Ari: Testing, testing, 1, 2, 3… This week's episode is all about tests. I’ll explain what I mean. 

Parshat Beshalach, tells the story of the end of the exodus and the crossing of the Red Sea. And after all of that we get these three short stories of stops that the Israelites took journeying from the Red Sea to the Sinai Desert, each one involving some kind of food or water crisis that leads the Israelites to complain. Three stories, three stops, three crises, three complaints. First the water is bitter and undrinkable, then they run out of food, and in the third story they have no water at all. It seems pretty clear that these stories are connected — I mean they are all about hunger or thirst — but what are we supposed to take from them?

Rabbi David Fohrman, along  with Imu Shalev took a look at these three stories and noticed that there’s this word that keeps coming up: test. It comes up in all three stories. There is even a subtle reference to this in the story that follows, the battle of Amalek. So what does this all mean? 

Imu and Rabbi Fohrman put their heads together to try to figure it out, and they came up with some really cool stuff. Here they are:

Tests

Imu Shalev: So right after the people of Israel sing their song of Az Yashir they show up to this place called Marah where they complain about the fact that they have very bitter water. They can't drink it. וַיִּצְעַק אֶל יְקוָה וַיּוֹרֵהוּ יְקוָה עֵץ וַיַּשְׁלֵךְ אֶל הַמַּיִם וַיִּמְתְּקוּ הַמָּיִם  – God basically showed a tree or a stick or something that got put in the water, sweetened the water and then here's the part that I want to focus on. שָׁם שָׂם לוֹ חֹק וּמִשְׁפָּט וְשָׁם נִסָּהוּ – There God placed for them חֹק וּמִשְׁפָּט, some law. וְשָׁם נִסָּהוּ, and there He tested them (Exodus 15:25).

I'm not exactly sure what is the חֹק וּמִשְׁפָּט, what's the law there? What was the test – what test is he giving them? Did they pass? I'm not sure, but that word נִסָּהוּ is actually something of a leading word throughout this parsha. It's a word that shows up again and again and again. Can I give you a few more examples?

Rabbi David Fohrman: You can.

Imu: Okay. Great. So we have a complaint about bitter waters. In the very next story there is a complaint about no food. If you jump with me into Chapter 16, הִנְנִי מַמְטִיר לָכֶם לֶחֶם מִן הַשָּׁמָיִם – God says that he's going to provide them bread from the heavens.  וְיָצָא הָעָם וְלָקְטוּ דְּבַר יוֹם בְּיוֹמוֹ – The people are going out and gather that day's portion on that day.  לְמַעַן אֲנַסֶּנּוּ הֲיֵלֵךְ בְּתוֹרָתִי אִם לֹא – so I can test the people to see if they're going to follow my law or not (Exodus 16:4). So there's that word test again.

Then, if you go to the very next story – so they had bitter water, no food – and the story after that, again they have no water. Not bitter water, but no water. וַיָּרֶב הָעָם עִם מֹשֶׁה וַיֹּאמְרוּ תְּנוּ לָנוּ מַיִםוְנִשְׁתֶּה וַיֹּאמֶר לָהֶם מֹשֶׁה מַה תְּרִיבוּן עִמָּדִי מַהתְּנַסּוּן אֶת יְקוָה – Moses says, why are you fighting with me? Why are you complaining about the lack of water? Why are you testing God? (Exodus 17:2) 

So the last two times you had God is the one who's testing. Here, for some reason, the people are testing God. Then just a few verses later we get told,  וַיִּקְרָא שֵׁם הַמָּקוֹם מַסָּה וּמְרִיבָה – The name of this place where they didn't have water is actually called Testing and Strife.  עַל רִיב בְּנֵי יִשְׂרָאֵל וְעַל נַסֹּתָם אֶת יְקוָה – On their fight and on their testing of God (Exodus 17:7).

Then because there shouldn't be a story in this parsha without this word, right after the battle of Amalek, Moses decides to recognize God. וַיִּבֶן מֹשֶׁה מִזְבֵּחַ וַיִּקְרָא שְׁמוֹ יְקוָה נִסִּי – He builds an altar and he calls the name of that altar – which is cool, I didn't know that altars get names, but he calls it יְקוָה נִסִּי, God is my banner (Exodus 17:15). But that word נִסִּי  is the same word of ניסיון and נסה, to test, which seems pretty on purpose. It doesn't seem like a coincidence in this week's parsha.

So, Rabbi Fohrman, we've given you a whole bunch of mentions of this word and a whole bunch of stories that seem like vignettes, a day in the life of the Dor Hamidbar (the generation of the wilderness) and their various complaints. What do you make of this pattern?

Why Did God Test the Israelites in the Wilderness?

Rabbi Fohrman: Well, it certainly seems to be a pattern. Let's start off by suggesting that it doesn't seem to be a coincidence. You don't get a word like ניסיון used over and over again in all these different contexts unless it is doing something. I think the most ground floor level of a theory that we can develop is that these stories are connected.

As you're kind of suggesting, the proper way to learn these stories are not as individual anecdotes that first this happened, and then oh look that happened and then something else happened, but there's a larger story developing and the word ניסיון is going to be one of the threads that's going to tie through the story.

I think the challenge that faces us is what's the larger story. As part of the larger story it feels to me like the word ניסיון is developing. 

Ari: Rabbi Fohrman Goes into the idea that tests could have both negative and positive connotations. One example of a positive test is…

Rabbi Fohrman: The Binding of Isaac. The question is what is the nature of the trial? I think you and I, I feel we must have discussed this in Aleph Beta videos somewhere, but the notion of the Binding of Isaac as a kind of trial is...

Imu: One second, just for our viewers who don't know why we're saying the Binding of Isaac is a test. I'm just pointing out the fact that the text introduces the fact that וְהָאֱלֹהִים נִסָּה אֶת אַבְרָהָם – God tested Abraham. That's one of the classic cases of this word.

Rabbi Fohrman: Right. The challenge of course is that when we think of God trying Abraham, וְהָאֱלֹהִים נִסָּה אֶת אַבְרָהָם what does that mean?

Theologically, it creates a big conundrum, right?

Why Does God Test Us If He Knows the Outcome?

Which is that here's God who is supposed to know everything and he's testing you and doesn't God know what's in your heart? If God knows what's in your heart, why is He testing you? This is something which Rishonim, earlier commentators, Nachmanides famously talks about this. And so there is the notion of a test that God sorts of imposes on people that has positive connotations, a test that is designed to sort of bring out a latent potential.

If I'm not mistaken, Nachmanides' theory is that the purpose of the test is to bring something from potentiality into actuality, which it's one thing to have the potential to serve God in a certain way. It's another thing to actualize that into real life. Sometimes we do that through tests.

In other words, there are even moments in our own lives which we find as sort of crucibles, moments that try us in some way. When we look back on our lives and say, you know in some way as much as the trial was uncomfortable, as much as it was painful, but it was a crucial aspect of my growth as a human being what we really mean is getting back to Nachmanides' idea that there was something latent within me that I had a chance to actually encounter some sort of difficulty in life and through that I changed as a human being.

Understanding How God Tests Our Hearts

Imu: I wonder if there's an interesting pedagogic point here, for all you teacher listeners, is that there's a major difference between a test that you give in class that simply assesses whether your students have knowledge, and a test that you can actually learn from, a test that brings out potential?

Rabbi Fohrman: Yeah, and you think about a teacher. A teacher is the classic non-omniscient authority figure, right. Whereas God knows everything, and there's no reason for God to test you, the challenge with being a teacher is you could say that look I don't know everything. It's my job to test a kid.

Or you could say, no, God in the Torah establishes another kind of test, a different kind of test, a test which is not designed for the teacher, but designed for the student. A test which is designed to get some potential that's latent into actuality and those kinds of tests are actually kind of gratifying to take as a kid.

Ari: We’ve seen how tests can be a positive educational experience, especially when coming from a benevolent God. So the question now is: what are these tests in particular supposed to be teaching? What are the Israelites supposed to get out of them? To understand this, Rabbi Fohrman and Imu look at the second “test,” the one where the Israelites run out of food and God provides them with mana.

How Does God Test Us?

Rabbi Fohrman: So the notion of the test in the first story having to do with the water is highly cryptic. It's unclear. My instinct in just reading it quickly seems like it's connected to the very next test with the food almost as there's a water and food challenge, which go back to back, and the food challenge comes with laws.

Hence the test is, will you keep the laws? Which sort of gives broad context to water and food, which is God's going to give water, he's going to give food; and yet there's going to be law that comes with it along with the test will you keep the law. It almost feels to me like those perhaps go together.

The challenge then is, you know, what's the nature of these laws, what's the nature of the test? This is something that you and I have touched on before where we talked about the nature of law with the manna. You want to maybe bring us up to date on that. Because that might have, I think, some kind of resonance over here.

Imu: Yeah along with the manna law was given. Specifically the laws of Sabbath, but also some other laws that were specifically manna related, and those laws seem to be designed to make sure that the people understand that they're getting their bread from God.

Rabbi Fohrman: What do you mean by that?

Imu: There are three laws that we get with the manna. Each person could only collect enough manna for their family. You couldn't collect an extra portion. You couldn't leave it over for the next day. You had to eat that portion for that day. You couldn't hoard the manna and save it for future days. And on Friday there'd be a double portion and you wouldn't be allowed to go out and collect on Sabbath. There wouldn't be any manna on Sabbath, but you weren't supposed to go out and collect.

Seemingly the common denominator between all three of these is you have to recognize that you're not in control of the food: can't take extra; you can't hoard; you can't leave it over for the next day and create a stockpile; and you shouldn't expect that it's going to come out on Sabbath. 

The idea here is that you can't be the one to control your food source. You have to rely that it's going to come from God. God's going to take care of you. He's going to make sure there's just enough for you every single day and don't worry about it. Don't be so greedy and take more than you need because God's going to provide for you.

The Meaning Behind God's Tests

Rabbi Fohrman: So keeping that in mind, Imu, I want to go back to this notion of test, and this test as a way of gaining experience and bringing something from actuality into potential because if you're thinking about that, it's one thing to sort of intellectually know that your bread comes from God. It's another thing to experience it and live by that in a way in which your actions live up to what's in your head.

It's a kind of tricky thing if you're telling me not to control one of the most basic things in my life, that I require for my existence, when I'm in the desert and there is no other way of getting sustenance. There is something challenging about it. There is also something benevolent about it.

You know, I think you asked me before how a test can be benevolent. One of the fascinating things about these laws is that they're like, we called them I think training wheel laws, in the sense that you can't break them.

With all of these laws there was something miraculous that happened, that made it actually impossible to break. Almost as a father lovingly holds on to the back of your tricycle and it's like, I'm here and I'm here and there's no way you can lose, right?

If you hoarded in the desert, what would happen? It doesn't make a difference if you collected more than an omer, when you got home there was just an omer in the sack. If you collected less than an omer, there was an omer in the sack. There was the same amount no matter how much you collected.

If you tried to go out on Sabbath, you wouldn’t find any manna there. You could try to collect on Sabbath it just wouldn't work. These laws were designed in a way that you couldn't fail. Almost as if what God is doing is ushering us into a new kind of life.

It's like a whole new thing for slaves, where laws are a way where a king takes advantage of you and beats you down. The people are getting training wheel laws. They're getting an experience of law that changes them as people, that helps them make the transition from in my head there is God and my bread comes from God, to what does that mean in real life, and their experience with that. Maybe something that builds them up.

Imu: Okay. Wow, that's really powerful. Sounds like the People of Israel are really going on this experiment. I like that analogy you said about the training wheels, because the People of Israel are in their infancy stages in their relationship with God. So I kind of like that imagery of the people on their bike, with the training wheels, with the loving God kind of helping them along and providing for them.

Ari: Ok, so these tests were meant to be a positive educational experience. The Israelites were meant to learn that God really cares about them, and everything He does, even the laws, are for their own good.

But then we get the third story, and instead of God testing the people, it says that the people are testing God. What could that possibly mean?

Imu: Let's take it to the other mentions of this word. The first two episodes are God testing the people, but if we go to 17:2, the episode where there's no water again, there seems to be a fight. The people are fighting with Moses.

Moses says they're testing God. God is the one who's testing them, but here the people, seemingly according to Moses, are testing God. What's that about?

What Does It Mean to Test God?

Rabbi Fohrman: So look at that verse a little bit more carefully. There's actually a little disconnect inside of it. Over here Imu's pointing us to Verse 2 in Chapter 17. וַיָּרֶב הָעָם עִם מֹשֶׁה – And the people argued with Moses. וַיֹּאמְרוּ – And they said, תְּנוּ לָנוּ מַיִם וְנִשְׁתֶּה – Give us water so that we can drink.

וַיֹּאמֶר לָהֶם מֹשֶׁה – And Moses says, מַה תְּרִיבוּן עִמָּדִי – What are you fighting with me for? מַה תְּנַסּוּן אֶת יְקוָה – Why are you testing God?

To me the disconnect is, and what I would ask you to consider Imu, is how do you see those last two phrases of the verse as connected to each other? Phrase number one Moses says, מַה תְּרִיבוּן עִמָּדִי – Why are you fighting with me? Phrase number two, מַה תְּנַסּוּן אֶת יְקוָה – Why are testing God like this? How do those two things go together?

Imu: Well those seem disjointed because Moses is saying that their fight here is with him, but he's saying that their fight with him seems to be a test of God. Like there's two different subjects, right? Are you fighting with Moses? Are you testing Moses? Or are you fighting with God and testing God?

Rabbi Fohrman: Exactly. Or, to put it another way, the fact that you are choosing to fight with me is an affront and in essence a test of God's patience. Which is, the whole point here, the whole point of training wheels is to learn how to ride a bike. But if you come along and say I'm not interested in riding a bike, I want to take the elevator instead, that's an affront to dad who's trying to help you ride a bike.

You could say, well I want to ride this kind of bike. I want to ride that kind of bike. I want to go slower. I want to go faster, but I have to interact with dad trying to help me ride the bike. I can't go saying, dad, let's do elevators instead. That's an affront to dad who's helping you drive the bike.

Similar here, what this is all about, this whole experience is learning to live with the notion that God provides food. What's the great affront to that? The great affront to that is that if you argue, if you're scared, what does Moses want? If you're scared, what should you do, People of Israel? If you don't have water and you don't know where water's coming from and you're trying to get used to the notion that God is giving you water, what should you do next?

Imu: You got to turn to God.

Rabbi Fohrman: Exactly. So you want to scream at God, scream at God. You want to complain to God, complain to God. My problem isn't the complaint, my problem is who you're complaining at. Don't look at me.

וַיָּרֶב הָעָם עִם מֹשֶׁה – they are striving with Moses and they're saying, give us water Moses. No. The whole point is I'm not the one who gives you water. God's the one who gives you water. Look over there. You see the one holding the training wheels?

So Moses says, .מַה תְּרִיבוּן עִמָּדִי

You're breaking the rules of the test. The one rule of the test is Talk to God. What are you arguing with me for? You're rejecting the test. In essence you're taking a loving test where God is trying to help you get used to an idea and you're flipping it around and you're testing God's patience, right? Because you're saying, no, it's all nonsense.

Let's take a look at Verse 7. וַיִּקְרָא שֵׁם הַמָּקוֹם מַסָּה וּמְרִיבָה –  and therefore they called the name of the place Masah U'm'rivah, Testing and Strife. עַל רִיב בְּנֵי יִשְׂרָאֵל – because of the strife of Israel with Moses. וְעַל נַסֹּתָם אֶת יְקוָה – and they're testing God. לֵאמֹר הֲיֵשׁ יְקוָה בְּקִרְבֵּנוּ אִם אָיִן – Saying, is God really with us or not?

The question I would ask you, Imu, is what do you mean by saying is God really with us or not? They didn't say it. The people never said, הֲיֵשׁ יְקוָה בְּקִרְבֵּנוּ אִם אָיִן Point me to the verse where they said that. So how come they're being accused of saying that?

Imu: Their actions seem to be saying this. If you're not sure that God is really with you and that He's caring for you and He's taking care of you, then your recourse is to act as if He's not. Which is you're going to argue with your leader, you're going to argue with Moses instead of dealing with God. Once you're dealing with God, you're not concerned if He's with you or not. 

Rabbi Fohrman: It's precisely as you said. Their actions are speaking louder than their words, and their actions are saying, we're not dealing with God. We're dealing with Moses... why?

Failing God's Tests to Have a Relationship

The answer is that they're so scared that they're succumbing to cowardice in this test and the succumbing of cowardice is that I'm not going to engage around the fear that comes with having my everyday, mundane needs in the hands of a transcendent, loving God. Because what if He doesn't love me? What if I let Him down? Will He still be there? Instead let me ignore Him and flip the test, and try His patience by ignoring Him.

How do I ignore Him? Because what am I saying? The way I justify to myself why I'm looking to Moses and not God is I say, look, הֲיֵשׁ יְקוָה בְּקִרְבֵּנוּ אִם אָיִן. I don't know. Is God really there? Can't touch Him, can't feel Him, I don't really know.

Yes, it's true I'm getting manna. It looks like it's coming from heaven. It's true I'm getting water miraculously, but let me close my eyes to the obvious truth around me, deal with Moses and wonder, is God really there and can I really trust putting myself in His hands. If I feel I can't trust it, then I can justify to myself my cowardice or my inability to engage Him.

Ari: At this point in the story, things are looking pretty grim. The Israelites seem to fail God at each location they stop at. But if you remember, there is one more story that follows where we got a hint to the word for test in the phrase יְקוָה נִסִּי – God is my banner (Exodus 17:15).

Rabbi Fohrman: Basically that's why the story is such a letdown at this moment. Right at this story who should show up, but the great nemesis of the Jewish people Amalek. It almost seems like the external enemy at this point that confronts us is nothing but an externalization of a kind of internal enemy that we're struggling with, this feeling is God really with us or not.

I'll quote something my tenth grade Rebbi, Rabbi Kalman Weinreb, used to say about Amalek. That the numerical value of Amalek, the gematria, if you add up the numerical values of all the letters happens to equate with the word ספק which is to be unsure.

There's something about Amalek that plays with our insecurity. It's you know, it's one thing to be insecure because what's objectively around you is unknowable, but sometimes it's knowable. Sometimes when you're getting manna from heaven, you're just getting manna from heaven. That's the way it is. Sue me. The transcendent God is actually giving me stuff. It's right here. It's objective and it's there.

If in the face of that, if I retreat into ספק, into uncertainty – I don't know, I don't know where God is, I don't – it's really an act of cowardice and at that point somehow that opens yourself up to this confrontation with an external enemy. So I think this is some way beginning to build the larger story that is woven together with this notion of ניסיון that you're beginning to talk about.

Imu: Wait, but then help me understand Moses's altar? Why is that יְקוָה נִסִּי? Which seems to be not at all a test, right? 

Rabbi Fohrman: Don't know the answer to that, but I'll give you a quick speculation, which is what does a passed test look like?

Passing God's Test of Our Faith

Rabbi Fohrman: If I manage to pass the test, if somehow I manage to pass the test what does it look like?

Imu: Victory.

Rabbi Fohrman: So then what does it look like? What does victory look like? It's interesting that victory looks like a banner being waved in the air, a victory banner. The victory banner in this case is that yes, there is God there. God is my banner. I've somehow vanquished this question mark of my own cowardice, and I'm happy to proudly wave this notion that God is here in my life and God is my banner.

Then it comes back to that notion of how did they defeat Amalek at this point? They defeat Amalek. If you look at the war, isn't this the war where they defeat with the hands raised? It is. If you think about the Gemara, what the Mishnah in Rosh Hashanah actually says about those hands, it really fits into the story in a beautiful way.

The Mishna says, so when Moses's hands are raised they win the war and when his hands aren't raised they don't win the war. So what? Moses's hands win the war? It's about Moses's hand? What's the hands?

Yet when the hands are raised it's like you're looking above the hands and you see God. When you choose to see God, you win the war. When you choose to ignore Him then you lose the war. The challenge that allows you to win the war is are you going to make the choice to see the transcendent God in heaven that provides the food? Or, are you going to bury your head in the sand and look down to the ground where bread usually comes from and just say no there is no such thing as bread that comes from the sky, there's only bread that comes from the ground. This must be it. I just have to figure out how. In which case, you are blinding yourself to the truth of the reality that you're living in.

So if you can be courageous enough to accept the challenge of the relationship with a God that provides you with bread from heaven, then you can be successful in the war. If you're successful in the war, God's your banner.

Imu: That's really incredible. So Moses's building of the altar somehow is the expression of the passed test. It somehow, he lays out the victory at God's feet and says יְקוָה נִסִּי, God is my banner and He is the one who has provided this victory.

It actually reminds me of a line in Adon Olam. וְהוּא נִסִּי וּמָנוֹס לִי, which is actually a really cool play on that word. וְהוּא נִסִּי – He is my banner, וּמָנוֹס, and my refuge. So if you are able to rely on God, then He can, you know, at once be the banner of your victory and the place that you will always be able to flee to, a Being who will always take care of you.

Rabbi Fohrman: Good. That's beautiful. Actually, if you think about it, it is through accepting that God is my manos, that God is my refuge, that I win the test and God becomes my banner and I stand for God. 

What that is in our own spiritual war is... if you think about refuge, refuge is a soldier trying to escape overwhelming odds. When I can't win and I'm able to take refuge in God, that is the kind of victory moment where I can raise the flag aloft and say that I've won.

I think you’re right. That's exactly where Adon Olam comes from. יְקוָה נִסִּי probably is a playoff of this verse in Adon Olam. God is my banner and maybe manos Li is a kind of explanation along the lines of what you've suggested here, of what's happening in the story. Maybe Adon Olam tells the story in two words.

Imu: Beautiful. 

CONCLUSION

Ari: On the one hand the Israelite tests seemed pretty easy. Just sit back and let God provide for you. But the truth is, that requires a whole lot of trust. That trust was especially hard for the Israelites who only ever knew one kind of master, an evil Pharaoh who abused them constantly. They had a lot to learn about this new kind of relationship with a God who actually loved them, who’s laws were for their own good.

Even for us, though, this isn’t always so simple. Like the Israelites, we run into difficult situations: droughts, famines – or maye the modern day equivalent – disease or war. Sometimes we are tempted to ask: is God really with us?! But what we learn from this week’s parsha is that these tests, they’re really opportunities for us to grow. And when we believe that God has our backs, like we did in the war against Amalek, then all of a sudden those obstacles aren’t so hard to overcome after all.

Credits

This episode was written and recorded by Imu Shalev and Rabbi David Fohrman

When this episode originally aired on Aleph Beta it was edited by Rivky Stern

Into the Verse editing was done by Shoshana Brody.

Our audio editor is Hillary Guttman. 

Our editorial director is me, Ari Levisohn.