Why Did the Israelites Hesitate to Take Egypt’s Wealth?

In last week’s Torah portion, we read about Moshe’s request that the people of Israel ask their Egyptian neighbors for silver and gold vessels. This request is emphasized with the language of supplication: “Speak, please, in the ears of the people” (Shemot 11:2). Rashi, citing the Sages, notes: “‘Please’ is nothing but a language of request.” God Himself, as it were, asks Israel to take the vessels — so that Avraham would not say: “‘They will enslave them and afflict them’ — that promise You fulfilled; but ‘afterward they will leave with great wealth’ — that promise You did not fulfill.”

By contrast, in our Torah portion, when the Israelites take the spoils of Egypt on the shore of the Sea after the Egyptians drown, they seize the wealth enthusiastically. No one needs to urge them. On the contrary, when it is time to move on, the verse says: “Moshe caused Israel to journey from the Sea of Reeds” — almost as if he had to pull them away against their will.

Why the difference? Why was there reluctance earlier, and such eagerness later?

Borrowing vs. Conquest

On a simple level, the situations are not the same. In Egypt, the Israelites are described as asking for the vessels — something that might appear, on the surface, like deception. Here, at the Sea, they are taking the spoils of a defeated enemy.

(The reason for this earlier “ruse” is explained by the Derashot HaRan and others: it was meant to entice the Egyptians to pursue Israel to the Sea of Reeds. Other explanations are also offered.)

Yet from the words of the Sages it is clear that the Israelites themselves understood that the property was being taken permanently. It is reasonable to assume they felt fully entitled to it after generations of brutal enslavement and suffering. Indeed, the Talmud (Sanhedrin 91a) relates that in the time of Alexander the Great, the Egyptians filed a claim in his international court demanding the return of that wealth. The Jewish representative responded that before making such a claim, Egypt must first pay wages for the labor of six hundred thousand slaves over all the years of bondage. The claim was accepted, and Israel prevailed.

The wealth taken from Egypt can therefore be seen as payment, or at least a down payment, for centuries of forced labor.

And yet, despite this moral and legal justification, there was hesitation in Egypt, and enthusiasm only at the Sea.

Reparations Money

Rabbi Zalman Sorotzkin offers a striking insight into why God needed to urge the Israelites to take the vessels in Egypt.

After the establishment of the State of Israel, when the German government decided to pay reparations to Holocaust survivors and refugees, a fierce debate erupted over whether such money should be accepted at all. These funds were known as reparations.

Many felt that this was an attempt to ease a guilty conscience, to purchase atonement for the murder of millions through money. Could blood be cleansed with payments?

State leaders were eager for the funds. Much of the money was directed to Israel’s struggling treasury and played a significant role in stabilizing the young state during years of austerity and mass immigration. At the same time, fierce opposition arose. Menachem Begin, as leader of the Herut movement, stood at the forefront of protests against accepting the reparations.

On a personal level as well, opinions were deeply divided, and both sides were understandable.
On the one hand: How can one accept money from the murderers of one’s family? “Blood cannot be atoned for by money.” Should such payments allow them peace of mind? While on the other: Survivors endured not only unimaginable suffering, but also devastating financial loss. Homes, property, livelihoods, education, and the chance to build a future were all stolen. Compensation for those tangible losses, at least, seemed justified, and could help survivors rebuild their lives.

We are not here to take a position on this painful and complex issue, but through this lens, we can better understand the Israelites’ hesitation to accept compensation from Egypt. The injustice done to them went far beyond economics.

Vengeance Belongs to the Sea

For this reason, God requests that Israel nevertheless take the Egyptian vessels. The reckoning itself, however, He leaves to the Sea of Reeds. There, each Egyptian receives exact justice, measure for measure, before the eyes of Israel.

Once full retribution has taken place, and the Egyptians have drowned and the wrong has been avenged, there is no longer any moral hesitation. Taking the spoils now poses no problem: most of the perpetrators are gone, and the wealth is taken as the result of conquest, not as a “gift” or goodwill gesture from Egypt.

A Point for Reflection

This discussion raises a broader and sobering thought. In the long, suffering-filled history of the Jewish people, there is virtually no precedent for a nation that oppressed and enslaved us later choosing to pay compensation. Whether Germany’s reparations were motivated by guilt, by a desire to cleanse a national stain, or by recognition of economic theft and enslavement, the phenomenon itself is unique.

We are not engaging here in historical analysis of German motives. What is striking is the matter from a perspective of faith. One might wonder whether it is precisely in the case of Germany — identified by many with Amalek, destined for obliteration at the end of days, that compensation was allowed beforehand. For other nations, perhaps the reckoning and repair have yet to come.

That correction will yet arrive. We await its revelation, as part of the profound unveiling of history — seen clearly, at last, in retrospect.

This article is adapted from the teachings of Rabbi Menachem Jacobson, Head of Yeshivat “Me’or Yitzchak”.