Omnipotence: Aaron’s Staff vs. Egypt’s Magic I P’ Vaerah

What’s said in this shiur

The opening of this shiur, in Rabbi Aaron L Raskin’s own words — taken from the captions, so names and Hebrew terms may be approximate.

The story of the Exodus and the 10 plagues, the splitting of the Red Sea are all legendary. Many books, many movies have been produced about these tremendous phenomenas. However, this morning we're going to focus on one particular miracle, one particular phenomena, one particular feat that was performed by Aaron. And this will change your entire comprehension and perception of the entire episode. The Torah begins with the words and Aaron threw down his stick and the stick was transformed into a tanim which according to Nashi was a snake. Why is it called here a tanin? And why previously in the story of Moses is it called a snake. They're both a snake. What's the difference between and furthermore what exactly happened here? The Torah tells us God tells Moses and Aar, I want you to go to Pharaoh and tell him let my people go. But before that, you shall perform the following sign. He shall take the staff of Aron and throw it to the ground. He's going to turn into a snake. Now the other magicians and necromancers of Egypt will follow suit. They too will throw their staffs and make them into snakes. But there's one catch and that is after they return back into their staffs. The staff of Aaron will now swallow up all of their staffs. Now according to the medish, it wasn't simply one or two magicians or necromancers. There were hundreds that came up before Pharaoh to prove that they too can make this miracle. And after they returned back into a staff, our own staff swallowed all the other staffs up. The med says that there was enough to make at least 10 bundles of staffs of all of the sticks that the magicians of Pharaoh performed.

Jump to a moment

1. 0:00The story of the Exodus and the 10 plagues, the splitting of the Red Sea are…
2. 2:35So much so says the Medish that Pharaoh was shivering. He was fearful of his life.…
3. 5:20this was aim many miracles took place. It wasn't simply that their hands became boils. There…
4. 7:56to go. Moses says, "However, they will not believe in me." So now Moses is blaming…
5. 10:29needed an additional miracle to return it back into the stick. He put his hand into…
6. 13:04they're non-believers. On the contrary, you spoke lash. You spoke like the snake and therefore the…
7. 15:41you begin with the 10 plagues, remind him who is in charge. take the stick and…
8. 18:14limits it and he contracts it. He puts a veil over this light. What do you…
9. 20:50insight that one may derive from the parish is as follows. But we as parents, we…
10. 23:24with the total subservience to almighty God. To end with a short story [clears throat] was…

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