Ki Tissa
Ex. 30:11 – 34:35
By Rabbi Baht Weiss
This week’s Torah portion contains the well-known story of the Golden Calf. Moses goes up to Mount Sinai to receive the Ten Commandments and the people wait at the foot of the mountain unsure of what is happening. They have just been freed from slavery, have followed Moses to the wilderness and now they are feeling deserted and lost. They want a god to serve, a leader to follow. So, they turn to Aaron, who is the second in command, and say “Come, make us a god who shall go before us, for that man Moses, who brought us from the land of Egypt—we do not know what happened to him”. Aaron’s response is surprising. One would think that Aaron would have told them to be patient, to assure them that Moses was returning, and to have faith. But Aaron’s immediate response is “Take the gold rings out of your ears of your wives, your sons and your daughters and bring them to me.” So, all the Israelites followed Aaron’s instructions, Aaron threw the gold into the fire and made it into a molten calf.
Aaron is referred to as a peacemaker. In attempting to control the mob and calm the anxiety of the Israelites, he makes things worse. Aaron is not brave enough to stand up against the people. Rabbi Jonathan Sacks explains “a leader can simply lack the courage to lead. Sometimes leaders have to oppose the crowd. They have to say no when everyone is saying yes. That can be terrifying…To say no may be to put your career, even your life at risk. That is when courage is needed, and not showing it can constitute a moral failure of the worst kind.”
This resonated with me. It can be hard to say no, to set boundaries, to go against the crowd, and to do what is unpopular even when we know it is right. We want to be liked. Moses was better at commanding the people in the name of God. He wasn’t always sensitive to the concerns of the masses. He was on such a different spiritual level, deeply connected with God, that he couldn’t often relate to those he led.
We can all feel this challenge as a boss or coworker, a parent, or in any leadership role. We want to make people we care about happy, but sometimes we must allow others to feel disappointed or sit in their discomfort. Aaron couldn’t stand to ask the Israelites to remain uncomfortable. He wanted to do something immediate to appease and comfort them. And Aaron’s fear of opposition ultimately hurt the people.
Due to Aaron’s failure of leadership in this moment, God becomes angry, and Moses pleads with God to spare the people. Then Moses gets angry! He descends down the mountain, sees what has happened, and smashes the tablets, burns the idol, grinds it to powder, mixes it with water, and makes the Israelites drink it. Then, he turns to his brother Aaron and says, “What have you done?”
Aaron refuses to take responsibility and instead blames the people. He says, “I threw it into the fire, and out came this calf.” It just happened! He was only a bystander.
Rabbi Sacks points out how similar this is to the story of Adam and Eve. When Adam and Eve eat the forbidden fruit God asks why they ate what they were instructed not to, rather than take responsibility the man says, “It was the woman” and the woman says, “it was the snake.” It wasn’t me. I was the victim not the perpetrator. Sacks explains, “in anyone, such evasion is a moral failure, in a leader all the more so.”
Aaron’s failure here is twofold. He wasn’t brave enough to stand against popular opinion, and then he couldn’t accept responsibility for his actions. Often, we need to lead by example, trusting in our own opinions, being willing to do what we know to be right, and to take responsibility for the choices that we make. This was a setback, but eventually, with strong leadership, Moses was able to steer the Israelites away from idolatry and back on course. While we may identify with Aaron’s desire to create harmony and keep the peace, sometimes we need an enforcer—a Moses, who will keep us in line. And sometimes we need to be that enforcer–being brave enough to do what needs to be done even when it can make us or the people uncomfortable. When we have challenging moments in our lives, we can ask ourselves—is this a Moses moment or an Aaron moment? Is it time for us to stand up against injustice and speak out against what we perceive to be poor judgment or is it a time to keep the peace and placate others. Both leaders had moments when they made poor choices in motivating the people they served. Leaders are humans. Hopefully we can learn and grow from our mistakes. Ki Tissa shows us how hard it is for us to change and to accept uncertainty. Let us learn to trust ourselves, to sit with our discomfort and to know that sometimes the right choice is not always the popular one.