January 19th: Bo
THIS WEEK IN THE TORAH
Rabbi David E. Ostrich
Last week, we considered the definitions of the word responsible. Prompted by my discomfort with a famous exhortation by Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel (“Some are guilty. All are responsible”), we looked at the several definitions of the word and their differences. Sometimes responsible is used regarding guilt or culpability. However, other times the word is not directed at blaming someone for a problem but rather at recognizing opportunities for solving a problem.
The question is pertinent again this week as we continue the year of the plagues. (From Burning Bush to the Exodus occupies about a year.) How does one assign culpability for ancient Egypt’s oppression of the Israelites? Is it a dictatorship where the Pharaoh is considered a god and therefore rules with unquestioned authority? Is there a leadership class—like the English nobility—who are less powerful than the Pharaoh but whose support and cooperation are necessary for the monarch to reign? And what about the regular Egyptians: are all who suffer from the plagues guilty, or are they swept up in the sins of their leadership?
Or are some Egyptians innocent and as exempt from the plagues as the Israelites? I am speaking about the mysterious Erev Rav / Mixed Multitude of non-Israelites who joins our people. Some Biblical interpreters speculate that they were foreigners associated with the Hyksos who invaded Egypt around 1650 BCE. When the Hyksos were deposed, those seen as their allies could have been identified as “enslavable.” Thus were the Hebrews and other “foreigners” swept up in the oppression from which God rescues us. Or perhaps this Erev Rav was comprised of regular Egyptians who, as some point during the many years of slavery defected from Egyptian injustice. The definitive moment of Hebrew Identification—painting one’s doorposts with lambs’ blood—could have been the time for others to join our tribes and our future.
Human life is both individual and communal, and our communal affiliations hold our devotion in varying levels. While belonging to a religion or political party or social group means some acceptance of the group’s agenda, it does not necessarily involve complete identification or agreement with all or even most of the group’s opinions or practices. Members may feel both connected and in dissonance. Consider for example the Log Cabin Republicans, Gays and Lesbians who are loyal members of a party not known for supporting LGBT rights. Or consider Roman Catholics who are loyal to the Church but who disobey the Church policies on artificial contraception or fertility treatments. Or consider the many loyal Israelis who are vehemently opposed to Bibi Netanyahu and his political machinations. Or consider Mosab Hassan Yousef, the now well-known son of a Hamas founder, who was raised in Hamas but later realized the evil of their ways and became a double agent for Israeli Intelligence (and a Christian!). He is not the only Palestinian opposed to Hamas. It is estimated that some 20% of Gazans are opposed to Hamas, and their comments (in hushed tones) may point to a better future after the war. Each of these examples represents the curious ways we participate, dissent, engage from afar, or seek to exert our influence in our various affiliations. Let us beware thinking in stark terms—ignoring the many shades of gray between black and white and the many ways that people take responsibility for fixing the world’s problems.
Another example is the recent “shocking revelation” that Bibi Netanyahu is “responsible for Hamas”—“using it” to counter the Palestinian Authority. I am certainly not an apologist for Mr. Netanyahu, but my scant knowledge of international realpolitik reminds me that leaders must sometimes do business with unsavory characters. Even those who think that Donald Trump is too cozy with Vladimir Putin understand that Putin/Russia is a player with whom we need to have some kind of relationship. Was this not the case with President Obama, and is it not true of President Biden, as well? We have relationships with Xi Jinping and all kinds of leaders and rulers who, despite being less that wonderful, exercise power and influence. I do not often quote Don Vito Corleone, but perhaps this is a time to do so: “Keep your friends close and your enemies closer.” Having a relationship or playing power politics does not necessarily mean approval. It is a leader’s responsibility to deal with whatever factors his/her country faces.
This is not to say that Bibi’s strategy is or was good. Or that a strategy that worked for a while ceased at some point to be helpful. Consider the US support of the Taliban fighters who opposed the Soviet occupation of Afghanistan. It seemed to be a good strategy for a while, and then it was not. Is this a moral question, or is it a strategic question—as leaders face a multiplicity of players and issues and international needs?
A final example may be equally controversial. There are serious questions about Pope Pius XII, the Pontiff who ruled the Roman Catholic Church from 1939-1958, and his responses to the Nazis. Did he support or enable them? Did he oppose them but not enough? What exactly did he do, and what could he have done? I am not an apologist for the Vatican, but one must remember that the supreme evil of Adolf Hitler was also an existential crisis for the Church. We know that there were elements of opposition—convents and monasteries that hid Jews and helped resistance fighters, but what about the many cases of Church inaction or acquiescence? Were they strategic or immoral? Were they anti-Semitic or realpolitik? Stories of heroic chance-taking are amazing and inspiring, but does not success require strategic assessment? Just being on the “right side” is not enough. Consider the disastrous consequences of the Arab Spring. Supporters of democracy in Syria and Egypt might have been morally right, but the results of their actions have been catastrophic. When we imagine a heroic Pope Pius XII fully confronting Hitler, is it a cogent strategy, or is it vainglorious thinking—consigning his Church to destruction? If I were Pope and I saw my responsibility to keep the Church alive and able to continue its mission after Hitler—for tyrants do always meet their end, then I might make similar decisions. When you meet the Devil, you just cannot unmeet him. He’s there, and he’s the Devil. The question is not how to beat him but how to minimize the damage he will cause.
The word responsible is multivalent, and the ways that we can take responsibility vary widely. When the heroic Egyptian midwives, Shifrah and Puah, are confronted with Pharaoh’s evil order (Exodus 1.15-19), they do not confront Pharaoh directly. They do not “speak to truth to power.” No, they resist his immoral commandments and dissemble. They take responsibility, but they do not grandstand in a senseless display of suicidal opposition. If we were Egyptians, how could we oppose Pharaoh’s immorality—effectively? And, if we, in our own measured and strategic ways, resist, would not the Lord realize what we are doing? Perhaps this is the role the Erev Rav plays in the story. They represent Egyptians who work against Pharaoh and whom God saves along with Israel.