“Look down from Your holy dwelling in heaven, and bless Your people Israel.” (Deuteronomy 26:15)
We learn in the Talmud (Sanhedrin 59b); R. Simeon b. Manassia said: “Woe for the loss of a great servant. For had not the serpent been cursed, every Jewish person would have had two valuable serpents, sending one to the north and one to the south to bring him costly gems, precious stones, and pearls.”
It is difficult to understand why the serpent, from whom all evil devolves, would have been such a good messenger for Israel, and why this good could not have come from other beasts and animals. If the reason is that when the serpent was cursed all the other animals were cursed with it, why then does the Talmud not say that if only the serpent had not been cursed, then all the beasts and animals would bring us gems and precious stones? Why does it say this only and specifically of the snake?
It may perhaps be as follows: We learn in the Jerusalem Talmud (Peah, 5a); R. Shmuel b. Nachmeni said: “We ask the snake, ‘Why must your tongue flicker as you move?’ The snake replies, ‘My tongue caused me all this trouble.’ We ask, ‘What pleasure do you derive from biting? The lion rends and eats, the wolf rends and eats, but what pleasure do you get?’ The snake replies, “ ‘Will the snake bite without venom?” ’ In Hebrew the word for ‘venom,’ lachash, also means ‘whisper.’ ‘If Heaven did not whisper in my ear to bite,’ says the snake, ‘I would not bite.’ ”
All other animals and beasts kill and rend to satisfy their hunger and for pleasure, while the snake does not bite to satisfy its hunger or for pleasure. This hints to us that when an action is altruistic, great things can come of it. Thus, only as a consequence of being cursed was the snake prevented from being useful. If not for the fact that it was cursed, it would bring gems and precious stones to the Jewish people.
The meaning could also be as follows: We can see that when God punishes man, using a carnivore as His instrument and simply substituting, God forbid, man for the meat of another animal, then the heavenly judgment is clothed in a natural event. The nature of every carnivore is to eat and satisfy its hunger. When, however, punishment is meted out using a snake, the judgment is a revealed one. It is not clothed in a natural event because the snake is not satisfying a hunger and takes no pleasure from biting, and so this is naked justice, administered “as is.” This is the meaning of the passage in the Talmud, “Woe for the loss, etc.” As the snake after being cursed has become an instrument of unclothed revelation of judgment, we can deduce that if it had not been cursed, the good it would have brought would have been an equally great good. It would have been supernaturally good. Similarly, when we see that, God forbid, we are being tortured and tormented in ways that are clearly of no benefit or profit to the person torturing us, but simply to cause pain, it is a revelation of naked judgment, unclothed in a natural event—and we can deduce from it that when we return to God and pray, then God will rescue us super-naturally, with a salvation not clothed in natural events.
It is possible that this is what is being hinted in the verses where our teacher Moses said: “O Lord, why do You mistreat this people? Why did You send me? As soon as I came to Pharaoh to speak in Your name, he made things worse for the people. You have done nothing to help Your people.” (Exodus 5:22–23)
We know that the style of leadership of our teacher Moses was a miraculous one, unclothed in natural events. He brought water up from below ground and bread down from above, and so forth. After becoming the messenger to Pharaoh to redeem the Jewish people, Moses saw that Pharaoh’s fresh decree against them—namely, that he would no longer give them straw with which to make bricks—was one from which he derived no benefit or profit. Moses thought that he was responsible, that the new decrees and the torture that necessarily preceded the salvation were happening precisely because he was the messenger and his leadership was supernatural. He felt responsible for the suffering because the salvation that he, Moses, wrought would also not come clothed in natural events.
So he said to the Holy Blessed One, “Why do You mistreat this people; why have You sent me?” Moses also pointed out to God that Pharaoh had made things bad for the people, that the evil was directed solely at them and served no purpose, for even Pharaoh derived no benefit from it. “So,” Moses pleaded, “even though it will be followed by great and supernatural salvation, do the Jewish people have the strength to withstand this much suffering?” Then God said to Moses, “Now you begin to see what I am doing to Pharaoh. With a strong hand he will be forced to let them go, and he will be forced to drive them out of his land.” (Exodus 6:1) “Therefore say to the Israelites, ‘I am God.’ ” (Exodus 6:6) God explained that henceforth there would be a total, complete, and unclothed judgment of the Egyptians and enemies of Israel, while for the Jewish people God would reveal supernatural mercy and loving-kindness.
This is what enables the Jewish person to bolster himself in times of such awesome suffering. The troubles are not clothed in nature, the judgment is not natural, and so also the buttressing of faith is not naturally achieved, because in the natural course of events it would be impossible to understand how to strengthen ourselves. Therefore, this strengthening of our faith works to change judgment to mercy, because it is a revelation beyond anything clothed in natural events.
This is what is hinted at in the verse that precedes our opening quote: (Deut. 26:14) “I have not eaten [the second tithe] while in mourning. I have not separated any of it while unclean, and I have not used any for the dead. I have obeyed You, God my Lord, and have done all that You commanded me.”
Even though, as hinted at in the verse, I had cause—death and mourning, God protect us—nevertheless I did all that You commanded me. Rashi (ibid.) explains the phrase “I did all that You commanded me” to mean “I was happy, and I made others happy with it.” That is, “I achieved this, even though in the natural course of events it would be impossible to understand how I could have strengthened myself, and how as well as this I also made others happy.”
And perhaps “I made others happy” may also be hinting that when others saw how even in my troubles I strengthened myself, then they who watched were also able to strengthen themselves in their pain, a fortiori, saying their own suffering is not as bitter as mine. This is the meaning of “I was happy, and I made others happy with it.”
So, we pray, “Look down from Your holy dwelling in heaven, and bless Your people Israel.” Our sages say (Exodus Rabbah 41:1) that whereas in the Torah the Hebrew word hashkafa, “look down,” generally implies something bad, here the meaning is inverted to denote something good. It is the strengthening of faith that succeeds of itself in turning bad into good, and to bring blessings to “Your people Israel.”
And bless Your people Israel.