SAN DIEGO — In this week’s Parshah, Vaera, God continues speaking to Moses. God remembers the promise to Abraham, Isaac and Jacob to bring them to the Promised Land as Israel. God hears the Israelites suffering as slaves now and tells Moses to let the people know they will soon be free.
Moses gives the Israelites God’s encouraging message, but they don’t believe him. God tells Moses and Aaron to go to Pharaoh and tell him to let the Israelites go free. But Moses is afraid Pharaoh won’t listen to him because he has a difficulty speaking. God tells Moses what to say and Aaron tells Pharaoh. But Pharaoh will not listen.
God then describes some of the plagues God will bring to the Egyptian people to make Pharaoh change his mind. God warns Moses but Pharaoh will harden his heart and refuse to let the people go.
God tells Moses to tell Aaron to take his staff and throw it down. The staff turns into a serpent. But Pharaoh has magicians that can do the same thing. Even when Aaron’s serpent swallows up the other serpents, Pharaoh is not impressed.
Aaron is then told to take his staff and hold it over the Nile River. All the water turns into blood and the fish die. But Pharaoh’s magicians are able to do that as well.
Seven days later, God tells Moses to have Aaron hold his arm over the Nile again. This time frogs appear and cover Egypt. The magicians also produce frogs. But the frogs are everywhere! Pharaoh asks Moses and Aaron to remove the frogs and he will let the people go.
God piles all the frogs into a big heap. But once the problem is solved, Pharaoh changes his mind and refuses to let the people go. Aaron is instructed to strike the dust of the earth with his staff. All the dust turns to lice. The lice cover the land and people of Egypt, but God keeps them away from the Israelites. When the magicians try to turn dust into lice, they can’t. They realize how powerful God is and advise Pharaoh to free the Israelites, but he refuses to listen.
The next plague brings insects swarming throughout Egypt. Pharaoh tells Moses the people can worship God, but must stay in Egypt. Moses tells him they must go into the wilderness to pray. Pharaoh agrees to let them go. Once the insects are gone, he changes his mind again.
Plague number five brings sickness to all of Egypt’s livestock. None of the Israelite’s livestock become ill. Pharaoh won’t let the people go. Even the next plague of boils doesn’t change his mind. Then God tells Moses to hold out his arm toward the sky. Hail rains down with streams of fire, shattering trees and destroying Egyptian fields. Once again, the Israelite land is spared. Pharaoh pleads with Moses to stop this plague. But as soon as the hail stops, Pharaoh’s heart hardens again and he refuses to let the people go.
What does this mean: Perseverance, continuing to try even when the task seems impossible, is an important thing to do. In the first Torah book, we read how Jacob worked seven years to be able to marry the girl he loved, then had to work even longer before he could marry her. He didn’t give up. In this parshah, we see another example of someone not giving up. But this time is different. Moses doesn’t want something for himself. He is trying to secure the freedom for his people. He is working toward a bigger goal, one that will help many others. He works together with God and his brother, Aaron, to accomplish this goal.
What you can do: You might think one person can’t make a big difference. Moses was one person trying to make the lives of the people around him better. He didn’t give up and became one of the world’s greatest Jewish heroes. You can be a hero, too. There are many ways we can work to help others, even when that task might seem impossible to do. Saving old toys and clothing and giving them to a homeless shelter is an easy way to help others. Collecting food to bring to the food bank is another. Even participating in a park or beach cleanup day helps the environment, which helps everyone enjoy those places more. Look around for simple things you can do to help others. Just like Moses, you might need help accomplishing your goals. It’s okay to ask your family, teacher or rabbi to help you.
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Marcia Berneger is a retired elementary school teacher. She loves writing stories for children. She is the author of such children’s books as Buster the Little Garbage Truck, and A Dreidel in Time.