SHEMOS 1990

In the Torah portion Shmos we learn about the slavery the Jewish people were subjected to in Egypt.  The rabbis ask, why did the Jewish people have to go into this Galut, into this exile? Why did we have to endure slavery? The answer that they give is because it was because of the slavery of Egypt that the Jewish people learned how to be a compass ionate people, how to be Rachmoneen Ben Rachmoneem, how to be compass ionate people who are the children of compassionate people.  There is a very famous short story written by the famous Israel author, Hazzaz, who claims that what is lacking in the peoples of the world is Galut, is Galus, is exile.  If the other peoples of the world would have experienced exile then they would have learned something about compassion.  Everyone is born with the potentiality to be compassionate.  That is why everyone is a Moracheem, but not everyone is a Rachamon.  Rachamon means people who are compelled to be compassionate.  Their inner nature compels them to become compassionate.  The Jewish culture has such an influence over those that are in it that an individual cannot help but be compassionate.  Compassion is one of the very bases of the Jewish culture.  Of course, those Jews who are estranged from their culture are not different from the people around them, but those people who are immersed in Jewish culture cannot help but be compassionate.  That is, of course, what the experience of Egypt was meant to teach us.

That is why even today you will find Jews in the forefront of almost every do-good organization because we Jews feel the pain of the world because we have been subjected to so much pain ourselves, and we want to alleviate the pain of the world.  In this Torah portion we learn how Moshe empathizes with his people.  We learn how Moshe goes from the palace of Pharaoh to see his people, how he slays an Egyptian when the Egyptian is persecuting a Jew.  Later he flees to Midian and there he marries Jethro's daughter and he leads a contented and happy life, but G-d appears to him and tells him to go back to Egypt and redeem the people.  And Moshe says, "The people will not believe me," and G-d said, "i will give you, Moshe, three signs, and when the people see these signs then they will believe you." What are these signs? The first one is that he will take his staff and throw it on the ground and it will become a snake.  Then he will grab ahold of the tail of the snake and it will turn once again into a staff.  The second sign is that he will take his hand and put it in his bosom and it will come out leprous, and then he will return his hand to his bosom and it will come out clean again.  The third sign is that he will take water from the Nile and turn it into blood.  These are magician’s tricks, and Egypt is filled with magicians.  Egypt had certain types of snakes that would look like staffs that they could pretend when they threw them on the ground that they became a snake when actually they were a snake from the very beginning.  Egypt knew how to have special gloves made to give a person the appearance of a leprous hand, and to change water into blood they could do that with a dye, etc.  What was so great about these signs? Why would the Jewish people listen to these signs? Why did G-d tell Moshe that if the Jewish people saw these signs they would immediately want to shrug off their slavery and help him free themselves.  How is that possible that these signs would have any effect on them?

My friends, actually these signs stand for something more.  They are not just magician’s tricks.  What Moshe was meant to tell the Jewish people was that the conditions in which they had endured up to now were no longer powerful and the only choice they had was to prepare for freedom, to press their freedom upon Pharaoh.  We see the events in eastern Europe today, how seemingly all these countries are throwing off communism.  Moshe was to convince the Jewish people that the assumptions that they had made they could no longer rely on and that they had to take matters into their own hands.  There are several ways that we can deal with persecution.  One way is to go along, to bide your time, that eventually the persecutor will get tired, that eventually he will see that his methods are false.  In a certain sense, this is what has happened in eastern Europe today, that those who had counseled, go along with the Russians, do not revolt have been proven correct.  They have claimed that the Russians will see that this is not an economically viable system, and, therefore, they will leave us and let us be free.  After all, why was slavery ended through most of the world? Not because of high-minded moral impulses but because it was not economically feasible anymore.  It was economically better to have hired workers and let them fend for themselves in their off hours than to have slaves.  The economic cost was too high.  Why did colonial empires disappear throughout the world? Not because the western nations did not have the military wherewithal to subdue the colonial peoples but because it was no longer profitable.  It cost more to subdue them than they could ever get out of them.  It was much better to let them have their freedom and to buy their raw products rather than to try to subdue them.  We see the same thing in Russia.  Russia looted the eastern European countries after the Second World War but now they were an economic drain on Russia, and Russia decided that it would be better that they be free and fend for themselves and she would not have to spend billions of dollars trying to prop them up the same way that she is having to spend billions of dollars to prop up Cuba and other countries throughout the world.  Russia saw that this was not helping her.  The ancient world is not the modern world.  In the ancient world Rome maintained her empire because every year tribute came into Rome, but today with modern industry economies do not run that way, and the more territory you conquer and have to hold means many times the more expenses you have, and the income does not equate with the expenses.  So Moshe was telling the Jewish people, "Up to now you thought that you could go along and things would get better, that you could placate Pharaoh."  This is similar many times to people in a terrible marriage where there is abuse where one spouse will say, "It will get better.  I just won't say those things so I won't rile the other person up.  I'll tiptoe around all these subjects, and everything will be all right." Most of the time it will not work, but sometimes it does work.  If the person is not riled up everything seems to be fine.  Up to this time the Jewish people were led to believe not to stir up things, be quiet, go along, things will be okay.  In fact, in the Middle Ages this was a view that was predominant in the Jewish community and it worked.  It saved Jewish lives.  Of course, it did not work with Hitler and it did not work on the Yiddin rock in the Holocaust where Jews said, "All right, we'll have to sacrifice a few Jews but we will save the rest." It did not work.  Moshe was telling them that the assumptions upon which they worked were no longer viable.  Pharaoh was getting meaner, not easier.

The second assumption that the Jewish people made was that they were more or less accepted by the society in which they lived.  Moshe said, "No, you have become a pariah." Moshe put his hand in his bosom and it came out leprous, that they were no longer part of the society, that the society was going to put you out even if it hurt the society, itself.  This is similar to Germany which was willing to divest itself of all the brilliant Jewish scientists even though it would hurt them.  Hitler said atomic physics was Jewish science.  He claimed that certain developments in other fields of human endeavor were Jewish and, therefore, were corrupt, and he expelled these scientists who then came to America.  If he would have utilized their brains, and fortunately for us he did not, Germany could have won the war.

Finally, Moshe told them and showed them that the Nile, itself, could turn to blood, that not only future developments of the current people in Egypt are willing to forego, but they are also willing to forego present developments, because there were certain people who were willing to hurt even their economy now.  Just get rid of the Jews.  In fact, you have these people in Russia today who are yelling, "Smite the Jew and save Russia" even though the Jew has proportionally more than any other group caused Russia to prosper as much as she has prospered.  The Jewish contribution to Russia has been immense.  My friends, this is what is happening today also in Russia.

Russian Jews feel the ground burning from under them.  They realize that the assumptions under which they operated are no longer right.  There is all sorts of instability in Russia.  When there was a Russian civil war 60 years ago at least 100,000 Jews, and probably more, were killed.  In the Second World War millions were killed.  When there is instability in Russia then, of course, the Jews are hit from both sides.  They realize that things are bad.  There have been pogroms already in Russia now.  Jews have been attacked.  National television has featured anti-Semitic organizations like Pomniat.  The Jews know that they are considered like a pariah now, and Jews look different in Russia.  You can spot a Jew by the way he looks, not like in America.  Each ethnic group in Russia has a particular appearance, and in the Ukraine you can pick out a Jew.  The Jews know that they are  a pariah, and, what’s more, many of the groups do not care how they hurt Russia.  Just get rid of the Jews.  The Jews are the scapegoats, and a million Jews are expected to come to Israel in the next year or two.  Already 5,000 Jews a day are coming into the Israel legation in order to try to come to Israel.  Israel needs our help.  Israel has to absorb these Jews.  Israel, of course, herself, has many problems because Israel's economy now is in transition.  The labor oriented economy is no longer profitable.  Kur, the greatest and biggest conglomerate in the Middle East, is now going broke.  It is going to have to be sold.  Israel, itself, has seen its social services deteriorate in the last 10 years because of the crushing military load.  Israel, of course, faces other problems: the Intifada, although the Intifada is not a serious problem really in Israel now.  It is confined basically to Arab villages.  What the Arabs have done now, by not working steady and by striking, is given up their jobs to these new Russian immigrants.  Israel needs these people.  These people assure Israel's future for the next 100 year.  It will assure Jewish majority in Israel.  They will assure that Israel will have the manpower necessary to man a modern state, and, besides that, Israel, of course, has other types of problems that they have to solve.  They have to solve their own governmental problems.  There is a proposal for Israel not to elect the prime minister directly from the people, etc., but Israel is optimistic.  You all know I just returned from Israel.  They feel that they can solve these problems, but, of course, it is our responsibility to try to help them.  The ground is burning under the feet of the Russian Jews and the Jews in eastern Europe.  Nationalism is coming to the fore, and we can no longer say we will play along with them and things will get better.  Things will get much, much worse.  The Jews are already looked on as a foreign element.  Even in Hungary and Czechoslovakia and Romania and Jews have been subjected to attacks, even those these Jews are aiding the economies of these countries mightily.  It is our responsibility to help get the Russian Jews out.  We should all help.  We should do as Moshe did.  Moshe lived in freedom, but, yet, he was willing to help his brethren.  He was willing to leave his comfortable abode in Midian and go down to Egypt and to help his brethren come out.  We, too, do not have to leave our abode in America, but we should certainly send our resources to make sure that Russian Jewry gets out in time.  The ground is burning under their feet.  Let us make sure that their bodies do not burn as happened in the Holocaust, but let's make sure that Russian Jewry comes safely to Israel.

I am reminded of the story they tell about an old man in the old day in Russia who started to learn Hebrew.  Of course, that was illegal in Russia, and a KGB man approached him and said, "What are you doing?" He replied, "Well, I am an old man and I may die soon and I may go to heaven and in heaven they speak Hebrew." The KGB man looked at him and said, "Why are you so sure that you are going to go to heaven? Maybe you will go to hell."  The old man looked at him and said, "Well, if I go to hell I already know Russian."  Let us make sure that Russia does not turn into a hell for Soviet Jewry.  Let us hope and pray that Gorbachev lasts long enough so that Russian Jews can come out, because if he does not and another type of dictator takes his place Russian Jewry may be doomed.  Let us do everything we can, as Moshe did to redeem them and bring them out from this exile.