“Moses returned to the Lord, and said: Lord, why have You harmed this people, why is it that You sent me?” (Exodus 5:22). “Moses returned to the Lord, and said: Lord, why have You harmed this people?” – at that moment, Moses came and argued before the Holy One blessed be He. He said to Him: “Why have You harmed…” – what is: “Lord, why have You harmed”? According to the way of the world, when a flesh-and-blood person says to another: ‘Why are you doing so,’ [the latter] gets angry at him, yet Moses said to the Holy One blessed be He: “Why have You harmed this people”?
Rather, this is what he said before the Holy One blessed be He: ‘I have taken the book of Genesis and read it. I saw the actions of the generation of the flood, and how they were judged; it was the attribute of justice. And the actions of the generation of the dispersion and of the Sodomites, and how they were judged; it was the attribute of justice. This people, what have they done that they were enslaved more than all past generations?
If it is because our patriarch Abraham said: “How will I know that I will inherit it” (Genesis 15:8), and You said to him: “Know that your descendants will be strangers [in a land that is not theirs, and shall serve them; and they shall afflict them four hundred years]” (Genesis 15:13), Esau and Ishmael are his descendants and they should have been enslaved like them. Even if so, He should have enslaved the generation of Isaac of the generation of Jacob, and not this people in my generation.
And if You say why do I care – if so, why is it that You sent me?’ “Since I came to Pharaoh to speak in Your name, he has harmed this people; and You did not rescue Your people” (Exodus 5:23). “Since I came to Pharaoh to speak in Your name, he has harmed…” – Rabbi Pinḥas HaKohen ben Ḥama said: He said before Him: ‘Your great name is mighty and awesome, and the entire world fears it. The wicked Pharaoh has heard Your name and sinned willfully.’
What is “You did not rescue”?38In the Hebrew this is formulated with a double usage of the term rescue – vehatzel lo hitzalta. Rabbi Yishmael says: You will certainly not rescue them. Rabbi Akiva says: I know that You are destined to rescue them, but You do not care about those who are under the building. At that moment, the attribute of justice sought to harm Moses, but since the Holy One blessed be He saw that he was speaking on behalf of Israel, the attribute of justice did not harm him.