Parashat Yitro 5765/
Lectures on the weekly Torah reading by the faculty of
Trust in Moses
Benjamin Salant
Kibbutz
Sa’ad
In this week’s reading the Lord says to Moses, “I will
come to you in a thick cloud, in order that the people may hear when I speak
with you and so trust you ever after” (19:9).
This expression is both difficult and
surprising. Why the need to believe in
Moses, a man of flesh and blood? Furthermore,
in last week’s reading of the Song at the Sea the Torah already stated that “they
had faith in the Lord and His servant Moses” (
Before addressing these questions we must say that the subject of faith raises many questions that can not be dealt with in depth in this context. Great philosophers have tried to define what faith is and whether the Torah command us to believe. In Sefer ha-Mitzvot Maimonides lists faith in the Lord as the first of the 613 commandments, although many take issue with him. Can a person be commanded, “thou shalt love,” or “thou shalt rejoice”? As we have said, these are not our issues at the moment.
Several homilies and interpretations that grappled with these difficulties explained that vaya’aminu “and they believed” or ya’aminu, “they will believe in you” was not speaking of faith in Moses the man, but in Moses the prophet and in his prophecies. Some even add that the words “ever after” in our Parasha refer to all the prophets who will arise after Moses. So we read in Mekhilta de-Rabbi Ishmael, Yitro (Tractate de-ba-Hodesh, ch. 2): “and so trust you ever after – you and the prophets that will arise after you.”
Many exegetes take this approach. The Aramaic Targum
Onkelos (
Maimonides relates to the question why this week’s reading had to repeat the idea, “and so trust you ever after,” when that point had been made in the previous week’s reading (Hilkhot Yesodei ha-Torah, ch. 8):
The Israelites did not
believe in Moses because of the miraculous signs he performed; for there is
fault in those who believe because of miraculous signs, since the signs could
become sorcery and magic. Rather, all
the miraculous signs that he performed in the wilderness were done of
necessity, not as evidence of his prophecy; it was necessary that the Egyptians
be drowned, and so he split the sea and sank them in it … and likewise all the
other miraculous signs. So in what way
did they believe in him? At the
Theophany on
Maimonides’ message is clear: true faith does not rest on miraculous signs. Yeshayahu Leibowitz explains Maimonides’ approach here and elsewhere: the ultimate objective is that faith in G-d be separated from all concrete realizations and anthropomorphism. [1] Natural phenomena or wondrous historical events are not sufficient to cause a person to have faith. Pure faith is evidenced by the personal resolve to worship the Lord, not because of miraculous signs that a person has seen or heard. [2]
Ibn Ezra (in his commentary on Ex.
Sforno explains: “and so trust you ever after – they will believe it is possible that you received prophecy face to face, that indeed I shall talk to them face to face, without any dream, as they said: ‘The Lord would speak to Moses face to face, as one man speaks to another’ (Ex. 33:11).”
Ba’al ha-Turim, Rabbi Jacob ben Asher (son of Rosh, 13-14th century) takes an original approach to our verse. He deduces from it that one must have faith in the Rabbis. The words “they had faith in the Lord and His servant Moses” are “to indicate that a person who takes issue with his rabbi is like one who takes issue with the Divine Presence; and one who believes the words of the rabbis is like one who believes the Divine Presence.”
The representative variety of the exegetical views presented above far from exhausts the subject. Faith was placed in Moses as a prophet, as the servant of the Lord. What is necessary is to believe that Moses relays the word of G-d (see Sforno, above), as was formulated by Rabbi Judah Halevy as well: “True, the people did not have the strength of Moses to see that great sight face to face, but from that day on the people believed that Moses, servant of G-d, had received the word of the Lord” (The Kuzari, 1.7).