[Avodah] Lying to Paro and the Egyptians

[Jay F. Shachter]

 From v41i33:

> 
> I have never been able to find a reasonable answer to this basic
> question about leaving Egypt.  Why is it that HKBH tells BY to lie
> to the Egyptians about "borrowing" their fancy kelim?  There was
> never an intent to return them, and
>

God did not tell our ancesters to lie.  God did not tell our ancestors
to pretend to borrow things that they did not intend to return.  God
told our ancestors to ask for things.  In Biblical Hebrew, sh-'-l does
not mean to borrow.  It means to ask for something.  Sometimes, as in
2 Kings 4:3, there is a contextual implication that the asked-for thing
will be returned, but that is an implication supplied by the context
of the word, not by the word.

In Rabbinic Hebrew the word's meaning narrowed, so that in Rabbinic
Hebrew the word came to mean to ask for something with the promise to
return it -- i.e., to borrow something -- but that change in meaning
occurred a thousand years after those verses in Exodus were written.

You will misunderstand the Bible if you read it thinking that it was
written in Rabbinic Hebrew.  For example, the last verse of Esther
states that Mordokhai was accepted by the multitudes of his brethren.
"Rov" in Biblical Hebrew means "multitudes" or "abundance".  In
Rabbinic Hebrew, "rov" means "majority", but Scripture was obviously
not saying that Mordokhai was accepted by the majority of his
brethren, that's preposterous.  Sometimes our Sages wrote midrashim
that played off of the contemporary meanings of ancient Hebrew words,
but the people who wrote those midrashim (unlike some of the people
who read them) knew that they were having fun with words.


>
> BY had to even use sneaky tricks to find out where their neighbors
> kept the kelim during makkos choshech.
>

I don't see that anywhere in the Torah.  And neither do you.


> 
> Also, why did Moshe have to tell Paro that BY only wanted to leave
> for 3 days.  It may have been worded in such a way that it wasn't
> necessarily a lie, but that is just double-talk.  We all know that
> is the implication, and using word play doesn't excuse a lie.  Why
> couldn't he just be straight with Paro and tell him that it's time
> for us to leave so please let my people go.  We know that HKBH
> wanted Paro to refuse so that He could bring the 10 makkos upon
> Egypt, but why was it necessary to lie from the beginning?
> 

On February 12, 2023, in v41i12, a posting appeared in Avodah, more
than two and a half months before you wrote the above words, which
addressed the non-issue of withdrawing an offer that has been
rejected.  When you make an offer that is rejected, and qal vaxomer
when you make an offer that is accepted and then the other party goes
back on his word, you do not have to keep on making the same offer.
It is perfectly legitimate for you to say that the original offer is
no longer on the table, and it is not legitimate for you to say that
someone who withdraws a rejected offer, is a liar.

               Jay F. ("Yaakov") Shachter
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               When Martin Buber was a schoolboy, it must have been
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