“They” say that the pain of childbirth is forgotten by the mother relatively quickly. It’s a good thing, too. We wouldn’t have too many babies born if that weren’t true. Now I’ve never given birth, and I haven’t discussed this with Suzy so maybe not every woman falls into that category.
The idea came to mind while thinking about B’haalot’cha, this week’s Torah portion in which, among other things, the Children of Israel complain about the wilderness conditions and wish out loud that they could return to Egypt.
For Heaven’s sake, have they forgotten the conditions under which they lived? Sure, there were all kinds of wonderful fruits and vegetables in Egypt that were an attraction when your only food in the desert is manna…and who knows exactly what manna is. But to get those goodies they had to endure slavery. Personally, manna seems pretty tasty if the alternative might be the taskmaster’s whip.
Now there are those who look at the Israelites’ journey in the wilderness. Forty years?? There’s a joke that had Moses asked for directions to the Promised Land it NEVER would have taken forty years, but it did (” Never let the facts interfere with the truth,” as a sage says). If you recall, I wrote about my week in the Sinai, how beautiful it was, how exciting, how “golden.” But just a week in that same desert would have been a completely different experience had we not had the “comforts of home,” as it were. If that had been the case, the group (let’s just say “I”) would have been yearning for everything we left behind in our Jerusalem homes. How much the more so the Israelites and their tortuous trek!
What do “they” say…Never look back? It’s human nature to wonder if we should take on the unknown – tomorrow – in favor of that to which we are accustomed – yesterday – even if it isn’t the greatest thing in the world. “Better the Pharaoh we know than the Pharaoh we don’t know,” is another aphorism.
It’s a predicament we all face one time or another. Though we hardly think of the Torah as having substantive illustrations reflecting contemporary issues, here’s a case in point. But just like life, it doesn’t always give us a definitive answer; that’s up to us to decide.
(Note: there’s an asterisk at the bottom of my column in the June issue of The BRIDGE but its reference (the byline) wasn’t included. My byline for that article was “My (Last*) Word!” Now when you read the asterisk’s reference at the article’s end it should make more sense)