And here come the plagues. With Parashat Va’era, the unfolding of a great divine lesson begins. Lesson, because the ten plagues are seldom referred to as such in the Torah. Over and over they are called otot umoftim “signs/letters and demonstrations/proofs” – acts of communication from Hashem designed to remedy Par’oh’s earlier response, “I don’t know Hashem, and (therefore) I also will not release!”.
An expected response on Par’oh’s part. After all, Hashem had told Moshe when He revealed Himself to Moshe at Mt. Sinai, “I know that Par’oh will not let you go, not until the mighty hand”. Hashem, of course, knew, and Moshe also should have known, having heard if directly from Hashem. Yet at the end of Parashat Shemot, we find Moshe, complaining to Hashem – after merely one Pharonic encounter – “ever since I’ve come to Par’oh to speak in Your Name, he has done worse to Am Yisrael, and saved? You haven’t saved Your People!”, As that parashah ends, Hashem reassures Moshe, as though he hadn’t previously informed him, “Now you will see, that through a mighty hand he will release them, through a mighty hand he will drive them from his land.”
Whose mighty hand? The commentators differ – most say the funny syntax is shorthand, what’s intended is G-‘ds Mighty Hand, i.e., the plagues. A few suggest it’s a double entendre, doubling as a wry reference to how how hysterically Par’oh will shove them out of Egype in the end.
For the time being, let’s leave aside the resolution of this textual problem and join Moshe as he sees the unveiling of this Mighty Hand, the teaching slap that will waken divine consciousness in Egypt – for many of them, only at the bottom of the sea, as well as for Israel. For, indeed, the communicative, revelatory function of the plagues is not limited to Egypt. As Hashem states at the beginning of Parashat Bo, before the last round of three plagues, the purpose of the plagues is also to so inculcate awareness of Hashem’s Presence and action in this world that Yisrael will relate the story of the redemption from Egypt from generation to generation, a sort of collective Jewish version, l’havdil, of Zen mind.
But there’s a question that has, yes, plagued me for years. IF the entire set of the ten plagues is of one piece, a divine lesson for each of the various players in the drama of Israel in Egypt, why not group them all together? Why does Parashat Va’era relate only the first seven plagues, leaving the last three for Parashat Bo?
To answer this question, let’s look at the last few verses of our parashah. With the seventh plague, hail, Hashem is no longer pulling His punches (well, He is, but…). Moshe introduces this plague in Hashem’s name by saying:
“This time, I am sending all My plague against your very heart, your slaves, your people, so that you should know that there is none like Me in all the land. I could have sent My hand and smitten you and your people, and you would have been wiped off the land, but for this reason have I maintained you – so that you would see My power, and tell [praise] of my Name throughout the land”. Shemot 9:14-16
And indeed, the plague of hail is as destructive as it is terrifying, and Par’oh quickly summons Moshe and say, for the first time, “I’ve sinned this time”, and, relenting, begs Moshe to intercede with Hashem and stop the plague, promising to let them leave unconditionally. Moshe agrees to beseech Hashem, stating, “When I exit the city, I will lift my hands in prayer and the thunder will cease and there will be no more hail, so that you know that the earth is Hashem’s”. But, this time, Moshe adds, “But, you and your servants, I know that you have yet to fear the Presence of Hashem, G-d”.
This is not a cynical remark dropped by Moshe, already accustomed to Par’oh’s zigzagging. Recall that the plagues are intended to teach everyone, Egypt, Yisrael…and Moshe too. Moshe heard and understood but did not really know that the plagues were not vindictive, that Hashem’s goal was not merely to redress an injustice, but to bring human beings to an awareness of the immediacy of the Divine Presence which permeates everything everywhere. Moshe, wielding staff and speaking grandly, would be the agency of this lesson for an idol-worshipping Par’oh, who must come to see Moshe not as sorcerer or magician but as agent of Hashem, transparent to His Will. Until Moshe can say, “I know” like Hashem said “I know”, Par’oh will continue not to know Hashem.
And indeed, it turns out that the early crops have been smitten by the hail, but the later crops, just under the soil’s surface, hold out hope and Par’oh’s heart is seduced by its own intransigence once again, and, continuing to misread his own reality, he recants, just like Hashem said by the hand of Moshe”.
Now we see whose hand is mighty. It’s Moshe’s hand, that hand which has taken itself by the scruff of its own stubborn, narrow neck and, slapping itself wide awake from its own presumptions and certainties, opened a wide thoroughfare for the awareness that “there is no other besides Him”.
And now we see Whose Hand is Mighty. For it would have been much easier for Hashem to dispense with the whole notion of human agency and do it all Himself. But He chose to wrestle with man, possessor of free will and evil urge, and coax him to allow Him into his heart. And He won. And we won. And He One.
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