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Parsha Themes Archive

This week’s parasha introduces several new themes which we will revisit many times as we make our way through the Torah. As a transition between the period of enslavement in Mitzrayyim (Egypt) and the journey through the desert, our parasha sets the stage for the rest of the Torah, which follows Bnei Yisrael through their desert journey toward Cana’an.

It happened, when Paro sent out the nation, that Hashem did not lead them by the way of the Land of Philistines, although it was shorter, because He said, “Lest the nation regret [leaving Egypt] when they see war, and return to Egypt.”

The parasha opens with Hashem’s leading the people toward Cana’an, their destination -- but He doesn’t take the shortest route. Hashem knows that if Bnei Yisrael run into adversity (like a war with hostile nations), they might turn right around and run back to Mitzrayyim. They don’t yet have the confidence and resolve to fight an enemy in order to preserve their independence; their most likely response to a threat is flight to familiarity and safety. People react to uncertainty, anxiety, or danger by reaching for the familiar. Even though the life the people knew in Egypt brought them slavery, cruelty, pain, death, hatred, and oppression, they might, Hashem knows, still try to return to that life if they feel like they are standing on quicksand. People are willing to pay an enormous price to cling to the feeling of security.

Sometimes, as here, Hashem makes allowances for the people’s mentality. But at other times, He challenges them to take risks and not allow their experiences to control them. Sometimes this results in His becoming angry when they fail.

Hashem went before them by day, leading them by a pillar of cloud, and by night with a pillar of fire to illuminate for them, traveling by day and by night. The pillar of cloud did not depart by day, nor the pillar of fire at night, from before the people.

Hashem’s presence -- His guidance and protection -- remains with the people at all times. But this does not banish their insecurity: despite constant signs of Hashem’s presence, the people continue to wonder whether Hashem is truly with them. Besides the cloud and the fire, the “man” (“manna”) which falls from the sky every day, the water which comes from rocks when stricken (on several occasions), and the birds (“selav”) which are sent to them every evening for dinner all testify to Hashem’s presence. But the people remain unsure: is Hashem truly among them? Can they truly depend on Him?

Why don’t the people “get it”? Can’t they see the cloud, the fire, the birds? Did their bread fall from the sky back in Egypt, too? Why don’t they understand that Hashem is truly with them?

Trust is built on facts, but it is made of emotion and supported by experience, encouragement, and familiarity. The people certainly see the pillars of cloud and fire, they certainly gape at the food falling from the sky and the water from rocks. But these very miracles contribute to their insecurity, offering them the impossible and the bizarre in place of the unremarkable but familiar. The miracles say “Hashem is present” to their intellect, but their hearts tell them that tomorrow there will be no more water from rocks or manna from heaven, that this is all a dream. This is why they violate Hashem’s instructions and leave over manna from the day’s gleanings: they do not believe it will be there tomorrow. It is all a fairy tale. Their eyes tell them what is here today, but this miraculous ground doesn’t look solid enough to step on; if they begin to trust this state of fantastic affairs and depend on it for their needs, it will suddenly evaporate and disappear.

Awhile ago I participated in a training session at a conference. The topic of the session was “Building Leadership by Building Trust.” We started off with an exercise called the “Blind Walk.” We split into pairs; one member of the pair would close his eyes, and the other would keep his eyes open. The one with his eyes open would lead the other around the conference center -- down the hallways, up and down stairs, escalators, and elevators, outside the building, into the pool (it was in Miami), into the gift shop, down the boardwalk. I started to lead my partner down the hall, and the first thing I noticed was that he did not trust me! Although we know each other well, he refused to walk at the brisk pace at which I wanted to walk. I was surprised -- did he think I would steer him into a wall or trip him down a flight of stairs? If he trusted me, wouldn’t he put his fate into my hands, relax, and walk willingly?

He couldn’t do it. Being blind was so unfamiliar and so unsettling that he was unable to let me be his eyes. When it came my turn to close my eyes and have him lead me, I was able to relax and participate only by a tremendous act of will. I did not trust him any more than he trusted me -- the situation was just too unfamiliar -- but for seven minutes I made this leap of faith (hoping it would not involve a leap down the stairs) and forced myself to tolerate it.

This is what Bnei Yisrael face in the desert -- the Blind Walk. But instead of seven minutes, they are walking the Blind Walk all day and all night. Nothing they can see means anything to them; everything is completely unfamiliar. They know Hashem is acting as their eyes, but this knowledge alone does not create trust. They do make the leap of faith at certain times, like when they walk right into the middle of the split ocean, but they cannot maintain the “Blind Walk” at all times. Imagine that the Egyptian army is at your heels, chasing hard in chariots, armed and angry. You turn to your leader frantically, and he tells them that the proper thing to is to do nothing -- that the invisible God will save you! It is to Bnei Yisrael’s immense credit that they accept Moshe’s words and obey his command to walk into the sea.

We now move to the actual confrontation between Mitzrayyim and Bnei Yisrael. In that context, one theme appears with great prominence: the focus on the chariots and horses of the Egyptians. This begins with Paro himself, who leads the move to the chariots:

He harnessed his CHARIOT and took his nation with him.

We then hear about the quality and quantity of the chariot forces Paro takes with him:

He took six hundred choice CHARIOTS, and all the CHARIOTS of Mitzrayyim, with officers over all of them.

We hear about the chariots again when the Egyptians catch up with Bnei Yisrael:

Mitzrayyim chased after them and caught up with them camped at the desert; all the HORSES of Paro’s CHARIOTS, his HORSEMEN, and his army, at Pi Ha-Hirot, before Ba’al Tzefon.

“I will strengthen the heart of Mitzrayyim, and they will come after them; I will be bear down upon Paro, his whole army, his CHARIOTS and his HORSEMEN.”

We hear about the horses and the chariots again as they begin to follow the Bnei Yisrael into the water:

Mitzrayyim chased and came after them -- all the HORSES of Paro, his CHARIOTS and HORSEMEN, into the sea.

We next hear the curious detail that Hashem rips the wheels off of the chariots, and that the chariots begin to drag “roughshod” over the temporarily exposed seabed:

He [Hashem] removed the wheels of their CHARIOTS, and they dragged heavily . . . .

We next hear about the chariots in Hashem’s command to Moshe to rejoin the split waters:

Hashem said to Moshe, “Stretch your hand over the waters, and they will return upon Mitzrayyim, on his CHARIOTS and on his HORSEMEN.”

The waters returned and covered the CHARIOTS and the HORSEMEN of all of the army of Paro which had come after them in the sea; not even one was left.

We next hear about the horses and chariots in the first line of the Shirat Ha-Yam:

Then Moshe and the Bnei Yisrael sang this song to Hashem: “I shall sing to Hashem, who has been exalted; the HORSES and CHARIOTS, He tossed into the sea.”

And then once more during the Song, once just after the Song, and once more in Miryam’s song:

The CHARIOTS of Paro and his army, he threw into the sea; the choicest of his officers sank in the Yam Suf.

For the HORSES of Paro came, with his CHARIOTS and HORSEMEN, into the sea, and Hashem returned upon them the waters of the sea . . . .

Miriam responded to them, “Sing to Hashem, for He has triumphed; HORSE and its CHARIOT He threw into the sea.”

Why do horses and chariots get so much attention here? Why does the Torah mention them so many times in the process of the story and in recounting the songs?

One other question has been bothering me since we left Sefer Bereishit: remember that when Yosef revealed himself to his brothers and sent them back to Cana’an to bring Ya’akov down to Egypt, Ya’akov did not believe his sons when they told him that Yosef was still alive and was the (de facto) king of Egypt. The Torah says that he believed the story only when he saw the wagons which Yosef had sent from Egypt to pick him up. What is there about wagons that convinces Ya’akov that the story is true? And, for that matter, why does Paro himself make such a big deal out of the wagons when he tells Yosef how to arrange for his father to come down to Egypt?

Here, a bit of Torah U-Mada seems warranted: what role did chariots play in warfare at the time of the Exodus, and what role did wheeled vehicles play in general? Archaeological, textual, and other historical evidence has convinced many scholars that while the wheel was certainly known in Cana’an at the time of the Avot, it was not widely used for either transportation (wagons) or war (chariots and war-wagons). On the other hand, we know very well from the Torah that wagons and chariots are very much in use in Egypt. Several reasons are advanced by scholars:

For these reasons, only organized nations with powerful economies could afford to support a wheeled-vehicle industry. Cana’an was highly splintered, tribal, and somewhat nomadic, while Egypt was more unified and had a more stable agricultural economy (supported by the fertile Nile delta).

This may explain why the appearance of the wagons convinced Ya’akov that the story about Yosef was true: the wagons could only have been supplied by a powerful person from Egypt, someone who could allocate valuable resources (wheeled vehicles) to the task of carrying Ya’akov and his family down to Egypt. And who would have done such a thing for him besides his son?

In Tanakh, the first time we hear of a large-scale chariot force being used by Bnei Yisrael is in the time of Shlomo Ha-Melekh (see I Melakhim 4:26, II Divrei Ha-Yamim 9:25, I Melakhim 10:26). Only once David had unified the country and Shlomo had built it into an economic power was it practical to field a military force of chariots. In fact, Shlomo built cities just for the chariots (see I Melakhim 9:19).

In our parasha, we encounter wheeled Egyptian vehicles once again: chariots drawn by horses. According to historians, chariots served a dual purpose on the battlefield:

Horses, which were used to draw chariots, were used mostly for this purpose alone; it was fairly rare (and considered somewhat low-class) for a person to ride on the horse itself (later on, this changes, as we see from Qohelet 10:7). Just as the automobile industry of today is always tinkering with new designs and ideas, introducing new models every year, ancient civilizations did a lot of experimenting with different chariot designs. In order to design effective models for different terrain and different purposes, and in order to take advantage of better technology and better materials, there was constant experimentation with different ways of building chariots. The Egyptian war-chariot reached the height of its development in the 14^th century BCE, shortly before the reign of Ramses II -- the Pharaoh who is supposed to be the Paro we know so well.

One other element is critical to the story: in several places in Tanakh, we see that Mitzrayyim is *the* place to buy horses. Horse-breeding and trading are major industries there. In fact, the Torah specifically forbids Jewish kings tosend people to Egypt to buy horses (Devarim 17:16); the warning is necessary only because Egypt is so attractive a market for ho, which are necessary for a strong chariot force and for less violent purposes. Later in Tanakh, we hear that Shlomo Ha-Melekh does indeed buy horses from Mitzrayyim (I Melakhim 10:28-29). In addition, he buys chariots from Mitzrayyim.

Now we return to our original question: why does the Torah place so much emphasis on the Egyptian chariots, horsemen, and horses? Furthermore, of all the details which the Torah could have reported to us about the destruction of the Egyptian army, why do we hear that Hashem “removed the wheels from their chariots” and dragged them over the seabed?

This is why the Torah makes special mention of Hashem’s removal of the wheels of the chariots as they cross the seabed. Using Bnei Yisrael as a decoy, Hashem draws the Egyptians into the danger zone and then overpowers them by paralyzing their trusty weapons. Removing the wheels of their chariots strips the Egyptians bare of the war-tools they trust to guarantee their victory. They drag to a halt with the walls of water trembling around them, and in the moments between the removal of the wheels and their deaths, the Egyptians have just enough time to understand what has happened:

Mitzrayyim said, “I must run away from Bnei Yisrael, for Hashem is fighting for them against Mitzrayyim!”

. . . Hashem moved the sea with a powerful east wind ALL NIGHT, and made the sea into dry land. The waters were split.

Apparently, the waters separate slowly, under the pressure of the wind Hashem causes to blow all through the night. This means that it is dark. Keep reading:

It happened, at the MORNING WATCH, that Hashem faced the Egyptian camp through a pillar of fire and cloud, and confounded the Egyptian camp. He [Hashem] removed the wheels of their chariots . . . .

Bnei Yisrael enter the parted sea and begin to cross while it is yet dark (the morning watch means the third of the night closest to morning), and Egypt gives chase through the darkness. Sometime during this pursuit, Hashem causes the chariots to lose their wheels, grounding the Egyptian pursuers in their tracks.

Moshe stretched his hand out over the sea, and the water returned to its strength TOWARD MORNING; Egypt was running toward him, but Hashem overturned Mitzrayyim in the midst of the sea.

Sometime shortly before dawn (morning), Bnei Yisrael complete their crossing. Moshe turns back to the parted sea, stretches out his hand, and the walls of water crash onto the seabed, drowning the trapped Egyptians - in the dark before morning.

In other words, Bnei Yisrael do not actually witness the Egyptians drowning, since it takes place just before dawn! They only know for sure what has happened when they see the bodies float to shore after sunrise, as the text emphasizes:

. . . Yisrael saw Mitzrayyim dead on the shore of the sea. Yisrael saw the mighty hand which Hashem had used against Mitzrayyim; the nation feared Hashem, and they believed in Hashem and in Moshe, His servant.

Only now do Bnei Yisrael know what has happened, when they “see Mitzrayyim dead on the shore”; only *then* do they “see the mighty hand . . .” because only THEN do they realize what has happened.

As the sun rises over the sea and the Egyptian bodies become visible on the shoreline, Bnei Yisrael finally understand what has happened to their pursuers. But they do not witness the crashing of the sea over their enemies. The Egyptians deserve their fate, but Bnei Yisrael are not so perfect that they can stand above the Egyptians and witness their destruction. For this reason, the whole scene takes place under cover of night. Only as the day dawns do Bnei Yisrael “see the mighty hand with which Hashem did to Mitzrayyim.”

This brings us to the next theme of the parasha, which we will deal with only briefly: the Song. What is its purpose? Why do the people sing, and why is the Song recorded in the Torah? The most obvious function of the Song is praise. But what else might be the purpose of the Song?

Looking at the structure of the Song may yield a clue. It splits neatly into three parts:

2. Ends with a poetic “summary” line.
3. Topic: praise of Hashem’s power

Looking at other songs which appear in the Torah and their function also provides possibilities:

The Song of Ha’azinu: Moshe is commanded to teach it to the people and make sure they remember it so that it will be passed down to later generations. The predictions it contains will serve as a resource to explain to the people how to understand events which happen to them in the course of history. In other words, the purpose of the Song is educational.

The same may be true of the Song in our parasha: one of its purposes is to teach the people something and reminthem of it in future generations: Part I reminds them of the power of Hashem; Part II reminds them of how He saved them at the sea; and Part III reminds them of the international reaction to the event and directs their attoward the ultimate goal: establishing a center for worship of Hashem in Eretz Cana’an.

Song is an excellent medium for education because of its vivid imagery and, of course, because it is easier to remember a song than a list of facts.

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