Our parasha , Parashat Bo, is the third in a set of four parshiyot dealing with the experience of b’nei yisrael in Mitzrayim . Moshe and Aharon approach Paroh and declare that if he refuses to let the Jewish people go, the plague of locusts will be unleashed upon Egypt. Moshe elaborates and explains that all of Egypt will be consumed. Moshe and Aharon leave Paroh. Paroh’s servants complain to Paroh. “How long will you allow Moshe to be a trap for us? Let the men go so that they should serve their G-d. Do you not know that Egypt has been destroyed?” The Torah continues the narrative. “And Moshe and Aharon were returned to Paroh. Paroh says to them, ‘Go serve the L-rd your G-d. Who and who goes' (מי ומי ההולכים)? Moshe responds, ‘We will go with our young and with our old, we will go with our sons and with our daughters with our flocks and with our herds; כי חג לה' לנו - because it is a festival unto G-d for us.’” Our commentators ask a number of questions on the passa...
Rabbi Benjy Owen, Dean, Margolin Hebrew Academy-Feinstone Yeshiva of the South, Memphis, TN