Adina Roth – Head of Jewish Life

Today’s parsha teaching about a father-in-law is dedicated to the Aliyah of the Neshama of Peter Michaelson ^z’l. It is dedicated to the memory of him as a wonderful and beloved father to Siena. May his memory inspire us all to be better parents, and may we be grateful for our fathers and father-in-laws and their perspectives and wisdom.

When it comes to leaders, no one is considered as powerful a leader as Moshe, the man who stood up to the tyrant Pharaoh, led the Israelites to freedom, accompanied them in their nagging, plaintive and often sinning selves through the desert and eventually prepared them to enter the Promised Land. Moses was courageous, authentic, vulnerable and deeply loyal to the  people of Israel. Yet who would have imagined that Moses, the greatest prophet to ever live and beloved servant of God, needed a good talking to by his father-in-law on his leadership style, the art of delegation and that ever deferred ideal, the work-life balance!

Moshe had married a woman by the name of Tzipporah, who was the daughter of a Midianite priest named Yitro or Jethro. Moshe and the people have left Egypt and are in the desert, and are about to receive the Torah. In this in-between place they are no longer slaves, but also have not entered into a covenantal relationship with God. It is often in these liminal spaces, where you have left one world behind and your identity is yet to take hold in another world that interesting things can happen. It’s at this time that Moshe receives some sage advice, not from God but from a Midianite priest.  

On Yitro’s arrival, he takes a look at his son-in-law’s daily routine and notes that the Israelites line up from morning until evening to receive judgement and guidance from Moshe. That evening, we can imagine that they were sitting in a tent with the desert breeze coming in, sipping herbal tea when Yitro asks Moshe about his workload. It is worth noting the details of their interchange. Moshe explains that every day, ‘the people come to me to inquire of God and I sort out the disputes between one person and another.’ Yitro listens and utters a sentence which I have heard many an in-law say to their son-in-law, ‘lo tov hadavar asher atah oseh’. This thing you are doing is not good!!’ It takes a unique father-in-law to have the chutzpah and the temerity to challenge any son-in-law, let alone the great Moses. Yitro continues, ‘The task is too heavy for you. You cannot do it alone’. With these words, Yitro proceeds to offer one of the oldest lessons on leadership and delegation. He advises Moshe to create a justice system, where magistrates will preside over the smaller matters and Moshe will manage the really big cases. He warns him of burn-out and points to work-life balance; Yitro is the Arianna Huffington of the ancient world. 

There is something so classically and culturally Jewish about your father-in-law telling you off, giving you a little rebuke and a lot of advice without mincing his words. But there might be more going on here beneath the surface. When Yitro arrives on the scene, Rashi is quick to tell us that Yitro had seven names, reflecting seven different qualities. According to Rashi, one of his names was Yeter because he added a law to the Torah (the law of delegation), his name Yitro signals that he converted to Judaism. He was called Chovav because he loved the Torah. He was also called Chaver which means friend. Rashi’s interpretations of Yitro’s names are fascinating. Yitro arrives on the scene as an outsider, someone who brings wisdom to Moshe from another culture and belief system. Although his counsel is accepted, it seems as if Rashi, and by extension our rabbinic tradition, needed to tame Yitro’s outsider status and incorporate his cultural difference into the fold by saying, actually Yitro did have wisdom but at the end of the day, he was really ‘one of us.’ Rashi’s reading of Yitro is not in accordance with the plain meaning of the text where Yitro arrives, assesses, gives advice and leaves returning to Midian. He does not join the Jewish people.

If we take the actual meaning of Yitro’s name as signaling surplus or addition, or something extra, we might come closer to what is going on here. Yitro is bringing additional, surplus and extra wisdom to the people of Israel from outside. His contribution is foreign. The Jewish people are about to stand at Mt Sinai, receive the Torah and enter into an eternal covenant with God. But just before they do so, there is almost an interruption in the text. Wisdom from the Torah is prefigured by wisdom from a pagan priest. Advice and teaching can come from an outside source.

As I see it, there is a doubling over of wisdoms in this portion. The first wisdom comes from Moshe’s non-Jewish father in law, while the second body of wisdom comes from God and the Torah. The portion seems to be saying, we may receive the Torah and certainly drink of its wisdom and draw on its resources but there are many fonts of wisdom in the world and we need to be open to receiving wisdom from all sources especially wisdom from the so-called outsider, the one on the fringes who presents something additional (yeter) to what we might think we know. This is why I respectfully disagree with Rashi. To make Yitro into one of us is to miss the point. It is  Yitro’s difference, his coming from a different place that is essential to his contribution.

In our lives, we may feel we have arrived at a set of values, ideals and even assumptions by which we live. Yitro reminds us that wisdom and change can, and should, come from surprising places. As the opposite of the echo-chamber, Yitro reminds us to listen for the voices on the edges that might jar a little with what we believe. In the words of Sydney Clours, if we look ‘a little further than we thought to go,’ we will find ‘a stream with a singing sound.’