B'shalach - Torah with a Capital T

(1) אז ישיר, “Then Moses sang, etc.” According to Bereshit Rabbah the Torah introduced the subject of man committing idolatry (Enosh) with the word אז (Genesis 4,26) and according to tradition G’d reacted with flooding one third of the surface of the earth. Moses, as an act of restoring G’d’s glory therefore commenced his song with the word אז, seeing this time the drowning of part of mankind had worked for the benefit of the Jewish people. Another reason why he may have commenced his song with the word אז is because he himself had challenged G’d’s masterminding the history of His people by claiming thatמאז באתי אל פרעה, “ever since I came to Pharaoh (in Your name to lighten the burden of the Jewish people) he has made their burden harsher, etc”. (Exodus 5,23) It was Moses’ way of apologizing for having been too rash in criticizing G’d’s ways.

(1) אז ישיר, he agreed to sing this song.

(1) כי גאה גאה, He alone is entitled to feel this sense of superiority seeing He is the source of all goodness in the universe. This is in contrast to Pharaoh who boasts about having created the Nile as the source of Egypt’s affluence, (Ezekiel 29.3) a totally spurious claim.

(1) אז ישיר משה THEN SANG MOSES — with regard to the usage of the future ישיר, the meaning is: THEN — i. e. when he saw the miracle it entered his mind that HE WOULD SING a song. Similar is, (Joshua 10:12) “Then Joshua would speak (אז ידבר)”; and similar, (1 Kings 7:8) “and a house he would make (יעשה) for Pharaoh’s daughter”, which signifies “he purposed in his heart that he would make it for her”. So, also, ישיר here signifies: his heart told him that he should sing, and thus did he actually do, as it states, “and they (Moses and Israel) spake as follows, ‘I will sing unto the Lord’”. And in the same way, in the case of Joshua, it means: then (או) — when he saw the miracle mentioned in that narrative — his heart told him (prompted him) to speak, and thus did he actually do, as it is stated, “and he spake before the eyes of all Israel”. The same applies to the Song of the Well (Numbers 21:17) which begins with the words: אז ישיר ישראל, “then would Israel sing”; it expresses the intention quite plainly in the following words, “Come up, O Well — sing ye unto it” (i. e. these words are a call to the people to sing to it after Israel had expressed their intention so to do and are not part of the song itself which begins with the words that follow). With regard to (1 Kings 11:7) אז יבנה שלמה במה our Rabbis explained that He proposed to build a high place for Chemosh but actually did not build it (Sanhedrin 91b). This, too, teaches us that the י as a prefix of the imperfect is used in reference to intention to do a thing. This explanation serves to settle the literal meaning of the text. But so far as its Midrashic explanation is concerned our Rabbis, of blessed memory, said: from here (i. e. from the fact that the future tense is used) we may derive an intimation that the tenet of the Resurrection of the Dead is from the Torah (is alluded to, although only by inference, in the Torah) (Sanhedrin 91b). And thus, also, do they explain in the case of all them (all of the examples quoted) except in the case of that referring to Solomon which they explained in the sense that he purposed to build a high place but did not build it. — One cannot say that this can be appropriately explained in the same way as one explains other passages which are written in the future tense, but which really refer to an immediate action (i. e. to a then present time); for example, (Job. 1:5) “Thus was Job doing (יעשה)”; (Numbers 9:18) “At the command of the Lord were they encamping (יחנו)”; (Numbers 9:20) “And there were occasions when the cloud was (יהיה) upon the tabernacle”, because these were each of them something that was continuously happening, and there is proper to it either the future tense or the past tense (cf. Rashi on Genesis 29:3). But this (אז ישיר and other passages quoted) which happened only at the particular moment mentioned (once and once only), one cannot fittingly explain in this sense (i. e. of continuous action).

(1) כי גאה גאה FOR HE IS GLORIOUSLY SUBLIME — render this as the Targum does: for He is exalted above all exalted beings and real exaltation (supremity) is His alone. [Another explanation: the repetition of the word is intended to state that He has done something which it is impossible for a human being (lit., flesh and blood) to do. When he (the latter) fights against another and vanquishes him he throws him off the horse, but here — horse and its rider together hath He hurled into the sea. The usage is, that in the case of everything which cannot possibly be done by anyone except Him the appropriate expression to use is a form of the root גאה, as in (Isaiah 12:5), “for He hath done גאות” — gloriously. In the same way you will find that throughout the whole Song the words are repeated: (v. 2) “The strength and vengeance of the Lord have become my help”; (v. 4). “The Lord is a man of war, the Lord is His name” (cf. Rashi’s explanation of this), and this is the case in all the verses]. Another explanation of כי גאה גאה: I will sing unto the Lord although (כי) He is exalted high above all songs and however much I may praise Him there will still remain something additional in Him to be praised (עוד יש בו תוספת — I can never exhaust his praises), and not as is the practice in respect to a human king whom one praises, attributing to him certain virtues whilst these are really not in him (cf. Mekhilta d'Rabbi Yishmael 15:1:6).

(4) On that day, Rabbi Akiva expounded [the verse] "Then Moshe and the Children of Israel sang this song to God, and they spoke, saying..." (Exodus 15:1) It was not necessary to state, 'saying,' so what is meant by 'saying?' It means the Israel was answering each phrase after Moshe, as in the reading of Hallel, thus it says 'saying.' Rabbi Nechemiah says, like the reading of Shema, and not like the reading of Hallel.

(undefined) Exodus 15,1.“then Moses and the ‎Children of Israel sang this song and they said: ‎saying;” first we must understand that the ‎essence of joy is what a person feels in his heart; ‎seeing that this is so, what need is there to express ‎these feelings in speech and song or poetry at the time ‎of his joy?
The reason is that joy in one’s heart, ‎unless formulated in word and song is bound to ‎subside and cease altogether in short order. By giving ‎verbal expression to one’s joy and composing a song ‎and writing poetry one prolongs and intensifies this ‎feeling of joy. The Israelites were aware of this ‎psychological axiom, and this is why they yearned to ‎give proper expression to their joy. They yearned to ‎share their joy with the Creator, Who had been the ‎architect enabling them to harbour such joyous ‎feelings in their breasts. This is the reason why the ‎Torah adds the words: ‎ויאמרו לאמור‎ “they said, saying;” ‎the word ‎לאמור‎ presumably refers to extraneous words, ‎not included in the actual song that follows; if this ‎were not so, who was there that they could have ‎spoken to about this other than their peers who had all ‎experienced the same salvation?‎

(undefined) Exodus 15:1 ‎“let me raise my voice in song to the ‎Lord, Who is most triumphant, He has flung ‎horse and rider into the sea.” According to ‎Onkelos, the words ‎גאה גאה‎ mean that Hashem ‎is more exalted than any exalted creature anywhere. ‎The very concept of exaltation is His. Moses attempts ‎to rationalize why The Creator, Who is so far above any ‎of His creatures that in a confrontation between Him ‎and His adversaries the onlookers would think that the ‎combatants are so unevenly matched that the Creator ‎would not have to resort to deeds that impress, as He ‎could blow away His opponent with the mere breath of ‎his mouth. When we read the “song,” it sounds like an ‎accolade for the victor who had exerted himself in ‎order to overcome a powerful opponent, something ‎that is simply not so. Having heard the prophet Isaiah ‎‎40,17 proclaim a basic truth, that ‎כל הגוים כאין נגדו‎, “all ‎the nations of the world (combined) are as nothing ‎when arraigned against Him,” why does Moses portray ‎G’d’s victory of the Egyptians as such a heroic deed? ‎The rhetorical question just posed has already been ‎voiced by the liturgist in one of his poems on the ‎eighth day of Passover. The answer given there is that ‎G’d appeared to exert Himself, taking with Him ‎myriads of angels in order to show the Israelites how ‎much He loved them. Had He blown the Egyptians away ‎with the mere breath of His mouth, the Israelites would ‎not have been impressed. While the Israelites would ‎not have been impressed, the gentiles, instead of being ‎profoundly impressed with the power of our G’d, would ‎have denied that the disappearance without a trace of ‎the armed might of Egypt had been due to the ‎interference in history by an Eternal Creator ‎altogether. Moses expresses his thanks to ‎‎Hashem for having gone to so much trouble ‎to accomplish what He could have accomplished in the ‎fraction of a second without ”grandstanding.” ‎Grandstanding when it is intended for the benefit of ‎the spectator, as opposed to when it is meant to show ‎off the party setting it in motion, is a valuable tool in ‎the hands of the Creator, and not to be denigrated as it ‎should be when displayed by one of G’d’s creatures.‎

(undefined) ‎Exodus 16:1 “He flung horse and its rider high into ‎the sea.” We need to understand why Moses ‎described the “tossing” of the Egyptian cavalry into the ‎sea by using a word referring to an upward motion of ‎G’d’s arm, instead of simply writing ‎הפיל בים‎, “He ‎dropped them into the sea.” Besides, seeing that in ‎verse 4 Moses describes Hashem as ‎מרכבות פרעה ‏וחילו ירה בים‎, “G’d threw (same word as “he shot,”) the ‎chariots of Pharaoh and his army into the sea,” why did ‎Moses choose the word ‎רמה‎ in verse 1? Since the only ‎kind of shooting in those days was the shooting of ‎arrows, it was mandatory that the trajectory first ‎involve the rising of the arrow before it could descend ‎and hit its target, so that there was no reason for ‎Moses not to have used the customary word for ‎‎“shooting.”‎
Our sages in the Mishnah Sanhedrin 6,4 ‎describe the platform or the “house,” ‎בית הסקילה‎, from ‎which the penalty of stoning to death was carried out ‎as being two stories (the height of two average sized ‎persons) high. From that platform the criminal or ‎sinner convicted to death by stoning would be pushed ‎down. The “stoning” would commence after the fall if ‎it had not been fatal. The wording in the Torah is: ‎סקול ‏יסקל או ירה יירה‎, “he will surely be stoned or shot,” ‎‎(Exodus 19,13). The word ‎ירה‎ alone therefore might ‎have been misleading.‎
Another expression which poses a difficulty in our ‎verse is: ‎ומבחר שלישיו טבעו בים‎, “and the choicest of his ‎officers drowned in the sea.” It would have sufficed to ‎state that “his officers drowned;” that would have ‎included both the junior and the senior officers.‎
The answer to these questions may be gleaned from ‎the words of the Midrash (Yalkut Reuveni, ‎B’shalach) where the protective angel, ‎שר‎, of the ‎Egyptians is quoted as having complained that seeing ‎that both the Israelites and the Egyptians had been idol ‎worshippers, why would the Egyptians be singled out ‎for such harsh punishment. ‎
We further need to understand why G’d resorted to ‎the stratagem of encouraging the Egyptians to pursue ‎the Israelites through commanding the Israelites to ‎turn back at Baal Tzefon (Exodus 14,2), after they had ‎already left Egypt and both politically and ‎economically, the Super Power Egypt had suffered a ‎lethal blow. Had G’d not found an excuse that misled ‎the Egyptians to believe that their deity had frightened ‎the Israelites, the entire pursuit of the Israelites and ‎the resultant drowning of the Egyptian army would ‎never have taken place. We must therefore conclude ‎that G’d paid heed to the complaint of the protective ‎angel of the Egyptians, and had to show him that his ‎protégées were totally wicked, having reneged on their ‎not only having released the Israelites but having ‎expelled them. (Exodus 12,33 and 39). The words ‎רמה ‏בים‎, may be understood as a reference to the illusion ‎that the Egyptians harboured that they might succeed ‎due to favourable astrological constellations at the sea ‎where they had failed on land. Secondly, the word ‎מבחר‎, ‎instead of being a reference to the choicest of the ‎Egyptian officers, is an allusion to the freedom of ‎choice, ‎בחירה‎, that G’d gave the Egyptians at that time, ‎i.e. they had brought their death upon themselves by ‎having made the wrong choice in pursuing the ‎Israelites, even after witnessing that the G’d of the ‎Israelites had split the sea for them. After having seen ‎this, even the protective angel of the Egyptians no ‎longer had any complaint against G’d.‎

(1) אז ישיר משה, “this is when Moses broke out with a song, etc.;” Moses now apologised for when in frustration he had said to G–d, also using the word מאז, “from then,” that since he had assumed his position the fortunes of the Jewish people had worsened (Exodus 5,23). He therefore used the same word when now singing G–d’s praises. An alternate interpretation: the numerical value of the word אז is 8. He hinted that the Jewish people had merited this miraculous salvation on account of the circumcision which is performed on the eighth day of the infant’s life. The verse לגוזר ים סוף לגזרים, “Who splits apart the Sea of reeds into separate sections,” (Psalms 136,13) is used as a Scriptural reference to this. The Hebrew word וימל, “he circumcised,” describing Avraham performing circumcision in Genesis 17,23, is translated by the Targum as וגזר.

(1) ויאמרו לאמור, literally: “they said to say;” a somewhat unusual construction, meaning that the Israelites singing this song meant for future generations to learn it by heart and to recite it on appropriate occasions. [As we still do in our daily morning prayers. Ed.]