A Bush that Burns but Is Not Consumed

by HaRav Dov Begon
Rosh HaYeshiva, Machon Meir

Moshe’s great vision of a bush that burned but was not consumed hints to us about Am Yisrael’s situation in Mitzrayim. Despite the fact that among the Jews there were gossips and slanderers, alluded to by the sneh, the Midat HaDin, alluded to by the fire, still did not consume them.

Although Am Yisrael in Egypt had sunk to the forty-ninth level of impurity, they still emerged from Egyptian slavery to eternal freedom. This is the axiom of Jewish eternity, that the bris between G-d and Am Yisrael shall never cease, despite Am Yisrael’s sometimes lacking merit. Or, as the Chachamim put it, “The covenant of the brit will never cease even after our ancestral merit has ceased.” All this is hinted at by the burning bush that is not consumed.

Right now we must learn to recognize and understand this great principle, that no fire can consume the Jewish People. Even the fire of the terrible Holocaust which annihilated one third of our nation, and even the fire of assimilation which is consuming large portions of our people in the Diaspora, and certainly the savagery of Hamas cannot destroy the Jewish People. How much more so that our enemies, who secretly scheme against us, will be unable to overcome the Jewish People. As Dovid, Melech of Am Yisrael said, “Why are the nations in an uproar; why do the peoples utter vain words against the L-rd and His anointed?…. You shall smash them with an iron rod; You shall dash them to pieces like a potter’s vessel” (Tehilim 2:1-2,9).

This glorious, awesome spectacle of Am Yisrael’s survival over thousands of years, despite all that they experienced, alluded to by the burning bush, must stand before our eyes during these times as well, when we are returning to our land, and the bush, which was full of thorns in Egypt, is producing more and more pretty leaves and blossoms. The day is not far off when the thorn bush will become a tree that brings life both to us and to the whole world.

BeSorot Tovot,
Looking forward to complete salvation,
With the Love of Am Yisrael and Eretz Yisrael,
Shabbat Shalom,
Chodesh Tov.