Forever a Conduit

First, let’s establish what Moshe did not look like. Centuries ago, a famous artist misread a passage in the Bible and sculpted a statue depicting the Av haneviim, Master of all Prophets, with horns!

Rav Pincus tells of yet another artist and another fallacy. There’s a legend about a painter living during the time of Moshe Rabbeinu who was commissioned by a king to paint Moshe’s portrait. When he returned with the painting the wise men of the royal court claimed they could discern Moshe’s character by viewing the picture, and they concluded that he was a lowly, despicable person. According to the story, when Moshe Rabbeinu heard of their analysis, he confirmed that he’d been born with difficult character traits, but he’d worked on himself for many years to reach perfection.

Although the fabricators of this story may have meant well, aiming to enhance Moshe’s greatness by conceiving humble beginnings, Rav Yehoshua Leib Diskin rejects it as groundless folklore. As Rav Pincus puts it, the very thought that we should — or even could — embellish Moshe’s stature is as absurd as placing a giant on a step stool in order to make him taller!

Furthermore, he adds, Moshe’s greatness was apparent from the first day of his life. And she bore a son and saw that he was good (Shemos 2:2). Chazal say his birth “filled the house with light,” and that his mother, Yocheved, “gave birth to 600,000 children at once.”