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Bo (Come) Parsha – Weekly Torah Portion

Bo

Exodus, 10:1-13:16

This Week’s Torah Portion | December 29, 2013 – January 4, 2014 – Tevet 26 – Shevat 3, 5774

In A Nutshell

In the portion, Bo (Come), the Creator—through Moses—tells defiant Pharaoh he must let the people of Israel go. The Creator casts two more plagues over Pharaoh, Locust and Darkness, and Pharaoh says to Moses, “Go away from me! Beware; do not see my face again for in the day you see my face you shall die” (Exodus, 10:28). Moses replies, “You are right; I shall never see your face again” (Exodus, 10:29). Indeed, Moses keeps his word.

The Creator tells Moses that after the final plague Pharaoh will let the children of Israel go. The children of Israel begin to prepare for the tenth plague, the plague of the first-born, and borrow from the Egyptians silver and gold vessels, as well as garments, preparing for their release.

The Creator outlines to Moses the rules of the Passover offering that the children of Israel will need to meet: slaughter a lamb in the twilight, spread its blood on the doorposts (Mezuzot) and on crossbars, and eat the lamb that same night together with Matzot (unleavened bread) and Maror (horse-radish). The children of Israel follow suit.

At midnight, when a great cry rises in Egypt at the strike of the Plague of the First-Born, Pharaoh urges the children of Israel to leave Egypt in haste. The children of Israel leave taking the mixed multitude along with them, and flocks and cattle in great numbers.

 Commentary by Dr. Michael Laitman

The exodus from Egypt described in this portion is both very significant and dramatic. Each moment in our lives is a remembrance to the exodus from Egypt. This is the point at which the human in us is born, when we come out of our egos, of the will to receive.

We all begin selfish, as it is written, “I have created the evil inclination.”[1] The evil inclination grows within us and causes us to be increasingly egoistic. Throughout human history we have been developing in this manner until we have come to a state where we feel that our entire nature is evil and we must exit it, get rid of it, and so we look for a solution. It is a process that unfolds in both individuals and in the entire human society.

When the Pharaoh in us grows, meaning our evil inclination, it does not let us live. The point in the heart, Moses in us, escapes from the ego in order to gain strength, then returns in order to fight it. Only once we understand how this “game” unfolds in us do we return to fight against the ego, much like Moses returns to Egypt to fight against Pharaoh.

When a person begins to discover the upper force, even a little bit, he or she discovers that everything happens from above, that “there is none else besides Him” (Deuteronomy, 4:35), and that includes Pharaoh, the Creator, and Moses who is between them. In this struggle, our inner Moses must decide who will rule over him, Pharaoh or the Creator.

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Glossary – Bo (Come) Parsha – Weekly Torah Portion

Locust

In all the plagues of Egypt, a person feels how beneficial the plagues are. The plague comes because a person is immersed in the ego, in a special situation, and the plagues help one out of that state. The plague of Locust corresponds to Bina.

Darkness

In each state we have darkness. However, in states of darkness, it is a person’s personal darkness, from which one can escape to another state. Here the state of darkness comes when a person is confused, not knowing anything, as it is said in the Purim story when the people did not know who was right, Haman or Mordechai. In a state of darkness a person needs to obtain the light of Hassadim because the darkness comes from light of Hochma, and through the light of Hassadim a person comes out of it. That person needs Hassadim, understanding that one needs the light. And because that person is ready, the pillar of fire, or the cloud, appears.

Plague of the First Born

The Plague of the First-Born is the final, biggest blow. It is a blow that is the root, because the first-born is the man. It is the biggest will to receive at the level of Keter, after which there is nothing more to do in Egypt. It is here that Pharaoh surrenders.

Pharaoh is left without an army, without anything. Once the children of Israel leave Egypt, Pharaoh sends after them whatever he has left of his army, but afterward the mixed multitude join Israel, as well, and Pharaoh is left with nothing.

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VaEra (And I Appeared) Parsha – Weekly Torah Portion

VaEra

Exodus, 6:2-9:35

This Week’s Torah Portion | December 22 – December 28, 2013 – Tevet 19 – Tevet 25, 5774

In A Nutshell

In the portion, VaEra (And I Appeared), the Creator appears before Moses and promises to deliver the children of Israel from Egypt to the land of Canaan. Moses turns to the children of Israel but they do not listen “out of impatience and out of hard work” (Exodus 6:9).

The Creator instructs Moses to turn to Pharaoh and ask him to let the children of Israel go out of Egypt. Moses fears that he will not succeed in his mission and asks the Creator for a token. The Creator says to Moses that he will be as God to Pharaoh, while Aaron will be as the prophet who does the actual speaking, and the Creator will harden Pharaoh’s heart and shower plenty of signs and tokens over Egypt. The Creator gives to Moses and Aaron a staff, and when Moses casts the staff to the ground it becomes a snake.

When Moses and Aaron come to Pharaoh, Moses is eighty years old and Aaron is eighty-three. There are many magicians and soothsayers around Pharaoh. When Moses and Aaron arrive, they throw down the staff and it becomes a snake. Pharaoh’s magicians do the same and their staffs turn to snakes, as well, but Moses’ and Aaron’s snake swallows the magicians’ snakes.

Despite that display, Pharaoh remains defiant. This is when the ten plagues of Egypt begin. This portion mentions seven of the plagues: blood, frogs, lice, flies, pestilence, boils, and hail. After each plague Pharaoh goes back on his word and refuses to let the children of Israel go.

 Commentary by Dr. Michael Laitman

While this depiction is graphic and picturesque, it actually conveys the interior of the Torah, the true law that instructs us how to get out of the Egypt within us. The Torah does not tell us to leave one physical place in favor of another, but rather how we can free ourselves of our egos.

The portion deals with a person who is working hard and discovers that he or she is in Egypt. It also deals with that person’s desire that does not agree with being in Egypt, the ego, the essence of evil. Therefore, that person escapes from there while arguing with one’s ego. Such a person cannot tolerate the ego, fearing it might bury or kill him. Therefore, that person rises above it and begins to part from it.

There are two forces in us. The first is the ego, which is Pharaoh and all of Egypt. The other is a “protruding” point called “the point in the heart.” All our desires that are in Egypt and are fed by it while there is a “famine in the land of Canaan” (Genesis, 42:6) create an internal struggle in us. This is the war from which we seek to escape, to rise above the ego with all our desires. In fact, only Moses, the point in the heart, escapes and rises above the ego, fleeing from Egypt to Jethro and to all that there is in Midian.

After forty years, during which we grow stronger in Midian working on enhancing the force of Moses, the Creator appears to us in the burning bush. Through our inner voice we hear and comprehend that we must return, fight against our ego, and get out of it, or we will not be able to attain spirituality.

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Glossary – VaEra (And I Appeared) Parsha – Weekly Torah Portion

Prophet

A prophet is a person who speaks with the Creator, the upper force. It is one who is at a level of speaking. Speaking is disclosure, the emission of Hevel (fume, mist) from the mouth. Hevel of the mouth is the Ohr Hozer (Reflected Light) emitted from the Partzuf, from the soul, as the light of bestowal.

Also, there is a prophet who sees, who is at a higher level. Some prophets say, “I saw,” and some prophets say, “I heard.” It is a degree of a Kabbalist who is at two degrees—a degree of speaking or a degree of seeing.

Moses

Moses is the upper force in us, which pulls us toward bestowal, love of others, and thus to the love of the Creator. It is a force that gives us no rest. This force comes to us from the breaking of the soul as a spark of light within us. If the spark awakens in a person it is considered that the person received an invitation. It guarantees nothing, but the invitation to actually begin one’s holy work has been given.

Holy means bestowal. Climbing up the mountain of holiness means that a person rises above one’s ego with one’s point of Moses, and thus actualizes oneself.

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Shemot (Exodus) Parsha – Weekly Torah Portion

Shemot

Exodus, 1:1-6:1

This Week’s Torah Portion | December 15 – December 21, 2013 – Tevet 12 – Tevet 18, 5774

In A Nutshell

The portion, Shemot (Exodus), begins with the demise of Joseph and all of his contemporaries, “And a new king arose over Egypt, who did not know Joseph” (Exodus, 1:8). Subsequently, Moses is born in Egypt and his sister hides him in an ark. She places the ark in the Nile and follows it. Pharaoh’s daughter goes down to bathe in the river, finds the ark, and takes the baby. Moses’ sister offers to help her find a Hebrew nursing women and brings Moses’ mother as a nursing woman.

Moses grows in Pharaoh’s home forty years. One day he sees an Egyptian beating a Hebrew. He strikes and kills the Egyptian and buries him in the sand. When he realizes that one of his Hebrew brothers saw him in the act, he fears being told on and escapes to the desert.

In the desert he meets Jethro, priest of Midian. He marries his daughter and sees the burning bush, where he is told he must return to Pharaoh and to the people of Israel, and tell them it is time to go out of Egypt.

The portion ends with the children of Israel complaining to Moses about their poor situation. Moses turns to the Creator who says to him, “Now you shall see what I will do to Pharaoh, for by a strong hand shall he let them go, and by a strong hand shall he drive them out of his land” (Exodus, 6:1).

 Commentary by Dr. Michael Laitman

The stories deal with man’s soul. The Torah tells us how to correct ourselves in order to develop the soul within us, how to open it up to the upper light, to the revelation of the Creator, and how to feel within it the upper, spiritual world.

The process begins with a special desire called Abraham, which awakens and asks about the meaning of our lives, leading us to open up our souls. The developing desire must escape Babylon, the sum of our great ego.

Subsequently, that desire procreates another desire, Isaac, which begets yet another desire, Jacob. These three desires form the foundation of the soul.

Jacob, which is a special desire, has twelve sons. This is a development of the third desire, which achieves equivalence with the upper force—the Creator—who is pure bestowal. The exodus from Babylon symbolizes our desire to achieve that same level of bestowal. Jacob is the first to actualize that desire through his sons, particularly through Joseph, who assembles all the qualities of bestowal of the corrections that Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, and the rest of the sons have made. Joseph is the only one who can descend to his ego with all the corrections and begin to work with the ego that is called Egypt.

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