There’s a little section in this parasha that is very, very, very curious. Strange. After seven days of arguing that he doesn’t want to go, Hashem finally sets Moshe Rabbeinu right, and he is on his way to Mitzrayim. He’s on the road. He’s at a hotel. And Hashem meets him and wants to kill him.
Now, this little section has a lot of mefarshim (commentators) on it and a lot of midrashim (rabbinic interpretations). There’s a lot to talk about, and I’m not going to be able to deal with it exhaustively. But I just want to point out a few things in Peshuto shel Mikra (plain meaning of Scripture), in the parasha—a peshat (plain meaning) of what the parasha says. Some insights, perhaps.
The first thing is, Hashem meets him. That’s a very strange expression. It’s like a chance meeting: “Oh, fancy meeting you here”—HaKadosh Baruch Hu meeting Moshe Rabbeinu. Whenever we talk about HaKadosh Baruch Hu meeting somebody, right? And then Hashem wants to kill him. If Hashem wants to kill him, kill him. What do you mean, Hashem wants to kill him? Right? A very strange expression. And then what happens? Tzipora goes and gives a bris milah (covenant of circumcision) to the son, and everything’s taken care of. Everything’s fine. What’s happening here? Perhaps, in Peshuto shel Mikra, we can take a partial lesson from what’s happening here. There’s a lesson here in life.
You know, we have jobs to do. We have things that we’re supposed to be doing. And then we find ourselves just wandering. HaKadosh Baruch Hu meets us. HaKadosh Baruch Hu says, “Wow! Fancy meeting you here. What are you doing here? I thought you were going someplace. I thought you were doing something.” And that happens to us very often in life. And we have to stop and say, “Wait a minute. Hey! What am I doing here?” Hashem says, “You’ve got a job to do. You’ve got a life in front of you. Are you doing what you’re supposed to be doing?” Stop and think. Stop and think. Are you going in the right direction? Are you doing the right things? HaKadosh Baruch Hu is saying, “Take stock. Think about what you’re doing. Think about what you’re supposed to be doing.” Tzipora takes the situation at hand and does a mitzvah (commandment), and that saves everything.
You know, sometimes we’re in a place where we don’t know: should we be there? Shouldn’t we be there? Do we have to be there for some reason? We’re a little bit aimless. But we can go ahead and save the situation. We can turn it into a positive situation. Go ahead and say, “Wow, I’m going to make something positive out of it.” I had an uncle, zichrono livracha (of blessed memory), who used to have family meetings. This uncle was a big-time chacham (wise scholar), and he used to take me aside and say, “Ah, the family is—they’re involved with their own things. Let’s sit down. Tell me what you’re learning. Let’s sit down and talk about it.” You take a situation that can be just not going anywhere, but, wow, you can go do something positive, change it all topsy-turvy, and make it into a positive situation.
So the lessons, perhaps, are that we’ve got jobs to do. Every once in a while, we find ourselves saying, “I’m wandering.” We have to remember that G-d is saying to us, “Where are you going? What are you supposed to be doing?” We have to think about it, especially if you have important things to do. Further, if we are in such a situation, we can do something about it. Make it positive! Do something good! And you can turn a situation that was pareve (neither meat nor dairy) or worse into one that is kosher (ritually fit) and mehadrin (strictly kosher standard). You can make it a good situation. Just do something. Do something. And that’ll make all the difference. Have a good Shabbat. Shabbat Shalom.