A Thought on Parshas Shmos

"...va'yomer HaShem ma zeh b'yadecha v'yomer mateh..." (4:2) "...and HaShem said, what's that in your hand, and Moshe said "a staff"..." This week, some of the more midrashic comments of ibn Shu'aib caught my eye. Perhaps it had to do with the fact that I am now on a plane thousands of feet above the earth, and thousands of miles from my destination, and watching the deep blue sky has swept my thoughts to someplace more mystical. Knowing me the way I know myself, I might have been drawn in thought into one of my favorite places, the desert, in that ibn Shu'aib comments about how Moshe Rabbeinu encountered the voice of HaShem out alone in the desolate wilderness. He actually writes that the desert lends itself to communion, in that its air is pure and clear and no one else is there to interfere with our solitude. But I moved past that, probably because I will be unable to lose myself in the desert this year of aveilus, being bound to minyanim so that I can iy'H recite the Kaddish. Even my flying schedule is now governed by the clocking of minyan accessibility. Baruch HaShem for these halachos which provide gedarim for divrei kedusha, and for how we grieve. So, on to the midrashic writings of ibn Shu'aib, drawn from his less known sources in Chazal. The Torah relates that in the desert, at the episode of the burning bush, Moshe was exposed to a stick, a snake, and a skin ailment. What were the implicit messages to Moshe when HaShem presented him with those experiences? HaShem showed him that his stick or staff turned into a snake, then the snake became a staff again, then his hand scaled over, then recovered. Then HaShem reveals that Moshe now has 'all of the wonders in his hand'. What is some of the deeper meaning? ibn Shu'aib writes that the snake-and-skin significance was to remind Moshe that early on in our history (Bereishis 12:17), another Pharaoh had been afflicted with bodily ailments when he treated our people with treachery. HaShem was now exposing Moshe to the reality that this had happened through Divine enactment, and heralded the selfsame fate which awaited the current Pharaoh now. This Pharaoh too would be afflicted, and brought down. The snake symbolism hinted at the snake-role served in this life by nations such as Mitzrayim. Our sages have taught us that in Mitzrayim, our people was exposed to the lowest levels of decadence and impurity. This parallels the "snake", which is an animal which slithers along the ground, scraping the lowlands and the dirt, out for no good. ibn Shu'aib actually adds that in the Divine system, the "Sar" of Mitzrayim, which is the counterpart force for "maaseh eretz Mitrayim" which decadent people engage in, is the Nachash HaKadmoni. That nachash had its role in the Gan Aden of Adam and Chava, and it continues to surface throughout history as the nether forces which desecrate the human mission and the spiritual ideal. Moshe ran from the snake, and ibn Shu'aib brings the midrashic perspective that when the stick transformed into a snake, this revealed to him that the forces of tuma are truly powerful in our world, and that they can transform reality. Lives can be altered. Holy can be made profane. This is a frightening reality, and one which terrified Moshe. This is why he ran from the stick which turned into a snake. It signified terrific destructive potential. When HaShem then instructed Moshe to grab the snake by its tail, this signified that living a life of purity through Torah elevates a person so that he has energy of his own, stronger power through HaShem to eradicate impurity and overpower it, provided that he truly seeks to vanquish all traces of evil. HaShem's Torah has the capacity to transform us, and can make the ignorant wise, the uncouth virtuous, and the mundane sublime. This is how the snake turns back into a stick, yet this is not just a plain piece of wood. This stick is referred to by HaShem (4:24) as 'all of the wonders in your hand.' ibn Shu'aib cites a source that this was a 'stick' which Adam had discovered in Gan Aden. It was created Erev Shabbos during the days of Bereishis, so it embodied some other-worldly qualities. Adam gave it to Chanoch, who gave it to Noach, who gave it to Avraham, who gave it to Yitzchak, who gave it to Yakov, who gave it to Yosef, who had it in Mitzrayim. When Yosef died, Pharaoh confiscated his belongings, and kept this mystical stick. The magicians and sorcerers of Mitzrayim held the stick in their archives until Yisro, who was the greatest of the Chartumim, took it back with him to Midian. It was there that Moshe, his son in law, saw the stick, and recognized its provenance - on the stick were the letters Dalet, Tzadi, Chof, Ayin, Dalet, Shin, Bais, Alef, Ches and Bais. We know of those letters as the "mnemonic of Rabbi Yehuda" in the Pesach Haggadah, and we think of them as the abbreviation for the 10 Plagues. What the midrash reveals is that those letters held a more mystical significance. They were the bridge between Shomayim and Aretz, the tool for bringing the Divine Presence into an active role during galus. Even in the depths of Mitzrayim, where virtually all kedusha was eclipsed, the use of DaTzaCh AdaSh BaChaV - focused utilization of the language of Torah - would repel the darkness and offer sanctity and salvation. Moshe now grasped the wondrous role which this staff would take as a catalyst for salvation. Our lessons this week are that goodness can and will be tainted by the lure and influence of the profane. The profane can really obliterate goodness. Sincere quests to regain goodness and purity can succeed, and can annul the damage done during decadence. However, that antidote must be very pure and precise. It requires utter sincerity and commitment to recovery, and it must entail the word of HaShem, and it must utilize the word of HaShem as it has been etched into authentic tradition. Our sages have said that "a little light can banish much darkness", but that light must shine without interruption or impediment if it is to penetrate past the shadows and blackness. Good Shabbos. D Fox