Rabbi's Blog

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Dear OZ family,

Today’s date, Nissan 10 is very well represented in early Biblical history. It was the day the Israelites began to prepare for their Passover sacrifice (Shemot 12:3). According to tradition, we left Egypt on a Thursday, in which case this preparation began on a Shabbos. Our ancestors began their departure from Egypt by fastening a ram to posts to prepare for sacrifice. This act of defiance flew right in the faces of their Egyptian tormentors who worshipped the ram, especially in the Springtime, when Aries ruled them from on high. The Israelites would follow up this brazenness by preparing the sacrifice in a way which would be most noticeable to the Egyptians, roasted whole in everyone’s household, for the Egyptians to smell and see. All of this was topped off by the blood of this sacrificed Egyptian god being dabbed on the doorposts and lintels all across the land.

This helped our ancestors extract Egypt from themselves so that they could take themselves out of Egypt. The Nile god, the fertility goddess, Heqt, with the head of a frog, all the Egyptian animal gods, and the sun god, were all diminished and despoiled throughout the Exodus story, in fulfillment of “I will deliver punishments to the gods of Egypt” (Shemot 12: 12). Moshe had originally asked Paroah to perform this ritual three days’ journey into the desert, and when Paroah suggested that they perform it in Egypt, Moshe was sure that if we would sacrifice the gods that the Egyptians worship before their very eyes, they would stone us to death! (Shemot 8:21-23). This was evidently no longer a concern by the time these commands were given. This brazen act of defiance is commemorated on Shabbos Hagadol, and we don’t keep the calendar date so as not to confuse this commemoration with the other two events the 10^th of Nissan remembers.

The second is the death of Miriam. According to tradition, today is Miriam’s yahrzeit. Let us always remember that if not for her there is no Exodus because there is no Moshe. Her role as enabler refreshed us with water in our desert journeys. She saved Moshe in the water and we drank from the well which sprang forth in her merit. For this reason, when she died, the Israelites thirsted (B’midbar 20:1-2). The 10^th of Nissan would therefore also be the day that the decree came forth for Moshe and Aharon to die outside the promised land. The Israelites for whom these three siblings toiled with every fiber of their existence for 40 years would cross over the Yarden exactly one year later to the day , on the 10^th of Nissan, 3,293 years ago (Yehoshua 4:19). This is how we know that Moshe died on the 7^th of Adar. He was mourned for one month (Devarim 34:8), and when the mourning period was over, Yehoshua was told that three days later they would cross into the Promised Land  (Yehoshua 3:2). This backtracks to determine Moshe’s yahrzeit. The third sibling, Aharon is actually the only character in the entire Bible whose yahrzeit is specifically mentioned in the text, Rosh Chodesh Av (B’midbar 33:38).

These are momentous times and today is a momentous date on the Jewish calendar. May the month of Nissan, usher in the hidden miracles from God which come to us every day in  a natural form, and may we continue to merit His salvation.

Stay safe.   Be healthy. Be excellent.

Rabbi Allen Schwartz