Еврейская мысль к Шмот 1:22

Since it is the duty of the father or husband to provide basic needs for his wife and children, a wife and children who have been abandoned do not normally make the first move in an effort at reconciliation. If, as in this case, the wife has care of her husband's children and is under the protection of a highly placed father, she has even less reason to seek out her errant husband. Lost objects do not as a rule chase after their owner. Tzipporah, it seems, had ample reason to feel the aggrieved party. Even if the wife is consumed by love for her husband and initiates the conciliatory moves, her father does not need "to lose face" by running after his son-in-law. (1) Yitro overcame all those feelings because he recognised the great and altruistic nature of Moses’s preoccupation with his people. Therefore, he decided not to stand on ceremony. Possibly, G-d had helped along in framing his state of mind so Moses’s family as well as Yitro would have a chance to participate in the revelation at Mount Sinai. Alternately, surely Moses would not have sent for them in time for the revelation at Mount Sinai. Our verse then reiterates the position of Yitro to tell us that in spite of his eminence, he made the first move in reuniting Moses and Tzipporah. (2) Since, after the Exodus, the reason for Moses to have temporarily abandoned his family at Aaron's behest had disappeared, the Torah mentions this fact to give an additional reason why reunion at this time was particularly opportune. Although this would have provided additional reason for Moses to make the first move, Yitro did not wait for this. (3) The reason it says "and the name of the one is Eliezer," is because normally Moses’s firstborn should have been called by that name, as a sign of gratitude for G-d having saved Moses from Pharaoh. Since at the time of Gershon's birth however, Moses was still in danger- a warrant being out for him,- he could not name Eliezer until G-d had told him that all his enemies had died already. Athough both Yitro and Tzipporah had waived any injured pride they might have felt, they were not certain of their welcome. Therefore, in the first instance, Tzipporah and her sons came to "the desert in which Israel was encamped," and only Yitro approached Moses (6) right away to find out how Moses felt about them. The enquiries after each other's welfare could only take place later. Once having ascertained that both he and Tzipporah were welcome, an official reception was arranged. According to our sages, the initial meeting was either by letter or intermediary. (2) The report about what G-d had done for Israel, is added to show that Yitro rejoiced in the new found freedom of the Jewish people. Also, of course, he recognised the "tit for tat" kind of G-d’s justice that had been at work in visiting retribution on Egypt. This added to the awe Yitro felt when he contemplated the might of the G-d of Israel. (7+8) It is extremely unlikely that Yitro's observations made "on the day after" refers to the day after the Day Of Atonement. More likely the reference is to the day after Yitro had arrived. All this was before matan Torah, the revelation at Mount Sinai, a time when Torah laws had not yet been promulgated. (11) Therefore, Moses’s personal judgment was essential in arriving at decisions, and the long line up is understandable. It would have been impossible for Moses to find a multitude of judges whose objectivity etc. could be assumed, and who had not received guidelines other than to consult their consciences. To win acceptance, Moses needed to explain the reasons for his decisions. Had Torah legislation existed already, it would have been so much simpler. All Moses would have had to do would have been to quote the Torah commandment in question. (9) When Yitro observed all this, he told Moses that his scrupulous efforts to win over both litigants to accept his judgment would prove counter productive, would tire him out and create impatience among all those who had to wait in line all this time. They would all become short tempered, the opposite of the objective of settling disputes. (10) Yitro's suggestion was that Moses should ask G-d for guidelines "and the Lord will be with you," so that he would only have to act as a mouthpiece and supervisor over what the other judges who would be taught the guidelines would judge. Yitro expressed his conviction that his advice was so sound that "and the Lord will command you," surely G-d would issue an order in line with what he had suggested. When Moses listened to his father-in-law, he in fact accepted the suggestion to ask G-d for the requisite legislation. Since Yitro's advice could not be carried out till after matan Torah when the (12) legislation would have been received and the people could have been trained, (all while encamped around the mountain, i.e. 11 months) Yitro remained with the Jewish people until all his suggestions had been implemented. The report in Parshat Behalotcha as well as the one in Parshat Devarim are then all in keeping with this interpretation. Although, of course, Torah existed long before Yitro had been born, according to our principle that a meritorious act is rewarded by benefits accruing to others through the merit of the person carrying out that meritorious deed, Yitro became the catalyst for Torah to be revealed at this juncture. We can now well understand that a whole Parshah has been named after him.

You lived in the time of Moses, and you were numbered among the advisers of ‎Pharaoh. Did ‎you ‎lift a finger when Pharaoh issued his evil decree that “Every son that is born you shall ‎cast into ‎the ‎river” (Exodus 1:22), or when the oppressors enslaved your brethren with back-‎breaking ‎work? ‎You were silent then and did not protest, for you were afraid of identifying ‎yourself with ‎the ‎unfortunate slaves. To toss them a coin? Yes; but to publicly demonstrate for ‎them? No! You ‎were ‎afraid that you would be accused of dual-loyalty.‎

The Torah has always taught that a man is permitted, indeed, has a sacred obligation, to ‎defend ‎himself. With the verse, “If a burglar is caught in the act of breaking in” (Exodus 22:1), the ‎Torah ‎establishes the halakhah that one may defend not only one’s life but his property as well.⁷ If ‎the ‎thief who comes to take the property of the householder is capable of killing the ‎householder ‎‎(should the householder not comply with his demands), the householder may rise up ‎against the ‎criminal and kill him. For good reason the Torah relates that two of its great heroes, ‎Abraham and ‎Moses, took sword in hand to defend their brethren: “And when Abraham heard ‎that his kinsman ‎was taken captive, he led forth his retainers” (Genesis 14:14). “And when Moses ‎saw the Egyptian ‎smite a Jew … he struck down the Egyptian” (Exodus 2:11–12). This behavior ‎does not contradict ‎the principle of loving-kindness and compassion. On the contrary, a passive ‎position, without self-‎defense, may sometimes lead to the most awesome brutality. “And I will ‎gain honor from Pharaoh, ‎and all his hosts, his chariots, and his horsemen. And the Egyptians will ‎know that I am the Lord” ‎‎(Exodus 14:17–18). God did not seek honor and recognition. He wanted ‎Pharaoh, Moses’ ‎contemporary, to know that he must pay a high price for his edict that “Every ‎male child born shall ‎be cast into the river” (Exodus 1:22). His present desire is that the blood of ‎Jewish children who ‎were slain as they recited the eighteen benedictions of the daily [Amidah] ‎prayer shall also be ‎avenged. When God smote the Egyptians, He sought to demonstrate that ‎there will always be ‎accountability for the spilling of Jewish blood. At present, it is necessary not ‎only to convince the ‎dictator of Egypt [Nasser], but the self-righteous Nehru, the Foreign Office in ‎London, and the ‎sanctimonious members of the United Nations, that Jewish blood is not cheap. ‎Therefore, how ‎laughable it is when they try to persuade us to rely on the declaration of the three ‎Great Powers ‎guaranteeing the status quo. We all know from experience what value can be ‎attached to the ‎pronouncements of the British Foreign Office and the so-called friendship of ‎certain officials in our ‎State Department. In general, how absurd is the request that an entire ‎people be dependent on ‎the kindnesses of others and remain without the ability to defend itself. ‎Public and private honor is ‎dependent upon the possibility of defending one’s life and one’s honor. ‎A people that cannot ‎defend its freedom and tranquillity is neither free nor independent. The third ‎of the phrases of ‎Divine redemption is “And I shall redeem you with an outstretched hand and ‎with great ‎judgments” (Exodus 6:6).Thank God we have lived to see the day when, with the help ‎of God, ‎Jews have it within their power to defend themselves.‎