Last week Parashat B’shalah ended with the famous Amalek war that even today, after such a long time, we still compare this war to other wars and especially to this kind of enemy.  This week’s Parasha, Parashat Yitro, comes immediately after Amalek war and in this Parasha we meet Yitro, Moshe’s father in law who “heard”, and our Sieges  try to understand what did he hear, what caused him to leave Midian and come. Let’s ask ourselves what causes us to change a position, to look up, to move and sometimes even to act. What can trigger us to react and start acting, what injustices and unusual events cause us to react and start acting. Is it a shoe which is thrown on the Supreme Court president enough? Or the closing of a factory in the North or the South? And if not this, maybe it is pictures from the Central Bus Station in Tel Aviv?   

The Parasha starts with Jethro hearing. You have to cause somebody to hear. Later on, when the People of Israel received the Torah they ask Moshe to speak to them: “And they said unto Moses: 'Speak thou with us, and we will hear; but let not God speak with us, lest we die.'” (Exodus 20:15) which means that the People of Israel can hear Moshe speaking but can not hear God, they are afraid.

After the chapter which deals with Jethro, we start preparing to receive the Torah and receive it – the Ten Commandments. Why is our Parasha called Jethro and not receiving the Torah? We will try to answer this question later.

We will focus on the first chapter that deals with Jethro, Moshe’s father in law. This chapter comes between the Amalek war and receiving the Torah and it happens in the parking place of God’s Mountain and not in Refidim. The Sages are not sure if Jethro comes before the receiving of the Torah and was present at the event, or after it, in the second year. This question could be only an historical one, or it could exclude Jethro and of course Moshe’s wife Zipora and his two sons Gershom and Eliezer, from receiving the Torah. I would like to suggest that it dose not matter when Jethro arrived, it must have been before receiving the Torah , in order to teach us the way we have to hear, listen see and speak to the stranger.

When we read the chapter, we can immediately note that sometimes Jethro is called by his name and sometimes with the title Moshe’s father in law and sometimes he is call only Moshe’s father in law/his father in law.

“Now Jethro, the priest of Midian, Moses' father-in-law heard… And Jethro, Moses' father-in-law, took… And Jethro, Moses' father-in-law, came… And Moses went out to meet his father-in-law… And Moses told his father-in-law… And Jethro rejoiced… And Jethro said… And Jethro, Moses' father-in-law, took a burnt-offering and sacrifices for God; and Aaron came, and all the elders of Israel, to eat bread with Moses' father-in-law … And Moses said unto his father-in-law… And Moses' father-in-law said unto him… And Moses let his father-in-law depart; and he went his way into his own land” (Exodus 20:1-27).

Way? Jethro, Moshe’s father in law hears and took Zipora and speaks with Moshe, but Moshe  went out to meet his father in law, not Jethro the man, and it says that Jehtro, the man Jethro, is very happy. And why, what does it teaches us?

When we tell a friend on an interesting meeting we had with “bereaved families, with a settler from Shilo, with Rabbis for Human Rights etc.. we do not say that we met Mahmud or Suleiman and also David from Elkana and Nava from Rabbis from Human Rights. We meet with the “title” with the headline of the story, but not with the man in the story. Jethro, Moshe’s father in law hears and Jethro is happy, but Moshe went out to meet his father in law, tells his father in law, and the elderly of the People of Israel eat with his father in law and at last Moshe send away his father in law, not Jethro the man.

We have to be strong and brave in order to meet the men and women. We have to learn and listen and see the man. When we cone to a burned and tattered tent in South Hills of Hebron, we meet Mahmud and Ali and not the “cave dwellers” or “those” from South Hills of Hebron near Susya.

Why should I meet the man and not the story or the title? The answer is hidden in our Sages’ interpretation to our chapter, and to the man Jethro, Moshe’s father in law.

Our sages have a difficult task: what to do with the respected Midianite. A respected man, who comes for a visit in a parking place in the desert, close to the time when the People of Israel are suppose to receive the Torah. He is not ours, but his daughter is married to our leader and they have two children. He comes in a problematic time:  the most important event, the acceptance of the Torah, a short time after a difficult war against a cruel enemy.

On one hand we can hear a voice asking why did Jethro come? What does he want?, Does he come now because we succeeded and won the war? And on the other hand Rashi said that we have to praise Jethro because he had a comfortable and respected life, but he chose to go out to the desert and here Torah words. The verse continues: “And Jethro rejoiced for all the goodness which the LORD had done to Israel…”(Exodus 18:9). On one hand it can be interpreted that Jethro was happy that his daughter married a leader and a special man. On the other hand there were those who were suspicious and asked why it is not written simply that Jethro was happy? It shows that he was not happy, he was sorry on the Egyptians who lost their lives, but Giora’s people say that you are not allowed to humiliate gentiles in front of converts until ten generations.

 “And Moses let his father-in-law depart; and he went his way into his own land” (Exodus 18:27). Why does he go? Why doesn’t he stay? It can be said that he finished his roll and returns to his family. In Midrash Tanchuma (Buber edition Yitro 11) is written that Moshe let his father in law depart and than it is said that in the third month…the Lord said that in the time when the People of Israel were slaves in Egypt Jethro was sitting secured and peaceful in his home and came to see them only in the happy occasion of receiving the Torah therefore it is said that Moshe let his father in law depart and them it is said in the third month, meaning that Jethro has no right to be present in the receiving of the Torah. What does it teach us?

It teaches that even when we meet the stranger, the other on a cup of coffee or a conversation there are those who are suspicious and those who love. There are those who look for a reason why the stranger came, maybe he wants us to love him and then he will blow us apart. Maybe he wants to become religious. Maybe he is spying on us. On the other hand there are those who say what a good man. He is so brave to come and speak with us. He is such a loving man. I very much like to be with him.

We can receive the Torah the minute we will talk to the man who is standing in front of us, with Mahmud or Yusuf and not with the organization or the title. We will receive the Torah when we will take off all the masks and obstructions and be simple good and loving people. Then we will not have to convert the other, the guest.  Our Sages immediately convert Jethro and his descendants, that is their method, they convert also the descendants of  Sanheriv and Haman, where is it coming from? They need to justify the fact that they sit with him, they talk with him, they meet with him. If we did not convert him, if we did not enter him to our camp, we did nothing, we just wasted time and resources. That the reason that when Jethro leaves at the end of the chapter, he does not simply go back home, to his family and community, he goes to convert his family. He is on Moshe’s mission.

When the Parasha was named after Jethro, it meant to tell us important things a short time before receiving the Torah:

The day we will take out the “little Amalekites in us” those little disturbers, the obstructions that prevent us from seeing the man and fills us with suspicious, and we will learn really  to see, to hear and to listen to the other, then we can receive the Torah.

In this Parasha Moshe accepts a simple and claver advice that puts everything in order and we will learn to hear the other, his advices and ideas.

If we could to accept the other and let him be “another”, “a stranger”  “different” and not convert him, we will not have to put on him our Torah burden, but give him the choice when to come, when to stay and when to go. When he goes, in fills comfortable and does not fill as he is our messenger to distributes our message, but goes back to his country and family to live his life. We do not have to appropriate him and make him to join us – then we will be ready to accept the Torah.