Higher Than The Angels - Parshat Beshalach - Rabbi Yaakov Asher Sinclair

[music] the word in Hebrew Kaya has two seemingly opposite meanings aaya is a wild animal a beast but it's also one of the names of the most elevated of the angels as we say in our daily prayers here the word means an angel what possible connection could there be between [music] a beast and a Celestial being like an angel man is [music] called a walker as it says in the prophet Zar [music] I will give you to walk amongst the [music] standers the standers are the Angels here the angels are called standard because an angel can only stand in its place it cannot move up or down it's [music] no freedom to choose its perception of God is so overwhelming that it can do [music] nothing other than the will of God and in a sense a beast is the same it too has no Freedom [music] of Choice it can only act according to its instincts which of course [music] is the will of God only man can choose between good and evil and thus [music] only man can move up or down if you elevate yourself [music] you can rise above even the holiest Angels that's the meaning of the verse the angel of God which had been going in front of the children [music] of Israel I.E preceding them in Holiness now moved and went behind them because the children of Israel had elevated [music] themselves even higher than the angels