Parshat Tetzaveh

Yaakov Linder, Elliot Eisenberg

Parshat Tetzvaveh, Chief Rabbi Sir Jonathan Sacks

Throughout all of Tetzaveh Moshe takes second place to his brother Aaron, the Cohen Gadol of the people; Moshe’s name is not even mentioned at all. There are many ideas of why this job went to Aaron instead of Moshe, but the most obvious is that Moshe tried to refuse the job of leading the people of Israel.

There is a deeper message here though, more than just “Man plans and God laughs”, we learn here the basic premise of the separation of powers. Human authority needs checks and balances in order to not become corrupt, something we can see even in the United States constitution. Specifically, political and religious leadership should not mix, like the Separation of Church and State.

The question is: how does this work out in a personal relationship between two brothers? The Torah never says it specifically, but hints at it numerous times.

The most commonly known hint is in the text after Moshe has talked to Hashem and is already headed back to Egypt. The Torah says that Aaron is “already on his way to meet you, and he will be glad to see you.” While these may seem like simple words, they are really a praise to Aaron. It would have been natural for Aaron to envy his younger brother, three years his junior, because of the position of leadership he was bestowed with, especially after Moshe’s long absence and adoption by Pharaoh. Compared to Aaron, Moshe was a complete and udder stranger among the Jewish people, so why does Moshe get the job instead of Aaron? Yet Aaron is happy for Moshe, despite everything he may want to be jealous about.

Aaron’s ability to be happy for Moshe stands out from the rest of the pairs of brothers in the Chumash, where the brothers were always involved in intense sibling rivalry, Cain and Abel, Yitzchak and Yishmael, Yaakov and Eisav, and Yosef and the other eleven brothers.  Aaron is a true gentleman when it comes to being happy for his brother, no matter the strain.

The Torah goes on to describe another test, this time for Moshe. Moshe has to create the Cohen Gadol position, one that he will never be able to fill, for his elder brother. The test is to see if he will be able to do it with the same happiness that Aaron displayed when Moshe became the leader. Moshe must show the people that he has the humility to share the leadership position with someone whose has strengths that he does not have, and with someone who is closer to the people.

To quote the end of Rav Sack’s dvar torah, because it really cannot be said any other way:
“True leadership involves humility and magnanimity. The smaller the ego, the great the leader. That’s what Moshe showed in the parsha that does not mention his name.”  

1.       The question asked here is: “what is the significance of moshes name not being mentioned throughout the parsha?” This is a great question because it is odd for Moshe to not be in a parsha, considering he is the leader of bnei yisrael. This question is a very interesting one because he is the leader of bnei yisrael, and it doesn’t make sense for moshe not to be spoken about in the parsha.

2.       The authors main points in this dvor torah are that moshe and aharon both are happy for each other while they are having two opposite roles. There was no true evidence brought. All of the evidence was straight from the torah itself.

3.       We learn from this that people should be happy with what they have, and when something good happens to someone else, then you should be happy for them.

4.       This was an excellent shiur. We agreed that it was both interesting and informal.