.
Parsha Bo is the one which, for me, annually relates to that crazy tune which played back “in the Old Country” a couple of decades ago, “Does Your Korbon Pesach Lose It’s Flavor Tied to the Bedpost Overnight?” (Actually, the real title to the song was “Does Your Chewing Gum Lose It’s Flavor on the Bedpost Overnight?”)
Over the years, this author has opened with this nutty parody of mine because it cuts right to the very heart of our Parsha. That is the Mitzvot of taking the Korbon Pesach, applying the da’am on Jewish doorposts, the going up from Mitzrayim (Egypt) to “…a land flowing with milk and honey …” and the first mitzvah commanded of the National entity (B’nai Yisrael), the Kiddush HaChodesh — the sanctification of the New Moon and the relevance today of these mitzvot which relate to emunah (belief in) and yirat (fear of)Hashem.
Each year, just like countless other stories of our heritage and Halachot, the perspective each year is unique just as the events of each year are unique unto themselves, yet part of Hashem’s “vast eternal plan.”
Rabbi Zelig Pliskin’s “Growth Through Torah” relates comments from The Chofetz Chayim on the verse “There will come a time when G’d will bring you to the land … He swore to your ancestors that He would give you — a land flowing with milk and honey, and you shall do this service.”
Rav Pliskin states;
“The Torah and the land of Israel are one unit. Their relationship is as the relationship of body and soul. A soul cannot exist alone in this world. The body alone is just dust from the earth, it needs the soul to give it life. The soul of the Jewish people is the sacred Torah. The body is the land of Israel. There are many Mitzvot that cannot be fulfilled outside of the land of Israel. Nevertheless, with all of the difficulties involved in living in exile, we as a people are still alive. The land of Israel without Torah, however is like a body without a soul. It is just a piece of land. Only when both exist together is there a complete unit.” (“Growth Through Torah”, p. 168-169 quoting “Chofetz Chayim al HaTorah”, p.65)
And Rabbi Eliyahu Eliezer Dessler added about being in the Land of Israel;
“In two hours, I attain in spiritual matters things that outside of Eretz Yisrael I had to work on a number of weeks.” (“Growth Through Torah”, p. 168-169 quoting Marbitzai Torah Umussar, vol. 3, p. 79)
But there is another dimension to tying that Korbon Pesach to the bedpost, the taking of the Korbon Pesach in the first place. We learn that lambs were among the “sacred” avodah zora of the Mitzrayim. Many of our brethren considered this act a great risk; the risk of angering the Mitzriyim thus risking their lives. A degree of Emunah was necessary, the faith that Hashem will protect his children who partook in this act. Many apparently arrived at a Cheshbon that by taking the Egyptian idol, tying it to the bedpost and then slaughtering it and smearing it’s blood on the doorpost, they would lose lives or limbs. Apparently, when many Jews had what to lose, and/or when they felt comfortable in their situation in Mitzriyim, their emunah, and thus their Mitzvot suffered.
We learn from Medrashim that as a consequence, roughly 20% of the B’nai Yisrael left in the Yetziyot Mitzrayim, the going up from Mitzrayim. There are other sources who indicate that the number of B’nai Yisrael surviving to take part in the Yetziyot Mitzriyim was more like 2%. The rest apparently died under cover of the plague of darkness. Those who remained applied the da’am to their doorposts, ate their Korbon Pesach and their first-borns survived the plague of the Egyptian first-born.
Similarly, today there are many among us here in Eretz Yisrael who
remain unwilling to put it on the line against an oppressive Regime which harms their fellow Jews. They are more concerned about their lifestyles, that they may lose that precious job — that the “boss” may not understand and they’ve got to have food on the table, a house over their heads. They can’t justify stepping out in defense of their fellow Jew — it doesn’t affect me, it’s not at my door. Why should I get involved in Yenamsville — in Gush Katif, the 4 Shomron Towns, the Shalhevet neighborhood in Chevron, Amona, etc? They justify their cheshbon by saying that this or that place is not at my doorstep.
But unfortunately, the grim reaper of consolidation, convergence, realignment is coming closer to YOUR doorstep. Jerusalem is endangered, over 100,000 Jews could be evicted from their homes. Kassams, Katyushas, Molotovs and more could fall not only in Sderot, but in Ashkelon, Ashdod, Kiryat Gat, Beit Shemesh, Jerusalem — over all that remains of Israel should the hard-hearted Olmert successfully facilitate a Pa. terror state on Jewish land.
What seems lacking in modern-day Jews in Eretz Yisrael as opposed to the Jews of Shushan who united, fasted and wore sack-cloth as did Mordechai? Why don’t we feel as compelled as the Jews of Shushan? Or as the people of the Ukraine who forced new elections by the force of hundreds of thousands demonstrating 24/7 for days, weeks, months — as long as it took to force change, to force new, honest elections? Is it even possible for today’s Jews to feel so compelled — even if there were a gun to our collective heads — in Kiryat Sefer or Beitar Illit, or such as Ahmadinejad’s or Egyptian nukes?
For how long will Observant adults, be they Dati, Dati leumi, Chardal, Chareidi, Chassidic or S’fardi leave the dirty work to “the golden youth” of Gush Katif, of Amona, the youth for Jonathan Pollard’s freedom? By doing thus, are we not emulating those in Mitzriyim who didn’t take the Korbon Pesach? Have we, as attributed to Sforno, “as a result, … lost the priviledge of going to the Promised Land[?] and their children were the ones for whom the promise … was fulfilled.” (Artscroll Stone Chumash, Sefer Shemos, Perek 6, pusuk 9, page 321)
What’s more, are we, as written recently by Director Levi Chazen of the English Division of Yeshivat HaRa’ayon, part of the Gra’s worse nightmare regarding “Pakod yifkod” — Yaakov’s forecast of Hashem’s two visits to B’nai Yisrael? Rabbi Chazen wrote;
The Midrash teaches us: “Pakod yifkod – HaShem will surely visit you” – Jacob informed them of two visits. The first time referred to the time of Moses, the second time, to that of the Messianic king. The last exile and its Redemption will be like the first one from Egypt. Just as in Egypt, when the time of reckoning came, G-d did not allow Israel to remain in the exile, the same will be true of the Final Redemption. And just as in the time of the redemption of the Jewish people from Egypt, all of the ones who tried to remain in Egypt were killed by the hand of G-d in the plague of darkness, so, too, in the Final Redemption no Jew will remain in the exile.
The Vilna Gaon (the GRA) writes in Kol HaTor: “It says, ‘In Mount Zion and Jerusalem there shall be those who escape… and among the remnant those whom the L-rd shall call.’ (Joel 3:5) According to the Midrash, the word Zion is equated with Mashiach ben Joseph, for whatever happened to Joseph happens to Zion.” Our master, the GRA, hinted at this also through the words “among the remnant,” which is equal in numerical value to the name Joseph, for according to the GRA, the ingathering of the exiles will occur though him. There will also be an increase in Divine prosecution of those who do not support the ingathering of the exiles (i.e., those who do not come) since the Redemption will start through it, for then there will be survivors in Zion and Jerusalem and from the remnant. The GRA worried about this greatly.
Are we to understand the last quoted lines of the Medrash this way; “…in the Final Redemption no Jew will remain in the exile” — either in physical exile or in in the complacency of mental exile of fearing loss of job, prison, etc. for actions against an evil regime bent on de-Judacizing Israelis? Will the masses of Jews yet again fear and lack the emunah to take and shecht that Korban Pesach?
B’Ezrat Hashem that the masses of the Am wake up, see the light and put themselves on the line V’Ahavta, L’Rei’echa, Kamocha for their fellow Jews and for our Eretz Kedusha lest the GRA’s worst nightmare be actualized.
May we be zocha in this coming year that our brethren — the refugee families from Gush Katif be permanently settled and be made totally whole, that our dear brother Jonathan Pollard and the 3 captive Chayalim and the other MIAs be liberated and returned to us and that we fulfill Hashem’s blueprint of B’nai Yisrael as a Unique people — an Am Segula, not to be reckoned with as with “the nations” and may we be zocha the Moshiach, the Ge’ula Shlaima, as Dov Shurin sings; “Yom Hashem V’Kol HaGoyim”, the Ultimate Redemption, bim hay v’yameinu — speedily, in our time”, — Achshav, Chik Chuk, Miyad, Etmol!!!
Good Shabbos!
**************************************************************
Moshe Burt, an Oleh, is a commentator on news and events in Israel and Founder and Director of The Sefer Torah Recycling Network. He lives in Ramat Beit Shemesh.
***************************************************************