kosher bookworm: alan jay gerber

Our yearly Pesach literary review

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Perhaps among our community’s most creative and articulate interpreters of our Biblical narrative and tradition, both in verse and illustration, is Rabbi David Fohrman. This year as in years past, Rabbi Fohrman has brought forth a unique animated series of video presentations dealing with the Exodus, themed to the Pesach holiday observance. This year’s series in entitled “Passover: The Three Great Lies of the Exodus.”

According to Rabbi Fohrman, “The story of the Exodus has so many awe-inspiring, belief-inducing moments that the three signs that G-d showed Moses at the beginning of the narrative are not typically seen as the top contenders. However, it is with these three signs that G-d explicitly states: ‘So that [the people] will believe.’ [Exodus 4:1] But this is curious: Why would the signs be an important way station on the road to belief? They are much less impressive than the plagues that follow shortly afterwards. Indeed, the signs — a white hand, a cup of water that turns to blood when it hits the ground, a staff that turns into a snake — seem like glorified magic tricks. Why are they catalysts towards national belief?”

In thi animatIon, Rabbi Fohrman teaches that the three signs are more than “magic tricks”; they serve as lenses through which we view the entire Exodus saga. When we begin to better comprehend the deeper meaning and theological focus of these three signs, we see an entirely new Exodus story unfold.

In Rabbi Fohrman’s words, these point to “a darker, but a more nuanced and more meaningful story than the one we perhaps learned as children. It is a story that reveals the depth of G-d’s abiding love for His People, and in the emotional power inherent in His commitment to redeem them. 

This video series as well all the previous ones certainly deserve your attention for both their educational and spiritual value. They can be viewed through the website of the Aleph Beta Academy at alephbeta.org/course/lecture/the-three-signs

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