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When Aharon's staff swallowed Pharaoh's magicians' serpents, why does the Torah (תורה) call it "the staff of Aharon" rather than "the snake of Aharon"? The Gemara (גמרא) and Rashi (רש"י) teach that the staff reverted to a stick before swallowing—a miracle within a miracle. The shiur resolves the Maharsha's challenge by distinguishing between Aharon's genuine transformation and the Egyptians' mere illusion.
The shiur analyzes a famous Gemara (גמרא) cited by Rashi (רש"י) on Parshas Vaeira regarding the miracle of Aharon's staff. The Torah (תורה) recounts that Moshe threw down his staff and it became a snake. Pharaoh's magicians replicated the feat with their staffs, which also became snakes. Then Aharon's snake swallowed theirs. The Gemara teaches that the staff of Aharon reverted back to a stick before swallowing the Egyptian snakes—it wasn't a snake swallowing snakes, but a stick swallowing snakes. Rashi explains this is called a "miracle within a miracle" (nes besoch nes): first the stick miraculously became a snake, and then the stick miraculously swallowed snakes. The Maharsha raises a fundamental question on Rashi's explanation. If the first miracle was that a stick became a snake, and then a second miracle occurred where the stick (after reverting from being a snake) swallowed the other snakes, this appears to be two sequential miracles, not a miracle within a miracle. One miracle happened, then it was undone, and then another miracle occurred. What makes this qualify as a miracle within a miracle rather than simply two consecutive miracles?
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Parshas Vaeira (Shemos 7:8-12)
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