Right
now, here in America, we are in the midst of the U.S. Presidential primaries
and that means a lot of people competing to be their party's nominee for the Presidency. And there are a lot of people out there who
want power; who want to be the leaders and who seem desperate to achieve this
position for themselves. In many cases
we might ask what their qualifications are and what sets them apart, or what
makes them suitable for the presidency. But
what is clear is that all of them want to be the leader, all of them have some
desire for this position.
It
stands in stark contrast to Moses in this week's Torah portion as he assumes
his position as the leader of the Israelites.
As we begin Shemot, the second book of Torah, with this first Torah
portion we meet Moses. First as the baby,
then in the House of Pharaoh, then as the one standing up for the Hebrews and killing
the Egyptian taskmaster. And then once
in the wilderness, working with his father in law Yitro, the priest of Midian,
we read about Moses as the shepherd and we read about the encounter that Moses
had with God at the burning bush.
God says
to Moses: ‘you shall free My people, the Israelites, from Egypt’ (Ex. 3:10),
and Moses in response says: ‘Who am I that I should go to Pharaoh and free the
Israelites from Egypt?’ (Ex. 3:11). Moses’
first response is reluctance. And Adonai
reassures Moses that God will be with him.
But this is not enough. Moses continues
with his concern; first asking for God's name and then after being told about
God's wonders and signs he still says: ‘What if they do not believe me and do
not listen to me, but say: Adonai did not appear to you?’ (Ex. 4:1). To this God shows him how he might throw the stick
down. But Moses is still reluctant. And he says to God: ‘I am slow of speech and
slow of tongue … Please, Adonai, make someone else Your agent’ (Ex. 4:10…13).
Throughout
this encounter it is clear that Moses is reluctant to lead. God has to reassure Moses several times and
then finally tell him that Aaron his brother will go with him and help him in
all of this work. Only then, with the
reassurance that Aaron will be with him, with the miracle of the rod that can
turn into a snake, is Moses finally willing to go back to his father-in-law
Yitro and say to him that I need to go back to Egypt to check in on my
people.
We
don't know exactly what made Moses so suitable for being the leader of the
Israelites. But in this week's Torah
portion we see that perhaps one of those characteristics was a reluctance to
lead. He didn't want to be the leader
for leadership’s sake; he tried to avoid the position. And only when called upon by God, several
times, did he finally accept it.
Sometimes
it feels like all leaders today are only in it for the power, rather than what
it means to really be a leader. It would
be good if they could learn a lesson, or two, from Moses.
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