Never again did there arise in Israel a prophet like Moshe—whom God singled out, face to face, for the various signs and portents that God sent him to display in the land of Egypt, against Pharaoh and all his courtiers and his whole country, and for all the great might and awesome power that Moshe displayed before all Israel.
Devarim 34:10-12
As unusually great as Moshe certainly was, the Jewish tradition does everything possible to keep him human. The fear that we might deify him is real, and wherever possible the Torah prevents such a suggestion.
Perhaps this is why, at the end of Moshe’s life, the Torah recalls how it began. Moshe’s birth and upbringing in Pharaoh’s palace, while highly unusual, was not miraculous. His birth and his childhood were both normal. His curiosity about the people enslaved by Pharaoh led to his rescue of a Jew in distress, resulting in his subsequent flight to Midian and marriage to Tzipporah. The only unsusual event is the encounter with God at the burning bush, but the rest of his life remained within the boundaries of normalcy. That is, until chapter seven in the book of Shemot!
A lesson in genealogy
But just before chapter seven, there is a classic example of how far the Torah goes out of its way to ensure that Moshe will never be deified. While telling the story of how Moshe tried to persuade Pharaoh to let the Israelites go, the Torah suddenly and awkwardly, interrupts the narrative of the Exodus to tell us at great length about the genealogy of Moshe and Aaron![1] We hear about their parents, their aunts, and uncles, and other family relations.
And then, as if we have no clue who Moshe and Aaron are, the chapter ends with: “It was they who spoke to Pharaoh king of Egypt to free the Israelites from the Egyptians; these are the same Moshe and Aaron.”[2]
What is the point of this break? Why do we need their genealogy in the middle of the story? Why repeat that it was Moshe and Aaron who took the Israelites out of Egypt? Don’t we already know that?
The need for normalcy
In a masterly stroke, Rabbi Samson Raphael Hirsch[3] tells us that in these verses at the end of Chapter 6, the Torah puts an end, once and for all, to any possibility of deification of Moshe and Aaron, especially Moshe.
Until this point in the book of Shemot, nothing particularly miraculous has happened. But soon will come the full story of the Exodus—the miraculous plagues, the splitting of the Reed Sea, Moshe’s ascent to the top of Mount Sinai to receive the Aseret HaDibrot (inaccurately translated as the Ten Commandments).
And so, just before this shift in events, the Torah emphasises that both of these incredible men were mere human beings of flesh and blood. They were not born of angels or other heavenly beings. They came from human families.
Until this point, no one could doubt this. After all, Moshe’s and Aaron’s meetings with Pharaoh had completely failed, and even made things worse. But now, with the miraculous departure from Egypt and all the open miracles, people might have believed that Moshe and Aaron had become Divine beings who could no longer be counted among normal men.
Instead, the Torah makes it clear that they were human beings, with parents, uncles, aunts, and family. The men who brought about these miracles were the same Moshe and Aaron as they always were. It was to these people, and not Divine beings, that God spoke.
This does not in any way diminish the greatness of Moshe and Aaron. Not anyone can receive the word of God and become a prophet. Far from it. Only those who have worked on themselves for years and transformed themselves through many struggles and tribulations, as Moshe and Aaron did, can perhaps achieve some spiritual greatness. But even so, they never become Deities.
In a cutting observation, Rabbi Hirsch adds:
We know well enough how, in later times, a Jew whose genealogical table was not available—and because it was not available and because he brought the world a few sparks of light borrowed from the man Moshe—became to be considered by nations as begotten from G-d.[4]
A human being who is presumed to be born from a virgin and therefore “God’s son” is the best proof that he must be a false Messiah and prophet.
Moshe’s “Box of Vermin”
There is, however yet another reason why God chose these two men: They were born of a forbidden marriage! Their father Amram married Jochebed, who was his aunt.[5] Such a relationship is strictly forbidden by the Torah.
It’s true that this prohibition was not yet in force, as the Torah had not yet been given. But once the Torah was given, this was considered to be one of the forbidden sexual relationships.[6]
It is most peculiar that the greatest Jew ever to exist was born of a relationship which was later strictly prohibited by the very Torah he would come to write!
The Gemara states: “One does not appoint a leader over the public unless he has a basket of worms hanging behind him, so that if his heart becomes proud, they say to him: ‘Look behind you’!”[7]
The blemish that makes a leader
The commentator Rabbi Chizkiyahu ben Monoach,[8] known as the Chizkuni, notes that this goes beyond ensuring that a leader does not become overly proud. A person who has no blemish in his ancestry cannot function effectively as a leader at all. To be exemplary, one must carry a similar burden as the people one leads. Just as the general public carries various blemishes, so must the leader be tainted with imperfections.
And so Moshe became the greatest Jew ever to exist, not because he was perfect, not because he was a deity, not because he was the son of God who should be worshipped, and not because he was born of a perfect marriage, but precisely because he was none of these.
Thus, the message delivered by the Torah with its last words is a strong condemnation of anybody who attempts to deify rabbis while they live, and even more after their deaths. Even in death, Moshe was not allowed to become an object of worship, for we are told that “no one knows his burial place to this day” (Devarim 34:6).
Notes
[1] Shemot 6:14
[2] Shemot 6:27.
[3] Frankfurt,1808-1888.
[4] Rabbi Hirsch on Shemot 6:14.
[5] Shemot 6:20.
[6] Vayikra: 18:12-13.
[7] Yoma 22a.
[8] The Chizkuni lived in the thirteenth century in France and is known as a sub-commentary on Rashi.
