Yitro - An Interlude with Meaning

וישמע יתרו כהן מדין חתן משה את כל אשר עשה אלהים למשה ולישראל עמו, כי הוציא ה' את ישראל ממצרים

(שמות י"ח, א')

This week's parasha contains one of the most momentous, perhaps the most momentous, event in Jewish history: the covenant of Sinai and the giving of the Torah. This is the denouement of the story about bnei Israel leaving Egypt, the raison d'etre of their liberation, indeed their existence, as the people of God. And yet this parasha is named after Yitro, Moshe's father-in-law, and opens with Yitro "hearing" about what happened:

When Yitro, the priest of Midian, Moshe's father in law, heard of all that God had done for Moshe and for Israel his people, and that the LORD had brought Israel out of Egypt.

(Shemot 18, 1; KJV)

The Torah then goes on to recount the encounter of Moshe and Yitro and Yitro's advice to Moshe on how to govern the people by setting up administrative layers to better manage his time. All this procedural account comes as an inexplicable interlude in the story, between the parting of the Red Sea and the giving of the Torah. This has prompted a debate among commentators about the chronological place of Yitro: some say this took place before Sinai, while others claim Yitro came only after Sinai. Regardless of the reasoning behind each of the opinions, the fact remains that the Torah tells us about Yitro before it tells about the covenant of Sinai, and the question is: why?

The Talmud (Shabbat 88.) tells us that when bnei Israel received the Torah in Sinai, God took mount Sinai and hung it above their heads, threatening: either you accept the Torah, or this is where you die! Even if the Talmud is speaking metaphorically and there was no actual physical threat, this story conveys the fact that the people of Israel basically had no choice in accepting the Torah. One can imagine that a people who witnessed God's presence and deeds first hand was in such a mental state that left no choice but to accept the Torah as the truth. The freedom of choice we have must be based on some incertitude about faith and God; in a certain world, where there is absolutely no doubt about God's existence and will, we are faced with one option only: accepting. This was the state of mind that bnei Israel were in when they "accepted" the Torah by saying "na'asse ve'nishma".

This poses a huge question mark for future generations, for us. We have not had the benefit of witnessing Sinai first hand; indeed we live in an era where God is not present directly in our world, there are no evident miracles happening every day. Since the destruction of the Second Temple we also lack the medium of the prophets to tell us what God wants. We must accept the Torah based on our own faith and understanding, on the reading of the texts and on our inner ability to accept the truth. Indeed, the Talumd continues to say that the people of Israel "re-accepted" the Torah in the days of Achashverosh, after understanding that God works to save them even when he is not directly present in the world.

Going back to Yitro, we can perhaps venture to guess now why the Torah places Yitro came before Sinai. Yitro did not see the plagues of Egypt; he did not witness the parting of the Red Sea; he did not see Israel defeat Amalek; and he did not see the Manna descending from heaven. As the first passuk of our parasha says, Yitro only "heard" about these miracles. But this hearing was enough for him to accept God and convert to Judaism, linking his fate to that of the people led by Moshe. Before we read about the "forced" convenant of Sinai, the Torah pauses and uses this interlude to teach us that there is an alternative way to accept God and the Torah: Yitro's way. Miracles and direct intervention of God are not the only way; one can attain faith by "hearing" and "understanding". We should not feel incapable of attaining what bnei Israel attained at Sinai only because they "saw" and we merely "heard". The power of our inner conviction and our decision is no less an engine (perhaps even a greater one) than God's "coercive" miracles.

History proves this point. We read later in the Torah about the deeds of the same generation that witnessed all these miracles and we wonder how a people who saw God almost face-to-face can cotinuously put its faith to the test. On the other hand we know of generations of Jews throughout history who preferred to give their lives rather than give up their religious beliefs. This is the "inner faith" that derives from our own hearing and understanding, a faith that has proved to be real and enduring.

The idea for this week's Parasha Thought is from R. Yehuda Amital.

Post-Traumatic Nearly-Naked-Breast Disorder

A year after Janet Jackson's unfortunate wardrobe malfunction at the Super Bowl, millions of US children are still suffering. The Onion reports.

Fontanelle, by Meir Shalev

Fontanelle is the term used for the soft spots between the unfused sections of the baby's skull, which enable the skull to compress slightly during its passage through the birth canal. The fontanelles usually close when the baby is about one year old.

Fontanelle is the nickname of the storyteller in Meir Shalev's book, a nickname given to him by an older woman who rescued him from a fire when he was five and named him for his "soft spot" (she is his only real love and the whole novel revolves around his yearnings for her). His real name is Michael Joffe, fifty-five years of age, father of twins, who tells us the story of the Joffe family, him being the only "normal" person in the family. Well, if you count someone who can hear and feel things through his fontanelle as being "normal".

Shalev masterfully weaves the story of four generations of the Joffes, from the grandparents who built their home in Emek Izrael (in northern Israel), through their four daughters, ending in Michael Joffe ("Fontanelle") and his family. As in his other novels, Shalev pays careful attention to details and repeats them throughout the book, as a result of which the characters gradually become more real, people we can connect to and understand.

When I read Shalev's novels I am always reminded of Gabriel Garcia Marquez, the Nobel price novelist from Colombia. Shalev's storytelling is borderline fantasy, combining surrealistic characters and happenings with minute care that somehow makes it all sound real in the context of the story. And yet, when one pauses to reflect on the book, one has an uneasy sense of "this is too big to be real". To try and explain this, here is a partial list of the charcters in this book:

• David Joffe, the grandfather. A "bigger than life" (literally), ambidextrous, bellowing man who carried his wife on his back for weeks until she found the right place to build their home. Ends up as a shrivelled, old man in an incubator.
• His four daughters: Pnina - the beautiful one, who is locked up in her home by a husband to whom she was promised before she was born; Batia, who married a German and ran off to Australia; Rachel, who lost her husband in the war and cannot sleep alone since, so the Joffes take up turns to cuddle up to her at night; and Chana, Fontanelle's mother, a radical vegetarian who is married to a diehard womaniser.
• Gavriel Joffe, David's grandson. Born prematurely from an illegitimate pregnancy, a brave soldier and expert bike driver, who also loves to dress up as a woman.
• "The groom", Pnina's husband, an inventor and skilled engineer, who is busy building a vast underground network of tunnels under the Joffe house because "something terrible is about to happen".

The Joffes also have their own family sayings and customs, a "language" which has descended through the generations and which distinguishes them from the rest of the world. One of these is the particular usage of the term "to compensate for". An example: he might be stupid, but to compensate for that he is also an idiot.

Shalev was voted last year as Israel's "most loved" novelist in an online poll. His first novel, A Russian Novel, was published in 1988 and was a huge bestseller. Fontanelle is his fifth novel. I admit that I did not take immediately to this book; it was a slow start. But after a while, once the characters established themselves and started to take shape in my mind, I found that I was enjoying the reading. Perhaps not as much as Shalev's previous novels, but it did make me laugh out loud several times and that is surely a positive sign for a good book.

Tsunami "Predicted" in the Bible

I received by email the following text from Yirmiyahu (chapter 54), supposedly showing the word "tsunami" in Hebrew in proximity to some text about sea and waves. Another fine product of the experts using the "bible code" technique.

The hour is late so I won't go into why this whole "bible code" thing is ridiculous. I'll just say that I'm still waiting for these so-called "experts" to predict - for once, just for once - an event in the future and not something that has already happened.

BeShalach - A Painless War?

ויאמר משה אל העם: אל תיראו, התיצבו וראו את ישועת ה' אשר יעשה לכם היום. כי אשר ראיתם את מצרים היום, לא תספו לראתם עוד עד עולם

(שמות י"ד, י"ג)

Bnei Israel have finally left Egypt, led by Moshe to the shores of the Red Sea, where they are caught between a rock and a hard place: the Egyptians have caught up with them and have trapped them on the shore. Out of fear, they complain to Moshe for liberating them and remind him that back in Egypt they had actually pleaded with him to let them be: better the devil you know than facing certain death in the wilderness...

To this, Moshe replies:

And Moses said unto the people: Fear ye not, stand still, and see the salvation of the LORD, which he will show to you today: for the Egyptians whom ye have seen today, ye shall see them again no more for ever

(Shemot 14, 13; KJV)

Is this the appropriate response? One cannot help but wonder about the attitude of Bnei Israel. After all, they just witnessed miracles that no living person before them has witnessed: God brought down the great nation of Egypt to its knees with the ten plagues and provided a group of slaves its freedom. Surely this calls for them to exhibit a different behaviour and show a little courage and willingness to fight, rather than complain and whine about their fate using phrases such as "are there no grave in Egypt that you took us to die out here?" One would also expect Moses to be angry or discouraged; instead, he promises them a "painless war" in which God does all the fighting and they merely stand by and enjoy the show. Instead of being punished, they are being rewarded. Or so it seems.

The Midrash in Eicha Raba provides us with an insight to a possibly different angle on this promise of "painless war". It tells us about four Jewish kings - David, Assa, Yehoshafat and Chizkiyahu - the way they approached the issue of war and how God responded to their approach:

David said: "I have pursued my enemies and overtaken them, I did not turn back till they were consumed" and God responded by giving David the strength to beat his enemies and pursue them. Assa said: "I have no power to kill my enemies, but I will pursue them so that you, God, can kill them" and indeed God answers Assa's prayer and aids him in vanquishing his enemies. Yehoshafat said: "I have no power to pursue and kill my enemies, so I will pray (sing) and you, God, will do so for me" and we read that God took care of Yehoshafat's enemies once the singing started. Finally, Chizkiyahu said: "I have no power to pursue and kill my enemies, and not even to sing, so I will lie on my bed and you, God, will do so for me", following which we read that God's angel fought against the Assyrians directly.

What we see here is a gradual decline through the ages, from David who believes in God but also fights his own wars, down to Chizkiyahu who does not even have the strength to pray and has to rely entirely on God's powers. It is obvious from this Midrash which kings are to be praised and which are to be pitied for their inability to take action.

The same goes for Bnei Israel on the shores of the Red Sea. By casting aside their faith in God and "forgetting" the miracles they witnessed but a few days ago, they forfeited the right to stand and fight. Furthremore, they also forfeited the right to even sing and pray for God to help. It is as if they are punished twice: God will fight for them and they must be silent. Instead of being rewarded with courage and the ability to stand on their own feet, as is befitting a people freed from generations of slavery, they need to be "nannied" and taken care of.

It is only after Bnei Israel show faith and leap into the Red Sea to cross it, that they regain some of their rights, as is shown by the song they sing with Moses on the other bank, the Shira that we read in this week's parasha.

The idea for this week's Parasha Thought is from the weekly newsletter of Hemdat Yamim.

A World Without Israel

Imagine that Israel never existed. Would the economic malaise and political repression that drive angry young men to become suicide bombers vanish? Would the Palestinians have an independent state? Would the United States, freed of its burdensome ally, suddenly find itself beloved throughout the Muslim world? Wishful thinking. Far from creating tensions, Israel actually contains more antagonisms than it causes.

Thus opens A World Without Israel, an article by Josef Joffe in the latest edition of Foreign Policy. The author dismisses the widespread notion that Israel is the root of all evil in the Middle East and points out some basic facts about the sad state of the Arab world: lack of freedom, widespread illiteracy and low participation of women in politics and economics. As Joffe puts it: "Israel is just a strip of land in the world’s most noxious neighborhood, and the cleanup hasn’t even begun".

The full article is here.

A Tale of Love and Darkness, by Amos Oz

Amos Oz is one of Israel's best known novelists; some label him as Israel's "number one". Any new book by Oz gets the immediate attention of everyone, gets translated to several languages and hits the no. 1 spot in the bestsellers list almost immediately. Indeed, Oz has become an icon in Israel to whom many turn to, not only to discuss literary matters but also get his opinion on politics, society and life in general. As my wife says, he has become a "sacred cow", elevated to a status where it has become extremely difficult for any critic to harm sales of his books in any significant way.

I read A Tale of Love and Darkness (in Hebrew) during my trip in New Zealand and it accompanied me throughout the journey. It is an autobiography that Oz started writing shortly after he turned 60, at the end of the previous century. It tells mainly the story of his childhood in Jerusalem, growing up during the time Israel was being formed (Oz was 9 when Israel gained independence). Although the book covers many aspects of his life, the one overriding theme surfacing over and over again is the suicide of his mother when he was 12. This event shaped Oz's life and led to the abrupt change he embarked upon two years later: the move from the book-centric, scholarly life of his father in Jerusalem to the freedom and agricultural life of Kibbutz Hulda.

Oz's writing is at times long-winded and pompous. Even daily, mundane events are recounted in excruciating detail that sometimes make the reader wonder whether they indeed made such an impact on his life to deserve such attention. Despite this, Oz manages to combine tragedy and comedy in his family's saga and his occasional self-effacing manner make the reader forgive him for his long-windedness. Throughout the book, the leading figures of Israel as a young nation pop up: Bialik, Tchernikhowsky, Agnon, Ben-Gurion and Yadin all came and went in Oz's childhood.

The book is more of a memoir than an autobiography. The storyline is not linear and Oz repeats some events several times. If we ignore the fact that Oz wrote this book and thus remove the "sacred cow" factor, the book is an enjoyable read and contributes to the understanding of how Ashkenazi Jews coped with their new life in the Middle East.