God once again, Moses prepares himself to enter Pharaoh's court. Raised there from childhood, and having fled the court to avoid Pharaoh's anger, Moses now returns to demand the liberation of his people. Formerly a slave to the Egyptians, and adopted grandson to the Pharaoh, Moses must transform his inner nature to stand in a new role in court. Moses is summoned to grow in stature before he meets with the earthly king.
In preparing Moses for his mission, God tells him: "I place you in the role of God to Pharaoh, with your brother Aaron as your prophet." Ordinarily, such a claim would be the height of arrogance. The act of "playing God" implies arrogating powers or feigning a certainty which is beyond the proper purview of any human being. Certainly, pious Jews throughout the millennia have worked hard to cultivate their own humility, their own sense of being "mere dust and ashes." Yet God instructs Moses to "play God" as a necessary step in our historic liberation from slavery. What is going on?
The rabbis of antiquity, in Midrash Sh'mot Rabbah, understand this verse as evidence of God's uniqueness. Most rulers, they point out, prohibit any other person from using their staff of office, wearing their crown or robes, and, most especially, assuming their names: "One must not call himself by the name of a mortal king, Caesar or Augustus, for if one assumed his name, he would be executed; yet God called Moses by His own name." Other sovereigns are finite in their power and their wisdom. Perhaps because they are all too aware of their own limitations, they become jealous of the emblems and titles of their rule.
God, on the contrary, is without limits. Not needing to fear running out of goodness or majesty, God willingly imparts holiness and dignity to all of creation. Perhaps the verse hints at an insight that extends beyond the unique example of Moses and Pharaoh. Perhaps Moses and Pharaoh provide a lesson in seeing God in every encounter with another human being. After all, Bereshit, the first book of the Torah, reminds us that all people are made in the Divine image. And the book of Psalms tells us that we are "made little lower than the angels." If that is so, that God's image is found reflected in the humanity of other human beings, then each encounter with another person is potentially an encounter with God. Each conversation, each opportunity to interact with someone else, with anyone else, is no less than an act of revelation.
Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel, for many years a professor at the Jewish Theological Seminary, used to criticize the popular idea that Judaism prohibited images of God inside synagogues. In fact, he would say, if you look around during a Shabbat service, you will see that God's image fills each occupied seat. The assembled worshipers are themselves images of God!
To experience revelation, however, takes a certain inner openness. All of us have the ability to come face to face with God in our contacts with each other. The Midrash tells us that Moses had to confront Pharaoh so that the self-obsessed monarch would be able to look upon a former slave and say , "This is God."
Can we, in the weeks ahead, teach ourselves to regard our fellows and to say the same?
Shabbat Shalom.