1.19.26 – Questioning the Story

I want to continue with some thoughts from last week's Torah portion, Vaeira ("and He appeared"), to glean some more fundamental life lessons. Here we have the memorable story of Moses and Aaron when they confront Pharaoh. The first time, they throw down the staff (matte) which turns into a serpent (tannin). It eats the other serpents (or swallows them), and then it turns back into a staff (Ex. 7:10–12).

Our intuition, our radar, is sending out signals that there is way more to the story than we are willing to acknowledge. This is not simply something to be understood at face value. There is so much potent symbolism here screaming for our attention, screaming for our interpretation. There is not a lot of interpretation out there—that is the interesting thing. You have to really dig to truly understand the inner meaning of what is going on. So we are going to approach the text like Sherlock Holmes, and we are going to begin with four major questions on just these few verses. Let us revisit the verses again and ask those four questions. With those, let us go much deeper and investigate what is really going on here. What is the Torah trying to reveal to each and every one of us? What are truths that we can conform our lives to? This is why the Torah is infinite, eternal, and has lessons and gems of wisdom for every generation.

This is not one, but two stories that have a theme of staff–serpent–staff. Moses spoke up and said, "What if they do not believe me, do not listen to me, but say, 'The Lord did not appear to you?'" (Ex. 4:1). The Lord said, "What is that in your hand?" He replied, "A rod or staff" (matte). God said, "Throw it on the ground." He cast it on the ground, and it became a snake (nachash), and Moses withdrew from it (Ex. 4:2–3).

Did you notice that the rods (matte) became two different creatures—one a serpent and the other a crocodile? Inquiring minds want to know why.

The first question: Why does the staff (matte) turn into a serpent (nachash) in chapter 4 but turn into a crocodile (tannin) in chapter 7? Are these the same creature? And if so, why does the Torah change the word? If they are not the same creature, why are two different creatures used, since it seems like the exact same sign? Simply put, the first question is: why is there a name change on the type of serpent or snake being used?

The second question has to do with the miracle itself. When it was performed in front of Pharaoh, it was not performed by Moses; it was performed by Aaron. Why? Why all of a sudden is Aaron playing such a dominant role? Why is he acting as the prophet? Why is he the spokesperson? What is the purpose of Aaron suddenly replacing Moses?

The third question is about the magicians of Pharaoh. Who were they, and what was their role in society and in the royal court? Are these magicians? Are they sorcerers? Do they use illusions? Are they part of a priesthood? Do they carry weight and authority in the royal court?

And this last question—the fourth question—is the one that bothers me the most. It gets on my nerves because after the whole magic trick or miracle where Aaron turns the staff into a serpent, it eats or devours or swallows Pharaoh's serpents. But that is actually not what the text says, as we have heard our whole lives. That is the way the stories have been told. The text says something very different. Look at what it says: it is Aaron's staff that swallows the staffs of the magicians, not the serpents:

"For they cast down every man his rod (matte), and they became serpents (tannin); but Aaron's rod (matte) swallowed up their rods (matte)."
(Ex. 7:12)

So, what is going on there? To discover the answer, we have to go back to the beginning—Genesis—where both nachash and tannin are mentioned. The snake, as we all know, is found in the garden as a land animal. The tannin, on the other hand, is created on day five alongside other sea life and is always associated with water (Gen. 1:21). In the Egyptian context, tannin refers to the crocodile—the Nile's supreme predator and the symbol of Pharaoh's power.

So just like that, we are supposed to take everything we have ever understood the story to be—Aaron's serpents versus Pharaoh's magicians' serpents—throw it out, and replace it with a new mental image of crocodiles? Yeppers. And with that wrench in our spiritual engine, we will leave our Sherlock Holmes questioning for another day. But not before we ask two more questions: Why is the word rod or staff (matte) most often translated as "tribe"? What could that possibly mean for us and the ability to swallow up the evil within our modern-day Egypt?

Shalom,
Alan

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