe's feelings
of grief for his father were to serve as a catalyst for him to feel the
suffering of his people, and accept the task of leading them put of slavery.
We still need to understand, however, what Moshe's removal of his
shoes had to do with the fact that he was stepping on holy ground. Following,
again, Rabbi Avraham's explanation of Moshe's reluctance to accept his mission,
perhaps we can say that God was telling Moshe not to think that holiness comes
through withdrawing into oneself and meditating. Holiness, rather, comes through
being involved with the problems of others, and bringing God's presence into
their lives. Rabbi Menachem Kasher, in his Torah Shleimah, cites midrashim that
point out the connection between the word for bush - 'sneh' - and the word
Sinai. Moshe's prophetic vision, they say, took place on Mt. Choreiv, another
name for Mt. Sinai, where the Torah would be given to the nation, and where they
would be charged to be a ' kingdom of priests and a holy nation.' Rav Kook wrote
that the point of forming a holy nation was to demonstrate that a life of
holiness is not restricted to people living alone on a mountain, but is
something that has relevance to a nation involved in all the various aspects of
life. The kohanim in the Temple blessed the people each day with love, following
the lead of Aharon, the first high priest, who demonstrated his love for all
Jews by acting as the peace maker whenever a dispute would arise. By telling
Moshe to remove his shoes in order to feel the nation's pain and thereby be
activated to lead them out of Egypt and toward Mt. Sinai, God was offering him a
path to holiness more effective than the path of secluded meditation that he
wished to continue on.
Please address all correspondence to the
author (Rabbi Hoffman) with the following address - JoshHoff @ AOL.com.
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