From the Wilderness to Trust: The Manna, Shabbat, and Finding True Security

Our Torah portion describes how the Children of Israel complained about the manna: “And the entire congregation of the Children of Israel complained against Moshe and Aaron in the wilderness. And the Children of Israel said to them: If only we had died by the hand of the Lord in the land of Egypt, when we sat by the pots of meat and ate bread to satisfaction, for you have taken us out into this wilderness to cause this entire congregation to die of hunger” (Shemot 16:1–3).

The Wilderness as the Root of the Complaint

The Ramban notes that the root of the complaint was the very fact that they were in the wilderness. The wilderness itself was the cause of their grievance. “They journeyed from Elim, and the entire congregation of the Children of Israel came to the Wilderness of Sin.” Their arrival in the wilderness triggered the complaint. This is the meaning of the verse that follows: “And the entire congregation of the Children of Israel complained against Moshe and Aaron in the wilderness.” Their complaint was primarily because of the wilderness.

The term “wilderness” does not refer only to hunger and thirst, but to uncertainty about the future. In the wilderness, it is difficult to know what tomorrow will bring or where the next meal will come from, and it is this uncertainty about the future that lead them to complain. The Children of Israel were not facing hunger alone, but uncertainty.

The “Pot of Meat” and the Slave Mentality

The Children of Israel refer to Egypt as the “pot of meat.” Clearly, they did not eat particularly well in Egypt. They were abused slaves, and their masters fed them only the bare minimum required for survival. What they did have, however, was a sense of security regarding food. The Egyptians provided enough nourishment for them to live and continue working, so there was no fear about where tomorrow’s food would come from.

A reality in which a person eats only the minimum necessary, yet is confident that there will be food again tomorrow, characterizes the essence of a slave. A slave owns nothing, but he is fully dependent on his master’s table, trusting that it will provide all his basic needs. The complaint of the Children of Israel at the beginning of their journey in the wilderness stemmed from this slave mentality. They remembered the sense of security that came with servitude.

For a slave who receives his daily meal at a fixed time directly from his master, the wilderness is a frightening place, even if he still has something to eat at the moment.

For this reason, the Creator brought down manna for the Children of Israel day by day, and forbade them from saving it from one day to the next. The goal was to establish in their hearts a sense of constancy and trust, not trust in their former Egyptian masters to whom they had grown accustomed, but trust in the Master of all masters, the Holy One blessed be He. This is the kind of trust that leads to true freedom.

The First Commandment of Shabbat

In the section of the manna, the Torah introduces one of the commandments of Shabbat, the commandment of boundaries: “Let each person remain in his place; let no one go out from his place on the seventh day” (Shemot 16:29). This was the first commandment given to the Children of Israel concerning Shabbat.

The Shabbat boundary defines the area within which a person may walk on Shabbat, Yom Kippur, and festivals. This area extends two thousand cubits, about one kilometer, in each direction beyond the city limits where a person is located at the onset of Shabbat or the holiday. There are ways to extend this boundary, but that requires separate discussion.

What is the meaning of this commandment?

Time, Place, and the Human Search for Stability

A person lives within the limitations of time and place. Time represents movement, change, progress, and constant motion. Place represents stability, rootedness, and permanence. On the one hand, a person is swept along by the flow of time and action, constantly moving, expanding, and developing. On the other hand, every person longs to find a stable place, not in the sense of stagnation, but in the sense of belonging, grounding, and inner security.

Each person must find a “place” of their own, where they can put down roots and build an inner structure with firm foundations. Only then can they truly expand and grow. If a person spends their entire life wandering, they may eventually discover that they are uprooted. In searching everywhere, they have no place at all.

Life as a Passing Shadow

“For we are strangers before You and sojourners like all our ancestors; our days on earth are like a shadow, and there is no hope” (Divrei Hayamim I 29:15). The Midrash comments: “Would that it were like the shadow of a wall or the shadow of a tree, but it is like the shadow of a bird as it flies, as it is written, ‘like a passing shadow.’ And ‘there is no hope’ means there is no one who hopes not to die. Everyone knows and says that they will die.”

A person knows that life passes like a fleeting shadow. They might wish to be like the shadow of a wall or a tree, something stable that lasts for a time. However, they realize that even this is too slow compared to the speed of life, which is like the shadow of a bird in flight, constantly moving and disappearing.

Within this fast-moving tunnel of time, we must work on finding our “place.” This does not necessarily mean land or a house. It refers to a spiritual place where a person can become grounded, strengthen themselves, and put down roots. From there, they can grow, flourish, and expand in every direction.

Shabbat as the Day of Grounding

On Shabbat, a person is called upon to take a practical step toward finding their place in the world. On the day when the entire world is infused with the sanctity of Shabbat, the obligation is “Let each person remain in his place.” Each individual is meant to rest in their own place. This commandment trains the soul to settle and become established.

This portion carries a powerful message: there is only one truly safe place in the world. There is no place more secure for a person than the Holy One blessed be He, who is called “the Place of the world.” When a person is rooted in that place, they can give thanks for suffering just as they give thanks for redemption. They can feel secure even in the wilderness and understand that bitterness itself is part of sweetness.