Musar sobre Êxodo 1:22

There is an interesting Midrash on Psalms 2,2, יתיצבו מלכי ארץ, "The kings of the earth will take their stand, and regents will intrigue together against G–d and His anointed." Rabbi Berechyah quotes Rabbi Levi as saying that the wicked are cursed, since they conspire against Israel. Each one claims to outdo the other in his devious plot. Esau describes Cain as having been foolish, since he killed Abel during Adam's lifetime, enabling Adam to replace Abel with other children. He, Esau was going to wait to kill Jacob until after his father had died and Jacob could no longer be replaced by Isaac siring any other children (Genesis 27,41). Pharaoh considered Esau as having been foolish, since he had overlooked the fact that while he waited, Jacob himself had a chance to sire many children, thus ensuring survival of the Jewish nation. He, Pharaoh, would not go about in in this way, but he would kill the Jewish males as soon as they emerged from their mother's womb (Exodus 1,22). Haman, on the other hand, considered that even Pharaoh had been foolish, since the latter had not realised that when the Jewish girls would marry they would multiply, the children being considered Jewish in Jewish law. Hence he decreed death for all Jews (Esther 3,13). In the future Gog and Magog will consider all former enemies of the Jews as having been fools for having ignored the fact that the Jews have a Patron in Heaven who may come to their rescue. Hence Gog and Magog plan to first contend with said Patron of the Jews, i.e. G–d, and only afterwards to attack Israel itself. This is why the verse in Psalms we quoted, reads "against G–d and His Messiah." G–d is reported as smiling, saying to Gog and Magog that their undertaking is both foolish and arrogant, since they have no idea how heavily outnumbered they will be when G–d employs His lightning, etc. After all, it is written (Isaiah 42,13): "G–d will go forth like a warrior, like a fighter. He will awaken His jealousy like a man of war." It also says (Zachariah 14,9) that "G–d will be king over the entire universe" (after having battled Gog and Magog).

On the verse "There was famine in the land" (12,10), Nachmanides writes as follows: Abraham descended to Egypt on account of the famine, in order to spend some time there to keep alive during the drought, and the Egyptians oppressed him by robbing him of his wife. G–d took revenge on them by striking them with great afflictions and G–d led Abraham out from there with livestock, silver and gold. Pharaoh even ordered his men to make sure that Abraham would depart. Abraham's experience was repeated when Jacob and family descended to Egypt to escape the famine in Canaan, when they were eventually oppressed and the Egyptians separated them from their wives. The Israelites were eventually liberated but only after the Egyptians had been smitten with many plagues. Everything that their patriarch Abraham experienced, his descendants experienced on a national scale. The whole matter is explained by Rabbi Pinchas in the name of Rabbi Oshiyah in Bereshit Rabbah 40,6 who has G–d tell Abraham that he should pave the way for his descendants, and that as a result you find that Abraham's experiences foreshadowed those of his descendants. Example: Abraham experienced famine and moved to Egypt; Joseph told his father Israel that there would be five more years of famine (Genesis 45,6).