BO: Our Egypt

Belief is so much easier than trust. You can believe in G-d and that everything that He does is for the best. But trusting in G-d to come through for you is a different kettle of fish. You believe it, but try as you might, it’s hard to trust it. How can you, when your future is on the line?

So you stop and meditate on the fact that the whole world sits in G-d’s lap and that if you must be somewhere, where better than in G-d’s embrace? G-d is the creator and everything depends on Him. Nothing can happen without His consent so if salvation is to come, it’s His decision and only His. You now feel like you can let go, and rest your head in His lap. But just as content settles in, just when you start letting go, just when you begin to surrender, along comes a pang of panic and jolts you out of your reprieve.

In The Sea

Being in the sea is a metaphor for a state of being. This is the state of keen awareness that existence and all therein is entirely contingent on G-d. We can’t breathe without G-d, who created our lungs and fills them with oxygen. We can’t stand without G-d, who pumps our heart, circulates our blood and delivers oxygen to our muscles and cells. The sun doesn’t rise and the moon doesn’t shine, the river won’t flow and the tree won’t grow, without G-d. Without G-d, we and everything around us is nothing.

To enter the sea, is to experience the fish. Just as the fish is intimately aware of its dependence on the sea for life itself so are we acutely aware of our dependence on G-d for our very existence.

Think of the Hebrew word yam, comprised of the letter Yud and the final Mem. The final mem is a closed box. Yam implies that the yud, the symbol of G-d, is locked inside the mem and does not escape.[1] This is a state in which we remain fixed in the mindset of dependence and attachment to G-d. Metzer Yam, restricting the sea, is the wrestling match, the struggle. The effort to rise, but the inevitable fall that follows. Meitzar Yam impedes our access. Even when we do access it, we soon fall back.

Suffering

Suffering in Hebrew is Ani, a word that also means poverty. Thus one can translate the verse as “you saw our ancestors’ poverty at the restriction of the sea.” Our sages taught, “The daughters of Israel are beautiful, but poverty wears them down.”[3] Jewish mystics understood this proverb in a metaphoric sense. As a spiritual poverty. A lack of faith and inspiration. As our sages said, “it is revealed and known before you that we would rather do your bidding, but who prevents us? The yeast in the dough.”[4] The poverty of spirit is the selfish urge, the yeast that sours and inflates our dough, that G-d implanted in us.

The Wrestling Match

Pharaoh is etymologically linked with oreph, Hebrew for the nape at the rear of the head. When you turn your back on someone, you have shown him your oreph. G-d gave us the gamut of human emotions. Are we driving them toward G-d or are they turning us from G-d, forcing us to show G-d our oreph? If we are turning away from G-d, we are in “Pharaoh” mode rather than “sea” mode.[6]

So you see, Pharaoh and the sea are diametric opposites, locked in perpetual battle. The prize – that’s you and me. Under ordinary circumstances we have freewill and control our own destiny by exercising choice. But sometimes we are confronted by challenges that defy us. Try as we might, we can’t relax and simply trust in G-d. Our hearts fill with foreboding and our minds with concern. Against our will, we find ourselves inexorably drawn from G-d. Turned toward the oreph. From the sea to the Pharaoh.

Do we enjoy this sensation? Absolutely not. It is not where a Jew wants to be. A Jew, even if he has sinned, he remains a Jew. The innate will of the Jew is to fulfill G-d’s will. [7] It is a foreign implant within us that has grown beyond our control that propels us to a Pharaoh that we don’t want to meet.

The Rescue

When we feel we have reached our limit and cannot prevail, it is appropriate to ask G-d for salvation. Though G-d gave us free will, He stands by the impoverished, to save their souls from constriction.[8] When we ask, G-d answers. We have our own Egypt. And just like G-d took our ancestors out of their Egypt, so too if we ask, if we pray sincerely and contritely, G-d will give us the moral, spiritual strength to prevail over our Pharaoh and leave our Egypt behind.