Komentaryong Sumisipi para sa Exodo 1:16

Kiddush is the first of the four cups of wine. The reason for the four cups of wine:
1. The four cups are for the four decrees, which Pharaoh made against the people of Israel.
2. The four promises of redemption in Exodus chapter 6:6-8.
3. There is a passage in Midrash Rabbah 26:1 that relates the four cups to the following verse: "I had no repose, no quiet, no rest and trouble came." (Job 3:26) "I had no repose," refers to Pharaoh's first decree, about which it says, "They embittered their lives." (Ex. 1:14) In response to Pharaoh's first decree, God appointed a redeemer - Miriam. She was named thus because of the bitterness which the Egyptians caused. "I had no quiet," refers to Pharaoh's second decree, "If it is a baby boy you shall kill him." (Ex. 1:16) God appointed a second redeemer - Aaron. He was thus named because he saved the women in pregnancy (herayon - similar to his name, Aharon). "I did not rest," is a reference to the third decree of Pharaoh: "Every baby boy who is born shall be cast into the river." (Ex. 1:22). God appointed third redeemer - Moses, who was thus named, "From the water I drew him out." (Ex. 2:10). "And trouble came," this refers to Amalek of whom it is say, And Amalek came…And Joshua overwhelmed the people of Amalek with the sword." (Ex. 17:8, 13)
Let me explain: The first two explanations are common reasons given for the four cups of wine: Pharaoh's four decrees and the four promises of redemption: "I will free you, I will deliver you, I will redeem you, and I will take you out." The third explanation is unique. The Midrash, based on Job 3, relates the four decrees against Israel to the four parts of the verse from Job. However, for each evil decree there was a redeemer. The four cups, then, were for the four redeemers who took Israel out of the land of Egypt and brought them to the promised land. The Midrash does not make a connection between the cups of wine and the four redeemers but Rabbi Bondi makes the connection by quoting this passage from Midrash Rabbah.

מרכבות פרעה וחילו, “Pharaoh’s chariots and his army.” The “chariots of Pharaoh” are the 600 chariots mentioned in 14,7. The word חילו, “his army,” refers to the שלישים who were manning these chariots. In view of this we would have expected the Torah to have written the following sequence: “He flung into the sea the chariots of Pharaoh and his army whereas his choicest captains drowned in it.” It is possible that the correct interpretation of the verse is: “seeing that the fate of Pharaoh’s chariots had already been determined in the celestial tribunal, they and their captains were bound to drown in the sea.”
Mechilta Beshalach 4 comments on our verse as follows: man is measured by the same yardstick he himself had applied to others. Seeing that Pharaoh had decreed that every Jewish male baby be thrown into the sea, his own chariots and his army were flung into the sea. He had instructed the midwives to look at the birthstool (Exodus 1,16) prior to male babies being born alive; in retaliation many of his soldiers went down in the sea like a stone (אבן).

וְאֶת־עֲמָלֵנוּ. אֵלּוּ הַבָּנִים V’et amalainu - elu habanim, “And our toil - this refers to the sons.” First Pharaoh commanded the midwives, “look at the birthstool: if it is a boy, kill him…” (Ex.1:16) But the midwives feared God and did not do what the King of Egypt commanded. When Pharaoh saw this, he slaughtered many babies each day and bathed in their blood for his leprosy, because his doctors told him that the blood of the baby boys would help him. But doctors don’t work for nothing; they treat the sick with contradictory cures and apply what is generally helpful. We find Isaiah cured King Hizkiyahu, with a cake of figs which is generally helpful even on healthy flesh.¹²⁶Thus, he seems to be saying that doctors don’t really know what they are doing and simply give common sense cures that have nothing to do with the illness. But the illness became worse in the way the doctors treated Pharaoh. When Pharaoh saw that the cure didn’t help, he still didn’t want to reject it without reaching his goal; he wanted to decrease the Israelite nation. Therefore he commanded that every male child be cast into the river. Then, “Catch us the foxes, the little foxes…” (Song 2:15) The Egyptians would enter the Israelite houses with their young children. They would then pinch them and make them cry so that the Israelite children who were hidden would hear the child crying and they would also begin crying - this is the way of infants. The Egyptians would then follow the sound of the children and take them against the parents will and throw them in the river.¹²⁷BT Sota 12a When the Israelite women saw that it didn’t help to hide their children in their homes they would go out and give birth in the fields and hide them in the ground. They would then come and nurse them there. When the Egyptians figured this out, they would plow over the field, as Scripture states, “Plowmen plowed across my back; they made long furrows. ” (Ps. 129:3) God would cause the ones who were most worthy to be redeemed from Egypt were place deep enough until they were at the level of rocks and there they would nurse on honey and oil, as Scripture states, “He fed him honey from the crag and oil from the flinty rock,” (Deut. 32:13)¹²⁸See BT Sota 11b Much of this passage is drawn from Sota.