Comentários de Citação sobre Josué 24:12

רק את המות הזה, “only this death.” This teaches that human beings also died during the plague of locusts, just as they had died from the effects of the hail. Perhaps the locusts caused them to become blind as a result of which they were prone to have fatal accidents. In the days of Joshua it is reported that the affliction of the skin disease called tzoraat caused blindness (Sotah 36). Alternatively, the reason that Pharaoh referred to this plague as “this death,” was that seeing the hail had killed the crops, the earth and the fruit, the locust finished what was still left over. As a result Pharaoh was correct in describing the situation in Egypt now as one of “this death.” The Torah adds the word רק, “only,” as a hint that the way he felt about things was temporary. As soon as there would be relief he would undergo a change of heart. What appeared to him as hopeless at this moment would suddenly assume a totally new dimension. He would think that he had survived the worst that the Jewish G’d was able to do to him. He revealed his eventual change of mind by asking that Moses entreat G’d “only at this moment.” He implied that there would not again come a time when he needed Moses’ intercession.

ואני, and what I say to you now refers to that land, נתתי לך, I have assigned to you, שכם אחד, a share על אחיך, over and beyond the shares which you will divide with your brothers in territory which I and my offspring will conquer from the Emorite in the future with my sword and bow, (in the wars conducted by Joshua). [The author, whose exegesis of the past tense used in Yaakov’s statement is most remarkable, now deals with possible objections that could be raised against his interpretation of Yaakov’s words. Ed.] Even though it is written in the Book of Joshua 24,12 לא בחרבך ולא בקשתך, “not with your sword nor with your bow (did you drive out the Emorite, but because G’d sent scorpions and the like against these people,” this verse does not contradict what Yaakov said here. Firstly, these scorpions did not cross the river Jordan, so how can we understand Joshua quoting G’d as saying “I have sent the scorpions ahead of you to drive out the two Kings of the Emorite, etc.” (same verse)? When reading the words quoted in Joshua before, we must put the stress on the pronoun endings of the words בחרבך בקשתך, i.e. “your sword, your bow. Joshua meant that although on the face of it appeared that your prowess with the sword and bow accounts for your successful conquest, your success was due to the merit of your ancestor Yaakov. The effect of that merit was equivalent to the effect of well trained archers and swordsmen using their physical weapons.

When Yaakov said: לקחתי, “I will take or I took,” he did not refer to his own person but to the extension of himself, his children or offspring. The same is true also when he said: ובחרבי ובקשתי, “and with my sword and with my bow.” He referred to the sword and bow used by the members of the tribes of Ephrayim and Menashe in the conquest during the days of Joshua. Although we read in the Book of Joshua 24,12 לא בחרבך ולא בקשתך, that Joshua is reminding the Jewish people that their victory was not due to their prowess in the martial arts, our sages already explained that Joshua did not mean to deny the facts, but to deny faulty interpretations of the facts, by not giving the credit for their success to G’d’s help, or in this case, for the assistance of the merit of their illustrious ancestor Yaakov. This is not the only time in Scripture that we encounter such apparently enigmatic statements. We read in Samuel II 22,3 that David speaks of G’d being “my shield, my fortress and my refuge.” Any fool can understand that David did not consider G’d as an invisible shield, seeing he had refused to use one in his fight against Goliath, for instance. He indicated that without G’d’s help, even if holding a shield in his hand, such a shield would have been powerless to protect him.

הצרעה THE HORNETS — This is a kind of insect which wounded their eyes and injected poison in them, so that they died. The hornets did not cross the Jordan and the Hittite and the Canaanite whom Scripture mentions here as being driven out by them were the inhabitants of the land of Sichon and Og (on the east side of the Jordan). It is for this reason that Scripture enumerates here of all the seven nations that Israel fought against when entering Palestine only these two (cf. Joshua 24:12, where the text expressly states that the peoples driven out by the hornets were those of שני מלכי האמרי, “of the two kings of the Amorites” who are identical with Sihon and Og). But the Hivites lived on the other bank of the Jordan and somewhat beyond it and yet it states here that the hornets would drive them out! They were indeed driven out by the hornets, for our Rabbis have explained in Treatise Sotah 36a that the hornets placed themselves on the east bank of the Jordan and from there cast the poison against them.