Psalm 105 is a psalm of thanksgiving and a recounting of Hashem's kindnesses toward Israel: from the covenant with the Patriarchs, through the descent of Yosef and Yaakov to Egypt, up to the plagues of Egypt and the Exodus. In this section, we examine the verses describing the servitude in Egypt and the plagues: Why did Hashem turn the heart of the Egyptians, what is the difference between the mission of Moshe and that of Aharon, what are "signs" and what are "wonders," and why does King David present an order of the plagues that differs from the order written in the Torah? We will follow the order of the verses, accompanied by the explanations of the Malbim and the commentators.
הָפַךְ לִבָּם לִשְׂנֹא עַמּוֹ לְהִתְנַכֵּל בַּעֲבָדָיו׃ - "He turned their heart to hate His people, to plot against His servants."
Radak explains: "Hafach" (turned) is a transitive verb, meaning that God, blessed be He, turned their heart, for He had decreed this - as it is said, "and they shall serve them, and they shall afflict them." Alternatively, it is an intransitive verb, as if it said "their heart turned" (nehefach libam). It is worth dwelling on this grammatical point, which the commentators frequently address, as it significantly alters the meaning. A transitive verb means that the subject acts upon an object, extending outward to affect someone else. An intransitive verb describes a state or an action confined to the subject, without an external agent acting upon an object.
Accordingly, "He turned their heart" can be understood in two ways. If it is a transitive verb, the Holy One, blessed be He, turned the heart of the Egyptians to hate His people; He was the One acting upon them. And if it is an intransitive verb, "hafach libam" is like "their heart turned," meaning their heart turned on its own to hate His people, with no outside force acting upon them.
"To plot against His servants" - to devise schemes of how to destroy them, as in "Come, let us deal wisely with them," plotting the destruction of the people of Israel. The Malbim explains that there are two dimensions here: "He turned their heart to hate His people" - the hatred was directed at them as a nation, because the Children of Israel were more numerous and mightier than they and continued to multiply, so Hashem turned their heart to hate them as a people. "To plot against His servants" - they had an additional agenda: to turn Israel away from the service of Hashem, so that they would not be servants of God. For Pharaoh was a denier who said, "I do not know Hashem," and sought to turn them into believers in the Egyptian pantheon. Thus, he bore hatred toward them as a nation, and hatred toward them as believers in Hashem rather than in Pharaoh - who claimed, "Mine is the Nile, and I made it for myself" - or in the other vanity-faiths of Egypt, such as the Nile, the lamb, and similar idolatries.
שָׁלַח מֹשֶׁה עַבְדּוֹ אַהֲרֹן אֲשֶׁר בָּחַר בּוֹ׃ - "He sent Moshe His servant, and Aharon whom He had chosen."
The Malbim consistently elucidates every single word in its precise meaning, never viewing different terms as mere repetition. Here too, Scripture refers to Moshe as "His servant," and to Aharon as "whom He had chosen." Moshe was sent by virtue of being the servant of Hashem - as Moshe is called, "Moshe My servant has died." Aharon, on the other hand, was sent not simply because he was a servant of Hashem, but because he and his descendants were chosen to be the ministers of Hashem.
And note, says the Malbim: Regarding Moshe it does not say "He chose him," because the term "chosen" implies one whose selection endures for all generations, whereas Moshe was not chosen for all generations - his sons did not succeed to his station. Therefore, with Moshe the term of choosing is not used; rather, the Holy One, blessed be He, took him because he was His servant. With Aharon, by contrast, He took him as "whom He chose" - there is a special virtue in his service, in that his selection was an eternal covenant, such that anyone from the seed of Aharon belongs to the chosen lineage that ministers in the House of Hashem. Thus, there is a distinct greatness to Moshe and a distinct greatness to Aharon.
שָׂמוּ־בָם דִּבְרֵי אֹתוֹתָיו וּמֹפְתִים בְּאֶרֶץ חָם׃ - They placed among them the words of His signs, and wonders in the land of Cham.
The Malbim explains: there were plagues that were "signs" (otot) and plagues that were "wonders" (moftim), as mentioned previously. The plagues that came with prior warning - where they were warned that a plague was coming and they refused to listen - are called otot ("signs"), as Hashem placed a sign upon them and forewarned them. The plagues that were not preceded by a warning, such as lice, boils, and darkness, which did not come through an admonition of "if you do not heed, a plague will strike you," but rather came directly as a punishment from the outset - these are the moftim ("wonders"), a demonstration of the reality of God, showing that the Holy One, blessed be He, brings punishment. And all of these, both the signs and the wonders, were "in the land of Cham": they did not come to teach the Egyptians the foundations of faith, but to punish them for not listening to the voice of Hashem.
Regarding the subject of signs and wonders, a notable teaching is cited in the name of the great sages. The son of the Chofetz Chaim was once traveling on a train, and Chassidim - who are particularly fond of stories of tzaddikim - asked him to share some mofsim, some of the miraculous wonders of the Chofetz Chaim, since it was well known that the Chofetz Chaim was a great master of miracles who possessed ruach hakodesh. He said to them: "Where I come from, they say that rather than being awestruck by 'a tzaddik decrees and the Holy One, blessed be He, fulfills,' one should be far more awestruck by 'the Holy One, blessed be He, decrees and the tzaddik fulfills.'" That is to say: the greatest wonder of all is when a person breaks his nature and his desires to serve Hashem. What is there to marvel at - that a tzaddik supposedly bends God's will to conform to his own? That is not what should impress us, but rather that the tzaddik subjugates his own will before the will of God.
One of the great Chassidic masters remarked that the matter of signs and wonders is truly not the primary essence of Judaism, finding a hint to this in the verse: "His signs, and wonders in the land of Cham" - one who is impressed by signs and wonders belongs "in the land of Cham." But we are not awed by signs and wonders; we are awed by how righteous a person is, how much he fears Hashem, how devoted he is in his service of God, and how meticulous he is in his deeds and the mitzvos. That is the true test, not signs and miracles.
שָׁלַח חֹשֶׁךְ וַיַּחְשִׁךְ וְלֹא־מָרוּ אֶת־דְּבָרוֹ׃ - He sent darkness and made it dark, and they did not rebel against His word.
First, a grammatical note: the word vayachshech (וַיַּחְשִׁךְ) is read with a silent sheva (sheva nach), because it is preceded by a short vowel - the yud has a patach, and since it takes a patach, the subsequent sheva is silent.
The Ibn Ezra asks: if darkness is summoned, how can it be sent as an emissary? Darkness is merely a natural phenomenon, not an entity about which one could say, "I sent so-and-so." He answers in poetic phrasing: "Perhaps this questioner should be awakened from his sleep" - the questioner appears to be asleep; let him be roused from his slumber to realize that even concerning divine speech it is stated, "So shall My word be that goes forth from My mouth... for which I sent it." We see that an abstract concept, even speech itself, can be described as carrying out a divine mission. Thus, it can likewise be said of darkness: Hashem "sent" the darkness. And what is the meaning of "and made it dark" (vayachshech)? That He darkened the land of Cham mentioned in the preceding verse - "and wonders in the land of Cham" - there He sent darkness and darkened it.
The Radak notes that King David does not list the plagues in their chronological order, nor does he mention all of them, but only a portion. The reason is that they are already recorded in the Torah, and there is no need to repeat and enumerate each one; rather, he mentions some of them as a commemoration of the signs. Similarly, in Psalm 78 ("Give ear, my people, to my teaching"), he does not mention all the plagues, but only some of them.
The written text (ketiv) is devarav ("His words"), while the read text (keri) is devaro ("His word"), and the underlying meaning is the same. But who are those who did not rebel against His word? Several interpretations are offered. The Radak explains: the signs. The signs that the Holy One, blessed be He, placed in Egypt did not rebel against His word - Hashem sent them, and they fulfilled their mission. A second possibility: Moshe and Aharon, who were mentioned earlier - "He sent Moshe His servant, and Aharon whom He had chosen" - acted precisely as the Holy One, blessed be He, commanded them. Even though Pharaoh humiliated them, and even though he decreed that if they appeared before him again they would incur death, they did not rebel against His word and went forth with utter self-sacrifice (mesirus nefesh). Nor was this simple: at first, they went with seventy elders, but ultimately they found themselves alone - a sign that the elders became afraid, and the courage to stand before Pharaoh remained with Moshe and Aharon alone.
The Radak cites a Midrash: Rabbi Elazar says, "and they did not rebel against His word" refers to the plagues - every plague that Hashem commanded to come arrived precisely according to His instructions. Rabbi Yehudah ben Rabbi Simon says, "and they did not rebel against His word" refers to the Heavenly Court - the Holy One, Blessed be He, issued an instruction to the Heavenly Court, and they did not rebel against His word. This would seem obvious, yet that is nevertheless what the Midrash states.
The Malbim addresses the difficulty: why does the verse mention darkness first, when afterward it reverts to "He turned their waters into blood" and "Their land teemed with frogs", which were the very first plagues? Furthermore, why does it not list all the plagues? He explains that darkness was the final plague of the three distinct series. The plagues came in three waves: DeTzaCh, AdA"Sh, BeACha"V. As for Rabbi Yehudah giving them mnemonics - everyone asks: were mnemonics really necessary? Even a child can make an acronym! The famous humorous answer is that "blows without marks are not blows" (playing on the dual meaning of *makot* and *simanim*). But more seriously, the Malbim explains that the purpose of the three series was to demonstrate three realms of dominion, as other commentators also write: mastery over the earth, mastery over the air, and mastery over the heavens and human life - demonstrating how the Holy One, Blessed be He, rules over His entire world.
And the structure was precise: at the end of each series came a plague without warning. In DeTzaCh - Blood had a warning, Frogs had a warning, Lice was without warning; Moshe never went to Pharaoh to say, "If you do not send them out, I will bring lice." Rather, after two plagues with warning, the third came unannounced. The same applies to AdA"Sh - Wild Beasts had a warning, Pestilence had a warning, Boils was without warning, where Pharaoh was not warned beforehand but struck with boils immediately. So too with the third series: the Malbim sets aside the Plague of the Firstborn, since with it Pharaoh finally sent them away, and we are dealing here with the plagues that served as instructional lessons; this leaves Hail, Locusts, and Darkness - and the third among them, Darkness, likewise came without warning.
Thus, darkness is the culmination of it all, for following it, in the Plague of the Firstborn, he already released them. And this is what is written here: He placed among them the words of His signs and wonders, culminating in "He sent darkness and made it dark." In simple terms, the verse leaped ahead to the final plague of the didactic series of plagues, after which, through the Plague of the Firstborn, He brought Israel out of Egypt. This is reminiscent of what we tell the Wise Son on Seder night: "One does not conclude after the pesach offering with an afikoman." Everyone asks: if we teach him according to the laws of Pesach, why single out this particular halachah? Rather, the meaning is: teach him the laws of Pesach all the way through "one does not conclude after the pesach offering with an afikoman" - that is, up to the very last halachah, where the eating of the pesach offering is complete and nothing further may be eaten. So too here: He performed signs and wonders upon them right up to the plague of darkness, which was the final one before releasing them through the Plague of the Firstborn.
In the sefer Yalkut Peninim, a teaching is cited in the name of the Chatam Sofer, noting that the Sages state in the Midrash that it is to the praise of Israel that they did not rebel against the word of Hashem during the plague of darkness. This presents a fourth explanation of "and they did not rebel against His word": we have seen that the signs did not rebel, that Moshe and Aharon did not rebel, and that the Heavenly Court did not rebel - and here, the Children of Israel did not rebel against His word.
The Chatam Sofer asks: how could Israel have rebelled against His word, and what praise is there here? During the plague of darkness, the Egyptians were completely immobilized, each frozen in his place, and the Children of Israel could easily have risen up, struck them down, killed them, and left the land. Why wait any longer for the Plague of the Firstborn and prolong the ordeal? Let us finish the matter, strike them, and leave! However, Targum Yonatan records that Yosef had bound Israel by an oath not to leave prematurely, before the appointed time of redemption. This is the meaning of "He sent darkness and made it dark" - they could easily have departed, yet "they did not rebel against His word" - they did not violate the oath, remaining until the Holy One, Blessed be He, redeemed them Himself. For the tribe of Ephraim had departed prematurely, and we know that they ultimately fell. We learn from this that a premature redemption cannot succeed; the greatness of Israel was that they believed in Hashem and in Moshe His servant, refusing to transgress the oath.
In Shemot Rabbah, a parable is brought of a king whose servant offended him. The king said to an officer, "Go and strike him with fifty lashes." The officer went and struck him with a hundred. That emissary was especially stringent and added of his own accord. So too, the Holy One, Blessed be He, sent darkness, and the darkness added of its own - "and made it dark." The Midrash asks: once it says "He sent darkness," darkness was already present, so what is added by "and made it dark"? It means that the darkness acted stringently and added yet more darkness beyond what Hashem had dispatched. The holy sefarim explain that this was not considered defying Hashem's command, for the Egyptians deserved far more than what had initially been decreed. Thus, the darkness, so to speak, championed the honor of Heaven and intensified their punishment beyond the initial mission.
The sefer Yismach Moshe explains: the plague of darkness came without warning, and according to this, it emerges that the Egyptians here did not rebel against the word of Hashem. For when does a person rebel against Hashem's command? When he is told, "Send out My people," and he refuses to send them - whereupon he receives frogs. But regarding the plague of darkness, which came without warning, one cannot say that he rebelled and refused to send them.
Rather, what was its purpose? The plague of darkness served two goals: first, so that the people of Israel could see where the Egyptians hid their treasures; and second, so that the Egyptians would not witness the death of the wicked among Israel. For according to the most conservative opinion, eighty percent of Israel were not worthy of redemption, and they died during the days of the plague of darkness, while Israel buried them secretly without the Egyptians' knowledge. Thus, this plague was not a plague of "if you do not send forth, I will bring darkness," but rather a plague intended to resolve internal issues, and therefore it had no warning - "He sent darkness, and it grew dark," without prior warning.
And concerning this, he says that so it will be in the future as well: "As in the days of your departure from the land of Egypt, I will show him wonders" - the future wonders will parallel the wonders of the Exodus from Egypt. And where is this written? "For behold, darkness shall cover the earth, and thick gloom the nations" - but "and upon you the Lord shall shine." Just as in the plague of darkness the darkness affected only the Egyptians and not Israel.
הָפַךְ אֶת־מֵימֵיהֶם לְדָם וַיָּמֶת אֶת־דְּגָתָם׃ - He turned their waters into blood, and killed their fish.
It was the blood that killed the fish, for fish can live only in water, and once the waters turned to blood - "and killed their fish."
שָׁרַץ אַרְצָם צְפַרְדְּעִים בְּחַדְרֵי מַלְכֵיהֶם׃ - Their land swarmed with frogs, in the chambers of their kings.
Rashi cites: Rabbi Yochanan said, wherever water lay, frogs lay - every place where there was water, there were frogs. And this is "their land swarmed with frogs," across the entire land, and not specifically in the Nile. Now seemingly it should have said shartzah artzam, using the feminine, since eretz (land) is feminine. The Metzudat David explains that it used the masculine form because it refers to the waters of the land - the waters of the land swarmed with frogs, and it therefore appears in the masculine singular.
The Malbim explains that sharatz here is a transitive verb, as we learned earlier in the lesson - a verb that acts upon another object. For there was one initial frog which they struck, and it brought forth swarms of frogs; that very frog spawned the frogs - the frog swarmed out frogs.
אָמַר וַיָּבֹא עָרֹב כִּנִּים בְּכָל־גְּבוּלָם׃ - He spoke, and there came a swarm of wild beasts, and lice throughout all their borders.
"He spoke, and there came arov" - meaning it came on its own. And why does the verse mention the arov (swarm of wild beasts) before the lice, when lice came first? Many commentators address this question. The Ibn Ezra explains: because it was severe - the plague of arov was particularly severe, so he mentions it first due to its severity. The Radak explains "He spoke, and there came arov" - that the Holy One, blessed be He, aroused the wild beasts to come; "lice throughout all their borders" - just as it is written, "all the dust of the earth became lice," for the dust of the earth represents, as it were, the entire land.
The Malbim explains: blood and frogs were brought about through Aharon, who struck with the staff, whereas the arov - "He spoke, and there came arov" - came by the word of Hashem Himself and not through an emissary, in contrast to the lice that preceded it. And why are the lice mentioned here, after the arov? Because the plague of lice did not depart from them. The lice remained even afterward: it does not say of it that the lice departed from the land, as is said of other plagues, "and remove from me this death." Therefore the verse says: "He spoke, and there came arov" - and still there were "lice throughout all their borders," for the plague of lice continued unabated even as the arov arrived.
In Shibbolei HaLeket, it is explained that because the verse here mentions wild beasts (arov) before lice (kinim), we can understand Rabbi Yehudah's practice of giving mnemonics (simanim) for the plagues. We previously noted the famous question: Who needs mnemonics; are the acronyms not obvious on their own? Rather, Rabbi Yehudah came to teach that the sequence of the plagues appears in two different arrangements - in the Torah in one order, and in Tehillim in another order. And which is the primary order? Concerning this, Rabbi Yehudah gave mnemonics: DeTZaCh, Adash, Be'AChaV - the order written in the Torah is the primary sequence, whereas David HaMelech in Tehillim did not list them chronologically. Therefore, mnemonics were necessary to indicate which sequence represents the true chronological order.
The Dubno Maggid also offers a famous parable to explain the words, "He spoke, and there came wild beasts, and lice throughout all their borders," addressing why lice preceded wild beasts in this verse. It is comparable to a wealthy man who made a wedding for his son and wished to invite people from all walks of life, yet did not see fit to mix the elite with the common folk, nor close relatives with distant acquaintances. What did he do? He divided the wedding across the seven days of feasting, inviting a different class of guests each day: on the first day, the main celebration, the relatives; on the second, craftsmen; on the third, businessmen; on the fourth, Torah scholars; and on the fifth, the poor. In this way, he ensured that everyone was ultimately invited without having to mix uncomfortably with one another.
However, he stipulated one condition: no one was to attend twice. A person could not say, "I enjoyed the food here," and return the following day; each had to come strictly at their appointed time - the poor person on the day of the poor, and each group on its designated day. And so it was. Yet on the fifth day, they noticed an individual who had already attended on the first day. They asked him: "What are you doing here? Our records show you were already here!" He replied: "True, but I was invited twice - first, I am a relative of the host; and second, I also qualify as a poor man, so I am invited on the fifth day when the poor are welcomed. It turns out I was invited on both the first day and the fifth day."
According to this, the Dubno Maggid explains, the verse is understood beautifully. What was arov? A mixture of diverse animals and swarming creatures. Blood, frogs, lice - the plague of lice functioned as its own distinct plague. Afterward came arov, and suddenly the lice appeared again! What are you doing here; was your role not already fulfilled in the third plague? They replied: All the creatures were summoned; earlier we came in the specific role of lice, and now we come in the general role of wild, swarming creatures, for we too belong to that category - and therefore we are invited once more, in the plague of arov.
Seemingly, according to this reasoning, frogs should also have returned, so why did the verse single out lice? It is very likely that this question troubled the Malbim, which is why he explained that regarding the frogs it is explicitly written that they departed - "only in the Nile shall they remain" - whereas regarding the lice, as he notes, it was a plague that persisted continuously and never departed at all.
In these verses, David HaMelech describes the progression of the enslavement and the plagues: Hashem turned the heart of the Egyptians to hate Israel as a nation and to plot against their faith as well; He sent Moshe because he was His servant, and Aharon because he and his lineage were chosen for all generations; and He placed signs in Egypt - plagues that came with a forewarning - and wonders - plagues that struck without a forewarning - up until the plague of darkness, which concluded the three cycles, after which Israel departed with the plague of the firstborn. "And they did not rebel against His word" was interpreted in four ways: the plagues themselves, Moshe and Aharon, the Heavenly Court, and Israel, who did not leave before the appointed time and did not violate the oath of Yosef. Above all stands the great lesson: the ultimate purpose does not lie in the signs and wonders - "His signs, and wonders in the land of Cham" - but in the tzaddik who subjugates his will before the will of his Creator.