This d’var Torah is dedicated to the victims of
Nechemya Weberman, recently convicted pederast, and other survivors of
childhood and teenage sexual abuse in the Orthodox community. May G‑d and our
community support and comfort all those in our midst suffering from this
scourge.
Rashi, commenting on the
recitation of the names of the sons of Israel at the beginning of Sefer
Sh’mos [Shemos 1:2-4], cites Sh’mos Rabbah to understand why the Torah would repeat
names already identified in Parshas Vayigash as among those who descended with
Jacob into Egypt:
Even though He counted
them in their lifetime by their names [Gen. 46:8-27], He
counted them again after their death, to make known His love for them, for they
were likened to the stars, which He takes out and gathers in by number and by
name, as it is said: ‘Who takes out their host by number — He calls them all by
name’ (Sh’mos Rabbah, quoting Isaiah 40:26).
The full text in Isaiah,
which is the concluding verse of the Haftorah read on Shabbos Nachamu,
runs:
Lift up your eyes on
high and see Who created these, Who takes out their host by number — He calls
them all by name; because of [G-d’s] great strength and powerful might, no one
is lacking. (Isaiah 40:26)
After employing part of Isaiah
40:26 to gloss host as echoing G‑d’s blessing to Abraham that his
descendants would be numbered as the stars, Rashi omits the final assertion of
the verse, that because of G‑d no one is missing. Subtly, Rashi raises a
fundamental issue at the core of faith: If all are loved by G‑d, why are only
the 12 sons of Israel mentioned? Were not all 70 of those who descended into
Egypt with Yaakov loved?
Indeed, the Torah itself
leads us to the question of the condensed enumeration of the house of Israel,
noting in Sh’mos 1:5 that 70 souls came to Egypt — yet only Jacob’s sons
are explicitly named. At a superficial level, we can perhaps beg the question
ourselves and suggest that in order not to offend or embarrass those not here
mentioned by name, the midrash and Rashi drop the second half of the
verse in Isaiah, that no one will be lacking. But if indeed G‑d names
the 12 sons of Israel simply because they are precious, why not identify by
name all 70 souls again? Were not all 70 loved by G-d?
Perhaps a more effective
response to this question may be found in Isaiah’s reassurance that G‑d will
take us out (from Egypt) and gather us in (in Eretz Yisroel) as a
numbered host, again following Rashi’s reading of Isaiah’s host not as
mere stars but as the whole community of Israel. Indeed, while the opening
verses of Sh’mos declare that “each man and his household” came — not
even families, much less tribes or a nation — Rashi and Isaiah reaffirm our
coming redemption as Klal Yisroel, the community and nation of Israel. Sh’mos
counts the sons of Israel, then, not merely as an evocation of G‑d’s love for
them as individuals, and not as an expression of affection for them alone, but
as recognition of their imminent status as heads of tribes, the collective
leadership of the nation Israel. We descend into Egypt as individuals, members
of the extended household of Jacob and his sons; G‑d redeems us from Egypt as a
people, the beloved host of G‑d.
Emphatically, Isaiah’s
prophetic vision embraces and offers comfort not only to a select few but to all
that ‘no one is lackng’, a particularly important expression of love in the
looming shadow of the Churban Beis Ha-Mikdash and the ensuing
dispersion. Isaiah, the midrash, and Rashi point us forward, to freedom
and nationhood, to liberation from Egypt, the land of the dead, as G-d’s living
people. As we learn near the end of the Torah’s story, after the final counting
and naming in the desert and late in Moshe’s final oration in Nitzavim
(De 29:9-14), all of us are here today, all of us count, from the hewer of wood
to the drawer of water, elders and infants, pious and secular. We are and
always will be part of the community and nation, the children of Israel, the
host of the Eternal, embraced in an unceasing redemption in which all are
precious, all loved by G‑d.
Guest posting by
Craig Hanoch
Highland Park, NJ.
Craig is writing a book about nihilism and faith.
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