Commentaire de citation sur L’Exode 2:21

על אודות האשה הכושית, they wondered why Moses had chosen this point in time to separate from Tzipporah and concluded that it was because she was a Negress (ugly), and they could not understand that he had married her in the first place seeing that she had always been a Negress. A different interpretation of this line: She had been a queen in her land, the land of Kush. This would fit with what we have read in Chronicles that Moses had been a King in that land. At the time, he had to marry a local woman. Now there was no need for him to remain married to a Kushite woman. If this were correct, our verse would not refer to Tzipporah, for the line: “for he had married a Kushite woman,” would not make any sense as Tzipporah was a Midianite woman as we know from Exodus 2,21. The Kushites were descended from Cham, the third son of Noach, and as such were a cursed people, and a Jew would not have married a woman from a cursed nation [although, Keturah, Avraham’s second and last wife, was an Egyptian and therefore also from a cursed nation, as Mitzrayim was the second son of Cham, Kush having been his firstborn (Genesis 10,6) Midian himself was a son of Keturah an Egyptian (Genesis 25,2), and therefore descendant of a cursed nation. Ed.]

אלה הדברים, the words that Moses is about to speak refer to the words that are recorded in this volume of the Torah. Moses will first review the whole Torah, commencing with the revelation at Mount Sinai and the Ten Commandments. In verse 6 we would have expected the verse to begin with the words ויאמר משה, something that is missing here. We do find a similar construction where such an introductory remark is missing when Joseph names his first son Menashe, and the Torah reports that he said: כי נשני אלוקים את כל עמלי, “for the Lord has made me forget all my troubles,” (Genesis 41,51, as well as verse 52 concerning Ephrayim) where we would have expected at least the introductory words כי אמר. The reason that Moses used this introduction was to remind them that not quite a year after that G’d had told the people that they had encamped around Mount Sinai long enough, and that it was time to begin their journey toward their ultimate objective, the Holy Land. This was a pointed reminder that as far as G’d was concerned they had been sufficiently prepared to make war successfully against the Canaanites, whose measure of guilt by then was full, so that the Israelites should have every chance to defeat them. These introductory words continue until 4,40 ושמרת את חוקיו ואת מצותיו אשר אנכי מצוך היום, “you shall observe His decrees and His commandments that I command you this day, to carry them out, etc.” After this Moses called upon the whole nation of Israel that stood assembled before him saying: שמע ישראל וגו', 5,1 and began with a restatement of the Ten Commandments. Having concluded with that restatement, including minor additions, he emphasizes the uniqueness of G’d, i.e.שמע ישראל ה' אלוקינו ה' אחד, “Hear O Israel, the Lord our G’d, the Lord is One,” followed by all the commandments contained in this volume of the Torah. This is the reason why we have the formula here: דבר משה אל כל ישראל that Moses spoke to all of the Children of Israel, and the same formula is used in 5,1 when he is described as calling to all of the Children of Israel when exhorting them to learn and to keep the commandments. It was important that just as 40 years ago at the revelation to the previous generation all the people were assembled, now when the covenant is about to be renewed with a new generation the whole people must be in attendance at that event. When the Torah describes Moses as באר את התורה הזאת “explaining this Torah,” (verse 5) this is a reference to the Torah which the people had already heard from his mouth once before. He now reviews this part of the Torah and in a number of cases expands on it, filling in details not revealed up until now. He emphasized that all of this had been commanded to him by Hashem, i.e. he had not added anything of his own. The meaning of the word הואיל is that the initiative for this review is his own; he had not been told by Hashem to do so. The term is used several times in Scriptures for free-willed agreement, as for instance in Joshua 7,7 ולו הואלנו ונשב בעבר הירדן, “if we had only been willing to remain and settle on the east bank of the Jordan.” When Moses responded to Yitro’s invitation to dwell in his house, his willingness is also described by the word ויואל משה לשבת את האיש, “Moses agreed to dwell with that man.” (Exodus 2,21).

The meaning of et is like the thing itself, yet indicating a direct object, like et hashamayim, and sometimes it is omitted, as in “since G-d created man” [with the direct object indicator missing] – Deuteronomy 4:32. And at times it’s [even] found with the subject, as in “the lion came and et the bear” – Samuel I 17:34, but there are few of these. It can [also] be in place of “with” and in place of ‘from”.