Scared to Death from Freedom/ Gabby Turetsky

Parshat Ki Tissa

Is this logical at all? When I read Parashat Ki Tisa, this is one of the most significant questions that comes to mind.

Bnei Yisrael had just witnessed the greatest miracles, like the plagues in Egypt, the splitting of the sea and even the manna coming down from the sky. So why did they drop it all and make the Golden Calf instead of Moshe Rabenu????

They were at a peak moment as a nation, they were standing before Har Sinai, waiting for Moshe to bring down the Ten Commandments with the word of Hashem. They were surrounded by holiness. So, what happened? How is this logical? What led them to commit this great sin?

While thinking of an answer, I tried to put myself in their shoes and understand where this came from.

Image that you are not free people, living in Eretz Yisrael, a free country, with work and private life.

Imagine yourselves in a foreign land, with a regime that hates you.

Every morning you get up before sunrise, and slave away all day. You are whipped and beaten and all you can think about is … how to survive another day? How to live? How will my children live? You are a slave! You are not a free person! You do what your master tells you to do, otherwise you won’t wake up tomorrow morning.

Suddenly, out of this life of despair comes a small sliver of hope. Freedom. Moshe Rabenu infuses them with faith, he objects to the highest power that existed at that time, Pharaoh.

Slowly, slowly, their master changes from one evil Egyptian to a great leader, Moshe!

Bnei Yisrael follow him with great faith. They leave everything and start their first steps as a nation.

When Moshe Rabenu is late returning by their counting, they are sure that their great leader, who they trusted with everything they had, had died, and now they were all alone!!

To regular people this does not sound so bad. A leader comes and a leader goes. It’s not the end of the world.

But the young nation is not made up of regular people, these are slaves who always did what they were told. The thought of being alone without anyone to tell them what to do, caused great hysteria and stress and made them do the unimaginable to bring a leader/ruler/master back into their lives.

What I have said here does not justify their sin or minimize its severity, but should make us understand how a person’s past and experiences effect their behavior and thoughts in the present.

There is much that does not meet the eye, so I believe that it is very important not to immediately judge other people, because there is always a lot that we don’t know.