In our discussion of Parshat Shemot (Ex. 1:1-6:1), we will explore the many names of Israelites, God, and ourselves. In the narrowness of Mitzrayim, how and why are new identities created?
Blessing for Torah Study
Baruch atah Adonai, Eloheinu melech ha-olam, asher kid’shanu b’mitzvotav v’tzivanu la'asok b’divrei Torah. Blessed are You, Adonai our God, Sovereign of all, who sanctifies us with mitzvot, charging us to engage with words of Torah.
Beginning with Our Own Torah
1) How many names do you have? You may consider nicknames, pet names, group names, personality traits, LGBTQIA+ labels, or anything that you feel named by.
2) How do your names shift depending on who you are around? Are there some names that only some people can call you?
Note: These texts contain transliterations of Hebrew names in place of their English translation.
Names of the Group: Israelites and Ivrim
Context: Jewish people have gone by many names throughout time. Israelite is one of the most common identifiers in early biblical narrative. This title originates from the group's forefather, Israel (formerly Jacob), meaning one who wrestles with God. Ivrim, often translated as Hebrews, is only used 14 times in the Torah, 8 of which occur in this Torah portion. The root of the word Ivrim means to cross-over, traverse, or transgress.
Questions to Consider: How and why are the names Ivrim and Israelites used?
(8) A new king arose over Egypt who did not know Joseph. (9) And he said to his people, “Look, the Israelite people are much too numerous for us." ... (12) The Egyptians ruthlessly imposed upon the Israelites. (13) But the more they were oppressed, the more they increased and spread out, so that the [Egyptians] came to dread the Israelites.
(5) The daughter of Pharaoh came down to bathe in the Nile, while her maidens walked along the Nile. She spied the basket among the reeds and sent her handmaid to fetch it. (6) When she opened it, she saw that it was a child, a boy crying. She took pity on it and said, “This must be a child of the Ivrim.”...
(11) Some time after that, when Moses had grown up, he went out to his kinsfolk and witnessed their labors. He saw an Egyptian beating an Ivri, one of his kinsmen. (12) He turned this way and that and, seeing no one about, he struck down the Egyptian and hid him in the sand. (13) When he went out the next day, he found two Ivrim fighting; so he said to the offender, “Why do you strike your fellow?”
Jericho Vincent, “Who is a Jew? Who is an Ivri?”, 2023
I am proud to be a Jew, but it is not the name that resonates most strongly in my own soul. I like Israelite or Yisraeli better…. I like that the name Israel means God-wrestler. But I like the name Ivri best of all. Ivri means one-who-crosses-over…. A person who crosses boundaries. Maybe an actual nomad. Maybe a spiritual nomad.
For so much of our history, our ancestors in exile were forced to be Ivrim, violently pushed across one physical boundary and then the next. I think spiritual transgressiveness arose from this physical condition. We crossed boundaries, bringing in wisdom from one culture we were embedded in and then the next. We crossed boundaries, offering the world daring and transgressive wisdom. It’s no coincidence that Jews played a key role in American feminism and the American struggled for LGBTQ rights and in the global struggle for trans rights….
I’m in service of a liberatory theology working to build a more God-awake world. It’s going to take some transgression to do that. Not cavalier transgression, but sacred transgression: the boundary crossing that lets us grow, that saves our lives, that heals the world.
Names of God: Elohim, Ehyeh-Asher-Ehyeh, YHVH, and More
Context: Moses has fled from Egypt and married Zipporah in the land of Midian. YHVH refers to the tetragrammation that we now read as, "Adonai." Elohim is a general word for "God" or "Gods." Until this parshah, God was mostly referred to as Elohim and sometimes El Shaddai.
Questions to Consider: How and why does the text use different names of God?
(1) Now Moses, tending the flock of his father-in-law Jethro, the priest of Midian, drove the flock into the wilderness, and came to Horeb, the mountain of Elohim. (2) An angel of YHVH appeared to him in a blazing fire out of a bush. He gazed, and there was a bush all aflame, yet the bush was not consumed. (3) Moses said, “I must turn aside to look at this marvelous sight; why doesn’t the bush burn up?” (4) When YHVH saw that he had turned aside to look, Elohim called to him out of the bush: “Moses! Moses!” He answered, “Here I am (hineini).” (5) And [God] said, “Do not come closer! Remove your sandals from your feet, for the place on which you stand is holy ground!”(6) and continued, “I am the Elohim of your father—the Elohim of Abraham, the Elohim of Isaac, and the Elohim of Jacob.” And Moses hid his face, for he was afraid to look at Elohim.
(10) "Come, therefore, I will send you to Pharaoh, and you shall free My people, the Israelites, from Egypt.” (11) But Moses said to Elohim, “Who am I that I should go to Pharaoh and free the Israelites from Egypt?” (12) “I will be with you; that shall be your sign that it was I who sent you. And when you have freed the people from Egypt, you shall worship Elohim at this mountain.”
(13) Moses said to Elohim, “When I come to the Israelites and say to them, ‘The Elohim of your fathers has sent me to you,’ and they ask me, ‘By which name?’ what shall I say to them?” (14) And Elohim said to Moses, “Ehyeh-Asher-Ehyeh,” continuing, “Thus shall you say to the Israelites, ‘Ehyeh sent me to you.’” (15) And Elohim said further to Moses, “Thus shall you speak to the Israelites: YHVH, the Elohim of your fathers—the Elohim of Abraham, the Elohim of Isaac, and the Elohim of Jacob—has sent me to you:
This shall be My name forever,
This My appellation for all eternity.
(18) They will listen to you; then you shall go with the elders of Israel to the king of Egypt and you shall say to him, ‘YHVH, the Elohim of the Hebrews (Ivrim), became manifest to us. Now therefore, let us go a distance of three days into the wilderness to sacrifice to the YHVH our Elohim.’
(22) Then Moses returned to YHVH and said, “O Adonai, why did You bring harm upon this people? Why did You send me? (23) Ever since I came to Pharaoh to speak in Your name, he has dealt worse with this people; and still You have not delivered Your people.” (6:1) Then YHVH said to Moses, “You shall soon see what I will do to Pharaoh: he shall let them go because of a greater might; indeed, because of a greater might he shall drive them from his land.”
Jericho Vincent, "The Vending Machine God and the Path to Freedom," 2023
Goddess appears to Moshah* with a request for a name change….Goddess asks Moshah to guide the people out [of Egypt]. But first, Goddess has to change Their name.... Goddess says to Moshah and to us: if you’re stuck in a narrow place, you might find inspiration in YHVH, in an awakening to the Divine expressed in ourselves and in each other, in the goodness of the past, in what’s present in the present, and in the staying fully open to the future. YHVH is a blessing for a capacity like that, a capacity for that kind of awakening. An awakening challenging and powerful enough to offer a path to freedom.
Ending with Our Own Torah
1) How do you connect with names of God and names of Jewish people? Are there some that are particularly meaningful to you?
2) Like God and the Israelites, many people take on new or multiple names in the queer community. How can we create Godliness in queer names and queerness in God's names?
וַיֹּאמֶר מֹשֶׁה אֶל בְּנֵי יִשְׂרָאֵל רְאוּ קָרָא יי בְּשֵׁם בְּצַלְאֵל... אָמַר רַבִּי מֵאִיר... אַתְּ מוֹצֵא שְׁלֹשָׁה שֵׁמוֹת נִקְרְאוּ לוֹ לְאָדָם, אֶחָד מַה שֶּׁקּוֹרְאִים לוֹ אָבִיו וְאִמּוֹ, וְאֶחָד מַה שֶּׁקּוֹרְאִין לוֹ בְּנֵי אָדָם, וְאֶחָד מַה שֶּׁקּוֹנֶה הוּא לְעַצְמוֹ. טוֹב מִכֻּלָּן מַה שֶּׁקּוֹנֶה הוּא לְעַצְמוֹ.
You find that a man is known by three names: the name by which his father and mother call him, the name by which other men call him, and the one he earns for himself; the most important name is the one he earns for himself.