Bo

📜 The Story

Parshat Bo continues the story of the ten plagues in Egypt. Hashem sends Moshe to Pharaoh again, and the last three terrible plagues come one after another. First the locusts, arbeh, swarm over the land and eat every green plant left, until nothing is left of Egypt's crops. Pharaoh almost lets the people go, but at the last moment his heart hardens again.

Next comes the plague of darkness. A thick darkness, so heavy you could feel it, covers all of Egypt for three days. The Egyptians cannot see each other or move from their places, but wherever the Israelites lived, there was light. This shows the difference Hashem was making between Egypt and His people.

Hashem then tells Moshe and Aharon about the tenth and final plague, makat bechorot, the death of the firstborn. Before it happens, Hashem gives Bnei Yisrael their very first mitzvah as a nation, kiddush hachodesh, sanctifying the new month, so that they will know how to count the Jewish calendar. He also commands them to take a lamb, keep it, then slaughter it as the korban Pesach, and to put its blood on their doorposts. This is why the holiday is called Pesach, because Hashem passed over the Israelite homes.

At midnight, the plague strikes every firstborn in Egypt, but the Israelite homes marked with blood are spared. Pharaoh finally breaks and tells Moshe to take the people and leave immediately. The Israelites leave in such a hurry that their dough does not have time to rise, so they eat matzah, unleavened bread, which we still eat on Pesach today.

The parsha ends with important mitzvot that come from the Exodus, including telling the story to our children, the mitzvah of tefillin as a sign of the Exodus, and pidyon haben, redeeming a firstborn son, because Hashem spared the Israelite firstborns. The Torah tells us Bnei Yisrael had lived in Egypt for 430 years before this great redemption finally came.