Reaching Redemption

The Ramban describes[1] the book of Shemos as the story of the first exile and the first redemption. And, as in other Torah narratives, it is not confined to the past: the Jewish bondage in Egypt and subsequent liberation are prototypes from which we can learn how to live our lives today.

We spend our lives waiting for redemption; we yearn for Hashem to liberate our minds, bodies and souls from this chaotic world. Our predicament today is similar to that of the Jews in Egypt. We are entrenched in a society dominated by beliefs and values so dissimilar to ours, and we don’t know how to detach ourselves. Yet, the Jews were redeemed from Egypt! How did they find a way to get out? What secret did they uncover? Most important, what can we learn from their redemption process, so that we too can merit salvation?

The third chapter of Shemos describes the famous incident of Moshe Rabbeinu (our Teacher) at the sneh (burning bush). In this encounter, we can uncover hints about the nature of exile and redemption. While Moshe is shepherding the sheep for his father-in-law Yisro, he experiences something quite unusual. “He led the sheep far into the wilderness, and he arrived at the mountain of G-d, at Chorev. An angel of Hashem appeared to him in the flame of the fire from within the bush. He saw and, behold, the bush was burning in fire and the bush was not being consumed.”[2] Discovering this unusual sight, Moshe decides to turn aside and investigate it: why isn’t the bush burning up? G-d then calls out his name, and Moshe Rabbeinu’s response marks the beginning of his first revelation. He is instructed to lead the Jewish people, take them out of Egypt and bring them into Eretz Yisrael (the land of Israel).

Rabbi Moshe Reiss emphasizes[3] that this incident cannot be understood superficially. Moshe Rabbeinu was not simply amazed at some type of supernatural incident, as if he thought, “Remarkable – there is a bush on fire, and it’s not burning up!” This was a mareh Elokim, a prophetic vision, and Moshe Rabbeinu perceived that it was so, and realized that it had tremendous depth. We, too, will attempt to decipher the deeper meaning of these verses in order to appreciate Hashem’s multiple messages – to Moshe Rabbeinu and to the Jewish people throughout the generations.

Burning Questions

Upon seeing the burning bush, Moshe said to himself that he will stop for a moment and attempt to understand “madu’a lo yivar hasneh (why will the bush not burn up?)”[4] Immediately, Hashem called out to him, instructed him to prepare himself by removing his shoes, and introduced Himself as the G-d of the Patriarchs. After these preliminaries, Hashem began His speech to Moshe Rabbeinu by saying, “I have surely seen the affliction of My nation that is in Egypt and I have heard their cries from before their oppressors, for I have known their pains.”[5]

Let us explore three questions about this passage:

First, what is the symbolism of the burning bush itself – why did Hashem display specifically this image to Moshe Rabbeinu? And why doesn’t Hashem ever answer his question? If Moshe’s question of “Why is the bush not burning up?” motivated Hashem to communicate with him, shouldn’t Hashem have offered an explanation of the miraculous sight? Hashem’s response in the pasuk doesn’t seem to answer the question.

Yet another question can be asked about Hashem’s answer in the pasuk, “Ra’oh ra’isi es oni ami asher beMitzrayim (Seeing, I have seen the affliction of My nation that is in Egypt).”[6] What is the significance of the repetition of the root ra’ah (see)?

The Fire of Galus

In order to grasp the significance of the words “Ra’oh ra’isi,” we need to first answer our initial question: Why did Hashem choose to show this visual phenomenon to Moshe Rabbeinu? What did this burning bush symbolize?

The Midrash Rabbah relates[7] that at the time of this incident, Moshe Rabbeinu was pondering the Jewish people’s situation. He was concerned that the Jewish people would be consumed by the Egyptians. Hashem addresses Moshe Rabbeinu’s concern by showing him a fire burning in a bush, but not burning it up. He utilized a visual aid, as it were, to deliver a powerful message: “Just as the bush is burning in fire but is not being consumed, so too, the Egyptians cannot consume the Jewish people.” Rabbi Reiss notes[8] that this vignette is all of Jewish history in a nutshell, a cycle playing itself out time after time. For “Egypt” one can substitute any one of the persecuting nations over the centuries. The fire could be the Inquisition; the fire could be the pogroms; the fire could be the Holocaust; the fire could be the Intifada. No matter how the fire manifests itself in each generation, “vehasneh einenu ukal (and the bush is not being consumed).”[9]

This is Hashem’s message to Moshe Rabbeinu at the beginning of his career and at the birth of Am Yisrael (the Jewish people) itself. Here at the very beginning of sefer Shemos, we are taught the fundamental principle: “Vehasneh einenu ukal.” The greatest fires can try to consume the Jewish people, but they will never destroy it. The fire here represents impurity: the fire of anti-Semitism, hate, evil and destructive forces that exist in the world. It will try to defeat us, but we will never be consumed.

Many have marveled at the Jewish nation’s remarkable tenacity in the face of adversity. Even Mark Twain wrote about the Jews: “The Egyptian, the Babylonian, and the Persian rose, filled the planet with sound and splendor, then faded to dream-stuff and passed away; the Greek and the Roman followed, and made a vast noise, and they are gone; other peoples have sprung up and held their torch high for a time, but it burned out, and they sit in twilight now, or have vanished. The Jew saw them all, beat them all, and is now what he always was. What is the secret of his immortality?”[10]

“Madu’a lo yivar hasneh” is Moshe Rabbeinu’s question, and essentially the question of every Jew. How is it that the Jews have not been consumed, despite repeated efforts to destroy them physically and spiritually? What preserves us forever, no matter what forces act against us?

The answer to “madu’a lo yivar hasneh,” as we mentioned earlier, must be in the words “Ra’oh ra’isi es oni ami.”[11] The secret of Am Yisrael’s survival is hinted at earlier in the story, in the verse telling us that the “angel of Hashem appeared to [Moshe] in the labas eish from within the bush.”[12] The Ibn Ezra explains[13] that the word labas comes from the word lev – heart. The angel appeared in the heart of the fire. What is the significance of this seemingly small detail? Rabbi Reiss, based on the Sefas Emes, elucidates[14] by commenting that Moshe Rabbeinu was focusing on the internal aspects of the flame, and not on the external manifestations of the fire.

The Slonimer Rebbe discusses[15] how the Jews had deteriorated almost to the lowest level of impurity; nevertheless, there remained one small kernel deep within them that had not succumbed to the impure forces. This kusta dechiyusa (kernel of vitality) that would be the spark to reignite the life of the Jew is the power of emunah (belief). Emunah is the most basic element of the neshamah (soul) of a Jew. As long as it still existed within the neshamos of the Jews, there was hope. Emunah is the point of origin. When everything external is destroyed, we can still start anew as long as a spark of emunah exists.

Moshe Rabbeinu thought that this power of emunah had been lost or critically damaged in the impurity of Egypt. Later he explicitly states this concern: “And they will not believe me and will not listen to my voice, because they will say, ‘Hashem did not appear to you’…”[16] When Moshe Rabbeinu did not see evidence of emunah among Am Yisrael, he doubted their ability to survive and asked “madu’a lo yivar hasneh?”

We can now grasp the meaning of Hashem’s reply of “ra’oh ra’isi…” The Midrash interprets[17] the double language of ra’ah as distinguishing between the human and the Divine perception of the Jewish people. Hashem is telling Moshe that he sees only one type of vision, while Hashem sees two types of visions. The Midrash explains the visions as being events in the future of the Jewish people, but the Slonimer Rebbe uses the Midrash’s concept to explain Hashem’s answer to Moshe’s puzzlement.

“You, Moshe, are a human being. You see only the externality of Am Yisrael, and on the outside, all is lost. They have lost their spirituality, they have lost hope. But I am Hashem and because I am Omniscient, I see both the external and the internal. I see that in the innermost depths, one spark of emunah remains.”

Hashem showed Moshe the labas eish, the heart of the fire. If the bush represents the Jewish people, and the fire represents the Egyptians who tried to destroy them, then the secret of Am Yisrael is in the innermost part of the bush on fire. Deep down in the heart of the bush, even as the fire of our enemies is raging around, is the spark of emunah. It was true of the Jews in Egypt, and it will always be true of Am Yisrael. The emunah is what is behind our power to renew ourselves.

The Power to Get Out

If this emunah is a fundamental part of the Jewish neshamah and is never lost, then we are struck with an additional question: How come so many members of Am Yisrael did not make it out of Egypt? Whether it was one fifth, one fiftieth, or one five hundredth, accounting for all the different opinions of the Midrash,[18] only a fraction of the people were actually led out, while the majority died during the plague of darkness. Didn’t they all have that spark of emunah and the basis for rebuilding? If they had only lost hope externally, then why didn’t all of them leave?

The navi (prophet) Yechezkel describes the process of Yetzi’as Mitzrayim (the Exodus). He reveals that when Hashem was preparing to take Am Yisrael out of Egypt, Hashem gave them instructions to prepare themselves for liberation. They were commanded to leave their avodah zarah (idol worship) and not to sully themselves with the impurities of Egypt. But from Yechezkel’s description, it sounds like they didn’t listen. “They rebelled against Me and they did not want to listen to Me. Each person did not cast away the abominations of their eyes and the idols of Egypt they did not leave…”[19] Rashi there explains[20] that this was not referring to every member of Am Yisrael, but only “the evil-doers, the majority of Israel, who died in the three days of darkness…” Why indeed didn’t they merit redemption? Because they didn’t want to leave; they were not ready for such a step.

The Slonimer Rebbe explains[21] that there is a crucial component needed if we want that spark of emunah to redeem us. He quotes Rabbi Moshe of Kobrin as saying that the worst situation is when a Jew accepts his spiritual situation as is and makes no effort to change it. The worst thing that a Jew can feel is apathy. The spark of emunah may be there, but it needs to be accessed and expressed. The expression doesn’t have to be drastic or even externally apparent. It only has to manifest itself as sincere discontent with the current spiritual situation. If a person falls into a deep pit, as long as he is still screaming for help, you know he’s alive. The moment he stops screaming, you know he’s in serious trouble. He has given up and is not using any strength he might have left. The Jewish people have that potential to scream out, whether internally or externally, to say: I can never settle for the situation I’m in.

What triggered the redemption process from Egypt? “The Children of Israel groaned from the work and they cried out. Their cry rose up to G-d from the work. G-d heard their moan…”[22] Right after that came the incident of the burning bush. The terms of “groan” “cry” and “moan” are all wordless cries, says the Slonimer Rebbe. They are not articulate expressions of the emunah of the Jewish people. The people did not turn to G-d in eloquent prayer to save them. All they did was groan internally, cry out wordlessly, show that in the depths of their hearts they were dissatisfied with the current situation, and that they wanted something better. That was enough to demonstrate that the life force of emunah remained within them enough to prevent succumbing to the destructive fire of Egypt. The cry was the catalyst for the redemption.

This idea gives us an insight about the people who were not redeemed. They didn’t really want to leave Egypt; they did not tap into the power of their emunah and try to express it. Those who didn’t get out were those who didn’t cry out.

We too have that potential, both on a national and a personal level. We see the situation of Klal Yisrael (the Jewish people) today: the assimilation, the persecution, the obstacles to our service of Hashem. We have the ability to cry out, to internally protest the situation. Hashem! We don’t want to continue like this! We want to be Your nation. We want to be united in our service of You. We want to be the light through which the entire world recognizes You.

In our personal lives, when we see that our relationship with Hashem is not what it could be; when we feel stuck in the pit of physicality and impurity – our first step is to let out a cry. I don’t want to be here! I want to be close to You! This voice is our spark of emunah manifesting itself in the labas aish, in our deepest place of self. We need to tap into the secret power of the Jew – our eternal emunah – and use it to be redeemed.

Taking the First Step

To sum up, when we find ourselves in a situation of tzarah (suffering), our responsibility is to wake ourselves up and to express our kusta dechiyusa, the emunah that is our small hidden spark of life. Once we take this tiny step, Hashem will respond.

The Torah reveals this to us in the events at the burning bush. First Moshe sees the bush and notices that it is burning but not being consumed. He says to himself, “I will turn aside and I will see this great vision, why will the bush not be burned up?”[23] The next pasuk tells us, “Hashem saw that he had turned aside to see. G-d called to him from within the bush and said, ‘Moshe, Moshe’.”[24] Rabbi Avrohom Schorr points out[25] that Moshe merited the Divine revelation because he took the initiative of actively turning aside to see. Rabbi Schorr applies that principle to our lives, explaining that we have to turn towards Hashem, to demonstrate that we want to come closer to Him. If we show that desire, even in a seemingly small way, we express that spark of true life within us, and we merit Hashem’s revelation.

That revelation is the ultimate salvation from tzarah. The word tzarah is related to the Hebrew word for “narrow,” because true tzarah is being constricted and distant from Hashem. The greatness of the ge’ulah (redemption) from Egypt was release from a place of spiritual constriction to a place of spiritual expansion, resulting in a vibrant connection to Hashem. In Egypt we had to initiate and show that we wanted more; so too in our own lives, we need to initiate.

In His love for us, Hashem wants us to make ourselves deserving of ge’ulah and He gives us opportunities to do so. For example, He gave us a mitzvah (commandment) in Bamidbar that tells us, “When you shall come to war in your land upon the enemy who oppresses you, you shall blow with trumpets and you shall be recalled before Hashem your G-d and you shall be saved from your enemies.”[26] Blowing the trumpets is supposed to awaken the nation to teshuvah (repentance), explains the Rambam,[27] and it is not only when the nation at war. The mitzvah to awaken ourselves by blowing the trumpets applies whenever the entire nation is in any state of tzarah, be it a famine, an epidemic, or any other kind of nation-wide suffering.

It’s hard for us to focus on teshuvah. We are human beings and physical creatures. Like the entire physical world, we’re subject to the law of inertia. The Sefer HaChinuch teaches[28] that if we don’t take an affirmative step towards self-transformation, we’ll naturally stay the same. It’s natural and it’s comfortable.

Tapping into the kusta dechiyusa within us can motivate us to do teshuvah. In reality, however, it’s often hard for that little spark to compete with the power of inertia. How can we overcome the routine habits we have established? Hashem gave us an external boost of trumpet blasts as if to say, “Wake up! Where are you going? Where do you really want to be going?” This wakeup call allows our internal spark to ignite a bigger fire. Every one of us can discover his or her ideal self and actualize the desire to be that person all the time.

The Rambam says that the blowing of the shofar offers a similar opportunity. “Although the blowing of the shofar on Rosh Hashanah is a decree of the Torah, there is a hint within it, as if to say: Wake up sleeping ones from your slumber… and search your deeds and return in repentance and remember your Creator. Those who forget the truth in the vanities of time and mistakenly spend all their year on nothingness which will not benefit and save [them] – look to your souls and improve your ways…”[29]

After a whole year of operating on autopilot without thinking about how we define ourselves and our relationship with G-d, hearing the shofar on Rosh Hashanah is a wakeup call and stand-still moment of opportunity. Who are you? Who do you want to be? It’s the moment when we can access that spark of true life within us and let it define us – but we have to be the catalyst. We just need to express our motivation. When we turn towards Hashem, it is the first step in our personal ge’ulah. But we are responsible for taking that first step.

We can do it – each one of us as an individual, and together as Am Yisrael. Bnei Yisrael did not uncover something new that led them to freedom. They tapped into a power that has been ingrained inside each of us since the beginning of time; the power of being a Jew, the desire to have a deep relationship with Hashem. No matter how near or far we seem, that kusta dechiyusa pulses within us. But we need to express it. Hashem is just waiting to hear that cry, expressing our desire to change and be His people in every sense. Our cry is the sign that we have woken up, that we are not content with the current state of our relationship with Hashem. Our cry expresses our turning towards Hashem, asking His help to be the nation we can be. We were able to achieve this level in Egypt and we merited ge'ulah. May we do so once again and experience the ultimate redemption.

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[1] Introduction to Commentary on Shemos.

[2] Shemos 3:1-2.

[3] Meirosh Tzurim, Shemos, p. 45.

[4] Shemos 3:3.

[5] Shemos 3:7.

[6] ibid.

[7] Shemos Rabbah 2:10.

[8] Meirosh Tzurim, Shemos, p. 48.

[9] Shemos 3:2.

[10] “Concerning the Jews,” Harper’s, Sept. 1899.

[11] Shemos 3:7.

[12] ibid., 3:2.

[13] Commentary to Torah, Shemos 3:2.

[14] Meirosh Tzurim, Shemos, p. 45.

[15] Nesivos Shalom, Shemos, p. 32.

[16] Shemos 4:1.

[17] Shemos Rabbah 3:3.

[18] Mechilta, Introduction to Beshalach.

[19] Yechezkel 20:8.

[20] Commentary on Yechezkel 20:8.

[21] Nesivos Shalom, Shemos, p. 32.

[22] Shemos 2:23-24.

[23] ibid., 3:3.

[24] ibid., 3:4.

[25] HaLekach VeHaLibuv, 5761, p. 90.

[26] Bamidbar 10:9.

[27] Mishneh Torah, Hilchos Ta’aniyos 1:1-2.

[28] Mitzvah 384.

[29] Mishneh Torah, Hilchos Teshuvah 3:4.