By: Head of School, Rabbi Jordan Silvestri
This week’s parsha, Parshat Yitro, is an enigma from start to finish. From the very first Rashi, the question of Parshat Yitro’s validity and placement is at the forefront of the minds of medieval commentators:
שֶׁבַע שֵׁמוֹת נִקְרְאוּ לוֹ: רְעוּאֵל, יֶתֶר, יִתְרוֹ, חוֹבָב, חֶבֶר, קֵינִי, פּוּטִיאֵל; יֶתֶר, עַל שֵׁם שֶׁיִּתֵּר פָּרָשָׁה אַחַת בַּתּוֹרָה
Yitro is known by seven names: Reuel, Yeter, Yitro, Chovav, Chever, Keini, and Putuel. Yeter is for the fact that he caused a parsha to be added to the Torah.
I mean, Rashi is not a commentator who stretches too often, and yet, this seems a bit much. The whole parsha is not all about Yitro. The receiving of the Aseret HaDibrot (the Ten Commandments), the gift of the Mahn (Manna), and the war with Amalek are completely separate from Yitro’s impact on the Jewish people. So what is Rashi’s commentary getting at? What are we meant to learn from Yitro’s fifteen minutes of fame?
The Ramban and Ibn Ezra argue as to whether Yitro’s story and its placement in Sefer Shemot is chronological (Ramban) or thematically appropriate (Ibn Ezra). Whichever approach suits you best, the placement of Yitro’s message to Moshe is intentional and necessary.
Let’s gain some context regarding what Yitro did at this juncture:
- Moshe and the Jewish people were traveling from the Yam Suf to receive the Torah at Sinai.
- Yitro, together with his daughter Tzipporah (Moshe’s wife) and his two grandsons Gershom and Eliezer, traveled to reunite Moshe with his nuclear family.
- After reuniting, Yitro offered advice to Moshe on how best to execute the role that Hashem set for him in overseeing the judicial process.
We often overlook something rather important—Tzipporah, Gershom, and Eliezer were in Midyan the entire time that Moshe was in Egypt attempting to save the Jewish people. They did not witness the hardships that the Jewish people suffered, they did not experience the wonders of Hashem’s plagues, and they were not emotionally entranced after walking through the Yam Suf, celebrating in song.
Why did Moshe decide to distance his family from Egypt? As Aharon advised many weeks prior, to spare them the pain and suffering of the Jewish people. But to what end?
Simon Sinek recently shared a moving quote about the difference between losing and failure:
“There is a difference between losing and failing. Losing reflects the score. Failing reflects our attitude.”
We often conflate and confuse the definitions of these terms. We do not want our children or students to experience pain or suffering. As such, we actively insert ourselves into our children’s lives to protect them from oncoming traffic, or we bulldoze the landscapes of their realities, ridding them of any potential failure even before they interact with it. We ultimately make life “fail-proof.”
What are the results? Our children are not able to practice and build resilience. The concept of perseverance is a skill left unlearned, which impacts their ability to strive for something beyond themselves, dream of a reality that is better because of them, or motivate themselves to solve the problems that no one around them seems to have cracked. Their futures stall because we were worried about them scraping their knees.
What happened to Moshe’s children? We never know. They did not take on positions of leadership. They did not take over for their father upon his death. Instead, we are left to wonder—What if?