Special thanks to community member Elizabeth Danziger, founder of Worktalk Communications Consulting, for assisting in transforming this sermon from 2009 into an essay for this year.
Words Are Cheap
Vaera 2009
This week’s Parsha is Vaera. The Parsha begins with a command from GD to Moshe. (Exodus 6:2) And God spoke unto Moses, and said unto him: ‘I am the LORD. And I appeared unto Abraham, unto Isaac, and unto Jacob, as God Almighty, but by My name YHWH I made Me not known to them. And I have also upheld My covenant with them, to give them the land of Canaan, the land of their sojournings, wherein they sojourned
GD has a number of names by which we call him. What does it mean for GD to have various names? The way we understand this is that there are so many ways that Hashem relates to us. The way he relates to us at a particular time determines the name that we identify Him by. So if He is merciful we call Him Adon-y, if He is judging us He is know as Elokim and the Name. The verse is telling us that to the Patriarchs (Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob) knew Hashem by His name of Sha-dai – and “my name of Hashem they did not know me by.”
Traditionally, this verse means that the Patriarchs did not know the merciful name of Hashem. However, the Jewish people’s salvation from Egypt required the mercy of GD. Thus, GD now informed Moshe that He would be adjusting His relationship with the Jewish people in order to bring them out of Egypt and into the land of Israel.
Rabbi Shimon Schwab attempts to explain our verse more simply. He is bothered by the word “V’Hakimosi” – “that I have upheld my commitment.” GD has not yet upheld any commitment other than delivering the Jewis into slavery! How can He say V’Hakimosi?
Rabbi Schwab says that this story is the same as another story. There was a very poor man who met a very benevolent fellow who wished to make his life easier. The rich fellow decided to give the poor fellow a million dollars. So what does he do? Does he give him 10,000 $100 bills? No he transfers the money to the poor fellow’s bank account. Now at this point we would say that the poor fellow is pretty wealthy now. But in truth has the money reached his hands? Has he actually touched or used his new money yet? No. But still we call him wealthy. Similarly when Hashem promised our forefathers that they would inherit the land of Canaan (eventually becomes the land of Israel) they considered it done! It was money in the bank. And even though they never saw the settling of the land themselves the promise was enough.
This is the idea of Sha-dai. For them it was dai, which means “enough.” It was enough to have the promise and they did not need to actions for them to feel as if it was done. Therefore to the Patriarchs–V’Hakimosi is truth! To them it had already happened. To them the words were enough – Sha-dai.
The statement alone was enough for the Patriarchs to be able to live a transcendent existence and be one with GD. But the Jewish people were a massive nation now, far from the lofty levels of the Patriarchs. They needed a more tangible relationship to GD. They needed to see the results. They needed to see the promises of Hashem come to fruition. And thus, in this Torah portion the process of the exodus began. The process of extricating the Jewish people from Egypt was now underway and the relationship with GD was more tangible to the Jewish people.
The Gemara in Avoda Zara (9a) says that the world is divided into three 2000-year periods. First there were 2000 years of darkness. This was until Abraham showed the world that there was a creator and taught the world about morality. The next 2000 years were the years of Torah. This was when we went to Egypt, were redeemed from Egypt and received the Torah. This was also the period of time that we lived the Torah to its fullest as the inhabitants of the land of Israel. The final 2000 years is the period of Mashiach. How can this be? The 2000 years is nearly complete and yet here we are with no Mashiach! That is not a very good result for a 2000 year period of Mashiach!
Rabbi Schwab uses the same principle as above to answer this as well. Out current exile mirrors the Egyptian exile. In Egypt the original relationship was a Sha-dai relationship with no action and just trust. That is how we are to relate to our situation as well. In our current exile we need to feel that trust. Eventually the redemption will come as a merciful act by GD and we will relate to that as the act of Hashem using his name of compassion. So these years of exile, of pain and suffering are still called the 2000 years of redemption. Since it was promised to us by Hashem, it is as good as done. We have a track record with GD. He has delivered us from salvation in Egypt and we trust that He will save us again. Because GD’s words carry weight, they come with a track record.
For many of us, talk is cheap. We are skeptical and cynical. Today there is much talk of “change” and “hope” and while these are welcome sentiments we tend to be skeptical. This is true for us as humans but we cannot get confused between the cheap talk of humans and the meaningful gifts and love that GD promises to us.
How can we as humans make our promises and ideas more meaningful? By attaching actions to our words we can make our words carry more weight. By doing more and saying less. Just as we expect GD to follow up his promises with action, we should follow up our own words with specific actions.
Related posts:
