Shemot parsha: The symbolism of the Burning Bush

Why, out of all places, did God reveal himself to Moses through the sneh (burning bush)? (Exodus 3:2).

One possibility is that the experience seems to be a microcosm of revelation. Note the similarity in sound between sneh and Sinai, the mountain where God speaks to the Jewish People. Indeed, the revelation at the sneh and Sinai occurred in the same place: the desert of Horev. Both unfolded through the medium of fire. At the sneh, the fire was not consumed (3:2). At Sinai smoke and fire engulfed the entire mountain (19:18).

Other approaches understand the sneh as symbolic either of Egypt or of the Jewish People. On the one hand, it was akin to Egypt. Just as it is difficult to remove the hand from a thorn bush without lacerating the skin, so was it impossible to escape the “thorn bush” known as Egypt without some amount of pain and suffering (Mechilta d’Rabbi Shimon Bar Yochai, Exodus 3:2).

On the other hand, the sneh can be viewed as representative of the Jewish People. In Egypt, the Jews were stripped of all goods and felt so low that it was as if they were driven into the ground. The sneh is a simple bush that is also close to the ground (R. Elazar in Mechilta d’Rabbi Shimon Bar Yochai, Exodus 3:7).

Perhaps, too, when Moses flees after being criticized by a fellow Jew for killing the Egyptian and having his life threatened by Pharaoh, he becomes uncertain to whom he should be loyal – the Egyptians or the Jews. In fact, after he saves Jethro’s daughters, they describe Moses to their father as an ish Mitzri (Egyptian man; Exodus 2:19).

Soon after, Moses sees the phenomenon of the bush that burns without end. “It is,” as Gaya Aranoff Bernstein writes, “as if he suddenly has a divinely inspired insight, that he is looking at his family tree on fire, in danger of being consumed and obliterated. He has an acute awareness…that he must heed the call to help, and leave the comforts and safety of living among non-Jews in Midian.… He realizes that despite his own reluctance and insecurity, he is uniquely positioned to help his people; he must respond to the call of his soul to help carry out the divine mission.”

But the meaning of sneh that resonates most powerfully sees the sneh as symbolic not of Sinai or of Egypt or of the Jewish People but of God Himself. As long as Jews were enslaved, God could only reveal Himself in the lowly burning bush in the spirit of “I am with My people in their pain” (Psalms 91:15). God cannot be in comfort, if you will, as long as His people are in distress (Rashi, quoting Midrash Tanchuma 14).

Revelation through the sneh teaches that God is with us in the darkest moments and places.

Candle lighting:

Shemot parsha

January 5 at 5:27 p.m.