I once heard an astonishing story about George Washington that stayed with me.
Early in his life, before he became the leader we know, George Washington served as an aide to a British general. In one brutal battle, every other aide around him was killed. Washington himself was shot at repeatedly. Bullets tore through his jacket without touching his body. Three horses were killed beneath him as he rode. Shrapnel grazed his hair, yet not a single bullet struck him.
Years later, Washington returned to that same battlefield. A delegation of Native Americans came to meet him, led by an elderly tribal chief who was on his deathbed. When Washington asked why the elder wished to see him, the answer was chilling. The chief said, "I am a great marksman. I killed many of your soldiers. I shot at you at least seventeen times. None of my bullets harmed you. I asked my people for one final request, to meet the man who clearly walks with divine protection."
That story sets the tone for a defining moment in Parashat Shemot.
Moshe is walking through the desert when he sees something strange. The Torah says:
וַיַּרְא וְהִנֵּה הַסְּנֶה בֹּעֵר בָּאֵשׁ וְהַסְּנֶה אֵינֶנּוּ אֻכָּל. וַיֹּאמֶר מֹשֶׁה אָסֻרָה נָּא וְאֶרְאֶה אֶת הַמַּרְאֶה הַגָּדֹל הַזֶּה מַדּוּעַ לֹא יִבְעַר הַסְּנֶה
"And he saw, and behold, the bush was burning with fire, but the bush was not consumed. And Moshe said, I will turn aside now and see this great sight, why the bush does not burn." (Shemot 3:2, 3)
There is something puzzling here. The Torah already told us that the bush was burning but not being consumed. Why then does Moshe say, "Why does the bush not burn"? He should have said, "Why is it not being consumed."
The answer reveals Moshe's greatness.
Anyone who has spent time in the desert knows that bushes catch fire all the time. Dry thorns ignite quickly and disappear just as fast. A burning bush, by itself, is not unusual. What Moshe notices is not just that it is not consumed, but that something deeper is happening. If it is not being consumed, then maybe this is not fire as he understands fire at all. Maybe this is a different phenomenon entirely.
So Moshe stops. He turns aside. He refuses to walk past it on autopilot.
This moment does not come out of nowhere. Even before the burning bush, Moshe already shows us who he is. When he goes out and sees an Egyptian striking a Hebrew, others surely saw it too. For them it was routine, part of the landscape of slavery. Moshe stops, looks again, and says this is not acceptable. As Chazal teach, in a place where there is no humanity, become the human being. The burning bush is not what creates Moshe's leadership. It reveals it. God appears to Moshe because Moshe already knows how to notice.
Chazal say that this bush was created during the six days of creation. It had been there all along. How many people walked past it and saw nothing more than another burning shrub. Moshe Rabbeinu sees something different.
And this is exactly the story of Am Yisrael.
On the surface, we look like every other nation. We are born, we struggle, we bleed, and we die like everyone else. But if we would stop for a moment, truly stop, and look again, we would realize how extraordinary this is. For more than three thousand years, every empire that encountered us tried to extinguish us. Pharaoh tried physically. Babylonia destroyed. Greece tried spiritually. Rome exiled. The Nazis attempted total annihilation. Again and again, the fire was real. The suffering was real. The pain was devastating.
And yet, we were never consumed.
This is not something to mention in passing. This is something that should make us stop in our tracks. To step back and say this is not normal history. This is not how nations survive. This is a burning bush in front of our eyes. We can walk past it and say, nations rise and fall. Or we can turn aside and say, something divine is happening here.
The tragedy is that familiarity dulls our wonder. We get used to miracles because they are constant. We stop seeing the phenomenon.
Our personal lives are no different. Our children. Our families. Our work. Our ability to wake up in the morning and build a life. All of it looks ordinary only because we see it every day. In truth, it is fragile, miraculous, and burning with meaning.
Moshe teaches us that God is revealed in the moments we slow down enough to notice. The Divine Presence speaks from within the things we stop taking for granted.
If we learn to turn aside, to truly see the burning bushes of our lives and of our people, we will hear Hashem calling to us from those very places.
The miracles were never hidden. We just stopped looking.
Shabbat Shalom Rav Shlomo