There are differing views within the religious community as to how far world opinion ought to be taken into account when we shape our policy, especially in matters of national security. Some argue that we should simply do whatever is necessary for the defense of the state and, in religious language, whatever the Torah commands of us, without regard for the opinion of the nations and without shrinking from international pressure. Others argue that we are obligated to act realistically, taking into account not only situations in which actual harm or sanctions are threatened, but also questions of appearance, diplomacy, and friendship with other states.
A well-known passage in the Talmud notes that we cannot be oblivious to what the nations think. When forewarning of the death of the firstborns, Moshe uses the word kachatzos, which the Talmud understands to mean approximately midnight, rather than the word ba-chatzos that Hashem had employed (exactly midnight). The reason for the approximation, according to Rav Zeira, is lest the Egyptian astrologers err in believing midnight to be earlier, leading them to say that Moshe is a liar (Berachos 4b).
We must be careful, it seems, concerning what others think. Below, I will consider the degree to which the Torah takes the opinion of other nations into account.
The Exodus and the Test of Justice Before the Nations
Let us begin with the story of the Exodus from Egypt.
Hashem sends Moshe to gather the elders of Israel and tell them that He is about to redeem them, bring them up to the land of Canaan, and give it to them as He swore to their fathers. At the same time, He commands that they be brought before Pharaoh to ask permission to go three days into the wilderness in order to sacrifice to the God who has “encountered” them. The very wording, “has encountered us,” suggests something almost accidental, as though He had come upon us in passing. Presumably, this language better suited Pharaoh’s own categories and way of thinking.
Hashem tells Moshe in advance that Pharaoh will not consent, not even under duress. Only after Hashem has struck Egypt with all His wonders will Pharaoh allow it.
But this immediately raises a simple question: why is this entire move necessary? Why ask as though the matter concerns no more than a three-day journey, when the true plan is to go to the land of Canaan? Had the point been to secure Pharaoh’s consent so that Israel might then flee, the matter would be understandable. But if he would not consent in any case, and only the plagues would eventually compel him, why not say so openly from the outset: Hashem has commanded you to release us entirely, for He is about to give us the land of Canaan, as He swore to our fathers.
A further question follows. The Pesukim imply that had Pharaoh agreed to let Israel go, nothing would have happened to him. But where, then, is the punishment due to him and to Egypt for all the affliction and forced labor they imposed upon Israel, for the casting of their children into the Nile, and for the whole scheme of “Come, let us deal wisely with him”?
The plain answer seems to be that this was not meant primarily for Pharaoh and Egypt themselves. They were not going to listen until they were struck, and they were already deserving of severe punishment for what they had done. Rather, the matter seems to have been directed toward the surrounding nations, the chieftains of Edom, the mighty men of Moab, and the inhabitants of Canaan, who would hear of all that Hashem had done to Egypt.
Those nations knew nothing of the scheme of “Come, let us deal wisely with him.” From their perspective, it may well have seemed perfectly legitimate for a guest people residing in Egypt to be required to perform royal labor and build store-cities. As for the casting of the children into the Nile, it is likely that the Egyptians did their best to conceal it so that it would not become known abroad.
If the nations were to hear that men had come to Pharaoh in the name of a god he did not know, commanding him to release an entire slave people so that they might go to another land, and that when he refused, this god struck him and Egypt with terrible blows and killed their firstborn, they would say that this was a cruel god, not one who judges justly. After all, from their point of view, what sense would it make to expect Pharaoh to obey a god he had never known, merely because some men spoke in His name?
But if they were to hear that the people had respectfully asked permission to go a three-day journey in order to sacrifice to their God, and that Pharaoh refused, whereupon that God struck him until he relented, the matter would appear far more intelligible. In that case, Pharaoh is the one who acted wickedly, denying them freedom of worship and withholding, as it were, sacrifices and offerings from their God.
This also helps explain why Moshe and Aharon initially departed from the precise form in which Hashem had instructed them to proceed, commanding Pharaoh in Hashem’s name rather than speaking in the name of the people (as Hashem had instructed): “Send forth My people, that they may celebrate unto Me in the wilderness.” The reason is simple. The elders of Israel did not come with them before Pharaoh, and Moshe and Aharon were not recognized by him as duly authorized representatives of the nation. They therefore could not speak on behalf of the people. So they spoke in Hashem’s name, and Pharaoh answered as expected: “Who is Hashem, that I should heed His voice?”
Only afterward did they speak in the name of the people, as Hashem had initially commanded: “The God of the Hebrews has encountered us. Let us now go a three-day journey into the wilderness and sacrifice to Hashem our God,” adding, “lest He strike us with pestilence or with the sword.” In other words, even if the Israelites themselves were not asking to go and sacrifice, they were bound to do so; and if they refused, their God would punish them.
Pharaoh responded by worsening their labor conditions, so that the people would not listen to Moshe and Aharon and ask to go and sacrifice. In this way, he was able, as it were, to disrupt the original plan.
This also explains why Hashem did not inform Moshe that the labor would first be intensified, and only afterward would the plagues and redemption come. Had the elders come with Moshe before Pharaoh and requested this in the people’s name, Pharaoh would have had no reason to increase their burden, for the people themselves would already have been making the request. It was only because he understood that the people themselves were not asking to go that he thought he could, by increasing the yoke, prevent them from listening to Moshe and seeking leave to depart.
Thus, in the end, Hashem altered the course of events and sent Moshe and Aharon as His own representatives, to demand His service in the wilderness, rather than as representatives of Israel, whose elders had refrained from appearing.
The surrounding nations might say that Hashem was a cruel god, striking Pharaoh because he refused to obey a god he did not know. Hashem therefore first had to bring the lighter plagues, so that Pharaoh would come to know Him and see “that I am Hashem in the midst of the land,” and that He has the power to distinguish, even in punishment, between Egypt and Israel.
This is why Scripture now says: “I shall harden Pharaoh’s heart, and I shall multiply My signs and My wonders in the land of Egypt,” whereas at first it had said only: “I know that the king of Egypt will not let you go… and I shall strike Egypt,” without speaking of hardening his heart or multiplying the plagues. Once the people themselves were no longer asking to go and sacrifice, the original difficulty returned. The surrounding nations might say that Hashem was a cruel god, striking Pharaoh because he refused to obey a god he did not know. Hashem therefore first had to bring the lighter plagues, so that Pharaoh would come to know Him and see “that I am Hashem in the midst of the land,” and that He has the power to distinguish, even in punishment, between Egypt and Israel.
Once Pharaoh had come to know Him, and still persisted in his defiance and insolence, it would be clear why he was now being punished with harsher blows, culminating in the death of the firstborn. In turn, this created a further difficulty: once Pharaoh recognized Hashem through the lighter plagues, one would naturally expect him to yield. It is for this reason that Hashem says He will harden Pharaoh’s heart. Not because Pharaoh deserved punishment merely for refusing to let Israel go, but because he and Egypt were already owed punishment for all they had done to Israel over the years, and not for the refusal alone.
The nations would thus see that even after recognizing Him through the lighter plagues, Pharaoh still persisted in rebellion to the very end. And from this they would understand that He is a God who judges justly, who does all things in judgment, and who punishes according to what is truly deserved.
Kiddush Hashem: Not Only the Honor of Heaven
But the importance of this goes beyond the concern that people should not think ill of Hashem. There is something deeper here.
Hashem’s central purpose in the world is that human beings should walk in His ways, the ways of kindness, justice, and righteousness, as the Torah and the Prophets make clear again and again. For this reason, Hashem chose Avraham Avinu: “For I have known him, so that he may command his children and his household after him, and they shall keep the way of Hashem, to do righteousness and justice.” For this same reason, He promised to multiply his seed and give them the land, in order to establish a people who walk in those very ways.
If the nations were to imagine that the God of Israel is not just but cruel, indifferent to the question whether it is even reasonable to demand that Pharaoh obey a god he does not know, this would not merely be a failure of honor toward Him. It would present Him in the world as though He does not truly walk in the ways of justice and righteousness, thereby weakening the very spread of that path within human life.
Should the nations think that the God of Israel is not a God of justice but a cruel one, indifferent to whether it makes sense to demand of Pharaoh obedience to a god he does not know, this is not merely disrespect. It portrays Him in the world as though He is not truly the source of justice and righteousness, and it weakens the dissemination of that very moral path in the world.
And indeed, Avraham himself, when pleading for the people of Sodom, argued before Hashem in the name of justice: “Far be it from You to do such a thing, to put the righteous to death with the wicked, so that the righteous and the wicked are alike. Far be it from You. Shall the Judge of all the earth not do justice?”
So too Avimelech, king of Gerar, who had taken Sarah and stood under threat of punishment, said to Hashem, “Will You slay even a righteous nation?” For had he not known that she was married, it would have been an injustice for him to die on that account.
If so, then should the nations think that the God of Israel is not a God of justice but a cruel one, indifferent to whether it makes sense to demand of Pharaoh obedience to a god he does not know, this is not merely disrespect. It portrays Him in the world as though He is not truly the source of justice and righteousness, and it weakens the dissemination of that very moral path in the world.
Redemption in Our Time in the Eyes of the Nations
The same may be seen with regard to redemption in our own time.
The Torah sets forth blessings and curses: if we do not keep the statutes and ordinances, if we do not judge justly, if we do not act with kindness and compassion, if we oppress the weak and harbor evil thoughts against others, then curses will come, even to the point of destruction, exile, and great suffering. And in Parashat Nitzavim it is said that if, within exile, we return to Hashem and heed His voice with all our heart and with all our soul, then Hashem will restore our captivity and gather our dispersed from all the lands.
But Yechezkel the prophet, in the haftarah for Parashat Parah (Chap. 36), says more:
“I had pity for My holy name, which the house of Israel had profaned among the nations to which they had come… Not for your sake do I act, O house of Israel, but for My holy name, which you have profaned among the nations… And I shall sanctify My great name… And I shall take you from among the nations, and gather you from all the lands, and bring you into your own land. Then I shall sprinkle clean water upon you, and you shall be cleansed; from all your impurity and from all your idols I shall cleanse you. And I shall give you a new heart, and a new spirit I shall place within you… And I shall cause you to walk in My statutes, and you shall keep My ordinances and do them.”
The plain sense is clear. First, He will redeem us from among the nations and lands and restore us to the Land of Israel, and only afterward cleanse us of idolatry and bring us back in repentance to keep His laws and ordinances. At first glance, this appears to contradict what the Torah says.
But Yechezkel himself explains why it does not. The Torah presents the covenantal order between Hashem and Israel. Within that order, Hashem does not bind Himself to restore us unless we return in complete repentance, with all our heart and all our soul. But this does not mean that He is somehow constrained from restoring us if He chooses to do so for another reason.
He has raised us up, our army, our economy, and our strength, until the nations themselves marvel at them. And He has done all this so that the nations should not think that He is unable to fulfill His covenant and redeem us.
Yechezkel teaches that in order to prevent the desecration of Hashem’s name among the nations, who say, “These are the people of Hashem, yet they have gone out from His land,” and Rashi explains that this desecration lies in the nations imagining, as it were, that Hashem lacks the power to save Israel from them and return them to their land, Hashem wills to redeem us even before we have fully repented. This is necessary in order to sanctify His name: “And the nations shall know that I am Hashem… when I am sanctified through you before their eyes.”
So too, all the redemption our eyes have witnessed in recent generations. Hashem has gathered us to our land and restored it to us through miracles and wonders, through wars and salvations great and awesome beyond anything known among the nations. He has raised us up, our army, our economy, and our strength, until the nations themselves marvel at them. And He has done all this so that the nations should not think that He is unable to fulfill His covenant and redeem us.
And after the war of Gog and Magog as well, Yechezkel says:
“I shall set My glory among the nations, and all the nations shall see My judgment that I have executed… And the nations shall know that the house of Israel went into exile because of their sin, for they trespassed against Me; therefore I hid My face from them and delivered them into the hand of their enemies…”
In other words, it matters to Hashem that the nations understand that the exile came about not because they had prevailed over the people of Hashem, but because we deserved punishment in justice, and that they should see that Hashem judges justly, that “all His ways are justice, a God of faithfulness and without iniquity, righteous and upright is He.”
The purpose of all this is that in the end we should return in repentance, keep His laws and ordinances, and fulfill the essence of His word as Zechariah the prophet summarized it: “Judge with true justice, and show kindness and compassion each man to his brother. Do not oppress the widow, the orphan, the stranger, or the poor, and do not devise evil in your hearts against one another.” This is the very essence of the message of the prophets of the First Temple, and because these things were not fulfilled, destruction and exile came.
What This Consciousness Demands of Us
If Hashem Himself is so careful that the nations should not say that He is a cruel god or one who does not judge justly, how much more must we be careful that they not say that the people of Hashem, who walk in His ways, are a cruel people, or a people who do not conduct themselves according to uprightness, justice, and morality.
If all this redemption was meant to prevent the desecration of Hashem’s name and to sanctify His name through us before the nations, so that they may know that He is Hashem, how great is our obligation, out of gratitude, and as a people of whom it is said, “the redeemed of Hashem, whom He redeemed from the hand of the foe, and gathered from the lands,” to weigh all our ways with care, lest heaven forbid we appear in the eyes of the nations as a people that does not keep the standards of justice or the demands of moral humanity.
Even when truth and justice require that we execute judgment upon the wicked and wage war against our enemies as is proper, we must still think, examine, and act in such a way that no desecration of Hashem’s name emerges from it, that the matter not appear, in the eyes of the nations, as evil, as though we were acting unjustly or outside the bounds of moral uprightness.
The very sensitivity to justice and human rights is itself native to the Torah’s moral vision. We are therefore obliged to relate to it accordingly, to strengthen the influence of these paths in the world, and certainly not to undermine them.
For the essence of the Torah is that we ourselves should walk in the ways of kindness, justice, and righteousness, and that in the end, the other nations too should be influenced by this and strive to walk in these good ways of Hashem. Indeed, they have already been deeply impacted by them. Through the long unfolding of the Torah’s teachings, the world has been shaped, generation after generation, until it has reached a point at which much of it constantly debates how to secure equal rights and protect the individual from wrong and injustice. I do not mean, of course, the corruptions of progressivism, of which this is not the place to elaborate. But the very sensitivity to justice and human rights is itself native to the Torah’s moral vision. We are therefore obliged to relate to it accordingly, to strengthen the influence of these paths in the world, and certainly not to undermine them.
At the same time, we must be careful not to consent to radical approaches that take good values and invert them, using them to prevent just wars or judgment upon the wicked, and to distort many fundamental concepts. We must not yield to this, even if many among the nations walk in such mistaken ways. But it is important not only that we act according to our truth and oppose the evil of these paths. We must also declare openly and with confidence that such ways are evil and immoral, and demonstrate this clearly before the nations.
In the end, the question is not whether to listen to the world or to ignore it. The question is how to be fully faithful to the way of Torah, while also remaining aware that the deeds of the people of Israel are performed before the eyes of the nations. Not in order to learn our values from them, but so that the name of Heaven may be sanctified through us; so that it may become clear that even in our firm insistence upon our duty and our right, we remain faithful to the ways of kindness, justice, and righteousness that are the heart of our calling.
May it be the will of Hashem that all the house of Israel be granted a kosher and joyous Pesach, and that all of us together merit always to walk in the ways of kindness, justice, and righteousness, to augment them in the world, and to sanctify the name of Heaven before all the nations.
