THE SPECIAL STATURE OF MOISHE RABBENU

Right near the beginning of שמות, the Torah tells us (second chapter verse 1, and verse 2)

וילך איש מבית לוי ויקח את בת לוי ותהר האשה ותלד בן ותרא אתו כי טוב הוא ותצפנהו שלשה ירחים

A man from the house of Levi went and took the daughter of Levi. The woman conceived and bore a son, she saw that he was good and hid him for three months.

We all know that, in fact, it was Amram a grandson of Levi who got married to his aunt Yocheved and the child being referred to here was our famous Moishe Rabbenu.

It is extraordinary that no names are mentioned, a man, a woman and a child but no trace of any actual name.

There is a Gemora, סוטה יב. which states that Yocheved was 130 when she bore Moishe. She had passed the menopause and similar to the story of Soroh returned to her youthful state by miracle and then bore Moishe.

What is extraordinary in this particular case is that Aharon was only three years older and Miriam possibly five years older than Moishe and yet they, apparently, were born in a normal fashion. It is only after that, that Yocheved ceased to be able to have a child in the normal way.

Indeed, a very strange chain of circumstances all round, I think!!

What can be gleaned from the whole story is that Moishe Rabbenu was born on a different plane than normal human beings. The Hebrew expression is למעלה מן הטבע, super natural.

What follows from that will explain, in my opinion, numerous facts that we are told in Torah about Moishe Rabbenu.

At the end of Parshas בהעלתך, there is the story of Miriam and Aharon speaking what amounted to loshen hora about Moishe and the Torah tells us (in Bamidbar chapter 12, verse 6, 7, & 8)

ויאמר שמעו נא דברי אם יהיה נביאכם ה' במראה אליו אתודע בחלום אדבר בו לא כן עבדי משה בכל ביתי נאמן הוא

And Hashem said to Aharon and Miriam, “Please listen to what I say, if you are prophets, Hashem shows himself to you in a vision, in a dream that speaks to you. Not so, My servant Moishe he is faithful in all My house.”

פה אל פה אדבר בד ומראה ולא בחידת ותמנת ה' יביט

Mouth to mouth I speak to him, and he sees clearly, not in riddles and can look at the image of Hashem.

Indeed staggering statements. The Gemora says that Moishe Rabbenu saw with such a clear vision that it is called אספקלריה המאירה, whereas all other prophets did not have that clarity of vision.

With what I mentioned earlier on, one can understand that as Moishe Rabbenu was born on this much higher plane, his relationship with Hashem was also on a different level and plane to other human beings. The statements of Moishe’s greatness are, therefore, not staggering.

In the same vein, the Chazal tell us that Moishe Rabbenu and all other prophets used the expression כה אמר ה', so Hashem said, but Moishe Rabbenu himself used the expression זה הדבר אשר צוה ה'. This is the command that Hashem gave. He could see precisely and enunciated precisely what Hashem had said.

If we go back to the first vision that we are told about, that Moishe Rabbenu had, at the burning bush, also in Parshas שמות. Hashem saw that he had noticed the bush which was not burning out. It says that Hashem called him from that bush and He said משה משהMoishe Moishe, The Zohar Hakodesh comments that two other people were called twice by their name. The first was Avrohom, where is says אברהםאברהם (this was when he was told not to sacrifice Yitzchok at the Akeidah). The other one was יעקביעקב. The Zohar states that whereas in the case of Avrohom and Yaakov, they started at a lower level and worked themselves up to an extremely high level, Moishe was born at the same level as he continued for his whole life. This is inferred by the use of משה משה without a line between the two words.

We find at the beginning of the last Sedra in Torah that Moishe is called איש האלקים and our Chazal tell us “part man” part “higher being”. According to the previous comment of Chazal, quoted just above, I would suggest that he was born like that.

In fact, regarding the words I started off with ותרא אותו כי טוב הוא and Yocheved saw that this child was good, Rashi quotes a medrash נתמלא הבית אורה, the house became filled with light, and we are told that that means that the Shechina, Hashem’s presence, came down with the birth of Moishe.

There are numerous other examples of how great Moishe was and how different to other human beings. Let us just quote one further example. After the Torah was given Moishe Rabbenu went up to Heaven, obtained all the details from Hashem and stayed there for 40 days and 40 nights. He, himself, stated לחם לא אכלתי ומים לא שתיתי, I did not eat or drink at all.

With my opening thoughts, one can now understand that because he was on a different plane, it follows that he was not bound by normal human needs and could go 40 days and nights without eating or drinking, and I assume, also without sleeping.

With all this, one can understand another midrash that tells us that when he found the Egyptian beating a Jewish person, he killed him and the midrash tells us that it was by uttering a special name of Hashem שם המפורש. Where did he learn this name? Surely not in Pharaoh’s palace where he was brought up. However, according to what I have suggested, he knew it because he was born on such a high level that automatically this was part of what he had been born with and imbibed.

Turning to the request by Hashem that he should undertake the task of leading the Bnei Yisroel out of Egypt, and his refusing, as we told for seven days. We find that Moishe Rabbenu’s reason was כי כבד פה וכבד לשון אנכי, because I am a stammerer and heavy of speech.

What I think Moishe Rabbenu was saying is that he knew himself that he was on a different level to other human beings and that the only way in which he was like them was that he had a body which was human. If his speech was impaired and impeded, he felt that he was the wrong person to try to take the Yidden out of Egypt in the circumstances. The main thing that he was supposed to do was to speak to Pharaoh as well as the Yidden and he could not relate to either properly. To which Hashem retorted מי שם פה לאדם, who gave man a mouth. I would ask you carefully note that it says לאדם I think this refers to Odom Harishon and Hashem was saying to Moishe, in the same way that I created Odom Harishon and gave him all his faculties and senses, I can repair your defect of speech.

There is a midrash which says that this was caused by Moishe Rabbenu having burnt his mouth on glowing coals. The midrash comments that at some time as he was growing up, Moishe decided to try on Pharaoh’s crown and Pharaoh got very agitated and wanted to have him killed, but one of his advisers, Yisro, who later became Moishe’s father-in-law, suggested that the child should be tested with a golden dish on one hand and glowing coals on the other to see which one he took. As he was only a child, by taking the coals it would show that he was too young to understand what a crown represented. Nevertheless, Moishe made for the golden dish and the angel Gabriel came and pushed him until he picked up the coals and burnt his tongue.

There is a מאמר חז''ל that the original inhabitants of the world understood why they gave particular names to their children. This was either to do with their characteristics or events that took place during the children’s lives. What I suggest is that Moishe did not have a name at birth because he was above such things, super natural and even his father and mother were not mentioned as the whole episode was above and beyond the norm. He was born to a father and mother, Amram and Yocheved, but had this special supernatural aspect.

We do, however, find one other incident where a child was born in similar circumstances, I am, of course, talking about Yitzchok who was born to his mother when she was already old as the Torah tells us clearly.

However, I think the case there was different because Hashem told Avrohom immediately after informing him that Soroh was going to have a child, that he should name him יצחק. Rashi comments that each letter signifies a particular important point. The י is in commemoration of the ten tests that Avrohom was put through, the צ was the 90 years that Soroh was old when she bore Yitzchok, the ח was the eighth day of the bris mila and the ק was the 100 years that Avrohom was old when Yitzchok was born.

In each case, this is what is known as צימצום and so Yitzchok was born with a specific name tailored to the circumstances and, therefore, not above the normal human way of life in contrast to Moishe Rabbenu, the supernatural child איש האלקים.

לעילוי נשמת אמי מורתי גיטל בת אברהם אבא ע''ה נפטרה ד' אדר תשס''ו לפ''ק

In memory of my mother, yarzheit 4th Adar

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