In one of my favorite movies, The Lion King, there is a
powerful moment when Simba has to
confront the past and decide to either run from it, or learn from it. To Simba, it seems that the hardest step is
that first step which he needs to take in order to return home and assume his
rightful place as the King of his pride.
We know that taking a first step can be difficult and sometimes very
scary. In this week’s Torah portion with
the Israelites having left Egypt they stand in front of the sea with the Egyptian
army behind them and find fear in their hearts.
It is understandable that having seen Pharaoh embark on his pursuit and
with the army approaching they would be fearful of what lay behind them. But stepping forward, stepping into the sea,
also appeared to be causing them fear and a moment of pause.
God appears to be somewhat confused and perplexed as to why
the Israelites are not moving forward with faith and says to Moses “why do you
cry out to me, tell the Israelites to go forward, and you lift up your rod and
hold out your arm over the sea and split it so that the Israelites may march
into the sea on dry ground.” It is
understandable that the Israelites, seeing the sea before them, might not have
known that a miracle awaited, but at the same time having seen all that God had
done for them up to this point, surely they should have known that a miracle
was coming.
But we know that it is difficult to take a first step and
that it needs faith to step into the unknown.
The Midrash suggests that Nachshon ben Aminadav had the faith and courage to step forward into the water before it had parted; eventually getting to the point where the water reached up to his neck before
the seas parted in honor of him and Moses stretching out his rod. After all that the Israelites had seen, after
all that they had witnessed, taking this first step into the sea still caused
them to have a moment of pause, and a moment of concern.
And we know in our lives that stepping into
the unknown can be difficult. But we can
learn from their experience. The
importance of having faith, courage, and just trusting that when we put one
foot forward our next step will be that much easier and so on and so forth
until eventually they reach to the other side and join together in song
praising God for redeeming them and saving them.
In our daily liturgy as we sing the Mi Chamocha and remember
the song that our ancestors sang when they crossed to the other side of the
sea, we might also remember that to get to that point, they had to have the
courage to put one foot in front of the other and take that first step into the
unknown.
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