Commento su Esodo 12:42

ליל שמרים IT WAS NIGHT OF WATCHING [UNTO THE LORD] — a night which the Holy One, blessed be He, was watching for and looking forward to, that He might fulfill His promise להוציאם מארץ מצרים TO BRING THEM OUT FROM THE LAND OF EGYPT.

IT WAS A NIGHT OF WATCHING UNTO THE ETERNAL FOR BRINGING THEM OUT FROM THE LAND OF EGYPT. The verse is stating that from the time He decreed the exile upon them, He observed the matter that He bring them out on that night once the end had come, for I will hasten it in its time.³¹⁴Isaiah 60:22. It may be that the verse, It was a night of watching unto the Eternal, means that He was watching and looking forward to the night when He would bring them out from the land of Egypt, for the Holy One, blessed be He, looked forward to the time when they would merit to be brought out therefrom.
Now if we are to say [as Rashi did, quoted in the commentary on Verse 40], that the [period referred to in] the verse, that thy seed shall be a stranger in a land that is not theirs,²⁹⁹Genesis 15:13. And they shall serve them, and they shall afflict them four hundred years. begins from the time that Abraham had seed, and that the reckoning [of the four hundred and thirty years] begins from the birth of Isaac, you will find that they stayed in Egypt two hundred and forty years, according to the explanation we mentioned.³¹⁵Thus: Isaac was sixty years old when Jacob and Esau were born (Genesis 25:26). When he stood before Pharaoh, Jacob was one hundred and thirty years old (ibid., 47:9). We thus have one hundred and ninety years since the birth of Isaac. Deduct them from the sum of four hundred and thirty, and you have two hundred and forty years remaining for the stay in Egypt. But this too in my opinion is not correct according to the plain meaning of Scripture, since all the days of Abraham cannot be counted as exile with respect to his seed.
The correct interpretation is that He was saying to Abraham “that thy seed shall be a stranger in a land that is not theirs … four hundred years²⁹⁹Genesis 15:13. And they shall serve them, and they shall afflict them four hundred years. from this day on.”³¹⁶I.e., from the time of the “covenant between the parts.” According to Ramban, who is now following the simple meaning of Scripture, this covenant took place after Abram had left Haran when he was seventy-five years old or thereabout. Thus at the time of the covenant, Abraham was about eighty years old, and not seventy, as we reasoned before according to Rashi. (See beginning of Verse 40.) The purport thereof was to tell him: “your children will not immediately inherit this land which I give them, but instead they will be strangers like you were, in a land not theirs [for a period of] four hundred years and more. They will not return here till the fourth generation³⁰⁸Genesis 15:16. when four hundred and thirty years will be completed.” But if so, then their stay in Egypt lasted about two hundred and twenty years or thereabouts.³¹⁷According to Ramban’s interpretation, Abraham was about eighty years old at the time of the covenant. (See Note above). It was twenty years from then until Isaac’s birth, since Scripture states that Abraham was one hundred years old when Isaac was born. Isaac was sixty years old when Jacob was born, and when Jacob stood before Pharaoh, he was one hundred and thirty. Thus we have two hundred and ten years. Deduct them from four hundred and thirty, and you are left with two hundred and twenty, which is the length of time they stayed in Egypt. Now if the numerical value of the word ‘r’du’ (get you down) thither,³¹⁸Genesis 42:2. These were Jacob’s words to his sons upon sending them to buy food in Egypt. He did not use the word l’chu (go you), but r’du (get you down), because the numerical value of the word r’du is two hundred and ten. There was thus an allusion here to the time the Israelites would stay in Egypt. [which is two hundred and ten], be an established tradition in Israel, it is possible that [Jacob, by using the word r’du], alluded to those who arrived in Egypt that after Jacob’s death they would stay there two hundred and ten years. With the seventeen years that Jacob lived in the land of Egypt,³¹⁹Genesis 47:28. their stay altogether totalled two hundred and twenty-seven years.
And I have already mentioned³²⁰Ibid., 15:13 (in Vol. I, Seder Lech Lecha, p. 203). the explanation of Rabbi Abraham ibn Ezra that the expression, that thy seed shall be a stranger, means “in servitude and affliction until the end of a four-hundred year period commencing from this day of the covenant.” And Ibn Ezra further said that the thirty additional years [mentioned here in Verses 40-41] represent the time that elapsed between Abraham’s departure from his country³²¹I.e., his native country, Ur of the Chaldees. From there he went with his father to Haran, where they stayed five years, and then Abraham left for the land of Canaan. He was then seventy-five years old. Twenty-five years later when Isaac was born, the thirty year period, commencing from the time he left Ur of the Chaldees, was thus completed (Ibn Ezra). [and the day of the covenant]. Accordingly, the explanation of the verse here is as follows: “Now the time that the children of Israel dwelt in Egypt until the end of the period when they and their ancestors were strangers in a land not theirs, was four hundred and thirty years.”
I maintain further that the most lucid explanation of all is that we say that the decree of the four-hundred year period, [as mentioned in Genesis 15:13], is to be reckoned from that day [of the “covenant between the parts],” as we have mentioned, and these thirty additional years — [in Verses 40-41 here] — were due to the sin of that generation. If exile and affliction are decreed upon a person for a year or two because of his sin and he will fully continue to add to his transgressions, exile and visitation of seven times³²²See Leviticus 26:28. the original magnitude will be his lot; his first punishment is no guarantee against his being punished for the additional sin he committed. Now it had been decreed upon Abraham that his children would be strangers in a land not their own [for a period of] four hundred years, and that they will not return until the fourth generation, for the iniquity of the Amorite is not yet full.³⁰⁸Genesis 15:16. Abraham was given no assurance [concerning the precise ending of the exile], except in the promise, And afterward they will come out with great substance,³²³Genesis 15:14. and that [“afterward”] could be immediately [after the four-hundred year period] or some subsequent time. Even that promise was given conditionally, as He said, And also that nation, whom they shall serve, will I judge; and afterward shall they come out with great substance,³²³Genesis 15:14. meaning that He will bring them to judgment to determine whether they did to Israel in accordance with their deeds and as was decreed upon them.³²⁴For fuller explanation of this point, see Vol. I, pp. 204-205. Besides, no assurance is immune to annulment because of subsequent sin unless it is accompanied by an oath. And it is a known fact that the Israelites in Egypt were wicked and exceeding sinners, having also done away with circumcision, as it is written, And they rebelled against Me, and would not hearken unto Me; they did not every man cast away the detestable things of their eyes, neither did they forsake the idols of Egypt; then I said I would pour out My fury upon them in the midst of the land of Egypt.³²⁵Ezekiel 20:8. Again it says, And put away the gods which your fathers served beyond the River, and in Egypt, and serve ye the Eternal.³²⁶Joshua 24:14. It was for this reason that He prolonged their exile for thirty years.
In fact, it should have been prolonged even more, but on account of their cries and many prayers, [it was shortened to thirty years]. This is the sense of the verses: And the children of Israel sighed by reason of the bondage, and they cried, and their cry came up unto G-d;³²⁷Above, 2:23. And G-d heard their groaning,³²⁸Ibid., Verse 24. And now, behold, the cry of the children of Israel is come unto Me.³²⁹Ibid., 3:9. And it further states, And we cried unto the Eternal, the G-d of our fathers, and the Eternal heard our voice, and saw our affliction, and our toil, and our oppression,³³⁰Deuteronomy 26:7. since they did not deserve to be redeemed on account of the end [of the four-hundred year period], but only because He accepted their cry and their groaning on account of the great agony they were in, as I have explained in Seder V’eileh Shemoth.³³¹Above, 2:25. Why should the earlier scholars — [i.e., Rashi and Ibn Ezra] — find it difficult to explain that their exile was prolonged after the end [of the four-hundred year period] by thirty years, when on account of the sin of the spies their stay in the wilderness was later prolonged forty years!³³²Numbers 14:34. Those forty years were indeed an affliction to them, as Scripture states, And thou shalt remember all the way which the Eternal thy G-d hath led thee these forty years in the wilderness, that He might afflict thee.³³³Deuteronomy 8:2. And it further says, And He afflicted thee, and suffered thee to hunger.³³⁴Ibid., Verse 4. Thus they were subject [in the wilderness] to complete exile in a land given over to serpents, fiery serpents, and scorpions,³³⁵Ibid., Verse 15. and the promise, And in the fourth generation they shall come back hither,³⁰⁸Genesis 15:16. was not fulfilled in them, since during those forty years, that generation surely passed away after the [fifth] generation was already born. Thus the sins caused all delays.
It is possible that this [delay of the thirty years] was on account of the children of Ephraim who went out [from the land of Egypt] thirty years before the coming of Moses our teacher, and as our Rabbis have mentioned.³³⁶Sanhedrin 92b. They reckoned [the end of the four-hundred year period from the time it was declared to Abraham], and they made no error, but his own iniquities shall ensnare the wicked.³³⁷Proverbs 5:22. In other words, the children of Ephraim were accurate in their reckoning. However, they failed to know that on account of the sins of the generation, thirty years had been added to the length of the bondage. And may the Holy One, blessed be He, forgive us all sin and error.