Usually when we find a contradiction in a text, we interpret that as a weakness in the text itself. When we edit things that we write, we try to remove any contradictions that may be there. But sometimes, a contradiction is so obvious, that it was clearly intended for us to notice and then explain.
Such a contradiction appears at the beginning of Parashat Va’era:
וַיְדבֵ֥ר א-ֱלהִ֖ים אֶל־מֹשֶ֑ה וַיֹ֥אמֶר אֵלָ֖יו אֲנִ֥י ה׳׃
וָאֵר֗א אֶל־אַבְרהָ֛ם אֶל־יִצְחָ֥ק וְאֶֽל־יַעֲק֖ב בְא-ֵ֣ל שַדָ֑י ושְמִ֣י ה׳ ל֥א נוד֖עְתִי לָהֶֽם׃
And God spoke unto Moses, and said unto him: ‘I am the LORD; and I appeared unto Abraham, unto Isaac, and unto Jacob, as God Almighty, El Shadai, but by My name Hashem I made Me not known to them.
If you were to walk up to a man on the street, show him these verses, and say: “explain what they mean,” nine out of ten people would interpret the verse to mean that the patriarchs, Avraham, Yitzchak, and Yaakov, did not know the four-letter proper name of God, but only related to God through a lesser name.
But, that simple and straightforward explanation of this passage is bellied by numerous occasions where the patriarchs and matriarchs encountered God, and they encountered God with the very name that our parsha claims was held in reserve until the time of Moshe.
A contradiction this good, a contradiction this obvious, cannot be a mistake. What is the significance of these different names of God?
Rashi points out that the God does not tell Moshe that the four-letter name was not made known to the patriarchs – it doesn’t say “lo hoda’ati” it says “lo nodaati” – I was not known to them in this way. Rashi then explains that God’s relationship to the patriarchs and matriarchs consisted of a series of promises and pledges which would only be fulfilled in the time of Moshe. The patriarchs’ relationship with God was a relationship of potential. Moshe and his generation experienced the actualization of God’s power.
Rabbi Naftali Tzvi Yehudah Berlin, Netziv, also understands the names to be stand-ins for the ways that we can experience God’s relationship to the created world. El Shadai is a name that signifies God as the Creator of the Universe, the Creator of Nature, and the Creator of the Scientific laws that describe the universe. (The One who declared, “dai” – enough, stop, to the universe and gave it laws). A relationship with God through the name El Shadai is a relationship that accepts the world as it exists and accepts that the world as it exists is precisely the way God wanted it to be.
The four-letter name of God, in contrast, signifies God’s operation in history independent of nature and nature’s laws. This Name of God signifies God’s ability and willingness to supervise, direct, and control the path of the universe, even when this means deviations from what have otherwise occurred naturally.
Rashi and Netziv have explained the contradiction. When God tells Moshe that the patriarchs did not know the four letter name of God, what Moshe was truly being told was that a new religious paradigm was beginning. God’s relationship to the world was changing and Moshe would witness God’s actions in ways that were not seen by Avraham, Yitzhak, and Yaakov. And there are numerous other commentators who adopt this approach. All of them see the religious perspective of the patriarchs as being immature and primitive compared to the fuller perspective that Moshe achieved.
And then I learned about the interpretation of Rav Simcha Bunim of Przysucha1. Rav Simcha Bunim, one of the most creative and fruitful thinkers in the iconoclastic Polish school of Hasidic thought, understood the patriarchs’ relationship with God to have been, in some ways, a more useful model for mature religious thought.
Rav Simcha Bunim explains the name Shadai as being, etymologically, linked to “Dai” – which means sufficient, enough. That much is common. But whereas earlier scholars understood the name to be a reference to God’s placing limits on creation, Rav Simcah Bunim says that the name alludes to God’s placing limits on the amount of God that is revealed in the created universe. There is “Dai” which means there is just enough opportunity to encounter God, but no more. There is just enough knowledge about God and encounter with God to sustain faith, but no more. God established a model of disclosure to the patriarchs and matriarchs that sustained their lives of faith and devotion. But the revelation did not surpass that minimal clarity. It was “dai” – minimally sufficient but no more.
This is a modest foundation for religious life, but its very modesty is its value. In the words of Rabbi Herzl Hefter, one of the Modern Orthodoxy’s most enthusiastic students of Hassidic thought:
“R. Simcha Bunim’s teaching discloses the precarious nature of creation. Too much Divine revelation and we lose our independent identity…On the other hand, too little divine revelation and we have a world which is devoid of meaning or the possibility of redemption. And only in the world of El Shaddai, where certainty about God is elusive, can we have religious passion alongside religious tolerance.”
Parashat Va’era introduces the four-letter name of God and that inaugurates a season of signs and wonders and dramatic revelation that forces Pharaoh to submit to God’s will and prepares the Hebrew slaves to accept the Torah. This form of revelation is awesome, but it necessitates the erosion of human freedom. Pharaoh’s heart is hardened and he becomes an object of God’s power rather than a moral agent acting in service of God’s plan.
The Hebrew’s too have their freedom eroded. How can we possible accept the Torah with full autonomy after being sustained by miracle after miracle for days and weeks.
כפה עליהם הר כגיגת
we are told – God held Mt. Sinai over our heads and threatened us with annihilation were we to reject the Torah. That could be a metaphor – I don’t know that the mountain was literally suspended in the air, the Torah doesn’t quite suggest that. But, how could a people witnessing and experiencing God’s self-disclosure in an unprecedented and never related manner, decide with detached autonomy whether or not to accept the Torah?
But, this degree of revelation, when God interacts with us using God’s proper name, the four-letter name, is a rare occurrence. It was necessary to free us from Egyptian slavery, but it is not the basis for our prosaic religious life. The more modest form of revelation, the approach of the patriarchs and matriarchs to God, allows space for our own freedom, and it allows space for the freedom of others to make their own choices.
One of the most vexing challenges facing the world today is whether or not liberal society, pluralistic, multicultural, democratic society, has enough vitality and passion, and fighting spirit, to confront extremist ideologies that are struggling with great violence and great determination to overflow liberal civilization.
Can moderation, and moderate religion survive? Don’t extremists have a built in advantage because of their passion and certainty?
No.
The patriarchs were knights of faith and they did so in communion with El Shaddai. God’s presence was revealed to the patriarchs and matriarchs just enough to sustain their world-changing journey of faith, to sustain their trust in God, and to make possible the revolutionary discovery of ethical monotheism. But God’s presence was withheld sufficiently to leave space for the patriarchs themselves to exhibit free choices, and to leave space for others to make choices.
During the cold-war, people spoke about America being the heart of the “free world.” That phrase can mean many things. It can refer to a system of government with elections or it can refer to an economic system with free enterprise. But, perhaps most significantly, it can refer to a form of liberal society where people are free to make choices about their actions and about their character.
Rav Simcha Bunim reminds us that our encounter with God can, at times, limit freedom, but that another model exists, the model of Avraham, Yitzhak, and Yaakov, who built a life of faith that preserved space for human freedom and human choices.
Liberal society needs encouragement to persevere in the face of attacks, new and old, to our way of life. And we need the reminder that our tolerance of difference and our embrace of choices are not symptoms of lukewarm commitments, but are fully consistent with a life of vibrancy and intensity. It is a product of God’s own choice to reveal only enough Godliness in the world to inspire faith, rather than a form of revelation that makes freedom impossible.
- Rabbi Herzl Hefter’s Huffington Post d’var Torah – available here, is the source for the core ideas that are developed in this drasha. I’m grateful to Rabbi Hefter for his d’var Torah and for his availability to respond to some follow-up questions that I posed to him. I take full responsibility for the “final product” and any distortions and errors in my formulations and understanding. ↩︎
Rabbi David Wolkenfeld 