Parashath Bo’ (Exodus X,1-XIII,16) 1/27/12

A.

Our parasha finds us in the midst of the ten hammer-blows which G-d rained down upon the Egyptians, ostensibly, at least, to force the Egyptian king to capitulate and free the bënei Yisra’él to leave Egypt. The first seven of these blows were described in last week’s parasha; the last three are in ours.

As we follow the account, and the blows grow progressively more disastrous and destructive we notice that the king appears to begin to give in, only to have G-d intervene, “strengthening” his heart, so that he reneges on the deal. This happens for the first time with the plague of Shëhin, a skin condition which caused the Egyptians to break out in boils and running sores (IX, 12), and continues onward to become a regular feature of the campaign.

At the beginning of our parasha, G-d takes a pause and explains to Moshe (and to us) why He is doing this; it is למען שתי אתתי אלה בקרבו: ולמען תספר באזני בנך ובן בנך את אשר התעללתי במצרים ואת אתתי אשר שמתי בם וידעתם כי אני ד': (“...in order that I show these signs of Mine in [Egypt’s] midst. And in order that you will relate in your son’s ears and your son’s son’s how I ran riot [hith‘allalti] in Egypt, and My signs which I placed amongst them, and you will know that I am Ha-Shem”; X,1-2). Rashi explains the meaning of hith‘alalti: שחקתי כמו "כי התעללת בי", "הלא התעולל בהם" אמור במצרים וגו' (“‘I mocked’, like ‘for you have mocked me’ [Numbers XXII, 29], ‘Did He not mock them’ [I Samuel VI, 6], said of Egypt....”).

“Mockery” would seem rather an odd quality for G-d the gracious and merciful to espouse, rather like kicking someone when he is down, or an expression of Schaden-freude, the descriptive German word which means joy at another’s suffering. Clearly this perception must be wrong, and there must be some deep lesson in this for us (as, indeed G-d intimates). What might it be?

B.

We begin by considering the words of the great Rabbi Yitzhaq Hutner, זצ"ל. He begins by quoting Proverbs XXVII, 21: מצרף לכסף וכור לזהב ואיש לפי מהללו (“A smelter for silver and a crucible for gold, and a man according to what he praises”), and then quotes Rabbeinu Yona of Girondi on the verse: אם הוא משבח המעשים הטובים והחכמים והצדיקים תדע ובחנת כי איש טוב הוא ושורש הצדק נמצא בו כו' והמשבח מעשים מגונים או מהלל רשעים הוא הרשע הגמור וגו' (“If he praises good deeds, and scholars, and tzaddiqim, you may know and discern that he is a good man, and the root of justice is in him... And one who praises unworthy acts or lauds rësha‘im is himself a complete rasha‘....”).

In other words, Rav Hutner explains, a man’s character can be discerned by noting to what or whom he gives deference; which persons, acts, or ideas receive his praise and approval are likely guides to the inner man (עיי' פחד יצחק על עניני פורים, ענין א').

Applying the principle מכלל לאו אתה שומע הן, that from the above one can also determine the truth of the reverse, what a person denigrates or despises will also tell us a great deal about his character. The ba‘alei mussar refer to this capacity for denigration or disparagement as létzanuth, “ridicule, skepticism” or, indeed, “mockery.” Létzanuth operates by finding the chink in the armor, the weak spot in he wall which can bring the entire carefully constructed edifice of ego down.

With this concept firmly in hand, let us examine Pharaoh’s reactions to the calamities being rained down on his nation.

C.

A careful examination of those reactions will show that the Egyptian king was consciously applying the malign quality of létzanuth to avoid confronting the overwhelming but unpalatable truth of the message being pressed upon him.

For instance, there was the blow of Dever, the plague which wiped out the Egyptians’ livestock. The Torah tells us: וימת כל מקנה מצרים וממקנה בני ישראל לא מת אחד: וישלח פרעה והנה ממקנה בני ישראל לא מת עד אחד: (“...And all the livestock of Egypt died, and of the livestock of the bënei Yisra’él not one died. And Pharaoh sent, and behold, of the livestock of the bënei Yisra’él there had not died but one”: IX, 6-7).

The Gr”a famously explains the apparent contradiction between ‘not one died’ and ‘none died but one,’ by suggesting that the dead animal amongst the cattle of the bënei Yisra’él actually belonged to the son of Shëlomith bath Divri (Leviticus XXIV, 10-16). This unfortunate was the scion of the Egyptian overseer whom Moshe caught beating one of the bënei Yisra’él to death (Shëlomith’s husband, as it happened), and dispatched (Exodus II, 11-12, Rashi ad loc.). Orphaned before he was born, the child of course stayed with his mother and followed her people. He was, however, an ethnic Egyptian, despite his mother, since he had been born before Mattan Torah, when descent followed the father’s line (עיי' רמב"ן שם בויקרא וקידושין ס"ז:). Therefore, his animal was an Egyptian animal, and it perished in the plague.

Pharaoh was surely aware of the laws of personal status amongst bënei Noah. Had he wanted to find out what had happened, he could easily have discovered whose animal had died. Instead, he clutched at the excuse that it had apparently not happened exactly as Moshe had predicted, and that therefore (despite the fact that every Egyptian beast was dead), it was not the sign Moshe had claimed.

A second example may be discerned from the seventh blow, that of Barad, the miraculous hail made of fire and ice. The Torah describes the fall of barad: וד' נתן קלת וברד ותהלך אש ארצה וימטר ד' ברד על ארץ מצרים (“...and Ha-Shem gave noises and hail, and fire came to earth; and Ha-Shem rained down barad on the land of Egypt”; IX, 23). Pharaoh was panic-stricken, and begged for mercy: חטאתי הפעם ד' הצדיק ואני ועמי הרשעים: העתירו לד' ורב מהית קלת אלקים וברד ואשלחה אתכם וגו' (“...I have sinned this time; Ha-Shem is the tzaddiq and I and my people the rësha‘im. Beseech Ha-Shem, and may there be enough of these noises of G-d and hail, and I shall send you forth....”; vv. 27-8).

Moshe agreed: אפרש את כפי אל ד' הקלות יחדלון והברד לא יהי' עוד וגו' (“I shall spread my palms to Ha-Shem and the noises will cease and the hail will be no more....”; v. 29), and brought the frightful event to an end: ויחדלו הקלות והברד והמטר לא נתך ארצה (“...and the noises ceased, and the rain and barad was not poured out earthward”: v. 33). Rashi explains that this means that the rain and hail were suspended in mid-air immediately upon Moshe’s prayer, and hence immediately ceased reaching the ground, as the loud booms died away.

וירא פרעה כי חדל המטר והברד והקלות (“And Pharaoh saw that the rain and hail, and the voices had ceased....”). Even though the cessation had happened exactly as Moshe had predicted, nonetheless it was perceived by Pharaoh that the order as reversed, that the rain and hail had stopped first, and only shortly afterward the terrible noises: ויסף לחטא ויכבד לבו (“...and he continued to sin, and he made his heart heavy....”; v. 34).

For our third example, we take the final, awesome blow, the mass death of all the first-born Egyptians. Here, Moshe tells Pharaoh: כה אמר ד' כחצות לילה אני יוצא בתוך מצרים וגו' (“Thus says Ha-Shem: At about midnight [ka-hatzoth laila] I am going out amongst Egypt...”; XI,4). As Hazal famously explain, Moshe said ka-hatzoth and not ba-hatzoth (“at midnight”) lest it happen that Pharaoh had a clock which ran fast or slow, such that it might seem to him that the blow fell either too early or too late (ברכות ג:). Moshe had got wise to his tactics....

D.

What this illustrates, then, is the phenomenon of מדה כנגד מדה. that G-d engages us measure for measure; He meets us on our own turf, as it were, and employs the very psychological tactics and tricks which we use, when we try to avoid being straight, and try to avoid admitting the truth to ourselves.

It was this which G-d sought to impress on Moshe, and through him, on all of Israel, למען תספר באזני בנך ובן בנך וידעתם כי אני ד' (“in order that will tell it into the ears of your son and your son’s son, and you will know that I am Ha-Shem”).

Parshath Bo’ (Exodus X,1-XIII,16) 1/6/11

A.

As our parasha opens, the first seven of the mighty blows which would bring Egypt to her knees have already fallen. The entire Egyptian nation is tottering, reeling at the destruction rained on their economic well-being. So, G-d tells Moshe: בא אל פרעה כי אני הכבדתי את לבו ואת לב עבדיו למען שתי אתתי אלה בקרבו: ולמען תספר באזני בנך ובן בנך את אשר התעללתי במצרים וגו' (“Come to Pharaoh, for I have made his heart heavy, and the heart of his servants, in order that I might place these signs of Mine in his midst. And in order that you will tell in the ears of your son and your son’s son that I have run amok in Egypt....”). Rashi explains the word hith‘allalti (which I translated above “run amok”) as שחקתי, “I played, I made fun”, and cites other instances in support (cf., e.g., Numbers XXII, 29, and I Samuel VI, 6, where the word is similarly used).

The mind reels as we contemplate the verse: Is G-d then a sadist? Were the Egyptians indeed ready to give up, and yet G-d is hitting them again and again, setting them up for the fall, in order to provide a spectacle to tell the children at Pesah?

In order to understand what is indeed going on here, we turn to one of the most profound thinkers of the 20th century, Rabbi Yitzhaq Hutner זצ"ל. Rav Hutner calls our attention to a comment by Rabbeinu Yona on Proverbs XXVII, 21. The verse reads: מצרף לכסף וכור לזהב ואיש לפי מהללו (“A refining pot for silver and a furnace for gold, and a man according to his praise”): אם הוא משבח המעשים הטובים והחכמים והצדיקים תדע ובחנת כי איש טוב הוא ושורש הצדק נמצא בו כו' והמשבח מעשים מגונים או מהלל רשעים הוא הרשע הגמור וגו' (“If one praises good deeds and scholars and tzaddiqim, you may know and judge that he is a good man, and the root of tzedeq is found in him... and one who praises unworthy deeds or glorifies rësha‘im, he is a complete rasha‘...”). Rav Hutner continues: והיינו שאם תרצה להעמיד למבחן אפיו של אדם תראה לאן נוטה עיקר ההתבטלות שלו שתנועת ההתבטלות נובעת מכח הכרת החשיבות שלפי ההכרה שיש לו להאדם לחשיבות איזה ענין באותה מדה הוא מתבטל כלפי אותו הענין ולפי מהללו פי' מה שהאדם מהלל תדע האיש פי' מהותו הפנימית (“That is, that if you wish to arrive at and judge the quality of a person, you should look to where his self-abnegation [hithbatluth] leans, for the direction of his self-abnegation is derived from the recognition of importance, for in the degree that a person recognizes the importance of some matter, to that degree he effaces himself toward that matter; and ‘according to his praise’, i.e., what the person praises, you will know ‘the man,’ i.e., his internal nature”; פחד יצחק, עניני פורים, ענין א' ).

There is a universal human tendency to try to minimize the gravity or importance of a situation, rather than face up to it as it is, often through ridicule. The Hebrew word for this tendency is létzanuth. This quality of létzanuth leads one to look for any chink in the armor, any weak spot in a structure, any loop hole, in order to cut something down to size, so that it does not appear so important, and hence does not need to be addressed with the seriousness it might otherwise command. Hazal characterize ‘Amaléq as a létz (שמות רבה פכ"ז סי' ה'), for the reason that, at the height of Israel’s greatness, when אז נבהלו אלופי אדום אילי מואב יוחזמו רעד נמגו כל ישבי כנען (“then panicked the chiefs of Edom, the leaders of Mo’av were seized with trembling, all the inhabitants of Këna‘an melted”; Exodus XVI,15), ‘Amaléq went looking for the chink in Israel’s armor, to bring them down, because ‘Amaléq would not face up to the reality of what was happening... The king of Egypt, too, clutched at this midda of létzanuth.

B.

We see this in an observation attributed to the Gra concerning the makka of dever, the plague which struck the Egyptians’ livestock. When the plague struck: וישלח פרעה והנה לא מת ממקנה ישראל עד אחד ויכבד לב פרעה ולא שלח את העם: (“Pharaoh sent and behold, there had not died of Israel’s livestock up to one; and Pharaoh’s heart was heavy and he did not send out the people”; IX, 7). Applying the Talmudic principle of עד ולא עד בכלל (“‘up to’ is not included in the generality”; ברכות כ"ו:), this clearly implies that one of Israel’s animals did die, at least so far as Pharaoh was concerned. Whose was it?

As Ramban explains, the mëqallél who was executed for cursing G-d (cf. Levitcus XXIV, 10) was the son of the Egyptian overseer whom Moshe killed at the beginning of his career; the slave whom the Egyptian had been beating to death was the husband of Shëlomith bath Divri, on whom the Egyptian had sired the child (עיי' הערתו שם בשם רבותינו הצרפתים). The halacha that ethnic identity follows the mother’s lineage took effect only after Mattan Torah; hence, the boy was, in fact, an Egyptian; but as he chose to stay with his mother, so far as the Egyptians were concerned, he was part of Israel, and his animal, of course, was pastured with the rest of Israel’s animals. Says the Gra, it was his animal that died, and it was this which provided Pharaoh with the illusory “comfort” that (despite the fact that all of Egypt’s livestock lay dead in the fields) Moshe’s prediction had been inaccurate; perhaps he was victim of a “natural” disaster without moral content after all, one which had claimed one of “Israel’s” animals as well.

This was the reed to which Pharaoh clung throughout Egypt’s ordeal; when the hartumim were able on some level to reproduce the first two miracles he called them mere magic tricks; as the evidence mounted that it was not so, he continued to clutch at straws.

Right up to the very end. When Moshe announced the makkath bëchoroth, in which the first-born of Egypt perished, Moshe announced: כה אמר ד' כחצת הלילה אני יוצא בתוך מצרים: ומת כל בכור וגו (“Thus said Ha-Shem: At about midnight I am going out amidst Egypt. And every first-born will die....”; XI, 4). In the end, when the blow fell, ויהי בחצת הלילה (“It was at midnight....” ibid., XII, 29); so why did Moshe say ka-hatzoth, “at about midnight”? שמא יטעו איצטגניני פרעה ויאמרו משה בדאי הוא (“Lest Pharaoh’s astronomers err and say Moshe is a fraud”; רש"י ע"פ ברכות ד.). In other words, all the bëchoroth Mitzrayim would be dropping like flies, but because it seemed to happen five minutes earlier or later than Moshe said, due to an error in the Egyptian clocks, the king would cling to his belief that it was not an act of G-d....

This attitude of létzanuth, present, as we see, to the bitter end, was what had to be broken.

Parshath Bo (Exodus X,1-XIII,16)

A.

Supernatural blows continue to rain down upon Egypt.

ויט מדה את מטהו על ארץ מצרים וגו': ויעל הארבה על כל ארץ מצרים וינח בכל גבול מצרים לפניו לא הי' ארבה כמהו ואחריו לא יהי' כן: (“And Moshe stretched forth his staff over the land of Egypt…. And the locust arose over the entire land of Egypt and rested on all the borders of Egypt; before it there had not been a locust like it, and after it there would not be such”; X, 12-14).

Rashi indicates that meaning of the last clause above was that this was a unique species of locust, which had never been in the world before and has not been seen since. The Ba‘al ha-Turim notes that the word va-yanach, “and (he) rested”, occurs exactly twice in the Biblical corpus, here and in Exodus XX, 11: וינח ביום השביעי, “and He rested on the seventh day”, whence he understands that this unique species of locust was Sabbath-observant.

Which begs the question: Why? The question appears particularly relevant, since none of the accounts of the other makkoth involving wild creatures, not tzfard‘im (“frogs”), nor kinnim (“lice”), nor ‘arov (the “mixture” of wild beasts) contain any similar language, or make similar allegations. What, then, was unique about arbeh, the plague of locusts, that made necessary the observation that they were shomér shabbath?

Whilst we are asking questions, if we take a look three verses later, we find Pharaoh beseeching Moshe and Aharon: והעתירו לד' אלקיכם ויסר מעלי רק את המות הזה (“…and beg Ha-Shem your G-d that He remove from upon me only [raq] this death”; ibid., 17.

It is starkly clear that, after the incredibly destructive ‘arov and dever (“plague”), which devastated their domestic animals, and the barad, the fiery hail which ruined much of their crops, that arbeh was indeed a sentence of death for the Egyptians. But what could Pharaoh mean by asking that “only this death,” i.e., arbeh, be removed? What is the significance of the word raq?

B.

Let us deal with the second question first.

The midrash asks: למה הביא הקב"ה עליהם מכת ארבה? מפני שעשאו ישראל לזורעי חטים ושעורים וכל מיני קטניות, לפיכך הביא עליהם ארבה וכלה להם כל מה שזרעו להם ישראל (“Why did the Holy One, Blessed is He, bring upon [the Egyptians] the plague of locusts? Because they had made Israel into sowers of wheat and barley and all sorts of legumes; therefore He brought upon them the plague of locusts and destroyed everything which Israel had sown for them”; תנא דבי אלי' פ"ז).

In other words, these were the only crops which had been left standing by the previous disasters, the only thing still remaining between the Egyptians and starvation, now rapidly disappearing down the maws of the locusts. A sentence of death indeed!

The Torah Tmima, in his first comment on our parasha, observes in the name of the midrash שעם כל המכות היתה מכת דבר ולפי"ז גם במכת ארבה היתה מכת דבר (“that with all the [subsequent] makkoth there was makkath dever, and accordingly also together with makkath arbeh there was makkath dever”; I have been unable to find the original source). This persistence or endurance of makkath dever together with all the subsequent blows probably explains the unique occurrence of the active durative participle hoya, “is actively present or existing,” in IX, 2: .הנה יד ד' הוי' במקנך ודו' (“Behold, the hand of Ha-Shem is actively present amongst your livestock….”).

With this in mind, he calls our attention to an incident recorded in the Talmud: בימי ר' שמואל בר נחמני הוה כפנא ומותנא אמרי היכי נעביד? מניבע רחמי אתרתי לא אפשר, אלא ליבעי רחמי אמותנא וכפנא נסבול. אמר ר' שמואל בר נחמני ניבע רחמי אכפמא דכי יהיב רחמנא שובעא לחיי הוא דיהיב, דכתיב "פותח את ידך ומשביע לכל חי רצון" (“In the days of Rabbi Shmu’el bar Nachmani there was a famine and a plague. [People] asked: 'What shall we do? To seek mercy is not possible, but if mercy is sought for the plague we shall [still] suffer from famine.' Said Rabbi Shmu’el bar Nachmani, 'We shall seek mercy for the famine, for when the Merciful One grants abundance, it is to the living that He grants it, as it is written: "[You] open Your hand and satisfy the will of every living thing"; Psalms CXLV,16;'" תענית ח:). The Talmud then goes on to cite the Scriptural justification for not seeking mercy for both disasters at once: ומנלן דלא מצלינן אתרתי? דכתיב: "ונצומה ונבקשה מאלקינו על זאת" (“And whence [do we learn] that we do not pray for both [simultaneously]? For it is written: ‘And we shall fast and seek [relief] from our G-d for this’; Ezra VIII, 23”). As Rashi points out, the singular “this” indicates that one pray about one thing at a time.

Since, as we have already seen, a plague of locusts was a guarantee of famine to Egypt at this point; if we apply what we have learnt to Pharaoh’s words, it become apparent that לכן אמר "ויסר מעלי רק את המות הזה", ר"ל רק מכת הארבה שהוא מכת הרעב, מכת דבר ממילא תסור, וכמבואר דכי יהיב רחמנא השובע לחיי הוא מה שיהיב משא"כ בשאר במכות (“therefore [Pharaoh] said, ‘that He remove only this death from upon me’, as if to say, only the plague of locusts which is the plague of famine; the makkath dever will automatically be removed as explained, that when the Merciful One grants abundance it is for the living that He grants it, which is not that case with the other makkoth.”

‘Ad kan the Torah Tmima. But consider what it meant for such an admission to be forced from Pharaoh’s lips. We see here his first truly heartfelt admission that it is indeed G-d Who runs the world, and that Pharaoh, too, is subject to His will like any other mortal creature. The arbeh had brought about a momentous change in the Egyptian ruler’s outlook.

C.

Now let us turn to our first question.

The Modzitzer Rebbe shlit”a, in his commentary on the Haggada shel Pesach, Alei Deshe, observes that the locusts were Sabbath-observant because they fell into the category of behemoth tzaddiq, an animal belonging to a tzaddiq, who would (of course) be Sabbath observant, in that these were uniquely Moshe’s locusts, and he goes on to cite the famous story from the midrash of a draft animal which formerly belonged to a pious Jew but was sold to a non-Jewish farmer, who subsequently complained that the animal refused to work on the Sabbath (עיי' פסיקתא רבתי פי"ד), והכי נמי הארבה בהמתו של משה ונהג כהאי גוונא (“and here, too, the locusts were Moshe’s creatures and behaved in the same way”).

Fine; but what made the arbeh Moshe’s more than the tzfard‘im, the kinnim, or the ‘arov? Can it be, perhaps, that they, more than any other creature, had accomplished the point of the exercise, by bringing Pharaoh to admit G-d’s sovereignty over the world? Perhaps by being identified more fully than any other with Moshe’s (and, of course, G-d’s) purpose in heaping blow after blow on the Egyptians, the locusts were, to that extent, more Moshe’s creatures than the others.

D.

So we see that from the inclusion of one small, apparently inconsequential word, raq, in a verse, and from the mere fact that a rare verb form occurs only here and in one other verse, we can deduce the precise point at which Pharaoh’s stubborn will was first broken.

Parshath Bo (Exodus X,1-XIII,16) 1/11/08

A.

ואכלו את הבשר צלי אש ומצות על מררים יאכלהו (“And [the bnei Yisra’él] will eat the meat [of the paschal sacrifice] roasted with fire, and [with] matzoth on bitter herbs they will eat it;” XII, 8).

This week’s parasha is a major source of the laws and customs relating not only to that first Passover in Egypt, but every subsequent one. On this verse, the Ba’âlei Tosafoth tell us in their collective commentary on the Torah, Da’âth Zqénim: לכן נהגו העם לעשות בליל פסח שלש מצות זכר לשלש סאין שאמר אברהם אבינו "מהרי שלש סאים סולת" ופסח הי' (“Therefore it has become the popular custom to make three matzoth on Passover night in memory of the three se’im which Avraham our father said, ‘Hurry, three se’im of fine flour [knead and make cakes],’ [Genesis XVIII, 6]; and [the occasion [was Passover”).

This is based, of course, on the oft-repeated assertion of Chazal that the patriarchs voluntarily observed the entire Torah before it was officially commanded to Israel (עיי' יומא כ"ח:). Accepting this, it must be acknowledged that a se’a is a rather large unit of colume, equivalent to nearly 249 cc (לפי שיטת הרב נאה); other than the fact that there were three of them, it is hard to relate this much dough to the three mazzoth lying before the ba’al ha-séder on Pesach. So what did Avraham really present to his guests?

B.

If we revisit the account of that angelic visit in Genesis XVIII, we find that Rashi asserts that every kindness which Avraham showed his visitors was repaid by the Al-Mighty to his descendants in the desert after the Exodus; thus, the water which they were offered, concerning which Avraham said, “Let a little water be taken” (i.e., by someone else, a shaliach) was repaid through a shaliach (Moshe; cf. Numbers XX, 11). whereas the bread or matza, concerning which Avraham said, “Let me take,” was repaid by G-d directly (עיי' בראשית י"ח ד', רש"י ושפתי חכמים שם), through the gift of the man (Exodus XVI, 31).

But if we turn to the midrash, we find that it appears to be a matter of controversy as to whether or not Avraham actually gave his guests bread: אפרים מקשאה תלמידו דר"מ משום ר"מ אמר פירסה נדה ונטמאה העיסה. רבנן אמרי אפי' פת הביא לפניהם (“Efrayim the questioner, a student of Rabbi Me’ir, said in the same of Rabbi Me’ir, "[Sara] began menstruating and the dough was rendered tamé." The Rabbis say, "Even bread [Avraham] brought before them;'” ב"ר פמ"ח סי' ט"ו ), and Rashi himself (ibid., v. 8) cites Rabbi Me’ir according to his student, Efrayim.

So there seems to be a contadiction between Rashi’s earlier assertion and this one: Did Avraham bring them bread, or not?

Expert on hospitality that he was, it would seem that whatever bread Avraham lay before his guests would have to have been brought immediately (עיי' ספר היראה לרבינו יונה שכך נוהגים מכניסי אורחים), and hence had nothing at all to do with the three se’im of tamé dough. If this is correct, then we can understand Rashi’s comments to refer to two different batches of matza, the first of which was offered by Avraham in greeting his guests, and the second of which was what he asked Sara to prepare. Thus, Rashi’s comments can be seen to make sense, for it would seem that the dispute recorded in the midrash concerns only the second batch. not the first.

That established, let us consider the opinion of the Rabbanan. According to them, just how much matza did Avraham offer?

C.

Avraham initially told his visitors: ואקחה פת לחם וסעדו לבכם (“And let me take some bread, and [you], satisfy your hearts”). The Gr"a states that the minimum definition of a satisfying meal is the volume of three eggs (פירוש הגר"א על משלי כ"ב ט' בשם הרי"ף). Hence, if we assume that Avraham, as the host, ate with his guests at this initial repast, we can calculate that it consisted of twelve eggs’ volume.

Now, Sara was preparing three se’im of flour. A standard se’a contains 144 eggs’ volume (עירובין פ"ג., רש"י שם ד"ה במדברות ), so three se’im total 432 eggs. Add to this the first twelve eggs, and we have 444.

Next, the volume of an egg is considered in halacha to equal the volume of two olives (zéythim; עיי' טור או"ח סי' תפ"ו, בית יוסף שם, ובשו"ע). So, 444 eggs equals 888 zéythim. Assuming that Avraham participated in the entire meal with his three guests, we may assume that he took one-fourth of the total, or 222 zéythim, for himself.

Talmudic sources tell us: האדם הגדול בענקים זה אברהם אבינו כו' ואכילתו ושתייתו כן הי' כנגד שבעים וארבעה אנשים וגו' (“The greatest man amongst the giants was Avraham our father.... And his eating and drinking were such, equivalent to [those of] seventy-four [ordinary] men;” סופרים פכ"א ה"ט, עיי' נחלת יעקב שם דזה מבוסס על יהושע י"ד ט"ו).

Finally, the absolute minimum shi’ûr to fulfill the mitzva of achilath matza is a k’zayith, one olive’s volume (שו"ע או"ח סי' תע"ה סעיף א') for an ordinary person. If so, Avraham’s “giant” appetite, presumably, obligated him to a proportional shi’ûr of 74 zéythim, exactly one-third of the 222 zéythim which the Rabbanan would say that he took. In other words, he had three minimum matzoth mitzva.

This, I believe, is the basis of the calculation made by our holy ancestors, to which the Ba’âlei Tosafoth refer, which led them to place three matzoth before the ba’âl ha-séder on the night of Passover.

D.

However, this brings up another fundamental question concerning Avraham’s halachic observance which must be dealt with.

Elsewhere in the Talmud (יומא פ:) it is firmly established that the same shi’ûrei halacha, the measures of food and drink relevant to fulfillment of the mitzvoth or violations of prohibitions, apply equally to everybody, even somebody as large as Og, king of the Bashan (another famous giant; cf. Deuteronomy III, 11). If so, what did Avraham’s enormous capacity matter? Why would not the shi’ûr of a k’zayith apply equally to him?

The answer, I believe, lies in the voluntary nature of Avraham’s observance, which was informed by his experience as a ben Noach. The Minchath Chinnuch points out that, unlike a member of Israel, who becomes subject to the mitzvoth of the Torah and responsible for them at the age of thirteen, there is no fixed age at which a ben Noach becomes a bar mitzva. The matter is determined על פי שכלו, at whatever pont he becomes cognizant of the mitzvoth which apply to him and their responsibilities and ramification (מצוה ק"צ, ד"ה אבל). It is, in short, a matter of emotional maturity and logical reasoning.

So, I believe it likely that Avraham applied his power of intellect, of svara, to these observances, too, and accordingly fixed a shi’ûr for himself proportional to his demonstrably greater capacity than that of others. however, when the Torah came to be commanded to Israel, and halacha was fixed for all generations, the shiûr of the common man prevailed.