<html><body style="word-wrap: break-word; -webkit-nbsp-mode: space; -webkit-line-break: after-white-space; ">Regarding the pasuk where Moshe tells HaShem "<i>And now if You would forgive their sin -- but if not, erase my name from Your book that You have written</i>," and my comment: It seems strange to me that for someone who was considered to be <span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: rgb(16, 22, 11); ">the most humble Biblical character of all time, had the chutzpah to say to the Almighty: "If you don't forgive them, then count me out." It sounds like a threat.</span><div><font class="Apple-style-span" color="#10160B"><br class="webkit-block-placeholder"></font></div><div><font class="Apple-style-span" color="#10160B">Two postings were quite defensive about my use of the word "chutzpah." It's funny how the same people had no problem in describing the chutzpah of Miriam toward her parents (with chazal justification, I know). The objections raised to the term chutzpah is lovely d'rash, but it's not p'sak. </font></div><div><div><br class="webkit-block-placeholder"></div><div>One response was:</div><div>So Moshe is telling Hashem, "If you wipe them out, I have no more reason to exist, and I won't want to exist!"</div><div><br class="webkit-block-placeholder"></div><div>The other was:</div><div>"Ribono shel olam, I don't want that honor and that glory. I just want you <br>to please forgive your children. Please, don't wipe them out -- wipe me out <br>instead. Please, I don't want the glory and the honor, I don't want to be in <br>Your book -- if my people -- YOUR people -- are going to be destroyed."</div><div><br class="webkit-block-placeholder"></div><div>The creativity of the above is wonderful, but it's not was the pasuk says. Simply put, who is any man to give God an ultimatum. Pshat is very clear. If Moshe meant what the above people claim,</div><div>then he could easily have been diplomatic and stated it by saying either: "I have no more reason to exist" or "I don't want that honor and that glory" or a million other things. The p'shat is clear.</div><div>It was not only an implied threat, it was a real threat. If you follow the very next 2 psukim, it says: "HaShem said to Moshe, Whoever has sinned against Me, I shall erase from My book. Now, go</div><div>and lead the people to where I have told you. Behold! My angel shall go before you, and on the day that I make My account, I shall bring their sin to account against them." So God is going to </div><div>do what God wants and He doesn't need anyone to threaten Him. In fact there have been commentaries saying that because of what Moshe said to HaShem regarding the <i>threat</i> is the reason</div><div>his name was erased from the entire Tetzaveh sidra.</div><div><br class="webkit-block-placeholder"></div><div>rw</div><div><br class="webkit-block-placeholder"></div></div></body></html>