This week's portion: Moses, the bush, open eyes
January 11, 2007
In this week's portion -- Shemot, the beginning of the book of the same name -- we get a lot of good stories. Here we read about the birth of Moses, his episode striking the taskmaster and then running away, and eventually his encounter with the burning bush. That's the story I chose to focus on in this week's d'var Torah at Radical Torah.
Here's a taste:
There's midrash which suggests Moses wasn’t the first person to pass by the burning bush. Others had walked by and ignored it. Maybe they thought they were seeing things. Maybe they assumed it was something other than what it was. Maybe they figured there was some rational explanation for a bush that burned but was not consumed, and anyway they had things to do, sheep to herd and goats to yell at. One way or another, as a result of their distraction they missed the presence of God, the ruach ha-kodesh, manifest in plain sight.
Read the whole thing here: Opening our hearts and our eyes.