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Why did men sing at Kriyas Yam Suf while women sang, danced, and played instruments? The shiur develops a fundamental distinction: women experienced the event as an immediate wedding to Hashem (ה׳), while men had to first commit their energies and potential before they could become spiritually receptive—the male must become feminine in relation to God.
Rabbi Zweig opens with a Midrash on the pasuk "Vayivla mata arnes matosam" about Moshe's staff swallowing the Egyptian staffs. The Midrash tells a parable of a donkey port-master demanding taxes from a lion-king on a ship. After the fox suggests the king should pay (since the money returns to the king's treasury anyway), the lion kills the donkey. When the fox eats the donkey's heart and the lion asks where it is, the fox responds: "If he had a heart, would he have asked you to pay taxes?" The Gemara (גמרא) in Sukkah presents a contrasting story where a king voluntarily pays taxes to set an example for his subjects. Rabbi Zweig resolves this apparent contradiction by distinguishing between revenue taxes and sovereignty taxes. Highway tolls are revenue-generating; a king paying them teaches fiscal responsibility. But port taxes are declarations of sovereignty—they announce entry into a new jurisdiction. For a king to pay a sovereignty tax would defeat its very purpose. Pharaoh, like the donkey, lacked "heart" (understanding/havana)—he saw only the surface mechanics of enslaving the Jews without grasping God's deeper purpose: not merely to train the Jews as slaves, but to teach them recognition of divine authority and their relationship with Hashem (ה׳).
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Why does the Midrash connect Pharaoh's expulsion of the Jews to the mitzvah of shiluach hakan? The shiur develops a chiddush that Pharaoh's sin wasn't only drowning the children, but the insensitivity of expelling the parents afterward. The deeper analysis reveals that Pharaoh may have valued the Jews greatly and wanted to control them—making his expulsion an act of tremendous cruelty, not liberation.
Why does Moshe respond to the splitting of the sea with shirah rather than praise or thanksgiving? Rashi's use of "al libo" reveals that shirah is an emotional expression—a response of love to love. When Hashem shows personal care, the only adequate response is "I love You too," not mere gratitude or praise, and this principle applies to all relationships.
Parshas Beshalach - Az Yashir (Shemos 15:1-21)
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