Dvar Torah for Parshat Shemot

Based on Likutey Halakhot, Hilkhot Eiruvei Techumin 6:18

"The King of Egypt said to the Jewish midwives, whose names were Shifra and Puah...."
(Exodus 1:15-16)

Shifra and Puah were in fact Yokheved and Miriam (the mother and sister of Moshe Rabbeinu, respectively). In their role as midwives they not only perpetuated the physical being of the Jewish people, but brought their souls to life as well. How did they do that?

You've probably already asked yourself, "If the midwives were really Yokheved and Miriam why doesn't the Torah say so? Why does she refer to them as Shifra and Puah?" As always, the answer starts "The Torah wants to teach us." The Torah wants to teach us at least two things: how to be spiritual midwives and how to let ourselves be born.

First, we must be aware that the midwife is in a unique position to give. She enjoys the benefits of neither motherhood nor childhood as a result of her work. She must get her hands dirty to do her job and there is much hand-wringing and apprehension on the way to a successful birth-which is not a guaranteed outcome.

Yokheved becomes Shifra. The word shifra is related to the Hebrew word for improvement. A prerequisite to "midwifery" is the realization that our only goal is to help the "child" improve. As anyone who has ever worked with children knows, progress is measured in very small, even tiny, increments. Similarly, when we are called upon to assist a fellow Jew in improving his/her success rate in choosing to do mitzvot, we have to be aware that safe progress, like childbirth, can only be gradual.

So to help our fellow Jew improve we have to give offer him strength. We have to realize that the "child" is already there, that our friend or companion is already committed to being a good Jew, already has a number of good deeds to his/her credit. As midwife we have to take the good deed, the good point, and make it better. We have to highlight the strength, intelligence and good characteristics that it took for it to come into being. Then we have to have to look for other instances of these qualities and use to them to find and highlight yet more good points in our friend.

Miriam becomes Puah. The Hebrew word puah is related to the words coo, speak, and scream. This is a second tool of our "midwifery." We all know how necessary it is to couch our lessons to children in terms they can comprehend. We have to use words they understand, words they find attractive, with a sincerity and honesty they can feel. This is what we must do when a friend is weak, wavering, or in transition from one level of growth to another. We have to express the encouragement properly. We have to know when to coo, when to speak, perchance to scream (with, not at), the "infant" in order help her progress to her next step.

So it goes for our own selves as well. "A prisoner cannot free himself from jail" (Berakhot 5b). We cannot always escape the womb ourselves-sometimes it is too comfortable, sometimes too constricting. We must on occasion realize that we are helpless babes and therefore must give ourselves over to the tzaddik, the sage and saint who mentors us across the narrow bridge of life, so that we might enter a higher, albeit more challenging, plane of existence. We have to let "Shifra" improve us, take hold of our good points and make them better. We have to open our hearts so that our ears may hear "Puah's" call, her soothing voice, to cajole and encourage us.