Bo

A Community of Shared Narrative: Dvar Torah for Bo

by Rabbi Len Levin

“You shall tell your child on that day: This is because of what God did for me when I came forth out of Egypt.” (Exodus 13:8)

“In every generation, a person should regard him/herself as if s/he had personally gone out from Egypt.” (Mishnah Pesahim 10:5)

This week’s portion is the focal point of the narrative extending from the enslavement of the Israelites through the exodus to receiving God’s revelation at Sinai. We read in this portion of the culmination of the plagues, the exodus itself, and the injunction to memorialize the liberation through an elaborate communal ritual.

It is clear from other regulations of this celebration that participation in it was a central requirement for membership in the Israelite community (see Numbers 9:10-14). An alien who becomes a member of the community becomes eligible to participate in the ritual. Conversely, an Israelite who Read More >

by Cantor Sandy Horowitz

The recitation of the ten plagues at the Passover Seder table is one of the rituals used to retell the story of the Israelites’ liberation from slavery in Egypt. This ritual is often done hastily, as we dip our finger in wine and name each plague. As we consider this week’s Torah portion, Parashat Bo, let us slow down this ritual in order to examine the significance of last three of these plagues. All three relate to darkness.

In continuation from last week’s Torah reading, a pattern has been established in which Moses asks Pharaoh to free the Israelite slaves and let them leave Egypt, Pharaoh refuses, and God casts plagues upon the Egyptians. Of this week’s final three, the first is the plague of locusts. In Exodus 10:15 we read, “They obscured the view of the earth, and the earth became darkened [vatehshakh ha-aretz].” Pharaoh asks Moses’ Read More >

Parashat Bo
Rabbi Isaac Mann

I was always intrigued by the penultimate makkah – that of hoshekh (darkness). It does not seem to fit into the order or sequence established by the other plagues whereby they seem to get more and more severe as they progress from the first plague of blood to the last one – death of the firstborn. The early makkot, those of blood, frogs, and lice were more like nuisances, not really destructive of humans or property.  The first two were even duplicated to some extent by the Egyptian magicians. But as the plagues continue they get more destructive culminating in barad (hail) and arbeh (locusts). The former was severe enough to kill animals, as well as humans, not brought indoors and to destroy crops and trees (Exodus  9:25). Read More >

By Rabbi Dorit Edut

The recent tragedy of the cold-blooded shooting of twenty-six young children and four of their adult staff at the Sandy Hook Elementary School in Connecticut shocked our entire nation. After ungluing ourselves from the media reports, some of us looked for spiritual and practical ways to express our sorrow and identification with the victims’ families – leading or attending worship services, sending items to help the survivors, signing petitions against gun violence and writing to our congressmen, etc. But I would venture to say that the most prevalent reaction was to contact our children, grandchildren, children of friends and neighbors to make sure they were safe, to offer them an extra hug or bit of loving advice, and probably to whisper a little prayer asking for God’s continued protection of these precious ones. Can we make sense of this and other such violent events that have left too many Read More >

By Rabbi Allen Darnov

Parashat Bo announces: “This month (Nissan) shall mark for you the beginning of the months; it shall be the first of the months of the year for you….” (Exod 12:2). This sounds, of course, as if the Torah is commanding a New Year’s festival to be observed in the spring. Should we be confused that the Torah posts two different New Years (one in the spring and one in the fall), Nahmanides (Rabbi Moshe ben Nahman, also known as Ramban) comes to our aid. He calls Tishrei the “beginning of years” (since Creation) while he refers to Nissan as the “beginning of months” since the Exodus from Egypt. By having Israel number their months in relation to Nissan, we would always keep in mind the miracle of the Exodus and our freedom. Thus, when the Torah calls for a day of blasting the ram’s horn “in the seventh month,” Read More >

By Rabbi Katy Allen

All About the Heart

I entered a patient room for a routine visit. Medical staff hovered nearby – they were having trouble with the EKG equipment, and yes, it was fine for me, the chaplain, to visit; they needed a few minutes. The patient, George (not his real name), told me his heartbeat was irregular, and they were trying to figure out why. I asked if he would like a prayer – yes. What would he like me to pray for? “I think you should pray for me.”

The next day, George requested another visit. “You’ll never guess,” he said. The EKG had shown his heartbeat to be normal, it was still normal. The doctors were stumped. Suddenly, this visit was no longer routine. I left the room a bit overwhelmed and wondering about the Mystery of the universe. Read More >

By Laurie Levy

“It’s been a long time comin’, it’s going to be a long time gone. But you know, the darkest hour, is always just before the dawn.” David Crosby (1968)

Last week’s parashah, Va’Era, leaves off right in the middle of the action where seven plagues have been visited on the Egyptians and Pharaoh’s heart is quite stiff. A teaching about why the parashah breaks here focuses on a common element of the remaining three plagues: darkness.

In the’eighth plague, when the locusts swarmed, they covered the “surface [literally ‘eye’] of all the ground, and the ground became dark.” (Ex. 10:15) Not only was the land not visible to the Egyptians, but the land itself appears to be blinded from its cover of locusts. This of course foreshadows the ninth plague which limits the sight of the Egyptians even further, with darkness so thick that it could be touched. (Ex. 10:21) And Read More >

By Jill Hackell

Parashat Bo is the climax of the story of the Exodus from Egypt. Pharaoh seems on the verge of letting the people go; indeed his courtiers are already convinced that Egypt is lost. Yet, heart-hardened, he refuses permission again, and three more plagues are unleashed – locusts, darkness, and the most terrible plague of all, the death of all the firstborn of Egypt. The remainder of the parashah recounts the events of that night, when the Israelites prepared for their departure from Egypt, and ensures that this pivotal moment of our history will be recorded forever in the collective memory of the Jewish people.

How do we remember? Through signs and symbols, through conscious action, and through retelling. In my family, there is a ring that belonged to my grandfather’s sister, marked with the numbers 1913 (This is a sign). My mother received it when she graduated high school, gave it Read More >

By Boaz Marmon

At first glance, we probably think of Parashat Bo, as a “middle.” It tells the middle of the Exodus story, beginning in the middle of the ten plagues and ending in the middle of the escape from Egypt. Perhaps, on second thought, it’s a tale of “ends”: the end of the plagues, the end of bondage. What’s easy to miss is how much Parashat Bo is about beginnings.

According to the sage Rabbi Yitzchak, as quoted by the Yalkut Shim’oni and famously cited by Rashi as his first comment on the Torah, the Torah need not have begun until the verse “This month shall be your beginning of months; it shall be the first of the months of the year for you,” (Ex. 12:2) which appears around the middle of the middle aliyah of Bo. This is the first command given by God not Read More >

By Barbara Wortman

This D’var Torah is written in memory of my father, Herbert Press (z”l) on the 2nd anniversary of his Yahrtzeit

In this week’s Torah portion, Parashat Bo, we are instructed to observe the festival of Passover, and to tell our children: ‘God did this for me when I went out of Egypt on account of this.’ (Exodus 13:8) In fact, children are mentioned 3 times in connection with the Exodus from Egypt: 12:26-27; 13:8; 13:14. The special connection with children in this parashah emphasizes the things that we do on the night of Passover in order to arouse the inquisitiveness of children. Curiously, the questions asked by the children are set in the future tense, even though the answers refer to the past.

Perhaps, the key to this is found in the Song of Ha-azinu (Deut. 32:7): ‘Remember the days of old, consider the years of many generations; ask your Read More >