Parshat Vayikra 5765
March 18, 2005

Az Yashir V

“Markavot Paroh Vechayloh Yara Vayam, Umivchar Shalishav Tube’u Beyam Suf - Pharaoh’s chariots and armies He threw into the sea, and Pharaoh’s primary officers were drowned in the Sea of Reeds.”

It is well known that G-d orchestrates the world measure for measure – known as Midah Kneged Midah. The Etz Yosef points out this phenomenon here in Az Yashir - He writes, “the reason the Egyptians drowned at sea is because when King Pharoah rose to power in the beginning of the book of Exodus he decreed, All newborn boys shall be mercilessly dropped into the Nile. How divinely ironic, that Egypt’s elite suffer the exact punishment that was originally intended for Bnei Yisroel”.

In addition, Rashi explains that the usage of the words Tube’u Beyam Suf - were drowned in the Sea of Reeds, indicate that the bottom of the ocean floor was now like pitch and tar. Why did G-d perform such a peculiar miracle?! Is it not enough that the sea split and The Children of Israel paraded through on dry land while the enemy perished in front of their eyes in the depths of the ocean?!! What can we learn from the ocean floor transformed and became like tar?

The answer is the same as above - Midah Knegged Midah - measure for measure, Since the Egyptian taskmasters commanded our forefathers to work with pitch and tar during their years of slavery, so too as the oppressors met their dramatic ending it was amidst pitch and tar again.

In the merit of our reading Parshat Zachor this week and remembering the horrors of Amalek through history, may we merit to see again soon the providential hand of the Creator restoring goodness, morality, and truth to His world.

Shabbat Shalom.

Rabbi Ephraim Epstein
rabbiepstein@sonsisrael.com

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