Shabbos Parashas Shemos - 5779

Shabbos Parashas Shemos - 5779

Rabbi Hal Miller

Pharaoh heard about this matter and sought to kill Moshe, so Moshe fled from before Pharaoh

and settled in the land of Midian. He sat at the well. [Shemos 2:15]

Moshe killed the Egyptian who was beating a Jew. As Rashi says, Dathan and Aviram "informed

against him." Moshe runs, and settles in Midian. What does the Torah mean that he settled, and

sat at the well?

Rav Hirsch notes an apparent time disconnect. If Moshe ran from Egypt directly to Midian and

the incident at the well, he would have been a very young man, perhaps as young as 12, possibly

in his 20s. He left at age 80, and his second son had only just been born, as we know from the

incident about brit milah on the road back to Egypt. This could possibly indicate that Moshe and

Tzipporah were childless for close to 60 years, but we do not find this mentioned alongside the

stories of other childless couples in our history. Another possibility would be that the two sons

were born many decades apart, but again, we see no mention of this. In any event, Tzipporah

must have been rather aged when she gave birth to the second child, but this is not noted

anywhere either. Does this impact on the word "settled"? Just when did Moshe sit at the well?

Rashi says that "settled in the land of Midian" means "he spent a considerable amount of time

there" which we might think is obvious. But in this, Rashi is comparing Moshe to Yaakov who

'settled' in Lavan's home. In both cases, the one settling was not making a permanent home,

just a long-term temporary commitment. Rashi then goes on to show that this comparing of

Moshe with a patriarch is the point of this verse. Just as Eliezer on behalf of Yitzchak, and

later Yaakov himself, sat by a well in order to meet their brides, so did Moshe. This would

point us to understanding the well incident here to have taken place early in Moshe's time in

Midian, and thus our question of the barrenness of the couple for close to 60 years.

Sforno and Rashbam tell us that our verse is nothing more than establishing the locality,

and serves as a lead-in to the Yisro and his daughters episode, thus we gain nothing from

the phrases about settling in Midian and sitting by a well other than as a preface. Why then

did the Torah give us this verse? To show that even if we might think that our mundane daily

affairs have little behind them other than chance, there is in fact an order to the progression of

things, and that God is in control.

Shemos Rabbah looks at the verses where Yisro's daughters explain to him that "an Egyptian

man" saved us. Moshe denies that he is that Egyptian man, rather that the Egyptian man that

Moshe struck was the cause of Moshe's being at the well, and thus is due some credit. R'Chaim

Shmulevitz takes it further regarding the extent of a person's debt of gratitude. The daughters

must be grateful not only to Moshe but also the the man he killed, all the more so they must be

grateful to God for setting up the incident in the first place. Moshe settled, albeit temporarily, in

Midian, and appeared at the well at the appointed time. This was no accident.

As to the timing, it is possible that Moshe's journey from Egypt took a while as he wandered

from place to place. It is possible that there was a large gap in time between his 'settling' in

Midian and the incident at the well. It is possible that the marriage of Moshe and Tzipporah did

not take place for many years afterward. The Torah did not consider these questions important

enough to tell us.