Last week I asked some questins. One of those questions wasn’t answered: how does the Moses of Parshat Shmot differ in being a prophet from the Moses of after lat week’s portion?
1. And the Lord said to Moses, See, I have made you a god to Pharaoh; and Aaron
your brother shall be your prophet. 2. You shall speak all that I command you;
and Aaron your brother shall speak to Pharaoh, that he send the people of Israel
out of his land. 3. And I will harden Pharaoh’s heart, and multiply my signs and
my wonders in the land of Egypt. [Exodus 7:1-3]
The difference is wonderworking. It is the number of signs and wonders God brings during the period until the Israelites leave Egypt. On his first attempt, mild mannered Moses simply asks Pharaoh to let the people go. On his second attempt, Aaron’s staff eats the other staffs, and things escalate from there. While we will learn later in the Torah that magic is a prohibited practice, wonderworking is not. What’s the difference? Magic as described by Pagan peoples is a force that is separate and superior to the gods, and which the gods use to manipulate the world. However, this same force can be harnessed by people as well and used against the gods and against other people. Wonderworking on the other hand, only comes from one source. It is part of God, thus it cannot be superior to God and cannot be turned against God. Indeed it is the Magicians of Pharaoh who declare this succinctly.
14. And the magicians did likewise with their enchantments to bring forth lice,One way to look on such magic is in comparing two more modern stories. Coming into popularity in the 18th century, there is the story of the golem of the earlier Maharal of Prague. In the 19th century, Mary Shelly wrote Frankenstein with its famous monster. For Shelly, to make life from inanimate material was against the will of God. The golem however was brought to life through prayer. Jewish thinking believes that the Golem came to life through divine will, humans only facilitated that will. The Frankenstein monster ran amok, and caused great devastation. The Golem was a protector of the Jews as long as it was kept under control and used responsibly. Both were inanimate men made real, something that is a wonder.
but they could not; so there were lice upon man, and upon beast. 15. Then the
magicians said to Pharaoh, This is the finger of God; yet Pharaoh’s heart was
hardened, and he listened not to them; as the Lord had said. Exodus
[8:14-15]
The story of the Golem inspired Frankenstein, yet one was Jewish thinking and one was Western thinking. But that is not the only story that the golem inspired, as several books published recently have come to note. In fiction, we have the work of Michael Chabon in the Adventures of Cavlier and Clay. However more authoritative non fiction works about this come from Rabbi Simcah Weinstein and Journalist and Author Danny Fingeroth.
While not as bad as Germany, Anti Semitism was rampant in the early part of the twentieth century in America. In one industry, commercial graphics and comic strips, this was particularly true. If you were Jewish, you could not find work. Two good Jewish boys from Cleveland, Jerry Siegel and Joe Schuster kept pitching this character they invented to newspapers. Being Jewish, the papers would not even talk to the duo. Eventually a New York publishing firm that was running not a single strip but a whole set of strips in a single book bought the concept: Superman.
Whether what they invented was Jewish or not is still a matter for debate. But the comic book industry in its inception was dominated by Jewish authors, editors and artists. With the exception of Wonder Woman, most of the major superheroes that came out of that early time including Batman and Captain America came from Jewish writers and editors. While reading the history of Jews and comic books stuff as my winter break recreation, I have been thinking a lot about one character doing one thing. In a lot of wish fulfillment in very isolationist America, months before Pearl Harbor, Captain America punches Hitler. Apparently a lot wish fulfillment: leading up to the war Captain America was outselling Batman and Superman.
While Superman’s origin story has a lot of overtones of Moses’ story, Captain America #1 has elements of Moses confronting Pharaoh – it is wonder he ever got that far to save the day. While debates of whether Superman is really an update of the Golem legend continue, one thing becomes clear about these characters. Very few of them went looking for powers. They were inherent or were thrust upon them, often in accidents or tragedies they could not have imagined. They work wonders, and they do so using their God-given powers. Even Batman, who uses his intellect and training alone, did this to avenge his parent’s tragic death. Superheroes use their powers to promote the good.
Prophets, on the other hand, don’t do a lot of good, they just talk up a storm. Even the few wonderworking prophets like Elisha and Elijah only give demonstrations of God’s power, and really do nothing that saves the people. Prophets might yell at you to not climb a tree, and tell you the consequences if you do, but only the superhero would fly up to catch you in mid air when you fall. Moses with the plagues, staff and the red sea, is actively leaving Egypt. This is not the actions of a prophet, but a superhero.
So, yes, what I’m saying is that Moses may have started as a prophet in the last portion, but ended up as the prototype of the superhero in much of the rest of the story. The next question is why. In time of darkness, there is a need for superheroes. The 1930’s and 40’s was a time where Antisemitism was rampant, the Holocaust was real, and FDR’s government actively suppressed information about the Shoah. In such times, a fictional character who had the ability to do the right things fired people’s imagination. With the Depression, one didn’t need to be Jewish to feel oppressed. To an oppressed people in Egypt, the plagues were not about Pharaoh, but about hope of the Israelites, the more wonders Moses does the more people get inspired. For the people who begin this portion who will not listen to Moses the prophet due to their “anguished spirit,” [Exodus 6:9] inspiration is just what they need, and Moses the superhero delivers.
Today, are we in need of superheroes? In the last two decades, Both Captain America and Superman died. Superman returned, but, Captain America is still dead. What does that tell us about ourselves?
Again, I’ll leave that as an open question.
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