This week’s Torah reading begins the Book of Exodus. Pharaoh issues harsh decrees against the Israelites, beginning decades of suffering and slavery. Moses is born and raised in the Egyptian royal palace. After killing an Egyptian, Moses escapes to Midian and marries. God appears to him in a burning bush and demands that he return to Egypt to redeem the Israelites. Moses returns to Egypt with the intention of freeing the Jewish people.
Please stand while I read from the parsha:
Exo 2:11 One day, when Moses had grown up, he went out to his people and looked on their burdens, and he saw an Egyptian beating a Hebrew, one of his people.
Exo 2:12 He looked this way and that, and seeing no one, he struck down the Egyptian and hid him in the sand.
Exo 2:13 When he went out the next day, behold, two Hebrews were struggling together. And he said to the man in the wrong, “Why do you strike your companion?”
Exo 2:14 He answered, “Who made you a prince and a judge over us? Do you mean to kill me as you killed the Egyptian?” Then Moses was afraid, and thought, “Surely the thing is known.”
Exo 2:15 When Pharaoh heard of it, he sought to kill Moses. But Moses fled from Pharaoh and stayed in the land of Midian. And he sat down by a well.
Based on FFOZ weekly eDrash from 2011
But he said, “Who made you a prince or a judge over us? Are you intending to kill me as you killed the Egyptian?” Then Moses was afraid and said, “Surely the matter has become known.” (Exodus 2:14)
When Moses was forty years old, he went out from Pharaoh’s court to visit his brethren, the sons of Israel. He was appalled to see the mistreatment they endured. He realized that God had placed him in a position of power in order to help his people. Moved with compassion for his countrymen, Moses went to the defense of one man who was being beaten by an Egyptian. Moses struck the Egyptian, killed him and buried him in the sand.
He returned to the Hebrews the next day. He had a deep sense of purpose. Somehow he must help his people. He was on a mission from God. When Moses came across two Hebrew men fighting, he attempted to mediate between them. They turned their resentment toward him.
When Moses realized that his attempts to help his people were not welcomed, nor could he trust them to conceal his secret about the Egyptian he had killed, he fled from Egypt. His noble delusions of being the redeemer of Israel all came crashing down.
We can divide Moses’ life into three forty-year segments. At the age of forty, Moses thought he was the redeemer of Israel. He had a dream of saving his people. His dream was frustrated, and in exasperation, he gave up. He fled into the wilderness, where he became a shepherd, herding sheep for a pagan. He married a Midianite woman. His dream of redeeming Israel died in the wilderness. Only after the dream was dead and Moses was no longer trying to achieve it at all did God call him. Only then–long after all the pride and bravado were gone–was Moses ready to be a tool in the hand of God. He spent the last forty years of his life fulfilling the dream that had been birthed in him forty years before. Now, he was on a mission from God.
This can be compared to a carpenter who hired a young apprentice. The apprentice was eager to get busy with building houses, too eager to take the time to learn the carpentry trade. “Very well,” said the carpenter, “if you are so certain of yourself, go ahead and build.” Halfway through the construction project, the lopsided frame he was erecting collapsed. The young apprentice turned in his tools and shamefacedly said, “I have to quit. I’m not a carpenter. I can’t build anything.” “Excellent,” the carpenter replied. “Now you are ready to learn how to build.“
Whenever we face some great discouragement or setback we need to remember this experience of Moses. His first try at redeeming the Israelites was not successful because he thought ‘he’ could do it. Maybe we’re not ready for this challenge, or we haven’t yet had the proper training, or perhaps we’re trying to do it on our own in our own strength, like Moses. When we realize our own inadequacy for the task God has given us to do, then we’re ready to get started.
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