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Today is the 125th Yahrtzeit of RSRH, "L.<br><br>
Below is part of his commentary in Shemos 6:2 and 6:3. IMO it gives
fundamental insight into why the Bnai Yisroel went down to Mitzraim and
why they were afflicted there.<br><br>
<font face="Arial, Helvetica" size=4><b>2
</font><font face="Arial, Helvetica" size=3><i>God spoke to Moshe and
said to him: I am Hashem,<br>
</i></font><font face="Arial, Helvetica" size=4>3
</font><font face="Arial, Helvetica" size=3><i>[And was so] even when I
appeared to Avraham, Yitzchak and Ya’akov as the All-sufficing God
but had not become known to them as that which My Name
</font><font face="Arial, Helvetica" size=3>Hashem</i></b>
</font><font face="Arial, Helvetica" size=3><b><i>signifies.<br><br>
</i></b></font><font face="Arial, Helvetica" size=3>This new revelation
of God had been prepared from the very beginning<br>
of Jewish history. All the paths of Jewish history have led up to
this<br>
moment. God says:<br><br>
“I was already
<i>Hashem</i></font><font face="Arial, Helvetica" size=3>
</font><font face="Arial, Helvetica" size=3>when I appeared to Avraham,
Yitzchak and Ya’akov<br>
only as <i>Aleph-Lamud Shin-Daled Yud </i>and did not allow My intended
sovereignty as <i>Hashem</i></font><font face="Arial, Helvetica" size=3>
</font><font face="Arial, Helvetica" size=3>to<br>
become manifest to them in their own lives.<br><br>
“You are wondering why things have only become worse, and why<br>
even your mission has served only to push your misery to the utmost<br>
limit. Do you not see that your
</font><font face="Arial, Helvetica" size=3><i>entire
</i></font><font face="Arial, Helvetica" size=3>history up to this point
has been<br>
a </font><font face="Arial, Helvetica" size=3><i>downhill
</i></font><font face="Arial, Helvetica" size=3>road? Avraham was a
</font><font face="Arial, Helvetica" size=3><i>Nasi Elokim</i>
</font><font face="Arial, Helvetica" size=3>among the nations,
whereas<br>
Ya’akov was an unfortunate, hard-working servant ‘who had to toil in<br>
order to get himself a wife and then was forced to perform
additional<br>
labor in order to keep her’ (see
</font><font face="Arial, Helvetica" size=3><i>Hoshea
</i></font><font face="Arial, Helvetica" size=3>12:13).<br><br>
“I could have led you on an upward path. Instead of giving Avraham<br>
a son in his hundredth year, I could have established for him a
family<br>
by the time he was seventy, and I could have allowed his progeny to<br>
flourish and become a people in happy, favorable circumstances on
its<br>
own native soil. But then this people would not have become God’s<br>
people, </font><font face="Arial, Helvetica" size=3><i>Am
Hashem</i></font><font face="Arial, Helvetica" size=3>, the people
through which God will be revealed as <i>Hashem</i>. Then<br>
this people, like all the other peoples, would have been rooted solely
in<br>
the world of things that can be seen and touched. Like all the other<br>
peoples, this people would have had only physical foundations, and<br>
would have sought only material power and material greatness,
aspiring<br>
to the spiritual and to the moral only to the extent that these were<br>
compatible with, and beneficial to, its material ambitions.<br><br>
“But this people is not to be like the other nations. Unlike the
others,<br>
this people is to be founded solely upon God and upon the
fulfillment<br>
of His Will in moral freedom, and is to have an earthly hold and an<br>
earthly standing only from and for this God and this
fulfillment.”<br><br>
The idea of a </font><font face="Arial, Helvetica" size=3><i>free
</i></font><font face="Arial, Helvetica" size=3>almighty God and of
mankind made </font><font face="Arial, Helvetica" size=3><i>free
</i></font><font face="Arial, Helvetica" size=3>by that<br>
God has vanished from the earth. People and nations have sunk into<br>
materialism in both theory and practice (cf. Commentary above,
3:14).<br>
The emergence of the people of Avraham is to reawaken consciousness<br>
of freedom and to release mankind from the bonds of materialism.<br><br>
Hence, this people must start where other peoples have stopped. It<br>
had to despair of itself
</font><font face="Arial, Helvetica" size=3><i>b'goal
Nafsho</i></font><font face="Arial, Helvetica" size=3>; it had to lie
prone, about to perish<br>
in its own blood (see
</font><font face="Arial, Helvetica" size=3><i>Yechezkel
</i></font><font face="Arial, Helvetica" size=3>16:5–6), and to rise to
nationhood only<br>
through the Creator’s call, so that, by its very existence, this
people<br>
would proclaim to the peoples of the world:
</font><font face="Arial, Helvetica" size=3><i>Ani
Hashem</i></font><font face="Arial, Helvetica" size=3>!<br><br>
This moment of God’s revelation as
</font><font face="Arial, Helvetica" size=3><i>Hashem</i></font>
<font face="Arial, Helvetica" size=3>, when the helplessness of<br>
Avraham’s descendants reached its climax, was planned by God from<br>
the beginning, when He guided the fate of the patriarchs on a
downward<br>
path and appeared to them only as <i>Aleph-Lamud Shin-Daled Yud</i>, the
All-sufficing One, with<br>
Whose help one can endure all the vicissitudes of life and
prevail.<br><br>
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