"The time has come," the Walrussaid,
"To talk of many things:
Of shoes - and ships - and sealing-
wax -
Of cabbages - and kings-
And why the sea is boiling hot -
And whether pigs have wings."
Yitro (not to be confused with Homer and Jethro), who we know as the man who may well have been a professor in the world’s first Business School, with his dictum to appoint a cadre of leaders in a descending order of responsibilities - in order to relieve his son-in-law of the wearisome burden of dealing with the ‘peoples’ minutiae; preceded his visit to the Israelite Nation in the desert with a somewhat confusing (to our minds) message to Moses announcing his arrival in the following manner:
“I, your father-in-law, Jethro am coming to you, with your wife and her two sons.”
[Yitro, bye-the-bye, had seven names (1. Re’uel; 2. Yeter; 3. Yitro; 4. Chovev; 5. Chaver; 6. Kini; and 7. Puti’el) & perhaps that goes toward explaining the wording of his message... as we may well find out as we progress]
Rashi [What IS bothering Rashi?] said, in elaboration: “If you will not come out to greet me for my sake, the come for your wife’s sake, and if not for her sake, the come for the sake of her two children.”
For my sake?
For your wife’s sake?
For her children’s sake?
For pomp?
Indeed, why Moses in particular should “come out” to greet him? Or, even, why assume that Moses (et. al.) would not come “out” to greet him/them?
Which ‘person’ was it that wrote the message? Was it Yithro or one of his six other personalities? (and where was Mother-in-law during all of this?). Yithro, it turns out, was, besides being a one-time advisor to Pharaoh, became a Ger (Proselyte, or Convert) after “having tried all other ‘religions’ and, finding them all false, became a Jew”. It is said that Moses, himself, taught him during the time that he was a shepherd for Yithro. And it is with the background of finding the truth by eliminating (all) the false, that Yithro approached life - even his new life as a Jew.
But what has this to do with his (strange?) message?
In an effort to use the “KISS” Principle, let’s see if we can winnow this down. Before Yithro gave suggestions on “Management Styles”, he became upset with Moses ‘sitting in judgment‘ over the problems of the Israelites all day long while the people stood and waited their turn. This was not a concern that these problems had to be addressed and the Moses was the arbiter - it was the fact, as Yithro saw it, of his sitting while the people stood. From the point-of-view that he brought to Judaism, his son-in-law was assuming an exalted position over the people. This did not seem to be in accord with what he had come to understand about Judaism. We know, from our study of Torah, that Moses was the “humblest of all men” and yet Yithro saw it in a different light. He had first been expecting to be ‘snubbed‘ by Moses when he came to visit with his daughter and grandsons, and now it seemed (to him) that Moses was placing himself above the others.
In the case of Yithro’s coming to Judaism, through the elimination of faulty concepts in other religions - a negative process, he was attuned to the false and the corrupt and thought that, “Now, here I am a Jew and I see my own son-in-law acting in (what he saw to be) an un-Jewish way.” For Yithro, he had yet to comprehend that - the terms of Hillel - it was necessary to come to an appreciation of the beauty of the positive precept of ‘Love your neighbor as yourself‘ rather than the ‘What is hateful to you, do not do to others.’
Going back to an earlier Parshat [VaYera], we read that “...G-d appeared to Abraham among the oaks of Mamre, while he was sitting at the entrance of the tent, in the heat of the day.” which is better translated as ‘he sat down’. [Notice the difference in form] Again, Rashi explains to us that Abraham naturally tried to stand in the presence of G-d, as we are encouraged to do in our shul when we read: Da lifney me ata omed - Know before whom you stand. HaShem, however, told him to sit: “You sit down, and I shall stand; and this will be a sign for your children that I will be standing in the assembly of judges, while they remain seated.” We are also told that he who loves someone does not care if the other is sitting while he is standing, even in those cases where this would be outside of the conventional norms. Therefore the perfection of the love that G-d has for Israel is beyond the normal demands of deference and respect. The judges would sit. Moses sat. And the love between them all would unite them. This was what Yithro did not know at the time but it was he, a stranger to the Jewish world, who attained it by logic, criticism and rejection (of the false) and who did not yet feel the intimate unity of the people; it took him, a relative outsider, to raise the criticism of Moses and this policy.
And yet, instinctively, he knew that had Moses not come out to greet him (his wife and his children) that there could be feelings among the Israelites that Moses would be showing disrespect toward them (all) and that they too would soon show disrespect for this non-Jewish woman and “her children”. So Yithro had the wisdom to request in no uncertain terms that is was, indeed Moses’ obligation to everyone to ‘come out’ to greet him (Yitro) and his family. No one would thereafter be able to say of Moses’ children; “What do you expect of them? They take after her!” The boys would be deemed her children but not Moses’.
So we find that “What is hateful to you, do not do to others.” is the minimum. We cannot discard that concept. Not even when you accept the concept that has deeper beauty; “You shall love your neighbor as yourself." This too, tells us about the acceptance that we are told to show the 'Stranger among us."
Shalom.
But what has this to do with his (strange?) message?
In an effort to use the “KISS” Principle, let’s see if we can winnow this down. Before Yithro gave suggestions on “Management Styles”, he became upset with Moses ‘sitting in judgment‘ over the problems of the Israelites all day long while the people stood and waited their turn. This was not a concern that these problems had to be addressed and the Moses was the arbiter - it was the fact, as Yithro saw it, of his sitting while the people stood. From the point-of-view that he brought to Judaism, his son-in-law was assuming an exalted position over the people. This did not seem to be in accord with what he had come to understand about Judaism. We know, from our study of Torah, that Moses was the “humblest of all men” and yet Yithro saw it in a different light. He had first been expecting to be ‘snubbed‘ by Moses when he came to visit with his daughter and grandsons, and now it seemed (to him) that Moses was placing himself above the others.
In the case of Yithro’s coming to Judaism, through the elimination of faulty concepts in other religions - a negative process, he was attuned to the false and the corrupt and thought that, “Now, here I am a Jew and I see my own son-in-law acting in (what he saw to be) an un-Jewish way.” For Yithro, he had yet to comprehend that - the terms of Hillel - it was necessary to come to an appreciation of the beauty of the positive precept of ‘Love your neighbor as yourself‘ rather than the ‘What is hateful to you, do not do to others.’
Going back to an earlier Parshat [VaYera], we read that “...G-d appeared to Abraham among the oaks of Mamre, while he was sitting at the entrance of the tent, in the heat of the day.” which is better translated as ‘he sat down’. [Notice the difference in form] Again, Rashi explains to us that Abraham naturally tried to stand in the presence of G-d, as we are encouraged to do in our shul when we read: Da lifney me ata omed - Know before whom you stand. HaShem, however, told him to sit: “You sit down, and I shall stand; and this will be a sign for your children that I will be standing in the assembly of judges, while they remain seated.” We are also told that he who loves someone does not care if the other is sitting while he is standing, even in those cases where this would be outside of the conventional norms. Therefore the perfection of the love that G-d has for Israel is beyond the normal demands of deference and respect. The judges would sit. Moses sat. And the love between them all would unite them. This was what Yithro did not know at the time but it was he, a stranger to the Jewish world, who attained it by logic, criticism and rejection (of the false) and who did not yet feel the intimate unity of the people; it took him, a relative outsider, to raise the criticism of Moses and this policy.
And yet, instinctively, he knew that had Moses not come out to greet him (his wife and his children) that there could be feelings among the Israelites that Moses would be showing disrespect toward them (all) and that they too would soon show disrespect for this non-Jewish woman and “her children”. So Yithro had the wisdom to request in no uncertain terms that is was, indeed Moses’ obligation to everyone to ‘come out’ to greet him (Yitro) and his family. No one would thereafter be able to say of Moses’ children; “What do you expect of them? They take after her!” The boys would be deemed her children but not Moses’.
So we find that “What is hateful to you, do not do to others.” is the minimum. We cannot discard that concept. Not even when you accept the concept that has deeper beauty; “You shall love your neighbor as yourself." This too, tells us about the acceptance that we are told to show the 'Stranger among us."
Shalom.
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