EXODUS X:1-XIII:16

THE PLAGUE OF DARKNESS

The people had to be prepared for the exodus from Egypt. Even the great leader of the Hebrew people, Moshe (Moses), was initially unwilling to undertake the task. He argued that he did not have the facility with words to present convincing arguments before the pharaonic court. It is possible that at the beginning of the mission that God entrusted to him he was not totally possessed of the justice of the cause, because it was difficult for him to convince his people about the benefits of freedom. How could he convince a group of slaves that Matzah, the bread of poverty in an environment of freedom, was preferable to any delicacy in an environment of slavery? 

So, the ten plagues that God sent had a threefold purpose: first, to soften Pharaoh’s “hard heart.” Second, to convince the Hebrews that it was worth giving up the relative “security” of slavery because of the uncertainty and danger they would face in the future. And finally, to make Moshe and Aharon (Aaron) feel more confident in their leadership every day. However, the initial difficulties had to convince themselves that any effort and hardship are justified when it is a question of freedom, the possibility of governing one’s own destiny.

Each of the plagues had this triple purpose, in addition to the demonstration of the weakness and surrender of the Egyptian gods to the Supreme Being; starting with the first, which turned the waters of the Nile River into blood, an element of Egyptian worship. This plague was sobering, for it taught that the one Creator dominated all of nature and there was no force that could oppose Him.  And so on with the other plagues, until we reach the tenth: the death of the firstborn, which directly affected the court of the pharaoh. His firstborn also died on that occasion.

The penultimate plague was darkness. The sun stopped shining for the Egyptians for three days, while the Hebrews enjoyed the fullness of light in their residences.

Rabbi Baruch Epstein, author of Torah Temimah, an extraordinary commentary on the Torah, suggests how this plague should be understood. It should not be forgotten that after the Mabul, the flood, God promised that no change would be made in the order of days, the light would be followed by darkness, regularly, because even the stars and stars had to obey the will of God. How can the phenomenon of darkness be explained? Did the sun stop shining for a period of seventy-two hours? Moreover, the Midrash states that the darkness was “thick”, it did not allow any human movement: people remained “frozen” in their respective places during that period. 

The author of Torah Temimah suggests that God did not modify the behavior of the sun: the phenomenon consisted of a kind of membrane that covered the eyes of the Egyptians and, therefore, they were enveloped in darkness. The “thickness” of the membrane is a likely allusion to the “thickness” of the membranes that prevented them from seeing.

It must be deduced that darkness, the equivalent of ignorance and intolerance, is not the result of the absence of light in the universe. Distrust and fear of the unknown, hatred and rejection of others are the product of individual blindness. When hatred and resentment, antipathy and revenge are allowed to take hold of the mood of society, a membrane is created that hides the light and allows the enmity that leads to aggressiveness to surface.

Just as the freedom that was gained with the exodus from Egypt must be renewed in every generation—and so we were commissioned to celebrate the Seder and remember the bitterness of slavery – in the same way we must remember that there are external plagues that plague humanity, but that the most perverse are those that we cultivate personally, those that spring from intolerance and enmity, when we stop observing the Veahavta lereakha kamokha, when we do not love our neighbor as ourselves, the “great principle” of the Torah according to Rabbi Akiva.

MITZVAH: ORDINANCE OF THE TORAH IN THIS PARSHA

CONTAINS 9  POSITIVE MITSVOT AND 11 PROHIBITIONS

4. Exodus I2:2 Consecrate the months (includes keeping the reckoning of the years and calculating the Hebrew calendar)

5. Exodus I2:6 Ritual Sacrifice of the Passover Offering

6. Exodus I2:8 Eating the meat of the Passover offering (on the night of Nisan 15, the first Passover Seder)

7. Exodus I2:9 Do not eat the Passover offering when it is cooked or insufficiently roasted

8. Exodus I2:10 Do not allow meat to be left over from the Passover offering until tomorrow

Exodus I2:15 Remove from the house all ḥametz (leavened food) 

9. Exodus I2:18 Eating matzah (unleavened bread) on the first night of Passover

10. Exodus I2:19 One should not possess ḥametz during Passover

11. Exodus I2:20 Do not eat foods containing ḥametz during Passover 

12. Exodus I2:43 Do not share the Passover offering  with an apostate Jew

13. Exodus I2:45 Do not share the Passover offering with a partial convert or a Gentile resident, even though he has ceased to worship idols

14. Exodus I2:46 No meat of the Passover offering should be carried  outside the house

15. Exodus I2:46 Not a bone of the Passover offering should be broken 

16. Exodus I2:48 Whoever is not circumcised cannot eat of the Passover offering

17. Exodus I3:2 Sanctify the firstborn in the Land of Israel

18. Exodus I3:3 One should not eat ḥametz on Passover

19. Exodus I3:7 No ḥametz should be seen  on Jewish property during Passover

20. Exodus I3:8 Narrating the events of the Exodus from Egypt

21. Exodus I3:13 Redeeming the firstling from a donkey

22. Exodus I3:13 To break the neck of the first-time donkey, if it was not redeemed