Big cold rocks from the sky and other lessons for 1.11.2024

 

Plauges

Quiz: Severe Storms and hail

1.     Does it rain in Egypt? Storm?

2.    Hail in real life-

 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6JbU0dIq70E

Posters- vote your #1 and #2 on #1 and #2.  

 The natural explanations-  Yul Brenner explains.

Practical effects vs. CGI Plauges- over the top!  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qofp7q7l0nI

Big Rocks from the sky

Commentary

 

 

דָּם

Daym

Dome

Dume

Dahm

Dummy

 

 

צְפַרְדֵּעַ

Tzephardey

Tzephar’dayah

Tzephareh’day

Tzephare’dayah

Tzippitdydodah

 

 

כִּנִּים

Chinim

Kinim

Binim

Vinim

Candy!

 

 

 

עָרוֹב

Aruv

Arov

Eruv

Erov

Arby’s

 

 

 

דֶּבֶר

Davar

Deeveer

Doovoor

Dever

Dobby

 

 

שְׁחִין

Shecheev

Shecheen

Secheev

Secheen

Surfing

 

 

בָּרָד

Berad

Barod

Barad

Varad

Brad

 

 

 

אַרְבֶּה

Areveh

Arebeh

Aravah

Arbeh

Airborne

 

 

 

חשֶׁךְ

Chashech

Chashecha

Hashech

Hashecha

Choshech

 

 

 

מַכַּת בְּכוֹרוֹת

Makat Bechurut

Makat Vechurut

Makat Bechorot

Makat Vechorot

Makas Bechoirois

 

קַר 

חַם

 

מָתוֹק

חָמוּץ

 

גָּדוֹל

קָטָן

  

1)   Which of these states almost never sees hail?

a.   California

b.   New Mexico

c.    Colorado

d.   Wyoming

e.    Alaska

 

2)  What is the name of the kind of storm that produces the largest hail?

a.   Hurricane

b.   Derecho

c.    Supercell

d.   Monsoon

e.    Kwyijibo

 

3)  Tornadoes are rated 0-5 on the EF scale.  What does EF stand for?

a.   Einstein-Fermat

b.   Enhanced Fujita

c.    Echo Focusing (radar)

d.   Easy Flowing

e.    Eschadoodle Ferengenar

 

4)  In Illinois,  the month with the most hail is usually

a.   March

b.   April

c.    May

d.   June

e.    October

 

5)  The 1999 Bridge Creek–Moore tornado had the fasted winds ever recorded with radar,  with maximum wind speed of

a.   224 mph

b.   324 mph

c.    424 mph

d.   524 mph

e.    It’s a, but only if you put these all as kph.

 

 

6)  How close have you ever been to a tornado?

a.   Never that close

b.   I saw it from afar

c.    I saw it close…. Too close.

d.   I drove really close but didn’t see it.

e.    We drove right through one. Disappointing.

 

7)   A slow moving storm can dump a lot of hail in one place.  What is the record for inches of hail in the USA from Seldon, Kansas, on June 3, 1959,?

a.   4”

b.   6”

c.    11”

d.   18”

e.    Hail can’t get more than an inch deep, and there is no Seldon in Kansas.

 

8)  The largest recorded hailstone in U.S. history fell on July 23, 2010,  and weighed just short of 2 lbs. How wide was it?

a.   5.9”

b.   8.1”

c.    13”

d.   17.5”

e.    Hail can’t get physically bigger than 2” before it falls.

 

9)  In where was the largest hailstone found?

a.   Vivian, Nebraska

b.   Vivian, South Dakota

c.    Vivian, Illinois

d.   Vivian, Oklahoma

e.    Vivian , this is a trick question, it was found in Quebec Canada.

 

10)        How many people have died from hail injury since 2000?

a.   1

b.   2

c.    3

d.   4

e.    Nobody has died from hail- that would be ridiculous with modern forecasts.  

 

#1- “What do I actually think happened with the Ten Plagues?  Well, that’s easy, it’s:

a)  Exactly what the Torah says.  God made something supernatural happen. God can make water turn to blood, or cause it to hail in the desert. The plagues were miracles, and our Torah says God can do miracles.

b)  Exactly what the Torah says. God worked through nature at the right time for miracles. Something in nature made the waters turn red and smell—at just the right time.  Storms are rare but not impossible in Egypt, so it hailed- at just the right time.  The plagues were miracles, and our Torah says God can do miracles.

c)  Something like what the Torah says, but not so dramatic. The Torah is exaggerating the details. 

d)  Not what the Torah says.  The story was made up by the rabbis to scare people into believing in God and make a big deal out of an ancient Canaanite holiday that existed long ago, where they ate unleavened bread.

 

#2- “It seems there are many events in the Torah that are seen by many people as scientifically impossible. When this happens, some people choose to abandon the Torah for Science, others the other way around, and some think of something in between.  What do you believe when it comes to the Torah and Science?

a) 
Torah has to come first.  Science is always changing its mind about things.  Scientist used to say smoking was good for you and that plastics were safe, but eggs were dangerous to eat.  Every year something else is suddenly good or bad for you.  But Murder is always wrong; Tripping a Blind person is always wrong;  Shabbat is always holy. The Torah holds truths for living that do not change, unlike science’s ever changing decisions. 

b) Reading the Torah and expecting things to make sense in a scientific manner is dumb.  The Torah is not a science text,  just like a chemistry text book is not a source of  right and wrong.  Science and Torah are two different areas of human effort. “Science takes things apart to see how they work. Torah puts things together to see what they mean,” taught Baron Rabbi Sacks.  If you spend time complaining that the miracles in the Torah aren’t scientifically possible,  you are missing the reason the miracles are there to begin with!

c)  When Torah and Science are in conflict, I’m going to go with Science over Torah.   When I read about miracles in the Torah, they seems almost as silly as the rules on Shabbat or keeping kosher, which I don’t see as helping people become better human beings.  The Torah helps sometimes with laws against stealing, killing, cheating and the like,  and holidays are cute when you are a kid, but for important things like stars and gravity and cures for diseases,  that comes from Science.  I wouldn’t say we don't need the Torah, we just need it less now that we have science.

d)  There is no conflict. Science tells us everything we need to know. If we don’t understand it yet, Science proves that we will understand it all some day soon. All the things religions claims happened? Science proves they never really did happen or were really exaggerated.  Science shows us what is true,  not  religion. Science can measure and weigh and prove things, religion cannot. The Torah talks about invisible beings and impossible events. When we lived in the dark ages,  maybe we needed religion,  but we don’t need a Torah  now that we have science. Science made the universe, not God.

 

AND NOW, A WORD FROM RABBI DR. MOSES BEN MAIMON (RAMBAM)

Rambam, in his Guide for the Perplexed says:

"The concepts of good and evil  are terms employed in the study of social conventions (mefursamot), not in that of scientific/rational knowledge (muskalot). For example  it is not correct to say in reference to the proposition "the planets in the heavens are spherical," it is "good"--- or to declare the assertion that "the earth is flat" to be "evil". But we say of the one it is true, and of the other it is false. Similarly, our language expresses the idea of true and false by the terms emet and sheker, but with the morally right and the morally wrong, with  tov and rah." 

 

Before Ahdam and Chavah eat of the fruit of the eytz HA’daat tov ve rah/the tree of knowing good and evil, Rambam argues, they lived in a world true and false, a scientific world.  Once they ate of the tree,  they didn’t just have an intellect,  they had a conscience. This is when being a human being meant being  responsible for knowing not just the scientific  standards of true and false,  but the ethical standards of Good and Evil. For Rambam, a philosopher and doctor who knew the best science of this day, science can bring us to True and false,  but not knowledge of Good and Evil. For that,  he would argue, there was the revelation at Mt. Sinai, where God gave us  Torah.

BIG, COLD ROCKS FALLING FROM THE SKY:BARAD/HAIL- SHEMOT/EXODUS 9:13-35

Then Adonai said to Moses, "Early in the morning, go to Pharaoh and say to him, 'This is what Adonai, God of the Hebrews says: Let my people go to worship Me.  Now I will send plagues that will affect you as well as your servants and your people. This is how you will know that there is no one like Me anywhere on earth.  By now I could have sent forth my hand against you and your people with a plague that would have wiped you off the earth.  But I have spared you for this reason: I will show you My power and make My name famous throughout the earth.  Yet you are still holding yourself over My people and have not sent them out.

“So, at this time tomorrow I will send the worst hailstorm that has ever happened in Egypt from the day it was founded until today.  Now, send [servants] to bring your livestock and everything else you have indoors. All people and animals still outside and not brought in will die when the hail falls on them.'" Those members of Pharaoh's court who listened to Adonai's warning brought their servants and cattle indoors quickly.  But those who didn't take Adonai's warning seriously left their servants and animals out in the open.

Then Adonai said to Moses, "Lift your hand toward the sky, and hail will fall on people, animals, and every plant in the fields of Egypt."  When Moses lifted his staff toward the sky, Adonai sent thunder and hail, and fire struck the earth; and Adonai made it hail on Egypt.  It hailed, and fire flashed within the hail. There had been no storm like it in all the land of Egypt since it had become a nation.  All over Egypt the hail knocked down everything that was out in the open. It struck down people, animals, and every plant in the fields and destroyed every tree in the fields.  The only place it didn't hail was the region of Goshen, where  Bnai Yisrael lived.

Pharaoh sent and had Moshe and Aharon called and said to them:
“This-time I have sinned!  Adonai is the one-in-the-right, I and my people are the ones-in-the-wrong!  Plead with Adonai,  for enough is the God-thunder and this hail!
Let me send you free—do not continue staying here!”

 

Moshe said to him: “As soon as I have gone out of the city, I will spread out my hands to Adonai; the thunder will stop and the hail will be no more—  in order that you may know that the land belongs to Adonai.  But as for you and your servants,  I know well that you do not yet stand-in-fear  before the face of Adonai God!”

—Now the flax and the barley were stricken, for the barley was in ears and the flax was in buds,  but the wheat and the spelt were not ruined, for they are late-ripening.—  Moshe went from Pharaoh, outside the city, and spread out his hands to Adonai,  and the thunder and the hail stopped, and the rain no longer poured down to earth.  Pharaoh saw that the rain and the hail and the thunder had stopped,  so he continued to sin: he made his heart heavy-with-stubbornness, his and his servants’.  Pharaoh’s heart remained strong-willed, and he did not send Bnei Yisrael free,  as Adonai had spoken through Moshe.

 

Commentators on Exodus 9:24

Rashi France, 11^th century,  often focusing on Midrash and Aggadic (legendary/non-legal)  parts of the Talmud:

מתלקחת בתוך הברד [AND FIRE] FLASHING UP AMIDST THE HAIL — a miracle within a miracle! Fire and hail mingled, although hail is water! But in order to perform the will of- their Creator they made peace one with the other (Exodus Rabbah 12:4).

 

Chizkuni,—Hezekiah Ben Manoach, 13^th century French commentator who compiled his work from over twenty other commentators:

 

ואש מתלקחת בתוך הברד, “and fire was contained within the hail stones,” it is clear that after the hail had hit the ground, that this fire started conflagrations. Otherwise who would have known that there was fire inside the hail stones?

 

Sforno —16^th century  Italian rabbi, Biblical commentator, philosopher and physician.  

ואש מתלקחת בתוך הברד. Driven by the immense velocity and pressure of the descending hailstones. The heat generated in the atmosphere resulted in unnatural sounds being heard everywhere. Both hard and soft plants were destroyed by the hail. Verse 25 spells all this out in detail.

 

Or HaChaim , Morocco, 16^th century, Talmudist and kabbalist.  Torah commentary is from the weekly lessons he taught his daughters (he had no sons).  

ויהי ברד ואש, there was hail and fire simultaneously, etc. The word מתלקחת is used to inform us that though water and fires are opposites, one of which is bound to prevail over the other in any encounter, in this instance they demonstrated the ability to co-exist. This was possible since both were performing God's will by so doing.

 

 

Cassuto,  Italy, 20^th century Moshe David Cassuto  was an Italian historian, a rabbi, and a scholar of the Hebrew Bible and Ugaritic literature,^[1] in the University of Florence, then at the University of Rome La Sapienza, and then Hebrew University of Jerusalem.

The term Eish Mitchalechet/flashing fire is also found in Ezekiel 1:4 ( “I looked, and lo, a stormy wind came sweeping out of the north—a huge cloud and flashing fire”) and  also there it is the description of a storm. Fire (in this verse), that is the lightning, which is called flaming because it does not go in a straight direction, but in a diagonal way, and as if it takes itself from time to time to go back or turn to the side, [like a flame].

 

 

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