Parshat Bo

The prophet Yirmiyahu issues a familiar message in this week’s haftarah—a message we read last week in the words of Yechezkel—about the punishments that would be rained down upon the Egyptian Empire. But unless we study the previous perakim—those that precede the 46th perek of sefer Yirmiyahu, the source of our haftarah—we would be unable to fully understand the Navi’s message to Israel and how it differed from the message of Yechezkel.

Yirmiyahu’s prophecy was offered after the destruction of the Beit Hamikdash and the subsequent exile and it was addressed to the remnants of the Judean community who remained in Yerushalayim and its environs. The Judeans, who had previously labeled the Navi a “traitor” for predicting the approaching churban and galut, now plead with him to beseech Hashem to tell them what they should do, now that the bulk of the nation had been exiled from Yehuda—promising the Navi that they would follow everything God would instruct them to do.

Hashem responds, telling them to remain in Judea and not to “escape” to Egypt, for He would protect them from Bavel and would rebuild the nation, planting them firmly in Judea (42:10-11). Unfortunately, the Judean leadership refused to accept the word of God and accused Yirmiyahu of lying to them. As a result, they left the land and moved down to Egypt—even taking with them those Jews who had returned to Yerushalayim after the churban!

In reaction to the perfidy of these Jewish leadership, Yirmiyahu shares Hashem’s wrath and delineates the punishments that He would mete out to the people in the chapters that follow (43-45). Yirmiyahu criticizes the people’s decision to seek refuge in Egypt’s power to protect them from Bavel, rather than relying upon God’s promise to do so. For that reason, Yirmiyahu predicts the defeat of the Egyptian empire on whom they depended and its fall into the hands of the Babylonians. And that is where Yirmiyahu begins our haftarah.

A careful reading of the text will show that, although both Yechezkel and Yirmiyahu prophesied about the same future events and both describe the “plagues” that would befall Egypt (hence the connection to both last week’s parsha of Vaera and this week’s parsha of Bo), there are clear dissimilarities between the two—as the purpose of the nevuot are different from each other.

Yechezkel’s words brought a comforting message to the exiled Jews in the Babylonian Diaspora. Egypt—the power that failed to come to the aid of Judea when the Babylonian Empire laid waste to Jerusalem, despite the alliance they had with Israel—would eventually be punished by Hashem for her perfidy. An act that the Diaspora Jews could regard as fitting “revenge” for Egypt’s inaction.

Yirmiyahu’s words describing the downfall of Egypt, however, had a different purpose. This variance between the two prophecies becomes eminently clear in the very opening verses of the haftarah which predict how the invading Babylonian army that had already destroyed the neighboring nations, would soon do the same to “mighty” Egypt. This nevuah was not meant to underscore the punishments of Egypt but, rather, must be understood as relating Hashem’s punishment of the Jews who ignored His call to remain in Judea and not to go down to Egypt. The fall of the Egyptian empire to the Babylonians would place the Jews, once again, under the heavy hand of the very enemy from whom they tried to escape. In fleeing from their land, they were fleeing from their God’s word. And for that, they would pay.

How eye-opening it is to study those events that precede Chazal’s choice of the haftarah. It is the best way to fully appreciate the eternal words of our neviim!

Rabbi Neil Winkler is the rabbi emeritus of the Young Israel of Fort Lee, and now lives in Israel.