Hidden Treasures

Thereafter, when Moshe and Aharon left the Pharaoh’s palace, the king remained in the palace, infuriated and worried. He called his servants and ordered them to toughen the work of the Jews by not providing them with the straw to make the bricks. They themselves needed to find the straw on their own power, the king ordered, and after that, to make the bricks and then to build houses and palaces with them.

From that time on, the lives of the Jews in Egypt became more difficult and bitter. They suffered greatly from having to find straw. The Egyptian farmers would severely beat and injure them when they encountered them looking for straw. The unfortunate Jews spent the greater part of the day and they did not have enough time left for making bricks and for building. The Egyptian supervisors counted the number of bricks that the Jews succeeded in making and when the required number was not met, they were severely beaten. So that the Jews would not have even an hour’s rest, and so that they could not think about the pending redemption, Pharaoh ordered the nullification of the rest days on which they’d had Shabbos (the Sabbath).

The responsibility for carrying out the hard work was placed on the Jewish police. They had to report the Egyptian supervisors which of the Jews tried to rest a little and which did not keep up with their quotas. Those police officers who were Jewish sympathizers and knew what a cruel punishment would be given to a Jew whose name was reported to the supervisor decided to keep quiet and not say anything about the weaker Jews who rested a bit and were not capable of doing the crushing labor. Therefore the police were severely punished for every brick they were short, and for every wall that wasn’t finished on time they were beaten with great cruelty. On the merit of police officers’ selflessness, for receiving blows in their brothers’ stead, they merited to become the elders and leaders of the people and that the holy spirit might rest upon them.

The Jewish police, who were suffering greatly, went to pharaoh to ask him to ease their work. With broken hearts and lamenting they asked the king: “Why does the king oppress the Israelites so? What have our people done that they must work such crushing labor? In the beginning, we had to make bricks. Now we also have to gather straw. From where are we to gather so much straw? The work is so hard we can’t do it. We beg you to remember, our lord the king, that we have a mighty Gd, and if you don’t show mercy on us, on the people of our Gd, you will be severely punished, your kingdom will be taken away from you and given to another.”

The words of the police infuriated the king, and not only didn’t he listen them but increased the work of the Jews. The police were driven out of the palace and ordered to work and to furnish a greater number of bricks every day.

Because he had dealt with them cruelly, Pharaoh was punished with ten plagues that Hashem Yisboroch (Gd) brought upon him. The Egyptian people were also punished with the plagues because they too had oppressed the Jews by mocking them and driving them out of their fields in disgrace  and beat them severely as they looked for straw.

Moshe our teacher saw the great troubles that were coming upon his people and from the time that he preached to them of the redemption he had great sadness. So that he could be with his people the whole time to help and empower them, he sent his wife and their children back to Midian so that he could devote himself completely to the Israelites.