[Avodah] Vayikra

Cantor Wolberg via Avodah avodah at lists.aishdas.org
Sat Mar 25 17:18:53 PDT 2017


“Vayikra el Moshe” And HE called to Moses.

According to the Rabbis, Moses had many names (cf. Megilla 13; Lev, Rabba 1:3).
He was called Yered, “because Manna descended (yarad) through his intervention.”
He was known as Avigdor, “for he fenced in (gadar) the breaches of Israel.”  He was
nicknamed Avisucco, “because he was like a protecting tabernacle (succah) for his
people.” 

Yet when God calls to him, He uses only the name by which Pharaoh’s daughter 
termed him, Moshe, a name which recalled Moses’s lowly estate, oppressed, 
thrown into the Nile and dragged from its waters. It was exactly because Moses 
still knew how to answer to that name that he was fit to be ruler over his people; but
more important, even in his prosperity, he never forgot from where he came.

Similarly, the Jewish people were redeemed from Egypt because they did not alter 
their names. They retained the traditions and way of life of their fathers. 


There is no respect for others without humility in one's self.
Henri Frederic Amiel,   (Swiss moral philosopher, poet, and critic)


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