The book of the Torah we just finished reading last week, Genesis, is described by several commentators as: “the story of a “family” living out its relationship to Gd in the midst of sibling jealousies and marital strife.” Essentially, the Book of Genesis is a series of stories of a “family” beginning with Adam & Eve and concluding with the families of Jacob and Joseph as they identify the singular Gd concept in the face of idol worship surrounding them, and their trials and tribulations as they attempt to refine the one Gd concept and live within what we know today as the Noahide Laws together with a loose conceptual idea of what Gd wants from them as human beings.

Their struggles are great, they move forward three steps and then slide back two, but slow steady progress is made toward a “one Gd” way of life so that by the time we get to the end of Genesis, we find the death of Rachel, Joseph burying his beloved father, followed by the death of Leah then Joseph himself. Within the last few pages of Genesis, we are treated to Jacob’s charge to his sons vis-à-vis their fates and futures. At the end, the Genesis story seems to be saying that we have reached a crossroads – the one Gd concept is generally a good thing but lacks cohesion from tribe to tribe – the principles and truths of obeying one Gd must be refined, a definitive set of rules must be set down and taught to the people. Which brings us to the Book of Exodus.

Quoting the Etz Chaim Chumash: “Exodus is the story of a people encountering Gd in the course of their journey from slavery to freedom.” And we all know the story of our Egyptian slavery and subsequent freedom won by Moses and Aaron and our trek across the desert to the Red (Reed) Sea and on to Sinai. This story has been taught to us by every rabbi and Hebrew School teacher we have ever had and by such dignitaries as Cecil B. DeMille and Charlton Heston, and lampooned by the comic strip B.C. and Mel Brooks, and yet, we stop our lives each year to remember the wondrous event across the week of Passover.

I relish looking carefully at the Parsha each week in an attempt to teach or describe some meaningful aspect of the material at our weekly Shabbat services and the two sentences I quoted from the Etz Chaim Chumash a moment ago conjured up a mental picture to me of Gd standing with his hands on his hips as the Israelites trekked around Sinai: “alright! Up to now I haven’t been able to get my singular Gd concept through your thick heads so I guess I’m just going to have to teach you a lesson you won’t soon forget. Then I’m going to write down the rules so everyone can see and obey them!”

Now I admit that my mental photo of Gd’s threat is very fanciful and probably a bit warped, but if you apply a little critical and creative thinking to the passages at the end of Genesis and the beginning of Exodus, you may not see the same picture but I am certain you will arrive at a similar understanding of the material.

Gd’s interaction with Abraham and Abraham’s reaction to these encounters resulted in a quantum shift in man’s thinking about a Supreme Power. Isaac sort of meandered around the countryside in something of a “Supreme Being fog” and was hoodwinked by his wife and Jacob over the birthright issue. Jacob’s life was fairly exemplary. Through his indentured service to Laban, he ended up with two wives, not one, but no matter. He went on to raise his family to respect Gd but then his son’s went off and lied about their brother being killed. Joseph ended up in Egypt, became a big shot in Pharaoh’s court, he and his brothers and father were reunited and all lived happily ever after. Gd seems to be an afterthought in much of this material. The principle figures in these stories seem to nibble around the edges of the one Gd concept but we don’t seem to find any attempts to universalize the one Gd principle until the death of Joseph and we are introduced to Moses.

There are those who postulate that the slavery of hundreds of thousands of Hebrews in Egypt was Gd’s way of demonstrating “tough love” in order to get his point across so that by the time Moses arrives on the scene, the Hebrew people are almost ready mentally to accept the one Gd idea and are ready to be led and taught.

My late father had a saying that “if you get hit in the head by the same 2 x 4 enough times, sooner or later you’ll learn how to get out of the way.” I feel that Gd made several attempts to instill and teach the “one Gd” concept to the families in Genesis but found only isolated acceptance and a lot of rejection. So as we begin to delve into the lessons and stories of the book of Exodus, we find Gd moving to teach his concepts to an entire civilization. The subjugated slaves of Egypt were forged into a civilization after 400 years of slavery and were made ready to learn Gd’s lessons by the time they reached Mt. Sinai.

The book of Exodus is a terrific set of stories! We are literally given a blow-by-blow account of the forging of the Hebrew people into a cohesive, Gd fearing, people. The dialog between Moses and Gd, and between Moses and Pharoah, and between Moses and his people, and the miracles performed are thunderous and breathtaking in their scope. Gd was really making a point – “pay attention! I’m serious about this! You will honor and obey only one Gd – ME!”

From the time we read about Moses killing one of Pharoah’s task masters until Moses sets up the tabernacle for the first time in the Sinai desert after the exodus from Egypt and Gd descends to reside in the Holy of Holies, only two years elapsed: 40 or so chapters. And yet, as we read these chapters over the next few weeks, we should look carefully at the number of social, moral, and ethical laws are given to the Israelites as they transform themselves into a true nation. To me, it’s not much different than observing a caterpillar changing into a beautiful butterfly.

I encourage everyone to take the time to read the Book of Exodus. Use your own Tanach or Chumash, or use one here at the Temple. The excitement and intrigue are palpable – I can’t think of better bedtime reading. Try it – you may find you like the stories and the subsequent lessons as much as I do.

Shabbat Shalom,

Rabbi Rubovits