Parshas Bo 5776

Was Moses an Egyptian or Hebrew Name? 

The Torah writes (Exodus 11:3):

And the LORD gave the people favour in the sight of the Egyptians. Moreover the man Moses was very great in the land of Egypt, in the sight of Pharaoh’s servants, and in the sight of the people.

The Torah writes earlier (Exodus 2:10):

And the child grew, and she brought him unto Pharaoh’s daughter, and he became her son. And she called his name Moses, and said: ‘Because I drew him out of the water.’

Daas Zkeinim (ibid) cites two opinions:

If you were to ask how she, the Egyptian gave him a Hebrew name? We have to answer that in fact she gave him an Egyptian name which was the equivalent of the word משה in Hebrew. The Torah contented itself with giving us his Hebrew name.

Second opinion (ibid):

An alternate interpretation: Pharaoh’s daughter had learned Hebrew after the Hebrews had come to Egypt and had made up a large percentage of the population. Pharaoh had even given Joseph a Hebrew name as we know from Genesis 41, 45.

Ibn Ezra (ibid) writes:

The name Moses was translated from Egyptian into Hebrew and his name in Egyptian was Monios ... It could also be that the daughter of Pharaoh learned Hebrew or asked someone

Rabbi Aryeh Kaplan in the Living Torah (ibid) cites several theories how Moses's name would be pronounced in Egyptian:

-- In Egyptian, Moshe means a son. Thus, his naming is prefaced by a phrase that is literally translated, 'he became to her as a son' ... The word moshe may indeed be of Semitic origin.
-- According to other ancient sources, the name Moses comes from the Egyptian mo (water) and uses (drawn from)

Ha-emek Davar (ibid) explains also:

I have seen in the name of Rav Shmuel that in Egyptian this word means "a child" and a son of the king is called a son of the country, when a son is born to the country.

(see also Josh Waxman's posts here and here)

What Happened to the Erev Rav

The Torah writes (Exodus 12:38):

And a mixed multitude went up also with them; and flocks, and herds, even very much cattle.

The Malbim learns that were killed after the Golden Calf.

As the Malbim writes (ibid):

"Go and descend, for the nation which you brought up from Egypt has become corrupted" (Exodus 32:7) ... and we do not find in any place that the Jewish people are called by the term "nation of Moses" only by the episode of the Golden Calf. From this our Sages explained that the core of the sinners in the episode of the Calf where the mixed multitude and they are not called "the nation of G-d" and G-d did not wanted them to leave Egypt with the Jews. However, Moses took them thinking that he would bring them closer to holiness.

and later on (Exodus 32:31):

"And G-d struck them with a plague" - the mixed multitudes that made the Calf were struck by a plague. The Sages explain that they did not have warning and witnesses, for only the Jews that worshipped had those since there were many who did not serve it. But among the mixed multitudes, all of them served and could not be witnesses for they were among the ones who made it. Therefore, all of the mixed multitudes were destroyed by a plague since G-d did not swear to Moses about them that He will bring them to Israel (see verse 11 above)

However, numerous Kabbalistic sources including the Zohar disagree and are of the opinion that they survived

(see our earlier post)


[Published at parshapeople.blogspot.com / Comments welcome to parsha-people@publishyoursefer.com]