Anon asked Staff ago Hello.
For a long time I have been bothered by a question to which I have not yet found an answer.
In the Passover Haggadah it is said that the Plague of the Firstborn was done by the holy One, blessed be He, and not a messenger, yet “instructions” were given to smear the blood of the Pascal sacrifice on the doorpost to distinguish between Egyptian and Jew, as is written in the Gemara (Pesachim chapter 2) “if the destructive agent is given permission to destroy, he does not distinguish between saint and sinner.”
But it was not a “destructive agent,” it was the holy One, blessed be He. If you say, heaven forbid, that G-d was the destructive agent, is it possible He cannot distinguish etc.?
I’d appreciate an answer
B.M.
jsadmin Staff answered 22 years ago
Hello, B.M.,
All the Scriptural stories relate to G-d as a physical being who moves from place to place, punishes and destroys, etc., and so, too, the story of the Plague of the Firstborn. Even Chazal treated G-d as though he had a physical body; see the essay The Body of G-d. Were it not for Maimonides, who devoted an entire chapter in his book Guide to the Perplexed to rejecting the physicality of G-d, it is possible that Jewish religious people would still believe in a physical G-d. Maimonides even admitted that he took Scriptural mentions of a physical G-d out of their plain meaning to adapt them to reason. We will cite his words in simplified language: What is written in the Scriptures points to G-d being physical…but the gates of interpretation are open before us…therefore we have gone beyond the plain meaning which points to G-d’s corporeality” (Guide to the Perplexed part 2, chapter 25).
Come see how Chazal explain the verses which deal with Moses’ ascent to G-d, to bring His word to the nation. “And to Moses He said, ‘Ascend to G-d’…and Moses went up alone to G-d…and Moses came and told the nation all the words of G-d.” Chazal ask: Why is it written “Ascend to G-d”? G-d should have said “Ascend to Me.” They answer that the YHWH written in that verse refers to the angel Metatron, whose name is as that of his master — YHWH (Sanhedrin 38b). According to the Sages’ interpretation Moses told the nation all the words of the angel Metatron and not those of G-d, and it was those words of which we said “We will do and we will listen.” Notice that YHWH is interpreted to mean the angel Metatron.
To show you that there is no room for questioning or finding contradictions in verses which are questionable in any case, pay close attention to the contradiction in the verse itself: “For when the Lord goes through to smite the Egyptians, He will see the blood on the lintel and the two doorposts, and the Lord will pass over the door and not let the Destroyer enter and smite your home” (Exodus 12:23). The verse begins with G-d and ends with a destructive agent.
But so as not to leave you without an answer, I will bring the words of the Chatam Sofer, who asked the same question and gave an answer very appropriate to the ancient beliefs in the influence of the stars and the zodiac on this world. In his words the Plague of the Firstborn was a cooperative venture between G-d and the destructive agent: G-d wearied and weakened the sign of Aries, the first of the signs of the zodiac, and thus weakened the firstborn. Only after G-d weakened the higher power (Aries) did the destructive agent have power to kill the firstborn, and the holy One, blessed be He, had to protect the Israelites from the destructive agent (responsa Chatam Sofer part 2 [Yoreh Deah] 346).
There is no end to the nonsense.
Sincerely,
Daat Emet
jsadmin Staff answered 22 years ago
Hello.
Thus does Maimonides write in Laws of the Fundamentals of the Torah 3:9, “All the stars and spheres possess souls, intellect and understanding, and they are alive, exist and recognize their Creator. Like the angels, all of them praise and laud their Creator, and do so according to their importance and level. Just as they recognize God so do they recognize themselves and the angels who are above them. The intellect of the stars and spheres is less than that of the angels, but greater than that of men.”
Sincerely,
Daat Emet