by Rabbi Lawrence A. Hoffman
an author and speaker on Jewish ritual, prayer, and spirituality, is a professor of liturgy at the Hebrew Union College in Manhattan.

January 17, 2008

Of all the miracles in Torah, none resonates more through time than the splitting of the Red Sea. It culminates in the most outstanding poem in the Bible, “Shirat Hayam,” the “Song of the Sea.”

Appreciating the song does not come easily, since the God it celebrates is largely a warrior. God drowns the Egyptians without mercy; his fury consumes them; “agony,” “trembling,” and “dismay” seize Israel’s enemies, when they perceive this God, an actual “man of war,” if we take the Hebrew (ish milhama) literally. No wonder, about halfway through the poem, looking back on being saved, the Israelites shout, Mi kamocha ba’eilim, “Who is like You, among the mighty!”

But this punctuating exclamation is itself a problem, for it means, “Who is like you among the gods,” and we Jews believe in no Gods other than our own. Spelling “gods” in lower case is mere sleight of hand. Whether capitalized or not, how can there be any other gods?

That is why we prefer to say “among the mighty.” These so-called gods are hazakim, says the biblical commentator Rashi, “the powerful.” They are the highest realm of angels, explains Ramban. For the commentator Malbim, they are forces of nature. Whether removed on high (Ramban) or embedded within nature (Malbim), they are certainly powers (Rashi) — “the mighty,” as our usual translation has it.

How is God not like them? The obvious answer, given the earlier part of the poem, is that mighty though they may be, God’s war-like might exceeds theirs.

But only the first half of the song concentrates on war. The second balances that with the assurance, “Lovingly, you lead the people whom you saved.” Not for nothing is the Song of the Sea followed by the story of the waters that God cleanses from bitterness so the Israelites can slake their thirst. The very opposite of a warrior now, God announces, “I am your healer.”

I see no way out of admitting that God is sometimes evident in repelling force by using force. Think of Pharaoh’s army as long-ago Nazis, perhaps, or as terrorists beheading innocent civilians. Until the final day of peace, we will need a God who lends us power enough to prevent pure evil from destroying us all. It is not so much “God as warrior” that disturbs us, as it is “God as willing warrior,” a “man of war” (ish milhama, in our poem) who kills when other means might do, perhaps even with cruelty, displaying power for power’s sake.

So we balance God the warrior with God the healer.

Midrash Mekhilta provides that balance by diverting our attention to Jeremiah 16:19, where God is “my strength” and also “my refuge.” The word “refuge” (manos), in turn, is adopted by an unknown medieval author of the familiar prayer Adon Olam. There, just like the “Song of the Sea,” we begin with praise to the God of power, “the master of the universe” (adon olam). But there too, the final verses move on to explore God’s other side, God as “refuge” (manos), which is paired with yet another epithet for God, nisi, a word that puzzles translators. The siddurim Artscroll (Orthodox), Mishkan T’filah (Reform), and Kol Haneshamah (Reconstructionist) render it “my banner.” Sim Shalom (Conservative) translates it as “my shelter.”

But the plain meaning of the word nisi is “my miracle,” a reference back to the “Song of the Sea,” where we see what the miracle is. Our God was once known primarily through the might of arms; but miraculously, this God who could have lorded it over us will increasingly be known through the act of healing.

Human evolution moves us beyond a fractured world of war toward a global age of universal healing. Advanced countries avoid war but increase the pursuit of medicine, from which healing comes. Their people show kindness and love — the very stuff of healing.

As it happens, the “Song of the Sea” may be the oldest piece of literature in the entire Bible, from (perhaps) the 10th century BCE, and with stylistic parallels in Egyptian poetry from 300 years before. No wonder it emphasizes God the warrior. But we humans have come a long way since then. We at least know war is wrong. Only a few centuries ago, it was held in high regard.

I read the song with haste, therefore, anxious to get beyond the “man of war” to the God who “lovingly leads the people, having saved them first.” And I do not let a day go by without reciting Adon Olam and focusing on God who is nisi, “my miracle” — a God who promises healing, not destruction. Made in the image of God myself, I learn to persevere in this world of war, but to pursue love and healing, not hatred and horror.