Why Do We “Blunt the Wicked Son’s Teeth”? | Parshas Bo

Okay, paras bo. [sighs and gasps] We started the book of Exodus. We delved into the story of our slavery and soon we are going to discover the Exodus freedom in the para of B. Now there's a there's a bit of um there's a little bit of historical tension in this parha and what I mean by that is not not historical tension um like sequential tension because in the very same para where we describe the exodus where that moment we finally got our freedom and we finally got to leave the land of Egypt. We finally got to leave hundreds of years of slavery. That's not how the That's not how the portion begins. The portion begins with God telling Moshe, "Bo El Po, come to parro and warn him." It's one of his last warnings, his third to last warning because there's going to be three more plagues. Commentaries wonder why the term boar come to parro as opposed to go to parro. There's different explanations. One of the explanations by the Bal Hatim of Yakov T was one of the books that he wrote who authored the tour. He writes that when the Torah says go to parro it's usually when parro is hanging out near the Nile. When it [snorts] says come to parro parro is hanging out at his house. Our sages tell us that power tried making a god out of himself, a deity out of himself. And part of being a uh deity, a a a god is not having human needs and functions such as relieving oneself. So he would hold it in all day [laughter] and he would just go early in the morning and late at night near the Nile River. And whenever it says go to Pyro, Moshe is going to bust him at the Nile River. Bust him being human. [laughter] That's what they just tell us. But over here it says come to Pyro as opposed to go to Pyro. Because in this circumstance, Pyro's actually in his throne. So, so it's not like you see in the movies [laughter] where Moshe is going into the palace. He's actually going into the laboratory to talk to Par. That's where he's conversing with him. Um [snorts] but in this circumstance where it doesn't say go to parro, it says come to parro, parro is actually in his palace. Which means when it says come to parro, the Torah is describing parro as being in a position of power. which makes this sound like the epitome of slavery, the antithesis, like the furthest thing from from freedom, at least before Moshe was in some sort of position of of power, of dominance, of exposing the humanity of of Pyro. And over here, no, Parro's in his palace in control. Moshe has to come to him. But sometimes even in the thicket of slavery in that dark space where we seem most powerless is where we could actually find the most freedom. In fact, freedom began before Exodus even took place. They they stopped the actual slavery on Russashana time. That's when they stopped working. They celebrated their freedom in public with the Corbin Pesak, with a Passover offering in Egypt. In their homes in Egypt, they made their home sacred and holy before the Exodus even took place. One of the first mitzvah we have as a people in this week's portion is the mitzvah of the corban pes, the Passover offering. And there's a specific mitzvah to not boil it, to roast it. And commentaries explain that if they were to take the Egyptian god, which is the sheep, and offer it to our god, you might be a little hesitant. Let me hide it. Let me boil it. Let me put it in a pot. Close the top. Do it in small increments. Nobody will know. And the the commentary say, "No, roast it as one big piece. Do it outside. There's going to be smoke. It's going to smell. We're going to make a big scene because we are free within Egypt, within the thicket of of slavery. where Pyro seemed most powerful in his home not in the laboratory is where we discover freedom and what is the purpose of Moshe though coming to Pyro when Pyro feels like he's in this position of power so God tells Moshe come to parro because I've hardened his heart I've hardened the heart of his servants to place signs and wonders within him and here's what the Torah then says and this is kind of the point that I I want to focus on today in order to convey or to tell over this story in the ears of your children or of your sons and sons sons and your children what I have done in Egypt. God says this is going to be a teachable moment for the future. The freedom you're going to experience now, which seems difficult because Pyro is literally in his house in a position of power. That freedom you're going to adapt is going to teach you how to be free later in the future. Us reading this right now, we will learn how to become free. In other words, God is saying, I'm this is not just for your freedom. This is freedom for the future generations because the future has to learn about the exodus because they're going to have their own personal Egypts that they're going to have to leave. And we have our own exile that we have to exit from. We have to enter into the messianic era. On a more simple level, this is education. One of the mitzvah, the many mitzvah we have in this week's Torah portion is the mitzvah of conveying the Passover story at the first night of Pesak to discuss the Hagada to teach the values of how to become free. And we read about in the Hagada the four children, the four sons, the wise son, the wicked son, the the simple son, the son who doesn't know how to ask. And each of these four sons are actually derived from this week's Torah portion. Some sort of variation of when your child asks this question, this is how you'll answer him. And I I think it's important to note that whenever a Jewish child, whether a child at age or child at heart, asks or challenges the exile, challenges the pain that God has allowed us to endure, challenges the ability to dream and hope and is looking for comfort, looking for open eyes for a better future. We answer them not just the standard answer but an answer that is relevant to them because we don't give the same answer to all four children. I mean we could but we speak their language. We convey the same value but in their language. What I'd like to do is take the next couple of moments and just focus on how we address the wicked son. Some might call the cynical son because they want to be PC. [laughter] No, I'm kidding. Um, no. But the truth is wicked is a strong word. Russia, Russia can mean multiple things. I mean in Hebrew it's Russia but we have the Russia son and the Russia son I'm just going to quote from the Hagada. The Russia son says what is this service to you? What is this service you guys are doing? Why are you doing this? He's challenging the Passover seder. He's challenging the Passover offering and Corban. He's wondering why we're sitting at this table discussing ancient values. And again, what God is telling Moshe is these are not ancient values. These are values that are relevant and timeless for all. This is going to teach all of us how to be free. But he doesn't see it that way. He sees it as archaic, at least for now. We'll soon have we'll soon discuss how to change his mind. has to do with breaking his teeth. We'll get there soon. [laughter] The Russia says, "What is this service to you?" And then the Hagada says, "Because he excluded himself." I'm giving a loose translation here because this is the common translation. We'll we'll be more accurate soon. because he excluded himself, he has denied something fundamental, right? He's he's denying the the fundamental principle of of Judaism. So what do you need to do? Bunt his teeth. This is our again, every child deserves their answer because we want it to be meaningful to them. We don't just give the standard answer explaining why this is true but we also explain oh we can do that too but but we also explain why it's meaningful and he has a good question his question is I don't feel like I'm a part of this I don't feel like this is relevant to me I don't feel like this is meaningful to me what is this thing you're doing and our meaningful answer that God has conveyed Moshe thousands of years ago that the whole purpose of this Exodus is so we to educate him. The meaningful answer we're giving him, I'm kind of saying this facitiously. The meaningful answer we're giving him is, "Hey, you think you're not part of this?" What are we trying to do? What are we trying to accomplish? How are we trying to inspire him? We first guilt him by saying, "Hey, you stuck you took yourself out of this. [laughter] Guess what? You're part of this whether you like it or not." Okay, well, that's meaningful. And then we blunt his teeth. [sighs] Let's better understand what's really bothering the Russia. What is he really asking? What he's really asking, why are you doing these things? Why are you doing this service? The way the commentaries explain why is this so difficult? You know why it's difficult? You know why Judaism is difficult? Do you know why relationships are difficult? Because you don't know why you're doing it. You forgot the reason why you're doing it. There's such a focus on content and such little focus on context and without the context the content becomes meaningless. Obviously, it's inherently meaningful but it's meaningful in a context. Without that context, it's just why are we doing this? Why are you doing this? Maybe the rush is not that bad. Maybe he's just being honest, guys. Maybe it's a cry for help. Guys, I don't feel part of this. Explain to me why you're doing this. He's missing context. And and this happens so much in Jewish observance where we can easily get lost in the content of Judaism, the checklist items. And the checklist items are so important because they're God's will. But the fact that their god's will is the context and that's also important. But the Russia loosely translated he excluded himself literally translated he removed himself from the bigger picture from the general principle from the context and therefore therefore he is denying something fundamental he is missing something fundamental because he's missing context. The context is why are we doing any of these things? Why is it a burden? Well, it's a burden because it's not meaningful. It's meaning not meaningful because you're missing context. I had a friend who it's part of a longer story and some of you are familiar with this story, but the short of it was he used to say that I'm not religious. I'm I'm just in love with God. Right? [laughter] Because to him it wasn't just checklist items. It's a relationship. So often in in relationships in interpersonal relationships when things are seem to be going south people ask what do I do? Like oh no how am I going to fix this? Right? what do I do? And they'll go on chat and say, "Help me better communicate with my spouse. Help me deal with my this. Help me deal with my children." Right? And they start bandating the issues. And hopefully it's not the wrong band-aid and the wrong issue, right? Assuming you're even addressing the right thing, you're bandating it because you're asking the wrong question. You ask, we ask very practical questions. What do I do? Actionable items. practical questions are um are actually overwhelming because you don't know if you're actually doing the right thing. You're just throwing solutions at a problem and hoping something sticks. And then when nothing sticks, it's like I tried everything. The real question is who do I need to be? Because when I discover who I need to be, what I need to do becomes more clear. When we discover who we are and who we need to be as Jews, the context, the content becomes more clear. The content becomes more meaningful, becomes real. The whole context of Judaism, the context in which the content, the checklist items exist is a relationship. Think about it this this way. The first day of of Jewish of the year of the Jewish year of Jewish existence, Rashashana, Rashashana on the surface is commitment day. It's day we recommit ourselves to God because we coordinate him as our king. We say, "God, we're going to listen to you. Give us a good year because we're going to listen to you. We're going to fulfill these checklist items." But explains something fascinating. What does Rashashana refer to in the Torah? A day of ter. Well, what's that? What's ter could mean a few things. It could mean the sounding of the chauffear could also come from the word like your fellow your friend. Friendship. It's a day of friendship. It's a day where we have friendship with God because the context of us committing to God is like a friendship. Like we care, we actually care about this. In marriage, marriage can often be seen as contractual. We have a kuba which is a contract of responsibility but that's the content the context of that contract is friendship in the bra in the blessings that we bestow to the bride and the groom we bless him with shalom brotherhood peace friendship ship friendship connection is the context in which the concept of Judaism exists. So now this Russia comes and he says why are you doing these things? What is this service to you? He doesn't feel part of it. He feels that it's a burden. He feels that it's just like like we went from one slavery to the next. Why are you doing this to yourself? And our answer is he somehow removed himself from understanding the bigger picture getting so caught on the checklist items he's missing something fundamental here let's give it to him and how do we give him that fundamental piece of Judaism that fundamental piece of inspiration of connection so that now oh everything makes sense We blunt his teeth. Well, what does that mean? What does it mean to blunt his teeth? So, I I think if we're just reading it in plain English, it means punch punch him in the punch him in the teeth. Knock his teeth out. Right. But there's actually um what happens when you expose your teeth? Try it right now. By the way, look at your camera. Look in the mirror. Expose your teeth. Okay. As you're exposing your teeth, what are you doing? You're smiling. We have to expose his teeth. This guy needs a little sima. This guy needs a little joy in his Judaism. The relationship isn't working. The relationship seems fa like it's failing. The relationship seems like it's overwhelming. And now it's like, let me just exclude myself from this. And why are we even doing this? The answer is not let's band-aid and start throwing things at the let's start throwing solutions at people. The answer is expose your teeth, smile, a little bit of joy, a little bit of sima. I I was once working with a couple [snorts] who were in a in a bit of a a rut. Um at least they they were in a difficult position. They wanted things to be better. They they wanted more connection, more love. And I said to them, if if that showed up tomorrow, and I don't know how that's going to show up yet, but if it did, what is the first thing you'd notice about yourself? What would be different about you? They said, I'd probably be smiling. Really? What would that smile do? And they start describing how they can generate, they're answering their own issue, how they could generate more joy. But this is what we're saying to the Russia who feels excluded, feels like this is not for me. This is painful. This is burdensome. We have to expose his teeth. We have to get him to smile. There's another interpretation and I think these two interpretations go hand in hand. Take the word Russia. Three letters. the ra and the which are on either side of the shin. I'm sorry I don't have this on like a whiteboard, right? But the r and the ion which are on either on either side of the shin spell the word rah bad. And our problem with the Russia is that the way he sees himself and the way we see him is rah. We see him as bad. But why do we see him as bad as Ryan? Because we're forgetting about the shin and that shin needs to be exposed. It needs to be blunted. We have to realize that within what we see as bad, that's the version of him that we might see, but within there, there's something else. There's a shin. Well, what does shin stand for? I don't know. [snorts] What do we want it to stand for? Because there's a wild card there. There is a we could find something redeemable and good about this person. Shin could stand for sima because sin it's same letter. Shin could stand for sheer for lies. Shin could stand for a lot of different things. Why don't we find something good about this guy? Why are we focused on what he's doing wrong as opposed to, hey, this guy showed up to a seder. He's at the table. He's there. He's doing something right. He's asking the questions. He could have just been thinking it. He wants something better. There's something redeemable in that rash within the rah within the the rah the bad or what seems bad. Like why are we giving that so much attention? Maybe we should give more attention to the shin because there's no such thing as a perfect Russia. It doesn't exist. It it does not exist. The Talmud says that every Jew is full of mitzvah like a pomegranate is full of seeds because you could be the worst person in the world and you may have you've done something good. Okay, this this is going to get me a lot of flack because it's like, well, wait a minute, there's evil people in the world. Yeah, there are. But but that not all of us it's not our job to be a judge. Like not all of us are serving as chief justice of the Supreme Court. Like that's that's not our role. [laughter] We have to know our role in life. The the Rambam rules, we're just learning in the daily Rambam um the laws of judges. And the Rambam has to see the litigants as wicked when they come in and as righteous when they come out. But how many of us are judges? Like we we like to be judges because it's fun, but how many of us are actually qualified judges to do that to number one see somebody as wicked because it's going to benefit them and number two make that switch to afterward see them as righteous when they leave. Okay, so maybe that's not our role. Maybe our role is not to see why they're wicked. Maybe our role is to see that within the ra and within the ra somehow there's a shin wedged within there. And that shin could be something redeemable and we have to figure out why. It might be the fact that he showed up at the seder. Might be the fact that we have to just get him to smile, which is expose his shin, his teeth, because the word shinav means teeth. I don't know if I mentioned that in explanation before. Um, I just realized. [laughter] Okay, whatever. Excuse my lack of translation. There's something there because there is no such thing as a perfect Russia. Even in the Tanya, I just want to leave you with this. In the Tanya in chapter 11 where he describes in depth what a Russia is he describes what the incomplete Russia is and then he goes on to describe the complete Russia who is totally integrated as animal soul but he says there and this is me paraphrasing you're not going to see this quoted but if you read the chapter you'll see this [sighs] he says there that the complete complete Russia is not that complete. He's not that good at being a Russia because he didn't completely drive his soul out. It's still there. It might be makif which means abstract. It might seem that it's not completely relevant on the surface, but it got him to show up to a seder. It got him to initiate conversation. It got him to be interested. And let's focus on that. Let's focus on the shin that's hidden deep within there. Okay, that's my story and I'm sticking to it.