Commentaire sur L’Exode 11:7

לא יחרץ כלב לשנו NO DOG SHALL חרץ HIS TONGUE — I say that it has the meaning of sharpening: “no dog shall whet his tongue”. So, too: (Joshua 10:21) “לא חרץ his tongue against any of the children of Israel”, i. e. “none whetted”; (II Samuel 5:24) “then תחרץ” — then thou shalt utter a sharp sound; (Isaiah 41:15) “a threshing-sledge חרוץ” i. e. sharp; (Proverbs 21:5) “the plans of a חרוץ” — of “an acute and sharp man”; (Proverbs 10:4) “the hand of the חרוצים maketh rich”, i. e. the hand of the acute — of sharp merchants.

ולכל בני ישראל לא יחרץ כלב לשונו, "not a single dog will whet his tongue against any Israelite, etc." Why was this so important? If the meaning of the line is that not a single Israelite would die as a result of a bite by a dog, why did the Torah not spell this out?

לא יחרץ כלב, the angel proceeds to afflict and kill the firstborn of the Egyptians. By contrast, the Jewish firstborn did not even have to endure the barking of a dog.

ולכל בני ישראל לא יחרץ כלב לשונו, “but against all the Children of Israel not a dog will whet its tongue.” (in preparation to giving the alarm) even though the city was full of corpses and it is the custom of the dogs to howl in the presence of corpses, as well as when they hear people walking at night; in fact there is a popular proverb according to which howling of dogs without visible reason, signifies that the angel of death is about. In spite of all this, on this night in Egypt the dogs kept mum.

לא יחרץ כלב לשונו, “not a dog will whet his tongue.” Looking at the plain meaning of the text the Torah appears to compare the plague of the dying of the firstborn to dogs. This is to teach us that at the time wicked people suffer damage the righteous are saved from suffering such damage. This concept is spelled out in Psalms 91,6 “a thousand shall fall on your left and ten thousand on your right, but it shall not reach you.”

V. 7. חרץ, das verstärkte חרש, die Hartes überwindende Schärfe; auf Geschmack übertragen: der eindringende scharfe Geschmack, חריצי חלב: Käse; auf Menschentätigkeit: der Schwierigkeiten überwindende emsige Fleiß: יד חרוצים die Hand der Fleißigen. Kein Hund wird seine sonst so fleißige Zunge in Bewegung setzen. Bis zum Tier hinab wird nicht nur niemand Israel etwas Leides zufügen, nicht einmal eine wenn auch ohnmächtige feindselige Regung, wie das Anbellen eines Hundes, wird gegen sie rege werden. Bis zum Tier hinab wird alles von stillem Respekt vor dem jüdischen Menschen erfüllt sein. Ganz ähnlich heißt es Josua 10, 21 לא חרץ לבני ישראל לאיש את לשונו, und zwar dort nicht bloß vom Hunde.

ולכל בני ישראל לא יחרץ כלב לשונו, “but not a single dog raised his voice against a single Israelite.” This was the miracle; normally dogs alert their owners to the presence of the angel of death in their midst. In this instance, not one of the watch dogs wagged as much as a tail to warn their owners of danger.

לא יחרץ כלב לשונו, “not a single dog will whet its tongue;” it was customary for the dogs to bellow at midnight as midnight was the time when the watches changed as we know from the Talmud in B’rachot folio 3. When the Israelites made ready to leave, each one with his walking stick in his hand, these watchdogs did not raise their voices in protest and gave no alarm.

אשר יפלה meant THAT HE MAKETH A DIFFERENCE.

A Kabbalistic approach: “what does the whetting of a dog’s tongue have to do with the plague of the dying of the firstborn?” It is a well known fact that the dog is a totally materialistically oriented animal which is never satiated. Isaiah 56,11 confirmed this when he said: “moreover the dogs are greedy; they never know satiety.” The greed of the destroyer (Satan) is similarly never satiated. Proverbs 30,15 describes him as הב, הב, “constantly demanding: “give! give!” Seeing that the animal which died of natural causes as well as the one which was torn by wild beasts (נבלה וטרפה) died due to the power of said “destroyer,” the Torah commanded to throw such carcasses to the dogs (compare Exodus 22,30) so that two species of the same category should meet. This is the mystical dimension of our verse here. Seeing that it is the nature of the dog to constantly attack and cause damage, it was appropriate that just as the celestial destroyer (Satan, the angel of death) did not attack the Jewish firstborn so its terrestrial counterpart would not make any threatening noises either. The tongue is characteristic of the original serpent which inflicted its damage upon the world and upon man by the indiscriminate use of its tongue. This is why the tongue of the dog is singled out by the Torah in this connection.
The most concentrated power of the destroyer is emanated to it by the attribute of Justice which killed all the firstborn of Egypt. This attribute is at its most powerful at midnight. This is why the dying of the firstborn had to occur at midnight. The Torah informs you here by inference that the dogs used to bark halfway through the second משמרת, “watch” (out of a total of three) of the night. In other words, it was customary for the dogs to bark at midnight. This was the time when the angel of death would normally reap its harvest in Egypt. Baba Kama 60 states that when the dogs wail it is a sign that the angel of death has arrived at that time. On the other hand, when the dogs make happy sounds it is proof that the prophet Elijah has arrived in that town (in the absence of bitches). We have a further statement in Berachot 50 that the night watch is to be divided into three sections. During the first watch the donkey brays, a sign of the attribute of Mercy, kindness. (The donkey was never mentioned by name until the advent of Avraham who represents the attribute of loving kindness). During the second watch the dogs bark; this is an allusion to the presence of the attribute of Justice. During the third watch a wife engages in intimate talk with her husband and the infant suckles at the breast of its mother. This is an allusion that this is the time G’d arranges the livelihood for every creature at this hour.
Solomon alluded to this in his famous poem אשת חיל (Proverbs 31,10-31). He wrote (verse 15) “she rose when it is still night and supplied provisions for her household and the daily fare for her maids.” The “infant” mentioned in Berachot is a reference to the universe at large, i.e. G’d’s “infant.” The “breast of its mother” is a reference to the conversation between wife and husband. Our verse here tells us that at the same hour when the dogs were barking at the Egyptians, not a single one barked at an Israelite. The Torah added: “in order that you shall know that Hashem will have differentiated between Egypt and Israel.”

Perhaps we should understand this as an allusion to a well known proverb quoted in Baba Kama 60 that when one hears the dogs bark it is a sign that the angel of death is in town. The Torah wanted to tell us that the angel of death did not cause the death of a single Israelite during that night. The Torah added the detail about the dogs not whetting their tongue against Israel as evidence that they did not even attack a Jew. The reason was "so that you shall know that G'd will make a miraculous distinction between Egypt and between Israel."

The word ולכל may also mean that only where the Jews congregated did the dogs not whet their tongues against them because this would prove that no stranger was amongst them. Wherever Jews and Egyptians would mingle the dogs would most certainly bark as proof that the משחית, the angel of death, was active in that environment. What the Torah revealed then is that no trick would save the Egyptian firstborn. If they decided to hide amongst the Israelites the barking of the dogs would reveal their presence (compare Shemot Rabbah 18,2).