Bad ideas, many bordering on sheer lunacy, are leaving destruction in their wake, and for all to see
Nearly thirty years ago, Rav Moshe Shapira delivered a Thursday night shiur at Yeshivas Ohr Somayach in which he explicated the difference between the miracles in Mitzrayim and those al hayam, in a manner that captures our current cultural moment.
The Haggadah makes a large point of the difference quantitatively: The Makkos in Egypt are characterized as the Finger of Hashem; those at the Sea as the Hand of Hashem — i.e., five times as numerous. But the difference is qualitative, not just quantitative: The Maharal differentiates the Makkos in Egypt, which he describes as pratis, from those at the Sea, which he describes as klalis.
Rav Shapira described the two sets of blows to Egypt as reflecting two separate middos with which Hashem combats evil in the world, netzach and hod. Netzach describes a situation in which Hashem overwhelms the enemy by weakening them over time. Those were the Makkos in Mitzrayim.
Hod derives from hoda’ah (confession). Evil simply goes up in smoke and vanishes — v’chol harishah k’ashan tichleh — destroyed by its own internal contradictions.
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