פרשת בשלח

. ואתה הרם את מטך ונטה את ידך, “as for you, raise your staff and incline your hand.” We must not understand this verse as an instruction to Moses to raise his staff above the sea. After all, the Torah does not report Moses as raising his staff over the sea. He only raised his hand over the sea (verse 21). The meaning of the words “raise your staff” is that Moses was to divest himself of the staff. You find confirmation of this in Shemot Rabbah 21,9 where the Midrash quotes the Egyptians as saying that Moses’ entire strength lay in his staff, that he was unable to do anything without it. There were also some Israelites who did not believe that Moses would be able to perform such a miracle without the aid of his staff. G’d therefore told him to get rid of the staff and to perform the miracle with his hand. This is why we read subsequently that the people had faith in G’d and His servant Moses, seeing that he had been able to perform such a miracle merely with his hand (verse 31). Whereas previously the Torah had stated that the people did have faith in Moses (4,31), this faith had been shaken in the interval. It was therefore necessary for the Torah to write in connection with the splitting of the Sea that their faith in Moses had been completely restored.

Then Moses held out his arm over the sea and the LORD drove back the sea with a strong east wind all that night, and turned the sea into dry ground. The waters were split,

A Midrash understands the word והמים as a reference to Torah which has also been compared to water. The meaning would be that because of the Torah which the Israelites were about to receive and which they would be eager to receive, this Torah now acted as a shield for them to their right and to their left. At the same time, this Torah would be an instrument of destruction for the Egyptians. This is the reason the word חומה, “wall,” is spelled defective, i.e. without the letter ו is so that it can be read חמה, “anger.” What proved a protective wall for the Israelites represented a few hours later G’d’s anger and the death of the Egyptians. The words מימינם ומשמאלם may also be understood as references to the merit of Torah and phylacteries respectively. The Torah is described as “the right side of G’d,” i.e. מימינו אש דת למו, (Deut. 33, 2). The phylacteries which are worn on our left arm provide the merit thanks to which the waters formed a wall on the left of the Israelites.

And when Israel saw the wondrous power which the LORD had wielded against the Egyptians, the people feared the LORD; they had faith in the LORD and His servant Moses.

A Midrashic approach (Mechilta Vayissa section 3): “how exactly did the manna descend? First a north wind descended and cleared away all the dust on the earth; afterwards a layer of dew descended smoothing out the surface of the earth. Following this, the manna descended on to this layer of dew. Please note that the Torah does not speak of the manna ascending, i.e. ויעל המן, but the Torah writes ותעל שכבת הטל, “the layer of dew ascended” (verse 14). This teaches that a layer of dew descended form heaven in order to cover the manna, i.e. it ascended on to the layer of manna which had fallen immediately before. As a result the manna was protected from below and from above.

When we keep this in mind we can understand why the sages demanded (Pesachim 30) that when placing the two challot on the Sabbath table we must place a serviette or other base both below and above the bread to symbolize how it was in the desert with the manna. Rashi explains the words ותעל שכבת הטל to mean that when the dew was lying above the manna facing the sun, it suddenly became visible; this is the meaning of the words והנה על פני המדבר דק מחספס, “and here!, on the face of the desert something fine and exposed.”