וַיֹּאמֶר ה' אֶל מֹשֶׁה נְטֵה יָדְךָ עַל הַשָּׁמַיִם וִיהִי חֹשֶׁךְ עַל אֶרֶץ מִצְרָיִם וְיָמֵשׁ חֹשֶׁךְ. (שמות י, כא)
Rashi on the passuk וַחֲמֻשִׁים עָלוּ בְנֵי יִשְׂרָאֵל מֵאֶרֶץ מִצְרָיִם (שמות יג, יח), in next week's parsha Beshalach, quotes the Midrash (מכילתא, שם) saying that only 1 in 5 of Am Yisrael were redeemed from Egypt and the rest died during the plague of darkness. Rashi quotes the lowest estimate, when in fact the Mechilta debates whether it was 1 in 5, 1 in 50, or 1 in 500. This is discussed at length in the shiur on Bo (2022).
Only 210 years prior, Yaakov and his family of 70 souls descended to Egypt. Only in the last 86 years in Egypt before the Exodus were Am Yisrael subjected to the hardships of real slavery.
Let us try to imagine it in contemporary terms. We are currently in the year 2024 (leminyanam). Imagine if Yaakov Avinu was still alive in 1814 (210 years ago) and the Twelve Tribes were alive until the early 1900's (Levi died 94 years after they descended to Egypt [Seder Olam], the younger siblings, probably a few years after him).
When we try to think of the Gedolim from 200 years ago, certain names spring to mind – R' Chaim of Volozhin, the Chazon Ish, the Chafetz Chaim, etc. all icons of the Jewish world, but they don't come remotely close to Yaakov Avinu and the Twelve Tribes! Imagine if Yaakov Avinu and the Twelve Tribes had been alive a mere 200 years ago, what the level of Yiddishkeit would be like today.
When we think of it in that context, it is absolutely mind blowing when Chazal tell us that before יְצִיאַת מִצְרַיִם Am Yisrael were at the lowest rung of the 49 levels of impurity. If HKB"H had not redeemed them exactly at that point and had waited a few seconds later, they would have been irredeemable.
How is it possible that from the lofty spiritual heights of Yaakov Avinu, in a short 210 years Am Yisrael could descend to the lowest depths our nation has ever reached in history? This is what we will be discussing in this shiur and the framework of the discussion will be contrasting the development of the culture of Am Yisrael and the culture of Ancient Egypt.
Am Yisrael's culture dates back 2448 years prior to the Exodus, to when HKB"H created the world and Adam Harishon. Am Yisrael's culture of belief in HKB"H and the Torah was passed down from Adam to Shet, to Chanoch, to Metushelach, to Noach, to Shem, to Avraham, to Yitzchak, to Yaakov and to the Twelve Tribes and their descendants. This was not a "man-made" culture, but rather the original, Divine culture of the Torah, according to which the world was created by G-d, passed down, unchanged, from generation to generation. It is incredible to think that every year we celebrate Pesach, commemorating an event in our history that happened 3336 years ago. No other culture or nation on earth has anything remotely similar.
When Yaakov descends to Egypt, HKB"H says to him – "Do not fear going down to Egypt, because there I will make you into a great nation!" (Breishit 46,3). Yaakov and Yosef knew what Egypt was – the most depraved culture in the world - and they did their maximum hishtadlut to preserve the integrity of Am Yisrael.
Yosef segregated them from the rest of Egypt by settling them in Goshen. Yaakov sent Yehuda ahead to establish yeshivot in Goshen to study Torah. When Yaakov died, all his twelve sons declared שְׁמַע יִשְׂרָאֵל ה' אֱ-לֹקֵינוּ ה' אֶחָד, the chain was firmly intact.
Things only began to change after Yosef and his generation died. Before his family came to Egypt, Yosef instituted legislation that all Egyptians had to perform בְּרִית מִילָה, otherwise they would receive no food from the State. Yosef did this in order to prevent his family from "standing out" and appearing different to the rest of the Egyptians, but most importantly to preserve the mitzva of בְּרִית מִילָה within Am Yisrael.
Yosef also instituted mass population relocation, moving large sectors of the Egyptian population from one province to another, all over Egypt, for the same reason - that his family would not appear inferior to the Egyptians and be regarded as "new immigrants".
It is not difficult to imagine how the Egyptians must have resented this "draconic" legislation and, although Yosef had saved them from perishing in the famine, they became dispossessed of everything they owned. It is safe to say that as a result of these new realities for the Egyptians, the seeds of "antisemitism" (or more accurately – "anti-Israelism") began to flourish.
When Yosef died, the passuk says וַיָּקָם מֶלֶךְ חָדָשׁ עַל מִצְרָיִם אֲשֶׁר לֹא יָדַע אֶת יוֹסֵף (שמות א, ח). The Gemara (Sota 11a) debates what this means. "Rav says that it was a new king mamash and Shmuel says it was the same king, but his decrees changed". According to the Midrash (Shmot Raba 1, 8), the shita of Shmuel that it was the same king – when the Egyptians began to express animosity toward Am Yisrael, Pharaoh said to them "Yosef fed you and this is how you repay him and his people?"
The people staged an uprising and deposed Pharaoh … for three months - and then reinstated him, the "new Pharaoh" (even back then leadership was based on opinion polls). The first decree he abolished was that the Egyptians had to perform בְּרִית מִילָה, which gives us an idea of what bothered them most.
Paradoxically, while Yosef was trying spare his family ridicule and humiliation, by creating equality between Am Yisrael and the Egyptians - in terms of בְּרִית מִילָה, in terms of immigration status, etc. - he did not anticipate what effect that would have, both on the Egyptians (the resentment), and also on Am Yisrael themselves, who came to consider themselves "equal" to the Egyptians.
The Midrash tells us that when the Egyptians stopped with בְּרִית מִילָה, soon after - so too did Am Yisrael (except for the Tribe of Levi). They did not want to feel different to the Egyptians (Shmot Raba 1, 8).
This is when things took a turn for the worse for Am Yisrael. Until then they were not suffering the hardships of slavery - it all began when they stopped doing בְּרִית מִילָה.
When the slavery and persecution began, slowly but surely all vestiges of Am Yisrael's culture were slowly stripped away. If you want to imagine how that could happen, think no further than Soviet Russia, who enslaved the Jews, exiled them to Siberia, persecuted them and a few decades later, most of the Jews never even knew they were Jewish.
Only the tribe of Levi lived a "privileged" existence (they were not enslaved or persecuted), perhaps because they did not stop performing בְּרִית מִילָה and clung to their culture. As for the rest of Am Yisrael, they descended to the 49th level of impurity.
Despite this, they retained the faint spark of Yiddishkeit in their hearts – they did not change their names to Egyptian names, they didn't change their clothes to Egyptian clothes and they never informed on a fellow Jew. Just like the Soviet Jews, who were totally devoid of any Yiddishkeit – retained the spark in their hearts, which was rekindled when the Iron Curtain fell.
To summarize so far. The deterioration of Am Yisrael in Egypt came about due to a lack of understanding of the principle of הֶן עָם לְבָדָד יִשְׁכֹּן (במדבר כג, ט). Although Yosef did not try to make Am Yisrael the same as the goyim and tried to separate Am Yisrael from the goyim, he tried to make the Egyptians like Am Yisrael. It failed dismally and had the same effect and result as trying to make Am Yisrael like the goyim.
Neither method can work, not forced "conversion" of the goyim to Judaism, and not assimilating Am Yisrael to the culture of the goyim. Both ultimately result in antisemitism and persecution. The only constellation of successful existence for Am Yisrael is via total distinction from the goyim and unwaveringly following our authentic culture of HKB"H and the Torah.
Let us now examine the development of the Egyptian culture.
The Egyptian culture was born around 1660 years after the Creation, when Noach's son Cham gives birth to a boy and names him מִצְרַיִם.
The Yalkut Shimoni (תשמ"ג) says –
כְּשֵׁם שֶׁאֵבָרִים לְאָדָם כֵּן לָאָרֶץ. "וְרֹאשׁ עַפְרוֹת תֵּבֵל", "הִנֵּה כִסָּה אֶת עֵין הָאָרֶץ", "וַתִּפְתַּח הָאָרֶץ אֶת פִּיהָ", "אֶרֶץ אוֹכֶלֶת יוֹשְׁבֶיהָ", "וּמִתַּחַת זְרוֹעוֹת עוֹלָם", "הִנֵּה רַחֲבַת יָדַיִם", "וַיֵּנִקֵהוּ דָּבָר מִסֶּלַע", "יוֹשֵׁב עַל טַבּוּר הָאָרֶץ", וְכוּ.
Just like the human body has different parts and limbs, so too does the earth have a "head", "eyes", "mouth" etc.
The part of the earth that is called עֶרְוָה is Egypt, as it says in the passuk, when Yosef accused his brothers of being spies כִּי עֶרְוַת הָאָרֶץ בָּאתֶם לִרְאוֹת (בראשית מב, יב). The reason Egypt is so named is because it epitomizes depravity, it is the most depraved country on the face of the earth.
The pagan, polytheistic culture of Ancient Egypt believed that there is not one G-d, but many gods, over 1500 in fact. The god of the sun, the god of the Nile, the god of each city, the god of the wind, etc. Animals, such as sheep, bulls, dogs, cats etc. were considered to be manifestations of different gods.
Ancient Egypt was obsessed with death and the afterlife, erecting opulent tombs and pyramids to house the embalmed, preserved remains of the dead. A large emphasis in Ancient Egyptian culture was placed on fertility and overt sexuality, which was regarded as natural and permissible.
If one examines the social, moral and ethical structure of Ancient Egyptian society on an academic level, it is hard to find evidence of the "depravity" hinted to above. Theoretically speaking, the Ancient Egyptian culture in many respects very closely resembles modern Western culture. There are mechanisms for social justice and social harmony, including justice systems for maintaining civil obedience and law, preventing crime, theft, murder, adultery and rape.
In the time of the Avot, Egypt was already established as a world superpower and a haven to flee to in times of famine, as it was considered the "bread basket" of Mesopotamia. The Nile Basin and the desert climate made Egypt the perfect place to grow and store grains. Ancient Egypt was well known for its science, engineering and architecture, which far surpassed other nations. Egypt at the time was considered the most advanced and "enlightened" nation on earth.
However, all this "enlightenment" and seeming "morality" was not real, it was all a sham. From the outside, the Egyptian culture appeared very advanced and enlightened, but in reality, their morality was perverse. The Torah teaches us that the Egyptians had no qualms about stealing a man's wife and killing the husband as a matter of course. This is what Avraham feared with Pharaoh and Sarah.
The Egyptians had no qualms about homosexuality, as the Torah tells us when Potiphar purchased Yosef as a sex slave. Marriage fidelity was only an illusion as we learn from Potiphar's wife trying to seduce Yosef.
Yes, the ancient Egyptians were advanced in "science", in engineering, architecture, technology (including food technology, such as bread baking and beer brewing), art and military power. However, their society and culture was morally corrupt – because it was man-made, it was a culture invented by humans, improvised as they went along.
Paradoxically, the nation (Am Yisrael) with the authentic, Divine culture "forgot" their own heritage and tried to become like the nation with the fake, made-up "on the fly" culture, devoid of any morality or accountability, while the nation with the fictitious/decrepit culture came to regard themselves as the "authentic", "advanced", "ancient" society, culture and morality.
The culture of Am Yisrael is ever gazing upward - elevating our lowly animal nature in spirituality, aspiring for Divinity. The Ancient Egyptian culture was ever sinking downward - embracing one's animal nature, glorifying it and deifying it. It is not difficult to assimilate into a culture that abolishes the guilt of succumbing to one's animalistic nature, it is the path of least resistance. It is not surprising therefore that the vast majority of Am Yisrael did exactly that.
Ironically, if the Egyptians had not persecuted Am Yisrael as they did, we would have most likely disappeared from the stage of history. Like in Egypt and in other instances during the course of our history, it was specifically our persecution that saved us from extinction. Historians may regard it as irony, but it is deeper than that – it is HKB"H looking out for His people and ensuring that we achieve our ultimate destiny.
Many tend to look on the periods of persecution in our history as the dark periods, when in fact they were our salvation. Contrast this with the many periods in our history where we seemingly enjoyed prosperity but were actually in a downward spiral. The prosperity was merely an illusion.
Slavery, the Ten Plagues and יְצִיאַת מִצְרַיִם served a dual purpose. Apocalyptically they reconnected the "nation who had forgotten" to our original, everlasting heritage, and at the same time exposed the "fake nation/culture" for what it really was – a transient illusion.
The pinnacle of the reconnection process for Am Yisrael was during מַכַּת בָּרָד (see shiur on Va'eira 2024). If that plague didn't wake you up, nothing would. It was the last wakeup call for those of Am Yisrael who were on the brink. It woke up 578,000 people in Am Yisrael.
Add to that the 22,000 of the Tribe of Levi (Bamidbar 3, 39) who did not require waking up – makes a total of 600,000 of "reconnected Jews" (actually it is about 5X that - 600,000 were the males between ages 20-60. Add to that the children, the women and the elderly).
The Ten Plagues was a stage-by-stage process of removing any illusions relating to the Egyptian culture. The pinnacle of the exposure was in the last plague, מַכַּת בְּכוֹרוֹת. There is a machloket whether this final plague was called מַכַּת בְּכוֹרוֹת or simply בְּכוֹרוֹת.
According to the opinion it was called מַכַּת בְּכוֹרוֹת, the Yalkut Shimoni (תהילים, קלו) says that when Moshe warned Pharaoh of this last plague, all the firstborn Egyptians ran to their parents and begged them to force Pharaoh to set Am Yisrael free, because they knew they were going to die. Their parents responded "Even if all of Egypt has to die we will not set Am Yisrael free".
The firstborns screamed at Pharaoh to let Am Yisrael go, but Pharaoh forcibly ejected them from the palace. As a result, the firstborns each took a sword and killed their fathers, 600,000 in all, as the passuk (תהילים, קלו, י) says לְמַכֵּה מִצְרַיִם בִּבְכוֹרֵיהֶם כִּי לְעוֹלָם חַסְדּוֹ. The passuk does not say לְמַכֵּה בְּכוֹרֵי מִצְרַיִם but rather that the firstborns killed the Egyptians.
At the end, it was the younger generation of Egyptians who finally woke up, but by then it was too late, their fate had already been sealed.
It is almost impossible to ignore the parallels between the events that occurred 3336 years ago in the Exodus and today, because uncannily, it is like a fast action replay… and we have the enormous privilege to be living through it.
You have a nation with an authentic, Divine heritage that dates back 5784 years, who along the way forgot their heritage. Instead of eliminating us altogether from the stage of history, HKB"H subjected us to persecution, which proved to be our salvation. If the Romans would not have destroyed the 2nd Temple and allowed Am Yisrael to continue to implode as we were with שִׂנְאַת חִנָּם, we would have eventually destroyed ourselves and vanished from the world.
In His mercy, HKB"H demolished the bricks and the stones of the Beit HaMikdash but did not destroy His people. He provided us with the salvation of persecution that has ensured our survival for almost 2000 years. The more we have been persecuted וְכַאֲשֶׁר יְעַנּוּ אֹתוֹ כֵּן יִרְבֶּה וְכֵן יִפְרֹץ, we continue to be indestructible. This is not a historic irony - it is by Divine plan.
After this period of slavery, HKB"H decided to redeem His people, set us free, gather up all the exiles and return us to our ancestral homeland, the land promised to Avraham, Yitzchak and Yaakov. The land of Yehoshua and the Prophets.
The land of King David and Shlomo, where the Beit HaMikdash stood in Jerusalem on Har Habayit for 832 years (briefly interrupted for 70 years in the middle by galut Bavel). The modern "Exodus" also emerged from a darkness, in which we lost a huge chunk of Am Yisrael.
We have for the past 76 years been witnessing the new set of "plagues", not those from the Exodus from Egypt, but rather the "plagues" of redemption, unleashed on the nations just prior to the Geulah. These are increasing in intensity and have the same purpose as they did back then – to strip away all the illusions and expose all the fake cultures, religions and moralities of the goyim for what they are - man made, made up as you go. They may masquerade as being "enlightened", "advanced", "technological", "moral", "humane" from the outside, but underneath they are rotten and fake.
The most recent fake culture to emerge on the world stage is that of the "Palestinian Nation", a fiction invented by people of my generation (or slightly older) for the next generation of youngsters who have no heritage – because there is no heritage. There is no history of a "Palestinian Nation" in this tiny strip of land.
From 70CE until 1948CE it has been a repetitious saga of conquest after conquest by different nations, Persians, Byzantines, Omayyads, Abbassids, Carmathians, Egyptians, Byzantines, Turks, Crusaders, Saladin, Mongols, Egyptians, Mongols, Ottomans, Napoleon, Turks, British. Each new conqueror dishes out parcels of conquered land to their family and buddies and so on with the next conqueror … ad nauseum.
Ask a "Palestinian" to name a famous "Palestinian" from 200 or 500 years ago! They cannot. The only famous "Palestinian" they can name is Yasser Arafat, the "world famous" guy who invented the concept of hijacking planes. There's a contribution to humanity for you!
They accuse the modern State of Israel of being a concoction of immigrant Jews imported from around the world. The "Palestinian Nation" (referring to the Arab population of Palestine before 1948) is exactly that, a concoction of Arabic speaking people from Egypt, Syria, Iraq, Iran, Turkey, Lebanon, Saudi Arabia, North Africa, etc.
The major difference is that the "concoction of Jews from around the world" are Jews who were kicked out of this strip of land in 70CE after we lived there for an uninterrupted period of 1400 years, in our millions. We are just returning to our land, from which we were exiled, the biblical land of King David and King Solomon.
There is no distinct Palestinian culture or language that is unique to this specific strip of land. The so-called "Palestinian culture" is no different from any other Egyptian/Iraqi/Lebanese/Syrian/etc. Arabic speaking person.
If there is any distinct "Palestinian culture" it is a culture of hate against Jews, in poetry, music and art. That is the Palestinian culture – "Kill the Jew!" taught to their children from age zero!
There is no heritage, so "Palestinian" leaders, like Yasser Arafat and his ilk, who succeeded Haj Amin al Husseini from the 1930-40's (one of Hitler's greatest buddies), invented a heritage of their own, a rewriting and erasure of well documented world history, pumped all over the world via the media funded by mega oil-bucks, pumped via universities from all over the world bought by mega oil/gas-buck countries like Qatar, in "pseudo academic" published papers that perpetuate the fake heritage and give it the legitimacy of "academia".
The "Palestinians" accuse the Jews of trying to dominate the world. Take a look at this map and tell me who is doing a better job of dominating the world –
Now observe an incredible paradox.
The authentic heritage and nation – Israel and Jews around the world, has for the most part forgotten their own culture and heritage. Most Israelis and Jews around the world do not have the faintest clue what the history of this strip of land is, not even in the last 150 years! All they know is what happened since 1948 and what the fake world media is pumping out.
The fake "nation" and "culture" – the "Palestinians" have completely and wholeheartedly embraced their fictional heritage invented by delusional, psychotic individuals. Try tell an Arab youngster today in Hebron/Ramallah/Nablus/Jenin etc. anything different to what they have been brainwashed with since age zero. It is impossible. They have accepted the lies as gospel. None of them know any history older than 100 years ago, because that is when their history began.
Similarly with all the other fake, man-made cultures and religions, which predate the "Palestinian" one above, but are no less fictitious. There is no way to dispel all the lies regarding אוֹתוֹ הָאִישׁ, the one from Nazareth and also the one from Mecca. It has been so repeatedly pumped from age zero and for such a long time, it has become gospel. Believing a lie does not make it true.
It is beyond our mortal power to dispel the lies now. Only HKB"H can do that and He is doing exactly that.
One by one, all the lies are being exposed for what they are, all the nondescript, clandestine players who until now have enjoyed the protection of the shadows, are beginning to emerge into daylight and are being spotlighted for all to see. The world is becoming a clearer place. That is Geulah in action.
The younger generation is inevitably going to have to admit the truth. The older generation never will. The younger generation will confront their parents and ask "Why did you feed us lies all these years? Recant. Make it right!" The older generation never will. The younger generation will rise up against them, but it will be too late, because their fate has already been sealed, just like it was in Egypt 3336 years ago. It hasn't happened yet, but it will. Very soon.
All those who created the lies, perpetuated the lies, lived the lies and refuse to recant - will be lost. Only those who accept the truth will remain. וְהָיָה ה' לְמֶלֶךְ עַל כָּל הָאָרֶץ בַּיּוֹם הַהוּא יִהְיֶה ה' אֶחָד וּשְׁמוֹ אֶחָד (זכריה יד, ט).
Shabbat Shalom
Eliezer Meir Saidel
Machon Lechem Hapanim
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