Parashat Yitro – “Talking to Your Son-In-Law”

The highpoint of Parshat Yitro is the Revelation atop Mt. Sinai when Moshe the rescuer and savior becomes Moshe Rabbeinu.  Yet the parsha begins with a more personal anecdote, describing the time when Moshe took a rare day off from work to greet his father-in-law, Yitro, who (finally) came to the Israelite camp with Moshe’s wife and children in tow.

Now Moses’ father in law, Jethro … heard all that God had done for Moses and for Israel, His people that the Lord had taken Israel out of Egypt.  So Moses’ father in law, Jethro, took Zipporah, Moses’ wife, after she had been sent away, and her two sons … Now Moses’ father in law, Jethro, and his [Moses’] sons and his wife came to Moses, to the desert where he was encamped, to the mountain of God.

Ex. 18:1-5

The text is silent – and our Sages therefore disagreed – about what news made its way to Yitro in Midian that was so inspiring that Yitro dropped what he was doing and showed up on the scene.  Said Ramban succinctly:

 

There are those who said that the Torah is chronological and that Yitro came before Matan Torah (the Revelation), and others said that he came after the Torah had already been given.

נחלקו רבותינו (מכילתא כאן), (זבחים קטז א) בפרשה הזאת.   יש מהם אומרים כי קודם מתן תורה בא יתרו כסדר הפרשיות, ויש מהן שאמרו שאחר מתן תורה בא   רמב”ן שמות פרשת יתרו פרק יח פסוק א

For those Sages who preferred the simpler, more straight-forward reading of Torah, ים סוף שמע, word reached Yitro about the great miracle of the splitting of Red Sea (מדרש אגדה שמות פרשת יתרו פרק יח סימן א).  For those Sages who did not require that the Torah’s anecdotes be understood sequentially, such as Rabbi Elazar, מתן תורה שמע ובא, Yitro was inspired by news of the giving of the Torah, even though it occurs later in our parsha.  (מכילתא דרבי שמעון בר יוחאי פרק יח פסוק א)

Many best-selling authors, HaShem included, know that occasionally telling a story slightly out of sequence has literary value.  For this reason, our Sages pithily declared: אין מוקדם ומאוחר בתורה, which basically means that detours in the historical order are sometimes necessary to advance our understanding of the Torah.

I must confess that the out-of-sequence viewpoint resonates with me, for I see in this version the great irony that Moshe’s wife and children missed out on the very experience that transformed a band of recently freed slaves into a nation.  In this reading, Moshe’s immediate family paid a price for the heavy mantel of leadership that Moshe wore.  Moshe was so consumed with the nation that he was neither father, husband nor “Rabbeinu” to his wife and children.

There is a strong clue in the Torah text, however, that Yitro (and therefore Moshes’s wife and sons) indeed stood at Sinai with the rest of Bnai Yisrael.  In our opening verses, (i) the family reunites, (ii) hugs and kisses are following by (iii) some small-talk catching up, and finally, the happy family (iv) eats together and (v) gives appropriate thanks to God.

There was, sadly, no rest for the weary as Moshe resumed his work routine the very next morning.  Fortunately, though, it was Bring Your Father-in-Law to Work Day:

It came about on the next day that Moses sat down to judge the people, and the people stood before Moses from the morning until the evening.  When Moses’ father in law saw what he was doing to the people, he said, “What is this thing that you are doing to the people? Why do you sit by yourself, while all the people stand before you from morning till evening?”

Moses said to his father in law, “For the people come to me to seek God.  If any of them has a case, he comes to me, and I judge between a man and his neighbor, and I make known the statutes of God and His teachings.”

Moses’ father in law said to him, “The thing you are doing is not good.”

וַיֹּ֛אמֶר חֹתֵ֥ן משֶׁ֖ה אֵלָ֑יו לֹא־טוֹב֙ הַדָּבָ֔ר אֲשֶׁ֥ר אַתָּ֖ה עֹשֶֽׂה

Ex. 18:13ff.

Yitro admonished Moshe for acting like he could rule the people alone.  He then offered a little professional advice, something Yitro no-doubt learned from his days as an advisor to Pharaoh.  Without relinquishing the role of head of state and chief emissary of God, Yitro told Moshe to

choose out of the entire nation men of substance, God fearers, men of truth, who hate monetary gain, and you shall appoint over them [Israel] leaders over thousands, leaders over hundreds, leaders over fifties, and leaders over tens.	וְאַתָּ֣ה תֶֽחֱזֶ֣ה מִכָּל־הָ֠עָ֠ם אַנְשֵׁי־חַ֜יִל יִרְאֵ֧י הִ֛ אַנְשֵׁ֥י אֱמֶ֖ת שׂ֣נְאֵי בָ֑צַע וְשַׂמְתָּ֣ עֲלֵהֶ֗ם שָׂרֵ֤י אֲלָפִים֙ שָׂרֵ֣י מֵא֔וֹת שָׂרֵ֥י חֲמִשִּׁ֖ים וְשָׂרֵ֥י עֲשָׂרֹֽת:
and they shall judge the people at all times, and it shall be that any major matter they shall bring to you, and they themselves shall judge every minor matter, thereby making it easier for you, and they shall bear [the burden] with you Ex. 18:21-22	וְשָֽׁפְט֣וּ אֶת־הָעָם֘ בְּכָל־עֵת֒ וְהָיָ֞ה כָּל־הַדָּבָ֤ר הַגָּדֹל֙ יָבִ֣יאוּ אֵלֶ֔יךָ וְכָל־הַדָּבָ֥ר הַקָּטֹ֖ן יִשְׁפְּטוּ־הֵ֑ם וְהָקֵל֙ מֵֽעָלֶ֔יךָ וְנָֽשְׂא֖וּ אִתָּֽךְ:

The advice demonstrated that Yitro was a good bureaucrat, and Moshe implemented the plan with some subtle but significant fine-tuning.  However, more important than the lesson in leadership, Yitro also threw in, at no extra charge, some unsolicited, well-needed, personal, family advice.  And he did so in the best way any father-in-law can when meddling into the private family dynamics of his adult children: without saying anything directly.

As noted above, Yitro preceded with advice with an observation:

Moses’ father in law said to him, “The thing you are doing is not good.”

וַיֹּ֛אמֶר חֹתֵ֥ן משֶׁ֖ה אֵלָ֑יו לֹא־טוֹב֙ הַדָּבָ֔ר אֲשֶׁ֥ר אַתָּ֖ה עֹשֶֽׂה

Yitro chose these words deliberately, for the expression לֹא־טוֹב, “it is not good”, ֹappears only one other time in all of Chumash.  At (almost) every stage of creation, God announced that “it was good”.  Yet after making man, even though God Looked upon a world teeming with beautiful life, He Saw a lonely, solitary man:

And the Lord God said, “It is not good that man is alone; I shall make him a helpmate opposite him.” Gen. 2:18

וַיֹּ֨אמֶר֙ ה אֱלֹקֵים לֹא־ט֛וֹב הֱי֥וֹת הָֽאָדָ֖ם לְבַדּ֑וֹ אֶֽעֱשֶׂה־לּ֥וֹ עֵ֖זֶר כְּנֶגְדּֽוֹ:

Treading carefully, Yitro sent this message to his son-in-law, using only the expression לֹא־טוֹב, loaded words that were surely familiar to Moshe:

Just as it was not good that Adam tendered his garden alone, so too it is not good that you are tending to your people alone.  You need help; you need a support staff, you need judges and courts.

But that is not all.  You are as alone in your personal life just as Adam once was, before God Saw his loneliness and fashioned a partner for him.  As God brought Adam a helpmate, so, too, did I return your wife and children to you.

In one breadth, Yitro taught Moshe to delegate power when tending to the nation, and to free up some time for the companionship of family.  This reading only makes sense, however, if the Torah conflated two separate stories.  The Torah juxtaposed the two opening stories (Ex. 18:1-12 and Ex. 18:13:23) and uses the words “It came about on the next day…” as a transition, implying that the two episodes occurred in back-to-back days.

But Rashi (quoting the midrash) opined that the second story happened a little later, after the Revelation:

What is the ‘next day’, the day after Moshe came descended Mt. Sinai with the Torah

ומהו ממחרת, למחרת רדתו מן ההר

The family reunion that opens our parsha occurred soon after the Exodus.  And even though the story of Yitro’s advice to Moshe is recorded immediately afterwards – and, of course, precedes the account of Revelation (Exodus Ch. 20 ff) – this encounter happened immediately after Moshe returned for Mt. Sinai.

The Torah must already have been given if Yitro was familiar with, and able to quote from, the beginning of Torah the words לֹא־ט֛וֹב הֱי֥וֹת הָֽאָדָ֖ם לְבַדּ֑וֹ אֶֽעֱשֶׂה־ל֥וֹ עֵזֶר כְּנֶגְדּֽוֹ,”it is not good that man is alone”.

When Yitro heard the words “it is not good that man is alone”, his mind’s eye pictured Moshe’s loneliness.  Yitro shared with his son-in-law that the foundational teaching of Torah is the simple, indisputable fact: לֹא־ט֛וֹב הֱי֥וֹת הָֽאָדָ֖ם לְבַדּ֑ו, “it is not good to be alone”; love and family make complete us, no matter what jobs and tasks our station in life places upon us.

It may seem like all this happened in a single day, but it often takes a while for complicated family dynamics to play out.

Yitro shared this advice with Moshe at the first available opportunity. He did so subtly, kindly, lovingly, nonjudgmentally, and without anger – the way any good father-in-law must.

 Shabbat Shalom!