The Meaning of God’s Hidden Face

Sept. 27 2024

In this week’s Torah reading, God warns the Israelites about the sorrows that will befall them if they forsake His commandments. The text explains this punishment with a peculiar, and resonant, phrase, “And I will surely hide My face on that day, because of all the evil they have done in turning to other gods” (Deuteronomy 31:18). David Wolpe discusses the meaning of this imagery, and how Jewish commentators have understood it:

In the Bible, seeing God’s face is an expression of support or endorsement. Thus, the priestly blessing promises that God will turn God’s face to the Israelites, and they will prosper: “May the Lord shine his face upon you, and be gracious unto you. May the Lord lift up his face upon you, and give you peace” (Numbers 6 25–26). . . . In contrast, the book of Psalms places the phrase in the mouths of speakers complaining about their suffering. For example: “How long, O Lord, will You ignore me forever? How long will You hide Your face from me?” (Psalms 13:2).

Perhaps the most surprising reading of this phrase comes from the Talmud itself:

In a remarkable emotional inversion, the Talmud records that the [sage known as] Rav (3rd century CE) saw God’s hiddenness as a sign of divine favor: “All who are not the object of ‘hidden of face’ are not of them (i.e., of the people of Israel).” What might be thought of as a purely negative action, God’s turning away, becomes instead an affirmation of relationship: if God does not trouble to ignore you, you are not close to God.

Ultimately, Wolpe concludes:

While God warns Israel that, in the future, the divine face will be hidden, even so, throughout history believers have held fast to the conviction that if we continue to hope for that hidden face to appear, we will catch glimpses of the divine through the interstices of existence, a bitahon, “trust” that brings a promise of both comfort and salvation.

Read more at theTorah.com

More about: Deuteronomy, Hebrew Bible, Judaism

 

Egypt Is Trapped by the Gaza Dilemma It Helped to Create

Feb. 14 2025

Recent satellite imagery has shown a buildup of Egyptian tanks near the Israeli border, in violation of Egypt-Israel agreements going back to the 1970s. It’s possible Cairo wants to prevent Palestinians from entering the Sinai from Gaza, or perhaps it wants to send a message to the U.S. that it will take all measures necessary to keep that from happening. But there is also a chance, however small, that it could be preparing for something more dangerous. David Wurmser examines President Abdel Fatah el-Sisi’s predicament:

Egypt’s abysmal behavior in allowing its common border with Gaza to be used for the dangerous smuggling of weapons, money, and materiel to Hamas built the problem that exploded on October 7. Hamas could arm only to the level that Egypt enabled it. Once exposed, rather than help Israel fix the problem it enabled, Egypt manufactured tensions with Israel to divert attention from its own culpability.

Now that the Trump administration is threatening to remove the population of Gaza, President Sisi is reaping the consequences of a problem he and his predecessors helped to sow. That, writes Wurmser, leaves him with a dilemma:

On one hand, Egypt fears for its regime’s survival if it accepts Trump’s plan. It would position Cairo as a participant in a second disaster, or nakba. It knows from its own history; King Farouk was overthrown in 1952 in part for his failure to prevent the first nakba in 1948. Any leader who fails to stop a second nakba, let alone participates in it, risks losing legitimacy and being seen as weak. The perception of buckling on the Palestine issue also resulted in the Egyptian president Anwar Sadat’s assassination in 1981. President Sisi risks being seen by his own population as too weak to stand up to Israel or the United States, as not upholding his manliness.

In a worst-case scenario, Wurmser argues, Sisi might decide that he’d rather fight a disastrous war with Israel and blow up his relationship with Washington than display that kind of weakness.

Read more at The Editors

More about: Egypt, Gaza War 2023